Month: August 2013

Hutt Valley choirs combine for two Haydn masses and other items

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Wainuiomata Choir and the Hutt Valley Singers, conducted by Brian O’Regan and Eric Sidoti

Haydn: Mass No 7 in B flat, Hob. XXII:7 (Missa Brevis or ‘Little Organ Mass’, 1775)
Mass No 11 in D minor, Hob. XXII:11 (Missa in Angustiis or ‘Nelson Mass’, 1798)
Telemann: ‘Machet die Tore weit’ (Psalm 14:7 and 8)
Fauré: Cantique de Jean Racine
Francesco Durante: Magnificat in C

Church of St James, Lower Hutt

Sunday 18 August, 2:30 pm

It’s embarrassing to find you’ve arrived late because you’d recorded the wrong time in this very website’s Coming Events listings. Though I was a little comforted to find that the document I’d taken the information from, emanating from a choral organization, had it wrong.

But it was still disappointing to have missed the first item on the programme, Haydn’s Little Organ Mass.

The concert was arranged for the two smaller works to be sung by Hutt Valley Singers conducted by the conductor pro tem. Brian O’Regan (he had also conducted the Little Organ Mass: so I am additionally sorry not to have heard him in that larger work with the combined choirs).

Telemann’s output in almost every genre was prodigious though his choral music is probably not as well known as his orchestral and instrumental. This short cantata, Machet die Tore weit, is a lively, tuneful piece in triple time which should have been within the capacity of this choir, but it suffers as a result of too few men’s voices and the very common problem of markedly individual voices affecting the achievement of a homogeneous sound. So the accompaniment by the string orchestra was of significant help in these circumstances.

It was followed by Fauré’s lovely Cantique de Jean Racine; while the start was tentative, the singers
soon gained a degree of assurance, especially when the whole choir was singing and when the strength of the music carried the singers along more successfully than in the Telemann. The accompaniment was from the organ, played by Judy Dumbleton.

There was a general rearrangement of singers and players for the next work, as it involved both choirs (as had the Missa Brevis), as well and the return of the orchestra. It was a Magnificat by Francesco Durante, a contemporary of Bach, Handel, Domenico Scarlatti and Rameau, which was previously believed to be by Pergolesi, as was a great deal of music by other composers who expected to gain a better hearing for their music by publishing it under Pergolesi’s name. The larger Wainuiomata Choir, now conducted by Eric Sidoti, was a different experience, a striking demonstration of the importance of having enough capable singers in every section, especially the men, to create confidence among amateur and not specially skilled voices.

The other important ingredient is an experienced and talented conductor, and Sidoti provided all that was needed to achieve good blend and ensemble, to minimize the effect of voices that might obtrude if left without guidance.

The scene for the second section, the slow ‘Et misericordia’, was set by the orchestra for the entry of soprano soloist, Imogen Thirlwall; her voice was tight to begin with , but her singing was well projected and accurate, as was alto Emily Simcox who followed in this short section.

The men soloists (James Adams and Roger Wilson) joined the women in the fugal ‘Deposuit potentes’, and in the next section they sang a fine duet with steady support from the strings, and throughout, their contributions were important. The solemn peroration involving the whole choir again, dealt with dignity with the famous concluding verse, ‘Sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper, et in saecula saeculorum’.

Then, after the interval came the Nelson Mass, so named because Nelson, after his victory over Napoleon at the Battle of the Nile, somehow found himself in 1800 at Eisenstadt (though Haydn’s permanent post at the princely court had ended in the early 90s, he continued to write his series of masses for the Princess Maria, the wife of Prince Nikolaus II Esterhazy who had succeeded to the principality).

Nelson appeared at Eisenstadt (this was the Esterhazy family’s earlier seat, abandoned after Nikolaus I built a new palace, Esterhaza, but returned to by his grandson Nikolaus II because Eisenstadt was closer to Vienna) presumably because Nikolaus II was a major general in the Austrian Imperial army: so a bit of tactical diplomacy? Encouraged by Nelson’s victory, both Austria and Russia formed a coalition with Britain, declaring war on France in 1799. I can find nothing to indicate that Nelson had gone there partly to meet Haydn or to hear the mass that had acquired his name.

The combined choirs found the right quality in this mass, regarded as perhaps the finest of the six written late in Haydn’s career. A martial air coloured the Kyrie, and the Gloria was driven by a firm 4/4 rhythm, followed by Roger Wilson’s striking delivery of the ‘Qui Tollis’, slow and suitably sententious. Here and there, I found myself harbouring heretical thoughts about the character of the music that often seemed rather at odds with what the words were saying, let alone what they might mean to the laity. The fugal treatment of the last words of the section, ‘Cum santo spiritu’ struck me, not for the first time, as pretty artificial and formulaic. However, regardless of one’s reaction to antiquated liturgy, the music was often near Haydn’s most vigorous and inventive, and the singers showed no sign of concern at any moral conflict.

