Exposition 2018 Photo Club Cluny

Setting-up the Expo 2018

Last year, while walking across Cluny's Saturday market, we noticed a poster near the Salle Malgouverne in the town centre announcing a picture exhibition of Photo Club Cluny. And since both of us are interested in photography we decided to walk in and see what the club had to offer.

Making the mats

The pictures on display were varied and interesting, we bumped into someone there whom we knew from another occasion, and we were invited to see what it was all about during the next biweekly meeting. When we arrived there a couple of weeks later, we found more people like us who had found the club through this exhibition.

In the concert hall

We received a short introduction in the activities the club had on offer: dedicated outings to cover a specific event, or a specific seasonal phenomena (autumn/mushrooms, Carnaval Vénitien in Annecy, playing with light ant lighting, a deer park, etc.), taking part in competitions of photo clubs in the department, access to a whole host of photography magazines, etc. It sounded interesting enough to give it a try for one year.

In the country

And soon the time has come: our club organises its yearly exhibition. We are now a group of 12, whilst there were 5 members when we joined. Not exactly a massive number, but nevertheless… Each member has to fill 3 exposition panels, covering 3 different subjects of max 6 pictures per subject.

Romanesque heritage

I am very curious to see what the rest of the group comes up with: my subjects are "In the concert hall", "In the country" and "Romanesque heritage". In this blog some of my chosen pictures.

And even the local newspaper had item on it! 

Graffiti

Gislebertus - Autun

I cannot name many places where a master builder, sculptor or stone mason, working around the year 1000 in one of the many Romanesque churches in this part of France has left his name or picture behind in one of his works.

Seguin - Ameugny

I can name only three: Gislebertus, whose name is displayed on the tympanum of the cathedral in Autun; the stone mason Seguin from Malay, whose name can be found on the tympanum of the church in Amegny and sculptor Gerlanus, who has an arch named after him in the abbey church St-Philibert in Tournus.

Gerlanus - Tournus

This arch is located in the St-Michael's chapel built above the narthex of the church. And not only did he carve his name in a stone; he also produced a rather labour-intensive selfie which can be found in the same chapel.

Gerlanus - Tournus

I must confess however, that I went back into that chapel three or four times because I knew that there was a stone with Gerlanus' name carved in it, but I had never been able to find that stone. But, as the saying goes, slow and steady wins the race.

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Two down, three to go

Last weekend the first two concerts in the series "Guitares en Cormatinois" took place in the small Romanesque church of Chazelle.
The program of the first concert was entitled "Brazil Brazil…" and it was performed by singer Aurélie and guitar player Verioca.

Aurélia & Verioca

As the name of the program suggested the repertoire consisted of Brazilian music or of songs based on Brazilian rhythms: hence lots of sambas and bossa novas. Even though I am personally not so keen on this sort of dance music both French ladies provided a very pleasant evening. And this is what our local fake-press had to say about the concert.

Duo Iberia

The theme of the second concert was "Viva España" featuring Duo Iberia, consisiting of the French guitarist Romuald Ballet-Baz and the Georgian singer Mariam Gueguetchkori. The chosen repertoire consisted of pieces by amongst others Purcell, Schubert, Albeniz, Granados and de Falla. It was an excellent concert; voice and guitar matched each other very well and the few pieces for solo guitar were performed impeccably. In one word, this evening was possibly going to be one of the highlights of the series.

The "real"star of the evening

The one who stole everybody's heart however, was not one of the performers, but the three and a half year's old son of the musicians. He sat at the first row, attentively listening to his parents, applauding as enthusiastically as the rest of the audience at the end of each piece. When he was invited by his mother to join them on stage, and he actually managed to sing along with the music they played he was warmly applauded by everyone. As an encore the couple played the famous aria "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle" from Bizet's Carmen, which was greeted with recognition and enthusiasm by the audience. And this is what our local fake-press had to say about the concert.

"Trio" Iberia

Tomorrow will see the performance of the Emmanuel Rossfelder Guitar Quartet. I am very curious to see whether our group of volunteers will have to listen to the concert from outside the church sitting in the cemetery, or whether we will be given places inside the church (e.g. behind the altar)….

