THE CAMBRIDGE CONCERT HOUSE CAMPAIGN
The brilliant glamour boy of British music has had enough. Simon Rattle has tossed his grey curls at the London Philharmonic and announced a return to Germany where he will take up his baton in a place that understands him. Sir Simon dazzled the cultural scene when he steered the glittering new concert hall for the Birmingham Philharmonic into existence. After a hugely popular stint in Berlin – flags of welcome waved on his arrival there – he came home. As well as conduct its major orchestra,he wanted to create a great Concert hall for London. All designed and ready to roll it was announced in 2019 and most concert- goers agreed it was high time London had a concert place worthy of a capital. But to put it brutally briefly, Brexit has put the kibosh on that and suddenly our golden – silver- star is gone, a loss the Guardian compared to the snaffling of Gareth Bale by Madrid.
Worse, critics worry that this is a blow for culture in our country. Players are in a parlous state. New Brexit regulations leave them in a performance limbo. We have negotiated a musical gilded cage for them, hard to leave and expensive to maintain. Details like instrument insurance, permits to travel and freedom to change locations are all in peril. We have the native talent in spades – but where can it go? Sir Simon has said, as parting shot, Britain doesn’t care about classical music. So what can we do?
If London has turned its back on a Concert Hall, can we not have it in Cambridge?
With more concert goers per capita here in East Anglia, than anywhere else, a fast train service to London and links to top class performers, Cambridge has long been a favourite for musicians keen to kick back and relax after a world tour – and in my experience, conscious that audiences here are discriminating, ambitious and avant-garde. They also like the age range from students to older people .There are plenty of small venues for performances - but no large one.
Could Cambridge with its connections internationally, contrive to steal a march on London and get us a very long overdue concert and opera house? It’s not as if we haven’t suffered enough. The jobsworth penny pincher who interfered with the Corn Exchange renovation back in the day, and reduced it from a potentially glorious space to a spruced up barn, has a lot to answer for. Meanwhile even villages and small towns have beautiful concert halls only a few miles down the motorway. Great, Saffron Walden and Bury St. Edmunds have built lovely halls for classical music, but their achievements puts Cambridge to further shame.
The University, the tech companies, the creditably successful pharmaceutical industry (well done AstraZeneca) are all sponsorial candidates.
As Sir Simon Rattle said, a concert hall could be as transformative as Tate Britain. It would herald a new even more optimistic era for Cambridge even as London loses its City strength, 10,000 financial jobs have already gone. Most of all ,it would be a home for the greatest music in the world performed by its most talented musicians (this country can sure turn ‘em out) before one of the world’s most appreciative audiences.
The Cambridge Critique begins its Campaign right here- in plague year 2021. It could be a kind of compensation, salvation triumph for a city and a nation that, contrary to Sir Simon’s view, does love classical music, adores opera and would love to see it in a building that does it all justice.