The strings continued to offer fine support, and at several stages the trumpets contributed strongly, for example in the Credo and of course, in the triumphant conclusion of the Agnus Dei: ‘…dona nobis pacem’; and the timpani offered portentous commentary in the Benedictus.

So the ending was what one would expect from a liturgical work that is doubling as victory celebration. The choir, the soloists, the orchestra, and not least conductor Sidoti could be well pleased with their efforts.

 

Worlds of experience and sensibility – the Antipodes String Trio

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Wellington Chamber Music Sunday Concerts Series:

Antipodes String Trio

LARRY PRUDEN – String Trio (1953-55)

KRZYSZTOF PENDERECKI – String Trio (1991)

WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART – Divertimento for String Trio in E-Flat K.563

Antipodes String Trio:
Amalia Hall (violin) / Nicholas Hancox (viola)
Sarah Rommel (‘cello)

St.Andrew’s on-the-Terrace, Wellington

Sunday 18th August, 2013

This was a concert that looked interesting enough on paper, but then really caught fire in performance. Its disparate parts came together simply and directly to produced the kind of combustion whose glow remained long after the last notes had been played.

The Antipodes String Trio has changed its personnel over the last couple of years –  the 2011 line up which toured New Zealand included Christabel Lin (violin) and David Requiro (cello), along with the present violist, Nicholas Hancox. The group was originally formed as a result of connections between students who were attending different various music conservatories and institutes in New Zealand and the United States.

The present group has a different violinist, Amalia Hall, and ‘cellist, Sarah Rommel, who met while attending the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where both are currently doing postgraduate studies. Previously, Amelia Hall and Nicholas Hancox had played together in the NZSO National Youth Orchestra. Nicholas Hancox is presently based in Germany, as principal viola of the Lubeck Philharmonic Orchestra.

For a group whose members spend much of their time pursuing individual career pathways, their playing demonstrated a remarkable unity throughout. Undoubtedly a good deal of this “esprit de corps” comes from an avowed commitment to help promote what the group calls ‘‘the under-utilised repertoire of the string trio, which many great composers throughout music history have contributed to’’

To my ears they realised much of the essential character of each of the works they performed – the breezy, out-of-doors angularity of Larry Pruden’s work, the contrasting ferocity and ghostliness of Penderecki’s piece, and the noble energies and fluid graces of Mozart’s Divertimento.

The programme note for the Pruden work cited Bartok as one of the chief influences, though I kept on hearing Tippett-like impulses in places. Not that the composer borowed consciously from other music, as it’s entirely natural that resonances of past encounters with various works from other sources would crop up in anybody’s music.

Here, I enjoyed the first movement’s restless energies, with the few moments of repose allowing the shades of a marching song to peep around the corners in places, and bringing forth a lovely alternating interplay between violin and viola. The second-movement Serenade (separately transcribed by the composer for string orchestra, as “Night Song”) featured beguiling open-air harmonies and delicate, watery pizzicato sequences, including a full-throated,  superbly-focused mid-movement “tutti”, filled with feeling.

The third movement’s delightful interchanges again brought the Tippett of the Double String Orchestra Concerto to mind, high spirits giving way to beautifully inward-sounding ambiences, almost Aeolian in effect in places, thanks to the rapt, concentrated instrumental soundings from these players. I also liked the Trio, with its viola-sounded echoes of the opening Vivace, poised here to perfection.

Continuing the mood-contrasts, the finale’s Lento tranquillo brought austere beauties from each instrument, the slow, fugal character of the music allowing the intensities to build systematically and inexorably – perhaps more “tragico” than “Tranquillo” in places, though the purer, more “ritualised” tones of the strings after the full-throated lines had run their course did suggest a kind of “home is where the heart is” aspect at the end. I thought these players gave of themselves so wholeheartedly throughout – so much so that we in the audience felt the “wrench” at the end when the sounds were broken off and all spells ceased.

What a contrast with the ferocity of Krzysztof Penderecki’s slashing chords at the very beginning of his String Trio! These brutal, hammered-out episodes alternated with lyrical and whimsical sequences for each solo instrument making for an ambience harsh, volatile and surreal in effect, after the Pruden work. The players threw themselves and their instruments into these sequences with playing of great verve, relishing the contrasts of colour, tone and emphasis, and creating as powerful and telling an atmosphere with their muted, spectral realisations as during the more forceful moments.

Viola, then violin by turns introduced the fugue-like second movement, the intensities leading back into the ferocious chords of the work’s opening, the music motoric and insistent, like some of Shostakovich’s, expressed most excitingly with some trenchant playing.