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Guitares en Cormatinois 2017

As was to be expected, 2017 will see another edition of the festival "Guitares en Cormatinois". This year there are quite a few new faces, however, most of them have earned there spurs elsewhere, and not only on a national level.
Below a short overview, where possible with an indication of what can be expected.
All concerts take place in Chazelle's church, and the entrance fee is € 20 per person per concert. Reservations can be made by telephone (03 85 50 19 06 or 06 88 40 91 73) or we can arrange a reservation for you. Just e-mail (cormatin71@gmail.com) or phone us (03 85 50 19 55).

The church of Chazelle

Saturday 8 July, 20h00
Aurélie & Verioca (vocals, guitar) with a program based on mainly Brazilian music.

Sunday 9 July, 17h30
Due Iberia (vocals, guitar) with a program of predominantly Spanish classical music. Their repertoire however covers a long time span with also non-Spanish composers, ranging from Purcell to Piazzola.

Rossfelder Guitar Quartet

Sunday 16 July, 17h30
Rossfelder Guitar Quartet (4 classical guitar players). Rossfelder is a well-known guest on our festival, and a crowd puller. They have a varied repertoire of compositions for classical guitar. Those who want to be sure of a seat better make a reservation.

Saturday 22 July, 20h00
Vassilena Serafimova & Stela Dinkova (marimba, guitar). Lat year we had the privilege to hear Serafimova in Cluny accompanied by a piano player. Even if she plays in Chazelle only half as good as she did in Cluny, this promises to be a very interesting concert.

Serafimova in Cluny 2016

Sunday 23 July, 17h30
Trio Tzigani (3 musicians, violin, double bass, guitar and cimbalon) with, as the name suggests music with a gipsy background. However, they do not play Hot Club de France-style music; their music is rooted in the Balkans, albeit with quite some Hungarian music as well.

The concert series 2017

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Classics Illustrated

American edition

When speaking to English people about comic strips, I often smell an air of disdain on this subject. I can't really blame them; if comic strips were only associated with Donald Duck, Superman, Spiderman and the like I would not be very impressed with the idea either. However, on the continent, and certainly in countries like the Netherlands, Belgium and France nowadays comic strips are widely appreciated, by children, grown-ups and intellectuals alike. When I was a kid however, times were slightly different. I sometimes borrowed a comic strip book (like Lucky Luke, "the man who shoots faster than his shadow") from my little friends, and my parents frowned upon it. Even Donald Duck was seen as a danger for my sensitive children's soul…. My parents found a solution, and made me a member of the public library. The problem with the books there was simple: the library decided which books were appropriate for your age group, and I was condemned to the equivalent of the Ladybird books, whilst knowing there were good, thrilling books available about e.g. Cowboys and Indians. Fortunately I had friends whose parents were not as narrow-minded (or as observant) as my parents were, and I managed to borrow decent books for young boys, like the Winnetou and Old Shatterhand series (Westerns) by the German writer Karl May or the translated "Famous Five" books by Enid Blyton. Anyway, that is how I discovered Classics Illustrated.

Dutcch edition

Of course in those days I was unaware of the fact that this was originally an American series with translated books from world literature in small size comic strip form. They were simply great books with juicy stories. My memory fails me, but somehow titles like "Robinson Crusoe" and "Moby Dick" spring to mind. It definitely was my first encounter with great books of great writers, albeit in condensed comic strip format. In later life I caught up reading the originals.
A few weeks ago I entered, unsuspectedly, the Tabac in Cormatin to buy a newspaper, when I noticed on the shelf a comic strip edition of "Around the world in 80 days", in French, published by Le Monde.

French edition

Since I like comic strips as well as Jules Verne, I bought the book and finished it in no time. It appeared, that Le Monde has a series in the making not dissimilar to Classics Illustrated. The 2nd book was "Treasure Island", the 3rd "The hunchback of Notre Dame". At the back there was an overview of the volumes to be published, with titles not dissimilar to those published in my youth. However, these books are printed on proper paper, in colour, and in French standard Comic Book size. If you want to read a book in French, and you have a choice between a Comic Strip in two volumes of 48 pages each (Like "The wretched"), or the original version of over 1200 pages, which is using the passé simple all the time, the choice is not so difficult. The only dilemma I have is this: am I going for the full series of 29 volumes at € 9.00 per volume, or am I going to skip the titles I am not terribly keen on (like "Jungle Book" or "A Christmas carol")? As a habitual collector, which I certainly am, skipping volumes does not sound very professional….

