ARTS DIARY
Concert in Harrogate: Acclaimed pianist Clare Hammond will help celebrate the life and works of the remarkable, yet little known, French composer Hélène de Montgeroult when she performs at the Harrogate International Sunday Series tomorrow. In a wide-ranging recital of Romantic music, Hammond will perform works by Ravel and Coleridge-Taylor alongside work by Montgeroult, hailed as “the missing link between Mozart and Chopin”. Montgeroult, a contemporary of Mozart, was an aristocrat who got caught up in the French Revolution. Legend has it she saved herself by sitting at a piano and improvising impressive variations on La Marseillaise. Following her death in 1836 she was all but forgotten until being rediscovered in recent years. At the Old Swan Hotel tomorrow, 11am.
Family mystery solved: A North Yorkshire woman has solved a family mystery after spotting a charm in a new exhibition, Displayful, at Scarborough Art Gallery featuring artwork by five artists inspired by items in the collection. Artist Liberty Hodes created a piece inspired by a Tommy Touchwood figure – a tiny good luck charm given to soldiers in the First World War by their loved ones. When Wendy Simms, who lives in Hutton-Le-Hole, saw a photo of the figure, it solved a mystery for her. “I’ve had one of these charms for years and never knew what it was but it now completes what I know of my great uncle George Henry Kaye’s life,” she says. “He died in action in Flanders in 1916. As far as I know, he was the only member of the family who fought in the First World War, so the Tommy Touchwood must be his.”
Multi-sensory room: A charity which empowers people living with sight loss and a range of disabilities has opened a dedicated multi-sensory room with funding from LNER’s Customer and Community Investment Fund. Henshaws Arts and Crafts Centre provides a range of services and activities for people from across North Yorkshire, putting creativity and independence at its heart. More than 175 Art Makers attend the centre in Knaresborough each week to learn skills ranging from woodwork, art, and IT to health and fitness.