When it was over, I thought of the worlds of difference between the two works we had just heard. I found myself thinking of Douglas Lilburn’s telling descriptions of Penderecki’s music in his landmark “A Search for a Language” talk, prompted by thoughts regarding the relationship of musical language to experience. And Lilburn goes on to point out that other creative minds have stressed the importance of finding universal truths in our own lives’ framework. The result? – a telling contrast here between the respective worlds of two composers.

A kind of synthesis of universal truth, life-experience and innate genius can readily be found in the music of Mozart, whose Divertimento for String Trio in E-flat K.563, which took up the programme’s remainder, seemed to somehow enrich the contexts suggested by both of those first-half works. Written in 1788, in the wake of financial difficulties for the composer, and from the same period as his last three symphonies, it’s a more serious and profound work than the title “Divertimento” suggests.

I thought the Trio’s playing had real “girth” throughout the first movement, bring out the music’s nobility – for me, only Beethoven, in works such as the “Eroica”, approaches Mozart in his wondrous “E-flat” mode. The group took us on a true voyage of exploration with the music’s development – from the golden, sun-drenched strains of the opening we were suddenly plunged into realms of mystery and unpredictability, the figurations containing such a variegated set of emphases – beautiful work, especially, from viola and ‘cello in thirds in places.

A dignified, heartfelt Adagio was followed by a “kicking-up-its-heels” Minuet, with each instrument given the chance to bend its back to the dance, then engage in expressive, even volatile exchanges with a partner in the Trio, before returning to the dance. The players enjoyed the Theme-and-Variations Andante, as well as the rather more rustic second Minuet, one with a delicious waltz-like first Trio – its “ready-steady-go” beginning was here pointed most engagingly – and a pretty, very feminine second Trio, again delightfully characterized.

Apart from a surprising single mis-hit from the violist at one point, the group’s delivery of the Allegro Finale was excitingly spot-on in terms of accuracy, flow, expression and interchange. It was playing that brought out the quote from musicologist Alfred Einstein, reproduced in the program – “Every note is significant – every note is a contribution to spiritual and sensuous fulfillment in sound”….the Antipodeans’ performance  here embodied that comment, playing into each other’s and into our hands, so that we in the audience were able to partake fully in the musical feast.

I do hope we shall hear much more from this talented and engaging trio of musicians.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

English sacred and secular song, choral and organ music at Saint Paul’s Cathedral

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Choir of Wellington Cathedral of St. Paul, conducted by Michael Stewart, with Thomas Gaynor (organ), Jared Holt (baritone) and soloists from the choir

Music of twentieth-century English sacred choral and secular solo music

Wellington Cathedral of St. Paul

Saturday, 17 August 2013, 7pm

These are unconventional times; before the music could commence, Michael Stewart, Director of Music at the Cathedral, had to give the audience instruction on what to do in an earthquake, while reassuring us about the strength of the building.  The back page of the programme had printed details about such procedures.

Following this, Stewart gave brief but informative and humorous spoken introductions to the items.

Entry to the concert was by donation, to support the purchase of a Steinway piano from the former TVNZ studios at Avalon.  Although not titled on the programme, it was a concert of English sacred choral and secular solo twentieth century music.

In honour of the centenary of Benjamin Britten’s birth, the first three items were his Hymn to St. Peter, Hymn to the Virgin and Hymn to St. Columba.  The first began with loud brass tones from the organ, introducing a slow processional-style hymn.  It incorporated similar introductions to each verse.  This was quite taxing music for choir and organist.  Phoebe Sparrow sang magnificently in the solo passages, to a delightful quiet organ accompaniment.

Hymn to the Virgin is better known than the other two.  This piece was sung unaccompanied, with an antiphonal quartet placed in a balcony above the north transept.  All the singers produced great clarity of notes and words.  A louder section of the music introduced some harsh tone from the men occasionally, but otherwise it was a fine performance.

Hymn to St Columba included an organ part, described by Stewart as ‘fiendishly difficult’, but played with no apparent problems by Thomas Gaynor. This was a gorgeous piece.

Jared Holt sang two of Roger Quilter’s lovely songs: ‘Go, lovely rose’ (words by Edmund Waller), and ‘Now sleeps the crimson petal’ (words by Alfred, Lord Tennyson).  Quilter was a master at setting English poetry; I always think it a shame when, as in this case, the poets are not credited in the printed programmes.  Lieder and song could not exist without the marriage of words and music.  These songs suited Jared Holt’s voice very well, and his performance both vocally and in interpretation he was admirable.

I could not say the same about the piano.  Although sitting near the front, and thus not catching too much of what has been described as the ‘bathroom echo’ in the Cathedral, I found the sound soon became an undefined mush when it left the instrument, i.e. there was a lack of definition, whereas my companion found the tone ‘tinny’.  This was not the fault of the pianist (Michael Stewart) nor, presumably, the instrument, but in the first case, caused by the vast and high space, and the second, by the concrete floor under the instrument.  Perhaps it would be better to keep use of the sustaining pedal to a strict minimum.