The first three volumes of Le Monde's series

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Orient-Occident with Jordi Savall - Cluny

Cellier (ground floor) and Farinier (first floor) - Cluny

When we ordered tickets for the concert series "Les Grandes Heures de Cluny" there was a bit of confusion. According to the booklet with the program there were seven concerts; a season ticket for six concerts was € 125 for the best seats at € 25 pp, hence six concerts for the price of five. We either had to skip one concert, or pay extra (full price) for one more concert. We chose for the first option and decided to skip Mozart's Requiem. Strangely enough, when we ordered the season tickets via internet we were not given a choice of which six concerts we would like to attend.

The set of instruments - Farinier

We ordered the tickets anyway, deciding to clarify matters later. When we phoned the organisation they told us that there was a mistake in the program. One of the concerts was € 35, and not € 25 as all other concerts. On top of that, that particular concert was not part of the season ticket, hence we had to pay separately an extra € 35 for that concert. At the end of the day we had tickets for all six concerts of the series, including Mozart, as well as for the concert of Jordi Savall that was part of the series, but not quite.

Anouncement

When we arrived at the Farinier within the abbey grounds in Cluny the concert was completely sold out, which did not really surprise us. What however surprised us was the fact that the guy who was supposed to play the oud (Arab lute) played the qanûn (a sort of Arab harp) all evening. The hand-out program made it clear: the originally announced musicians had been replaced by the Turkish qanûn player Hakan Güngör and the Greek percussionist Dimitri Psonis. Savall played the rabâb (a kind of fiddle) and lire d'archet (a kind of viola da gamba).

The concert

The program consisted of a mixture of Eastern and Western (early) music, from amongst others North-Africa, Byzantium, Armenia, France, Italy, etc. It was fascinating to hear how the music of the various regions during or around the middle Ages had cross-fertilised and influenced each other. Apart from that it was simply very interesting and beautiful music, played by three virtuoso instrumentalists. It does not happen that often that a renowned musician like Jordi Savall gives a reasonably priced concert at spitting distance from our doorstep.

2016

Reason the more, as I said before, to keep a good eye on the future concerts in the series "Les Grandes Heures de Cluny"!

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The inventor of photography – part 2 and last

Because they are accessible free of charge we decided, on a day more suitable for a museum visit than for a day lazing in the sun, to visit the two museums in Chalon-sur-Saône.

Statue of Nicéphore Niépce - Chalon-sur-Saône

We planned to see the Musée Vivant Denon first, and to do the Musée Nicéphore Niépce, like the one in Saint-Loup-de-Varennes (see the previous blog) dedicated to the inventor of photography, afterwards.

Musée Niépce : the permant collection

We had seen both museums before; Denon for the first time in 2013, Niépce in 2011. Both had undergone some changes, and for the better.
Denon, a local museum with an archaeology and a fine arts department, had a small but interesting temporary exhibition of treasures from the Near- and Middle-East, and had extended its permanent collection with antique furniture from Senncey-le-Grand.

Musée Niépce : space for temporary exhibitions

Niépce had also been renovated or re-organised in the past years. It boasts a far more interesting collection about Niépce (and Daguerre) than Saint-Loup, including a display of antique cameras and objectives, and has ample space for temporary photo exhibitions. When we visited, there were two exhibitions running simultaneously: one with black-and-white pictures of Léon Herschtritt (La fin d'une monde) and one slightly less interesting (to my taste) of contemporary photographs in colour (L'oeil de l'expert).

Musée Niépce : space for temporary exhibitions

Two museums with the same theme: that cries out for a comparison.

The Maison de Nicéphore Niépce in Saint-Loup-de-Varennes has, as the place where the first photograph was taken, mainly historical value. It pays some attention to other inventions of Niépce, but the collection (mainly replica of inventions and re-arranged rooms) is not very impressive. The 6 € entrance fee could be better used drinking something on a sunny terrace elsewhere, to my humble opinion. I will leave the welcome and the opening times out of the equation to give the museum at least some credit. On a scale of 1 to 10: a meagre 4.

The most interesting display in Saint-Loup-de-Varennes

The Musée Nicéphore Niépce in Chalon-sur-Saône has a reasonable collection, and on top of that often interesting temporary exhibitions. Besides there is no entrance fee, and once one has seen the museum there are plenty of other things to see within walking distance (cathedral Saint-Vincent, Musée Vivant Denon, mediaeval houses, markets), and the old town boasts a number of terraces which invite one to sit down and watch the world go by. On a scale of 1 to 10: a good 8.

