Birmingham on the cheap

Fancy a trip to Europe's most boring city? The place that makes two thirds of its residents miserable? Here's something to cheer up any trip to Birmingham.

The CBSO are offering 25% off all remaining concerts for the rest of this season. They include Der fliegende Holländer conducted by Andris Nelsons on Saturday 16 March, and the continuation of his Beethoven symphony series. There's also a discount of 25% on all CBSO membership schemes. And with return rail fares from London starting at just £10, it's possible to enjoy a night out in Birmingham for less than the price of a Royal Festival Hall ticket alone.

The offers expire on Sunday 27 January. See the CBSO website for further details.

 

Comments

[Tinkerbelle]

Went to Walkure concert performance in Birmingham last year, a 5 hour train journey. So booked into a very cheap hotel chain nearby for the night, a chain I have used all over the country.

It was really hell that night in Birmingham. Mayhem in the streets. Not boring, but completely wild. But a pub bouncer told me that actually it was quiet!

Returning to my hotel, 2 ladies of the night were negotiating, just outside my room, very loudly and in gruesome detail, with a lad dressed in nothing but shorts. In the early hours there was a severe, loud and very rude altercation between them outside in the corridor.

Wild horses would not drag me to Birmingham again.

[regkarpf]

A tip if you live somewhere where it is more convenient to drive. Park at Birmingham International station and get the train into the centre. Like Tinkerbelle's ladies of the night, it is easy, reliable, cheap and quick.

[ctussaud]

Make sure the end of the concert time allows you to catch the train: I sang in a CBSO concert a few months ago and the LAST train to London left 20 mins after the end. Blow the Olympics; we set a new Personal Best from Symphony Hall to New St Station.

[MikeG]

Well, if there were actually three ladies of the night (plus a queen), maybe they were just rehearsing :-)

Schwarze Augen - richtig, Rote Lippen - richtig, Blonde Haare - richtig. Alles trifft ein, usw...

[Sarah R]

I think that you are all very unfair about Birmingham; it's got a lot going for it and Symphony Hall and indeed the Town Hall are splendid concert venues. New Street Station is close (I nearly said 'a stone's throw from) to both concert halls and the nearby canals and restaurants make visiting the city for a concert a really attractive proposition.

[Sheila]

Yes, but the buy-in for experiencing high culture in Birmingham seems to be heavy: a five-hour train ride in each direction and a hotel room (with or without ladies of the evening), or fretting over making the last train out. It does not make for a relaxing evening.

I understand Bregenz offers similar tactical challenges.

[Rannaldini]

Birmingham - it's not quite the end of the world - but you can see it from there.....

[Ruth]

Five hours in each direction? Where from?

From London at least, it's an easy day trip, with the fastest outward trains during the day taking not much more than an hour and a half, and the rather slower last train back at night (which goes at something like 23:10, every night except Saturday) taking two-and-a-bit.

I've been to Birmingham several times, usually for WNO at the Hippodrome plus a couple of visits to Symphony Hall. On the couple of occasions I've chosen to stay overnight, I've used the clean and fairly comfortable new Travelodge opposite Moor Street station.

It's not pretty, but it is convenient. And besides the excellent acoustics of Symphony Hall, the Hippodrome is highly thought of by WNO singers as being one of the most acoustically generous venues on their tour. Suits me.

I've never been there on a Saturday night, however...

[Brett Sidaway]

As a Birmingham resident, I agree with Sarah R that the city musically has a lot to be proud of. A recent Symphony Hall scheme has meant I have been able to access dozens of concerts at £5 simply because of my postcode, and even without the scheme the Subscription Packages offer great value and allows Brummies to see some top class soloists as well as the CBSO.

The excellent Conservatoire also offers almost daily concerts, often featuring new and modern works. There are free weekly Friday lunchtime concerts at The Barber Gallery Concert Hall and a brand new concert venue at the University.

Perhaps less prejudice and a little more fact in future posts.
*******************
Intermezzo replies - Perhaps a little more clicking on the links provided in the post, and you'd find the facts which support the 'prejudice'.