One of two major choral works on the programme by Ralph Vaughan Williams, his Mass in G minor, written in 1921 for double choir and dedicated to Gustav Holst and his Whitsuntide singers, was unaccompanied. The influence of Tudor music, was noticeable, especially echoes of William Byrd’s masses.

The performance featured beautiful sustained phrases, refined tone and excellent intonation. There were rich harmonies, especially in the Gloria and a quartet of solo voices interspersed the passages for the full choir of around 30 voices here and in later movements.  The soprano and tenor were strong and clear.  The counterpoint section was bright, lively and intricate.

The Credo was full of delicious contrasts.  The choir’s balance was excellent, especially in the quieter passages.  Vaughan Williams’s word-setting was amazingly varied.  The quartet of soloists again made a significant contribution, and the Amen at the end contained elaborate writing, triumphant in mood.

The Sanctus was perhaps the most contemporary (twentieth century) sounding of  the whole work, with interesting harmonies – always resolved.  Significant dynamic variation was incorporated.  A soprano solo introduced the Benedictus where the voices blended beautifully.  The Agnes Dei was another wonderfully varied movement, sung with assurance, accuracy and affecting attention to tone, clarity of diction and gradations of dynamics.

It was a memorable and superb performance of supremely exquisite English church music.

Following the interval was James MacMillan’s ‘A new song’, a choral piece with organ accompaniment.  This exhibited delicacy and robustness by turns.  And there were some tricky turns for the singers, accompanied by pianissimo chords from the organ, which were followed up by loud ones at the end.  However, I did not find the piece very interesting.

Next we heard the one piece on the programme that was written just before the twentieth century (1895), Elgar’s Andante espressivo (Organ Sonata in G major, Op.28), played by Thomas Gaynor.  This I found rather ho-hum – not the playing, nor the choice of tone colours, but the music, which was rather improvisatory in style and did not seem to have much to say.  It became grand and flashy, but with attractive registrations. Elgar wrote very little other organ music, most of it unpublished; perhaps there was nothing in English organ music of the twentieth century with a greater claim to be included in the programme.

Vaughan Williams’s Five Mystical Songs are great favourites of mine.  A large part of their beauty stems from the poems of George Herbert (1593-1632, again not credited). I have always marvelled at the incomparable language used by this remarkable poet.  The composer’s highly sensitive settings, using a modal opening to several of them, are complemented by magical accompaniments, here, the organ substituting for the original setting for orchestra..

I thought that the second song, ‘I got me flowers’ needed a little more variation of tone and dynamics from the soloist, Jared Holt.  The wordless choir part was ethereal, followed by a strong unison ending.
‘Love bade me welcome’ was for soloist and organ only.  Here, there was more subtlety, and a good range of registrations on the organ.  Words were very clear, and the singer’s tone was warm and earnest.  A wordless coda from the choir accompanied the soloist’s final words.  A high pianissimo ending from the organ was marvellously euphoric.

The setting of ‘The Call’ (Come my way, my truth, my life – quoting words from the New Testament) featured modal tonality.  The final, big choral item, ‘Antiphon’ (Let all the world in every corner sing) is
often performed separately from the rest of the cycle.  Its demanding organ part is like triumphant bells.  It is grand and joyous.

Michael Stewart elicits from his choir an energetic sound, with notable flexibility, especially in its superb dynamic range. Most of the singers looked committed and involved in the music, but a few looked completely bland.  Nevertheless, well done, all – not least young organist Thomas Gaynor, home on a break from his studies in the USA.

 

Viola partnerships at St.Andrew’s

Posted on by Frances Robinson

St. Andrews on the Terrace Lunchtime Concert Series
“Classical Strings, Viola Partnerships, bowed, plucked and struck”

Donald Maurice and Victoria Jaenecke – violas
Jane Curry classical – guitar
Jian Liu – piano

 Franz Schubert (1797-1828) – Arpeggione Sonata in A
Donald Maurice and Jane Curry
 Anton Wranitzky (1761-1820) – Concerto in C for two violas (1st movement)
Donald Maurice, Victoria Jaenecke and Jian Liu
Boris Pigovat (born 1953)  – Sonata 2012 (premiere of 2nd and 3rd movements)
Donald Maurice and Jian Liu

 Wednesday 14 August 2013

This was an intriguing programme presented by three faculty members from the NZ School of Music plus Victoria Jaenecke, principal viola of  the Wellington Orchestra. It opened with a viola and guitar transcription of Schubert’s sonata which was originally scored for piano and arpeggione, a bowed, fretted 6-string instrument, rather like a bowed guitar. The version presented here sat very comfortably with the transformed instrumentation, despite the tonal balance being tipped at times in favour of  the stronger viola timbre.

