Karen Kingsley at Lunchtime Live !

Karen Kingsley, Portsmouth Cathedral, Nov 14

Portsmouth and its surrounding area are blessed with a number of fine musicians contributing to its active music community. They come from different backgrounds, from far and wide, only having their excellence and ongoing contributions in common. Few are busier or more versatile than Karen Kingsley who performs as accompanist to choirs, singers and other instrumentalists, as half of the Mornington Duo but chiefly herself, as well as teaching.

One knows who is playing at Lunchtime Live events but not what. Out of the lucky bag today came pieces by seven contemporary composers from New Music Brighton, four of who were in attendance. 

John Petley's Toccata was immediately busy crossing Bach with something like Scott Joplin and the Fugue that went with it, a beat or two slower, would not be flattered by comparison with those great ones by Shostakovich, remaining not quite resolved.

David Hoyle's Clouds breaking on Elizabeth Street, NY 10012 had a similar hint of edginess, as if hoping to achieve tranquility but not being able to before Johnson and Johnson (or Blues in E) by Simon Hopkins mixed Scottish baroque with jazz, in a strange meeting of rhythms and inflection.

We don't live in such confident times as Haydn did and a theme was emerging of unsettled feelings and the time, often literally, being out of joint. Karen was putting in a sensational performance in meeting such a variety of technical challenges so convincingly.

A Short Story by Gavin Stevens was an eponymously programmatic set of five miniatures in which the dash of The Chase ultimately led to the lush, briefly expansive Love Theme and the celebrations of Fanfare for a Happy Ending offering plenty left to our imaginings.

We were due something quieter and while The Calm Lake by Barry Mills provided that, it was still eerily evocative rather than restful but with its own anxious beauty. Three Jazz Pieces by Lluis Nadal took as their starting points Bartok, in Bluebeard, an Indonesian palace and a jazzman in Kraton Teremasa and 'gentle falling rain' in Rincik, in which we were caught in the onrush of a squall. We might, though, have been misdirected by the title of Peter Copley's Ballade if expecting something romantic or sentimental. It wasn't that, it was emphatic from the first chord and demonic and possessed in the most highly-charged Romantic way as the fff climax to an extraordinary and generous menu of very recent music from Brighton. Music is in a very healthy creative condition there on this evidence.

While all the composers are worthy of individual, as well as collective, further investigation it had to be Karen that deserved top honours in delivering such a sustained, absorbing and quite intense performance. 

It gives local star turn, Angelina Kopyrina, something to aim at next week.