[SJT]

It's evidently quite the cottage industry in Birmingham. Last time I was there, in what I would have thought was a sufficiently upmarket hotel rhyming with Stilton, there came a knock at my door at about midnight which turned out to be not my anticipated club sandwich but a jaw-droppingly tarty, er, tart, who enquired if I wanted an oral service (which I sort of did, of course, though not of the kind she had in mind). For some reason I kept thinking of dear, East End-Jewish Alfie Bass in Polanski's "Dance of the Vampires" when confronted by a crucifix-wielding
nymphet: "Boy, have you ever picked the wrong man......"

I have never returned since. Scarred for life. Whom do I sue?

[Tinkerbelle]

Brett, to be specific! Super concert performance of Walkure by Opera North and Birmingham Symphony Hall is a great venue. However outside in the street it was mayhem. There were groups of elderly women cackling obscenities, dressed in not a lot beside lewd slogans: gangs of youths hanging about shouting at girls falling over in their skyhigh stilletos and not much else: dozens of police and ambulance workers standing on street corners: people throwing up: prostitutes negotiating with near naked boys graphically in the corridor outside my hotel room: sirens, shrieking and fighting in the street until 6.00am next day, altercations over money between said prostitutes and clients in the hotel corridor at 4.00am, etc. etc.
This is fact and I did not like it!

[Ruth]

Saturday night? I'm not entirely surprised. I've only ever been there midweek, it's been pretty quiet, and I've felt perfectly safe.

I'd been considering going there for Siegfried of the same cycle, which is on a Saturday. Your report makes me very pleased that I've opted instead to see it in Leeds a week earlier, moving on to there straight from a three-night WNO stay in Birmingham. I imagine Leeds city centre can be fairly colourful on a Saturday night too, but at least I don't have to pass through the main nightlife area between the concert venue and my hotel.

[Andres]

Having read this and SJT testimonials, I wonder how come it was voted the most boring city in Europe...

I'll brave all that life's rich tapestry and will drop by to see Der Fliegende. Nelsons has to be my favourite conductor working in this country.

[Brett Sidaway]

As a Birmingham resident for nearly half a century, none of these portraits of this latter-day Sodom reflect my experience of a vibrant friendly - and safe - City. Let's hope any return visits provide a truer - and more agreeable - experience of the 2nd City

[villagediva]

Went to Birmingham last year for first time since childhood, and came away thoroughly ashamed of the jokey metropolitan prejudices I had taken with me. Symphony Hall - great. CBSO, Andris Nelsons and its audience - fantastic. Traffic-free city centre - brilliant. Canal-side development - excellent. City Museum and Art Gallery - a user-friendly Victorian gem fill of pre-Raphaelites, French Impressionists and Italian paintings, and a galleried tea room where you can get excellent cheap lunch and sit for as long as you like. 18thC St Phillips Cathedral - with Burne - Jones windows, Stayed in the Briar Rose hotel over the Wetherspoons pub - no problem. Wonderful 19th century industrial architecture, being imaginatively converted into housing and performance spaces. And all the above within walking distance of New Street station. Intend to go again this year to catch with Graham Vick and the adventurous Birmingham Opera Company - it it's good enough for them.......... . Always felt safe, and happy not to have to dodge bendy buses or lorries.

[SJT]

"happy not to have to dodge bendy buses or lorries".

I believe that, even in as buzzing a place as London, these vehicles are only to found in the roads. Furthermore, the bendy buses have now been completely got rid of. Tip: stick to walking on the pavements and crossing at crossings and you almost certainly won't have to dodge traffic at all....

[Miriam]

I cannot recall ever having needed to dodge a lorry in central London either. The things that frighten me most there are the cyclists, one is not even safe from them on the crossings as they often ignore red lights. BTW at the ROH ballet performance on Wednesday evening I saw a man wearing lycra cycling shorts. A bit cold for them IMO apart from any other considerations.

[SJT]

"at the ROH ballet performance on Wednesday evening I saw a man wearing lycra cycling shorts"

On stage, I assume?

And in Onegin, too?

Please specify the "other considerations" and state whether you're using inches or centimetres...