The Allegro moderato was delightfully melodious and light hearted, followed by beautifully sympathetic phrasing and dynamics for the poetry of the Adagio. The players took full advantage of the contrasting moods offered by the rondo form of the final Allegretto,  moving with affection and grace between the lilting principal section and the scampering, almost gypsy idioms of the contrasting parts. This was Schubert delivered with a lively grace and musicianship that must surely be an inspiration to the students of both teachers, quite apart from the obvious delight of the audience.

Wranitzky was a pupil of both Mozart and Haydn, and an accomplished violinist and violist. He wrote a great deal of chamber music and a number of string concerti, including this double viola work played here with piano realisation. The Allegro was an interesting and attractive movement, delivered with effortless mastery of its considerable technical demands. The bright and vigorous conversations between the players were warm and rich, comfortably filling the hall, although passagework in the lower register of the second viola part was sometimes swamped by the brighter tone and upper register of the first. Again a happy and inspirational performance much appreciated by the listeners.

The most powerful item in this programme was undoubtedly the Sonata 2012 by the Ukrainian born, Israeli composer Boris Pigovat. The initially dark, brooding mood of the Con ira was soon fractured when Donald Maurice and Jian Liu threw themselves into the dissonance of its explosive development, where frenetic anger and resentment poured out to riveting effect. The movement’s huge technical demands were masterfully subordinated to the  passionate violence of its delivery, which was quite literally breathtaking.

So too was the complete contrast of the contemplative solo viola voice as it spoke so expressively to the sudden calm of the following Misterioso.  The poignant opening melody was picked up with exquisite poetry by the piano, and the wistful beauty of the ensuing conversation led the work through to a very moving conclusion.

The Sonata 2012 is dedicated to Donald Maurice, who will give the world premiere of the complete work at the International Viola Congress in Krakow next month. This will be followed by a special concert in Warsaw presented by the New Zealand Embassy as part of events marking forty years of diplomatic relations between the two countries. Donald Maurice and Richard Mapp have recorded Sonata 2012 for Atoll, and the CD will be launched at that commemorative concert. I have no doubt it will be a CD well worth waiting for.

This was an exceptional concert which showcased an unusually interesting programme and outstanding musicians. The good turnout for the event and the enthusiasm of the audience made it clear that they really appreciated the privilege of being offered such an event.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two masterpieces of the violin repertoire at Old St Paul’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Valerie Rigg (violin) and Mary Barber (piano)

Beethoven: Violin Sonata No 1 in D, Op 12 No 1
Brahms: Violin Sonata No 2 in A, Op 100
Sarasate: Malagueña 

Old Saint Paul’s, Mulgrave Street

Tuesday 13 August, 12:15 pm

Wellington’s music scene is generously endowed with musicians young and old who are prepared to give their time and devote some effort to enriching the lives of those disposed to be enriched by good music, music that had stood the test of time (which I think is the best way of defining the meaning of ‘classical’).

Though, as the education system no longer regards the furnishing of young minds and souls with music of this kind, as one of the most important functions, those who can tell the difference between the lasting and the ephemeral are disappearing.

I recently came across a quote that is pertinent: “Few people mind saying they have a bad memory but no one admits to having bad taste.” Guess that’s a bit meaningless to most of the educational and political establishment.

Valerie Rigg and Mary Barber know, however, and the few score who come to sit under the beautiful gothic timber arches of this most beautiful of New Zealand churches probably know why they’re there too.

In the past Valerie Rigg has explored some of the less familiar masterpieces of the repertoire such as violin sonatas by Janáček and Prokofiev. This week she and Mary Barber chose to get back to the very heartland of the violin repertoire, with Beethoven and Brahms, as well as a classic of the ‘encore’ variety by Spanish virtuoso Sarasate.

The first movement of Beethoven’s first violin sonata seems designed to provide the violinist with plenty of arresting, exhortatory pronouncements, much given to scales and arpeggios, and Rigg entered its spirit wholeheartedly. In the slow movement, an Andante and not an Adagio, in Theme and Variations form, the violinist’s playing matched the wide range of expressive variety, and the charming episodes for the piano were handled gracefully by Mary Barber. A similar spirited and confident tone brought the last happy, lyrical movement to life, with little sign of declining facility on the part of the violinist.

In Brahms second violin sonata there was a tendency for the violin to drive a bit hard though it never risked overwhelming the pianist’s part, which itself is so rewarding.  What was always clear was the
enjoyment felt by both players, perfectly self-effacing in their exploring the gentleness and modesty of the music.  What touched me particularly was the readiness of this retired, fine professional violinist to maintain her facility in the challenging music she tackles, and to perform freely in these enterprising
concerts for the edification of the faithful audiences. Many of her orchestral colleagues retire from their posts and abandon music almost entirely.