Musée Niépce : part of the permanent collection

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Les Grandes Heures de Cluny

In 2014 and 2015 we attended for the first time a few concerts in the series "Les Grandes Heures de Cluny", and we were very content with what we saw and heard. That was the reason we decided to subscribe to all concerts this year.

2015 Farinier : Edgar Moreau

"Les Grandes Heures de Cluny" is a series of classical concerts that takes place in July/August, which in itself is part of an even bigger event, the "Festival Musical des Grands Crus de Bourgogne".
In short: The concerts are given at various locations in Cluny. Last year the Cloister of the abbey was used for the bigger events (like the Chamber Orchestra of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra), while the Farinier of the abbey was hosting the more intimate concerts. After each concert there is a wine tasting on offer (at a price though) offered by various prestigious caves from the area around Cluny, such as Viré, Igé, etc.

2016 Transept : Ensemble vocal Beatus

This year there were even more venues. The program started off with a (free) presentation of the series with musical accompaniment of pianist Thomas Enhco and marimba player Vassilena Serafimova in the Cloître.
The first concert: : "Lux Lucis – Chants Byzantins & Grégoriens", by the Ensemble vocal Beatus in the Transept. An excellent concert of religious music by five singers in a location that was built for the occasion.

2016  Cloître : Orchestre Lutetia

Concert no. 2: A Beethoven concert by the Orchestre Lutetia conducted by Alejandro Sandler with pianist Frank Braley in the Cloître. the ouverture Coriolan, the fourth piano concerto and the seventh symphony.
The third concert:Chamber music of Haydn, Schumann and Dvorak by the Quatuor Ludwig with pianist Dana Ciocarlie in the Farinier.
Concert no. 4: "La Trompette dans tous ses Eclats", a varied but mainly Baroque program featuring six excellent trumpet players (alone, with two, three and even six players) accompanied by the Orchestre Lutetia conducted by Alejandro Sandler in the Cloître.

2016 Cloître : Simon Fournier & Nicolas André

Concert no. 5: Mozart's Requiem by the Choeur & Orchestre de l'Ain conducted by Eric Reynaud in the Eglise Saint-Marcel (again an excellent choice for this type of music).
The sixth and last concert: Music of Grieg, Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich by the Orchestre de Chambre de Minsk conducted by Evgeny Bushkov with pianist Kyril Keduk and trumpet player Guy Touvron in the Eglise Saint-Marcel.

2016 Eglise Saint-Marcel: Orchestre & Choeur de l'Ain

And than there is still a seventh concert, even though it is outside the series: Jordi Savall with the Spanish percussionist Pedro Estevan and the Moroccan oud player Driss El Maloumi with a program called "Orient Occident". This very last concert will most likely be covered by a separate blog.
Summarizing I can say that, in hind sight, I regret that we did not take much notice of this particular series earlier. Each and every concert in the 2016 series was of excellent quality, the programming was varied and the venues for the concerts were chosen very carefully. Les Grandes Heures will certainly be on our program for the 2017 version!

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Killing two birds with one stone

Given the enormous amount of artisans around here who occupy themselves with all sorts of handicrafts, the artists have to go through some length to be able to sell their products.

Exposition Belles de Mai - Berzé-la-Ville

They are united in a number of associations, some rigid, some a bit more flexible, which regularly organize exhibitions of their work. One of these associations is the "Belles de Mai" (in winter they operate as "Mères Noël"), that organizes at the beginning of summer and towards Christmas an exhibition in a spot that is also of interest on different grounds.

Gypum kilns - Berzé-la-Ville

This year they had chosen the old gypsum kilns in Berzé-la-Ville. We knew the kilns from a previous visit in August 2012, when we were invited there by a group (Amis de Vieux Berzé) who occupied themselves with the restauration of the kilns. Of course this was reason enough for a revisit. http://amisvieuxberze71.org/
This exposition gave us a chance to see what the restorers had achieved, and what the artisan hat makers, potters, jewellers, etc. had wrought.

Exposition - Berzé-la-Ville

The kilns had undergone a metamorphosis over the last three and a half years and formed a perfect setting for the exhibited jewellery, ceramics, clothing, etc. The weather, which is an important factor for the success of these events did not spoil the fun. When we arrived around lunchtime (a perfect time to avoid the crowds) all the ladies were enjoying the warmth and the sunshine chatting and sipping their glasses of wine. The whole scene gave me a strange déja vu feeling, seeing all these ladies dressed in white.

