AN intriguing late night gathering at Salisbury’s trendy bar The Cosy Club saw the usual festival concert-goers prodded to move out of their comfort zone – literally in some cases, as it was so crowded a variety of seats had to be pressed into use.

Some had already attended the Schubertiade earlier in the evening featuring the most loved of his Lieder and this was a great way to round off the evening.

A cast of four accomplished musician/actors played a variety of roles and instruments over the course of the evening (although Jonathan Ainscough, playing Schubert got to stay as the composer for the whole thing).

The premise – Schubert and a group of his friends enjoying an after party after a concert in 1820.

They discussed art, love, poetry and of course, music, with philosophy, death and censorship thrown in. Along the way the audience was invited to play some games, including one where five random words were given, then teams had to come up with a limerick that featured all of them – some fantastic verses resulted, and the ‘winning’ one was instantly set to music.

Inevitably, the tone became darker as the final event, a raid by the police and the arrest of the poet Senn, played out with the rest of the cast running off after them down the street. Perhaps, as the characters mentioned, hedonism and to live in the present, is to run from the inevitable (death). We are certainly encouraged to be mindful and present a lot these days. Schubert himself died young, aged 31 and is now known to have contracted syphilis, which was often treated at that time with mercury, itself a poison. This could perhaps account for the ‘two sides’ of Schubert which we saw throughout the piece, but the sense that he could never really love, only idolise unobtainable or unreal loves, gave much to think about in the context of the works he leaves behind.

Sarah Collins