The players explored sensitively a certain hesitant air in the second movement, punctuated by sudden impulsive Vivace moments, which created a feeling of simplicity and affection; and again in the Allegretto last movement, a contemplative approach at the beginning was never quite banished. Even though there were blemishes in the piano part, rather more than one might have expected, the technical assurance and spirit of the violin carried it to happy conclusion.

The recital ended with the Malagueña of Sarasate, not one of the dances of huge energy from Andalusia, but one rather irregular in rhythm, though it does permit touches of flamboyance. So it began, decorously, but I had a 1pm date and had to leave after a minute or so.

The major pieces in the programme had been enough to make the journey worthwhile, and I look forward to Valerie Rigg’s next recital with whichever of her repertoire of pianists she invites to join her.

 

SMP Ensemble plays Contag for “The Crowd”

Posted on by Frances Robinson

Forty-second Wellington Film Festival 2013 presents:

The Crowd

Silent Film with live score performed by SMP Ensemble

Composer: Johannes Contag
SMP Ensemble conducted by Karlo Margetic

Paramount Theatre,  Courtenay Place, Wellington

Sunday 11 August 2013

This film dates from 1928 and is in the timeless tradition of Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton. It was written and directed by King Vidor, and the score was commissioned by Creative NZ from young Wellington composer Johannes Contag. The 12-piece SMP Ensemble comprised a handful of strings, flute, clarinets (including bass), bassoon, percussion and piano, a selection which gave Contag a varied colour palette to work with, and the tools he needed to support the wide sweep of settings, emotions and characters depicted in the film.

The composer comments of the film that “Despite being received very well at the time, its bold modernism and systemic cultural critique defy most Hollywood tropes. Already an enormously successful director, King Vidor had the rare privilege of flouting studio expectations, and consequently there’s not a single hero or villain to be found here. Instead, we are treated to an engaging dissection of everyday city life, one that refuses to succumb to the predictabilities of comedy and tragedy alike. What really makes The Crowd a delight to watch is its underlying love story……..It is in its astute depiction of the romantically mundane that The Crowd wins us over, making us care for the underdog despite his follies.”

King Vidor’s film is a poignant drama of a charming but all-too-fallible dreamer and the exasperated woman who loves him unconditionally and never gives up on him through thick and thin. The dramatic range of this screenplay presents an enormous challenge for the composer – almost two hours of non-stop music for scenes that encompass the dreamer’s gentle rural upbringing, the shock of a parent’s premature death, the heady thrill of setting off to seek his fortune in New York, the grinding reality of employment as a pen-pushing clerk in a vast office, then the romantic encounter that drives the remainder of the plot.

Each of these settings was sympathetically handled in Contag’s score, with the frenetic pace of New York life being perfectly captured in his Twenties-style ragtime idioms. The colour of the score more than compensated for the 35mm Black and White medium which seems so spare to modern viewers. The scoring for the courtship and honeymoon scenes trod a masterly knife edge between the extremes of lust and tenderness, with never a hint of predictable banality. The central part of the screenplay covers the mundane realities of daily work and commuting, and the monotony of suburban life for the stay-at-home wife and children. This called for essentially background music but, given that,  I nevertheless felt that Contag’s writing here was somewhat short on melodic, rhythmic and  tonal variety. It became rather pedestrian compared with the earlier score but, that said, his sense of drama was still keenly expressed in his very effective use of silence at key dramatic moments.

The latter part of the screenplay covers the increasing pressures on the marriage that result from the heartrending death of their daughter – a catastrophe which catapults the husband into a reckless decision to quit his pen-pushing job. Contag captured the poignancy of grief and crippling self doubt with great sympathy, together with the agonized indecision of a wife who still unswervingly loves her man, but has finally reached the end of her tether. When their fortunes finally seem to be recovering, the score sashays effortlessly into a conclusion filled with the brighter moods of optimism and hope.

Bouquets are due to the Film Archive and Creative NZ for putting their efforts and funding into this very successful collaboration between the composer, the Wellington Film Festival, and the local SMP Ensemble, who did such justice to the score. Together they made possible the only live performance of this year’s festival, and the fact that the house was sold out well in advance demonstrates the soundness of backing this endeavour. Hopefully this will be just one of many similar collaborations in the future.

 

 

 

 

Polished and admirable performances of trios for flute, cello and piano

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Mulled Wine Concerts, Paekakariki

The Homewood Trio (Bridget Douglas – flute, Andrew Joyce – cello, Rachel Thomson – piano)

Haydn: Trio in F for flute, cello and piano, No 1, Hob XV:17 (No 30 in the Robbins Landon list of all the trios)
Charles Lefebvre: Ballade for flute, cello and piano
Villa-Lobos: The Jet Whistle
Philippe Gaubert: Trois aquarelles (Three Water-colours)
Martinů: Trio for flute, cello and piano

Paekakariki Memorial Hall

Sunday 11 August, 2:30pm

A relatively unusual ensemble usually calls up music that is similarly off the beaten track, and this was no exception.

