Sarah Beth Briggs (piano)Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham | 14 December 2025 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review by William Ruff.

Photo credit: Royal Centre

Sarah Beth Briggs (piano)

Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham | 14 December 2025

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐  Review by William Ruff.

“A seasonal programme devised, presented and played with musical intelligence.”

Sarah Beth Briggs has become something of a favourite with Nottingham audiences.  This was her fourth visit to the Sunday Morning Piano Series and once again she chose a varied programme, presenting each piece in ways which both illuminated the music and created just the right sort of rapport with an audience that really does appreciate artists who can manage friendly chat as well as fine playing.

It has become traditional for the last recital of the year to feature some seasonal music.  Sarah’s programme was no exception, although this time the links were more subtle than usual.  She started with one of Domenico Scarlatti’s 550 keyboard sonatas, the one in C major, K.513.  It’s a good opener in the run-up to Christmas as it evokes shepherds watching over their flocks.  Its opening bars are charmingly pastoral in atmosphere and are followed by a section which invites us to imagine shepherds playing a Neapolitan carol on flutes and and bagpipes – before the whole thing comes to a rapid conclusion in a sort of musical whirlwind.

Next came four short pieces by Mendelssohn, selected from his Pieces for Children, a Christmas present written for young members of his wife’s family.  Sarah captured the mood of youthful innocence perfectly, moving from the uncomplicated joy and playful energy of No. 1 to the gentle, lyrical ‘song without words’ that is No.2.  No. 5 was a brilliant, energetic showpiece, whilst the breathless excitement of No.6 provided an exhilarating conclusion to the set.

Sarah admitted that Debussy’s Suite Bergamasque has little to do with the festive season, apart from the fact that it makes a rather lovely Christmas gift.  She captured the suite’s dual character from the outset: its combination of the old and the new, its nod to the 18th century and those hushed, hazy moments that are pure 20th century Debussy.  The following Minuet was a courtly dance made wistful, mysterious and modern.  The concluding Passepied became a whirl of energy and grace, ending with dancers apparently vanishing into the night.  All this was delightfully characterised in Sarah’s performance, but it’s the third movement, the famous ‘Clair de lune’, that  makes this suite such a good Christmas gift from pianist to audience. Sarah made it a study in restraint and resonance, making the spaces between the notes as eloquent as the notes themselves, her playing conjuring up the sensation of being bathed in moonlight: hushed, contemplative and deeply poetic.

There followed two months from Tchaikovsky’s The Seasons: November’s vivid depiction of a troika, a sleigh drawn by three horses across Russia’s vast snowy plains -  and December’s celebration of Christmas, accompanied by a graceful, elegant waltz taking place in an elegant St Petersburg salon.  Once again Sarah brought the music to life with sharply drawn detail.

Also on this festive menu: Mendelssohn’s Variations Sérieuses a piece which demands not only dazzling technical mastery but also deep musical intelligence (both of which Sarah displayed in abundance).  Its finale is a fiery tarantella: cascades of notes in which the musical ideas are whisked up into a virtuosic tornado.  Sarah’s control over the keyboard pyrotechnics was extraordinary to behold – despite a minor iPad malfunction.

The audience’s enthusiasm for what they had heard was rewarded with an encore: an entirely apt set of variations on the Christmas favourite Let It Snow.

Sarah Beth Briggs playing in the Sunday Morning Piano Series at Nottingham’s Royal Concert Hall.