Manchester Camerata at Victoria Baths

Manchester Camerata at Victoria Baths – music from the pool!

Back in late we were at Victoria Baths to see the Helios exhibition, you can see the post with pictures from that event at this link.

I mentioned in that post about the terrific work that has been done to restore and maintain this fine old building after many years of neglect.

I would say it’s well worth checking out.

It’s pretty unique

The Victoria Baths website describes the baths as being widely recognised as Britain’s finest historic municipal swimming pool. The following in italics is a straight copy and paste from their site:

From the iconic green tiles and beautful stained glass, to the vaulted ceilings and other period features you won’t find anywhere else, don’t miss this unique venue for your next event. Victoria Baths has a variety of spaces available for hire for special occasions, arts & community events and commercial use.

Manchester Camerata at Victoria Baths

Sometimes you stumble into places that mean so much more than just their mark on the map. They are the sort of places where there’s a real sense of history in the air.

There are three that always come back to me: Glencoe, The Colosseum, and Monza. Different countries and with different histories, but each with the same sort of feeling.

I’ve ridden through Glencoe more times than I can count, on four wheels and two. Every time it feels like the landscape is special and feels like its alive to what has happened there in the past.

The Colosseum has that same thing. It’s something you feel when you wander around, I can’t really explain it but it’s instantly recognisable.

A few years ago, travelling alone, I spent a few days in Baveno, on the edge of Lake Maggiore.

On the second day I was there I pointed the bike south towards the Autodromo Nazionale Monza — sometimes referred to as the Cathedral of Speed. It was built back in the 1920s and has an incredible history and place in motorsport.

The circuit was almost empty when I arrived. I wandered around for a while, then climbed a fence and sat in the deserted grandstand on the start/finish straight, looking down towards the Variante del Rettifilo.

It was a place I had wanted to visit for a long time. For a few minutes I just sat there quietly. There were no raceday engines or crowds, but I let myself imagine the smells and the sounds of raceday.

That’s the feeling I mean. That sense of history you don’t hear or see, but somehow still feel and it’s that thing that gives you lasting memories.

The same but different

I’m not putting Victoria Baths on the same level as Glencoe, the Colosseum or Monza — but there is something about the place.

Maybe it’s because there’s an earlier version of me that has a connection there. I swam there in the late 1960s.

Maybe it’s the stillness and the echoes in the air or the feel of the old tiles, who knows? And as unlikely as it might sound, it turned out to be a strangely ideal setting for Manchester Camerata.

The small ensemble set up in the old pool, the instruments and musicians sat where swimmers once dived down to touch the bottom of the deep end.

They worked through a mix of Beethoven and played through an interesting medley of pieces, some with a modern interpretation

I wasn’t really quite sure what to expect – but sitting in an empty swimming pool that I had swam in as boy and listening to a decent small orchestra play in such a unique environment was a terrific and enjoyable experience.

Who would have thought that almost 60 years later my own history would be added to in this way.