The best known name was Haydn, though the piece would probably have been known almost only to flutists and those who happened to have a 2003 CD on the Concordance label by three Wellington musicians, Penelope Evison (6-keyed flute), Euan Murdoch (classical cello) and Douglas Mews (fortepiano). They recorded all three of Haydn’s flute trios using period instruments, most distinctively Douglas Mews on Victoria University’s fortepiano.

Haydn wrote these three piano trios in 1790 with the treble part scored for the flute instead of the violin. They are numbered 28, 29 and 30 by Haydn scholar H C Robbins Landon, and are nos 15, 16 and 17 in the Hoboken catalogue. Both catalogues include them among the total of some 45 works for piano trio.

If that had been a somewhat too scrupulous attempt at authenticity, so lacking much robustness, this performance on a Schimmel piano and modern flute and cello, made few gestures in that direction. The piano opened boldly and the flute had all the marks of modern orchestral sound, though acknowledging the habits of the ‘classical’ period through a fluent range of sparkling ornaments. The cello’s role was confined mainly to the doubling of the piano bass line.  In total, the players paid full attention to the music’s formal shapes, the modulations and changes of tone, the variations, and the teasing pauses and phantom closures and the whole work emerged as a great deal more substantial than might have been imagined. Haydn is predictable only in his delight in the unpredictable.

Flutist Bridget Douglas explained how she had come across the score of Charles Lefebvre’s Ballade among a collection that had belonged to long-standing NZSO principal flute, Richard Giese. Lefebvre was not a major French composer, a near contemporary of Massenet and Fauré, but there was no doubt, listening to the affectionate and studied playing by these musicians, that even a merely competent piece can become delightful and interesting in imaginative hands. All three determined to find the maximum enjoyment and interest in the music, the cello in particular catching my ear in quite striking passages. It deserves to be more played in contexts such as this.

Brazilian Villa-Lobos wrote a lot of music for unusual combinations and The Jet Whistle, for flute and cello, is a good example of his originality and quirkiness, some might say eccentricity. Its first movement is much given to endlessly repeated notes and gestures that can strike one as time-filling; the second movement is allowed to be more lyrical and again the players accorded it a degree of attention and care that rewarded its listening. It’s most famous for the build-up in the third movement of a screeching whistle from the flute, simulating the sound of a jet aircraft preparing for take-off on the tarmac. Last time I heard it, Bridget Douglas (I think it was) was in a space that allowed her to let rip with the final shriek that might do significant hearing damage; she was a little more restrained this time.

Philippe Gaubert was another rather minor French composer of a generation later than Lefebvre, born in 1879 (c.f. the wrong date in the programme). He was primarily a flutist during an age when the flute
was extremely popular, so most of his not inconsequential compositions are for that instrument. His Three Water-colours depict three scenes:  ‘On a clear morning’, ‘Autumn evening’ and ‘Serenade’.

Though not likely to be mistaken for Debussy, Gaubert cannot help being influenced by him or Ravel, his greater contemporaries; the morning music ripples with arpeggios, dreamy, seeming to flow effortlessly from his pen; the evening creates a more sombre mood though I can’t claim that my mind was filled with crepuscular imagery; a Spanish feel enters in the third water-colour, with more distinct atmospheric and rhythmic changes. Even if Gaubert is no Ravel, his music is listenable and charming, emerging without marks of great toil such as to tax the listener.

Martinů was hugely prolific; much of his music is so characterful and marked by such vivid melody and insistent rhythms, that it is memorable and commands more attention than most of the other music heard this afternoon. I have known this trio for years though cannot recall where heard, and a rehearing only confirmed my affection for it.

A friend and I reflected sadly on the fact that we could recall none of Martinů’s six attractive symphonies being played in this country.

The music plunges straight into passages of clear, well-constructed themes and their varied repetition, the flute typically soaring over other busy motifs from cello and piano. The second movement seemed to fall somewhat into a repetitive routine though it recovered charm towards its end. Its last movement starts misleadingly: the flute with a slow solo statement. But there’s a sudden bursting into life with the arrival of a moto perpetuo which eventually comes to an almost Haydn-like stop, only to resume in a meditative, exploratory phase. It leads to a coda in which an insistent rhythmic motif takes hold and builds to a finish that is positively exciting in a way that little post-WW2 music is.