Not a Chinese funeral!

That is however something very personal. It very strongly reminded me of the gatherings around Chinese funerals, where a certain generation of mourners is dressed in white, and where after a wake of 3, 5 or 7 days the mourners are behaving as a group of family or friends during a happier occasion than a funeral. Anyway, the "Belles de Mai" had every reason to be really happy and gay!

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Swan Lake

Recently my eye was caught by an announcement in our local paper of the ballet "Swan Lake" performed by dancers and orchestra of the National Opera of Russia in the Parc des Expositions of Chalon-sur-Saône.

Poster (internet)

That is a ballet we know quite well, which we have seen a number of times in the past at various locations, and which we certainly would not mind to see again. At the bottom of the article there was a phone number given: so what would stop us? The phone number appeared to belong to the local Tourist Office, where they could only tell us that the tickets were most likely for sale at the Supermarkets. At the "Ballet" section of your local Coop? We did not think so, and decided to search the internet.

Parc des Expositions - Chalon-sur-Saône

It turned out to be possible to buy on-line tickets which we could print out ourselves, so within no time we were geared up for an old fashioned outing. However, the outing was not as old fashioned (plush chairs, a foyer) as we thought it would be. The Parc des Expositions appeared to be a big hall, specially built for fairs and the like (in hindsight the name could have been a give-away, duh….).

Stange and seats for the orchestra

For this show the hall had been transformed into a theatre, with a stage, places for the orchestra and a big number of uncomfortable seats at ground level in front of the stage and a number of seats, amphitheatre-wise, at the back of the hall. One had either a reasonable view on the stage from far away, or a good view on what was happening on stage hoping that those sitting in front of you were midgets or toddlers. We found out that we had chosen the latter option, however without a no-dwarf no-toddler guarantee…

The seats

Very un-French the show started spot on time (20h05), and that was a novelty for us. Photographing and filming was strictly forbidden, and so were switched on mobiles. They would interfere with the microphones (an argument I had never heard before, however, it worked!). The pictures of the ballet in this blog were nicked from the internet.

Swan Lake (internet)

Despite the venue and the seating arrangement the evening was worth its while. The orchestra played very good, and the dancers (although not Bolshoi class) gave an excellent show. In the end it worked out quite well; with a big classical ballet like this, the draw-back (wringing your neck in all sort of bends to see something) sound much more dramatic than it really was.

Swan Lake (internet)

Certainly in scenes with big quantities of dancers on stage, each spectator could focus on a spot on the stage where he or she had a good view on what was happening. And now we are looking out for the Nutcracker…..

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World Music

When we were still living in the Netherlands we really enjoyed going to concerts which would be classified nowadays as World Music. A number of consecutive years we signed up for a complete season of Indian music, and sometime later also African music, and certainly the guy who organised the Indian concerts had very good taste and was very lucky in engaging the right artists. When the man had to stop, for whatever reason, the Indian concerts became less interesting, but since that more or less coincided with our move to France we did not lay awake about it.

Bourg-le-Comte (A) - La Tuilerie de Chazelle (B)

As said earlier, the available concerts in Burgundy are by far not as varied as those available in the Western part of the Netherlands, where concert halls in Rotterdam, Amsterdam and The Hague offer a wide variety of different concerts. Here the really great names are scheduled for the big towns such as Paris and Marseille, and at not such a high standard in places like Lyon and Dijon. For jazz concerts one has to watch out for the big festivals in Montreux (CH), Juan-les-Pins and Vienne.

Sandip Chatterjee

We were pleasantly surprised when we found a venue that had programmed during a number of years one Indian music concert a year. How good the musicians are is of course a gamble, but in general the musical quality of the concerts around here are of a reasonable if not excellent standard. Besides, nowadays one can easily get an impression of the musical quality of a group via Youtube and the like.

Nihar Metha

In the very near future we will be heading for Le Canoë Renversant in Bourg-le-Comte for a concert of Sandip Chatterjee on santoor en Nihar Metha on table. Bourg-le-Comte is a good one and a half hours drive, so we will not be home in time to watch the late news. However, in order to see and hear a possibly interesting concert one should not begrudge those sort of things, should not one?

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The pictures have been taken from the internet.