The Alehouse Sessions

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Although Charles II would lift the ban, by then tavern music had grown into something of a genre, in which the vagaries of quotidian life rubbed elbows with mythologies in the making. Of course, all baroque music requires a degree of improvisation – whether secular or ceremonial music. This was the popular music of the streets and taverns where artistic freedom was paramount so that musicians would be free to respond and change to whatever audience might be at hand. You won’t be able to bring any bags over 40 x 25 x 25cm into the Queen Elizabeth Hall, so please leave large bags at home.

They also brought great humor to their presentation, interrupting their opening number, for instance, to play out a drunken brawl in slow motion. Dreamed up and curated by Norwegian violinist Bjarte Eike, “The Alehouse Sessions” takes audiences along on a 17th century evening of entertainment, not only with a live classical performance, but also through theatrical storytelling, folk, strings, improvisation, and dance.The chemistry of a group is one of those – the sparks of musical energy that fly when certain artists collide. For access to the Queen Elizabeth Hall auditorium seating rows A to C and wheelchair spaces in the Front Stalls, please enter via the Artists' Entrance in the Queen Elizabeth Hall Slip Road (Level 1). Cut scene, and we move into the “back room” of the pub (which is really a stage at the Battersea Arts Centre), we’re on stage in front of a very enthusiastic, diverse audience who’s joining in singing, laughing and dancing. A smattering of Purcell, dances from Playford’s Dancing Master, shanties, reels and ballads succumb to a nine-piece ensemble drawing on Baroque, jazz and folk styles for a no holds barred hooley of riotous improvisatory give and take…The result is more gastropub than spit-and-sawdust hostelry, but ‘cheers’ all the same! drawing its inspiration from the Shakespearian theatre where there was a direct communication between stage and hall", says Bjarte Eike.

A Changing Places toilet is located on Level 1 Royal Festival Hall next to the JCB Glass Lift, for the exclusive use of disabled people who need personal assistance to use the toilet. That balances of bawdiness and reflections are the group's forte was obvious during their first stateside performance on 11 October 2017 at New York City's SubCulture. We have a great line of music for everyone, with professional lighting, stage and sound all weekend. Purchasing a ticket to this event gives you access to both Purcell’s Playhouse at 9pm and The Alehouse Sessions at 10. This spring (most likely 23 April), BBC4 brings The Alehouse Sessions to screens in a new film directed by Dominic Best, capturing the sound world of rebellious London under Oliver Cromwell’s draconian laws.Watch Bjarte Eike and Barokksolistene perform ‘The Alehouse Sessions’ from the Czech Musica Pura Festival in 2019. Hans Knut Sveen plays anything from harpsichord to harmonium; Frederik Bock plays any kind of continuo – guitar, lute, theorbo and any style up to blue grass; Johannes Lundberg’s roots are in jazz; Milos Valent is one of the greatest Slovak folk string players; Per Buhre is a countertenor and cider-maker extraordinaire; Helge Andreas Norbakken plays all sorts of percussion and drives steam locomotives; Tom Guthrie is a stage director and vocal entrepreneur; Steven Player is our unstoppable pony-tailed dancing Romeo; and I have found a new thrill in jumping out of aeroplanes and teaching yoga. Eike was a beacon of focus throughout, linking his ensemble into a chain of artful exchanges, comic interludes, and audience rapport.

Other morsels, such as “Curtain Tune” (incidental music for Shakespeare's "Timon of Athens") and “Lead Me” (set by Henry Purcell for a production of "Bonduca") are plucked from the Jacobean tree. Then, it’s time for the Alehouse Sessions to begin at 10:30pm, with Eike and his “Alehouse Boys”, also known as Barokksolistene, putting on a wide-ranging performance entirely from memory, and you can expect plenty of humour to be thrown in among the fervent show.Like the “Spanish Set” with which the group encored, during which Eike walked through the crowd with his violin, it was a reminder that listening is an active process.

Along with a variety of classical stringed instruments, their own arrangements delight us in a joyful mix of vocals, percussion, harmonium, guitar, charango and storytelling. Tickets can only be sold through the Southbank Centre and our authorised agents, and can't be resold. When 17th Century England went into lockdown and the Puritans closed playhouses and theatres, musicians and performers sought refuge in backrooms of taverns and alehouses to vent their anarchy. The players all sing, dance, tell stories and jokes, and the result are performances that have an anarchic, organic spirit all their own. YouTube sets this cookie to measure bandwidth, determining whether the user gets the new or old player interface.Commissioned by the BBC and directed by award-winning director Dominic Best (AdLib Productions), the film will be premiered on BBC TV in late April 2023. A smattering of Purcell, dances from Playford’s Dancing Master, shanties, reels and ballads succumb to a nine-piece ensemble drawing on Baroque, jazz and folk styles for a no holds barred hooley. This was immediately followed by a version of Purcell's “Lead Me” that was even more resolutely alive than the album version. Bjarte Eike’s Barokksolistene is an alchemical miracle of an ensemble, a collective of virtuosos whose instinctive, playful communication and delight in one another’s skill amplifies their individual performances, transforming them into pure musical gold. The programme features a lively mix of Handel, Purcell and Rebel plus explorations of a much more adventurous repertoire, including moments of improvisation for which Bjarte and his ensemble have become so renowned.