 

Expansion of review of Il Corsaro, published by London’s Opera magazine

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Il Corsaro (Verdi)

Production by the New Zealand School of Music, conducted by Kenneth Young and directed by Sara Brodie

Soloists, chorus and orchestra of the School of Music

The Opera House, Wellington

Friday 26 and Saturday 27 July 2013

This is a review of the New Zealand School of Music’s July production of Verdi’s Il Corsaro. Its core is my review for Opera magazine in London; it was printed in the December issue, and was posted on this website in mid December.  I decided to publish here what I had written, since it was a good deal more than the magazine was able to print, and have placed it chronologically about a fortnight after the performances. Frances Robinson’s review was published at the time on this website.

My colleague Nicholas Tarling, in Auckland, drew attention in the August issue [of Opera magazine] to the failure by Opera New Zealand to tackle a planned Billy Budd this year as New Zealand’s acknowledgement of the Britten centenary. Verdi was evidently not even on the horizon, since there’s enough exposure in ordinary seasons to the popular pieces.

But in Wellington, the auspices for 2013 pointed rather firmly to Verdi as the New Zealand School of Music’s biennial production (Britten had been honoured in 2011 with an enchanting production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream; and Wagner might have seemed a little beyond the school’s ordinary resources). The head of the school, Professor Elizabeth Hudson, earned her doctorate at Cornell University with a dissertation on Verdi and she was later asked to prepare the critical edition of Il Corsaro for the University of Chicago Press and Ricordi. This production was the happy fruit of that circumstance.

Unsurprisingly, this was the New Zealand premiere; I had thought it might also have been an Australasian premiere, but I later discovered, by accident, that the semi-professional Melbourne City Opera had staged it in 2006.

Apart from an interesting little essay in the programme booklet about the problems of settling on the best possible edited version of the piece, Elizabeth Hudson refrained from direct involvement in the production.

Instead of performing in one of the venues in the school of music itself, the production was brought down town into Wellington’s ‘other’ round-1900 era, Opera House which, both nights I attended, was comfortably filled, apart from the top gallery. (It’s slightly smaller than the 1500-seat St James Theatre where professional opera in Wellington is usually staged).

Il Corsaro is one of Verdi’s shorter operas – about one hour and forty minutes – and the scope of the roles looked manageable by capable students. Such was the talent on hand that the four main roles were double cast to spread the opportunities around. On successive nights (26 and 27 July) I saw both casts.

Stage director Sara Brodie did not resist the temptation to get Byron on stage in a mute role at the start and a couple of times later. Otherwise, there were no directorial liberties or indulgences. If at first glance the story in Byron’s poetic drama is pretty straight-forward, the stage reality uncovers a story of some originality. It overturns the common shibboleth that women are always the victims in opera: for Gulnara, Pasha Seid’s favourite in his harem, murders him in order to save the captured Corsair, Corrado, to whom she is attracted. And at the end she is the only one of the four principals left alive; something of a victory for feminism in the 19th century!

Though double cast, there was no question that the first was better than the second: on average, the levels of talent and accomplishment were balanced between the two casts. One of the two Corrados, Thomas Atkins, sang with a little more swagger and command than Oliver Sewell whose voice was perhaps a little more polished and lyrical.

Both Medoras easily conveyed a fragility and an archetypical romantic disposition towards suicide: Elizabeth Harris in cast No 1 was a little more natural in the role than Daniela-Rosa Cepeda, in the second; though the latter suggested a tenderness that was touching.

The Gulnara was really a no contest, given the extraordinary gifts, musical and histrionic assurance, of Isabella Moore who has already made an impact nationally in non-student performances and competitions. Her alternate, in Cast 2, Christina Orgias, presented a somewhat less determined and murderous disposition, which lent the confrontations with Pasha Seid less conviction.

The two Seids were more even, with the Frederick Jones of Cast No 2, exhibiting just a little more
authority in both voice and acting than Christian Thurston.

The choruses were among the best things. Though there were too few pirates in the opening chorus to
make an immediate impact on the audience, the later mixed choruses were more full-blooded and showed evidence of excellent coaching both musically and in stage movement; and their frequent mélées and the Act III battle demonstrated director Sara Brodie’s flair in crowd control and at least in the general choreographic aspects of the sword conflicts between pirates and guardians of the harem.

The musical management was in the hands of Kenneth Young, among the country’s leading resident conductors; the 55-piece orchestra may have been a shade less than professional, though there was much distinguished playing and the needs of the singers and of the drama itself were splendidly served.

 

Mozart from the NZSO – magical music and music-making

Posted on by Frances Robinson

The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra presents:
Magnificent Mozart

Overture: The Abduction from the Seralio K.384
Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola in E-flat K.364
Symphony No.40 in G Minor K.550

Andrew Grams (conductor)
with Vesa-Matti Leppänen (violin) and Julia Joyce (viola)
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

Michael Fowler Centre

Friday 9 August 2013

This early evening concert was conducted by Andrew Grams, billed as “one of America’s most promising and talented young conductors [who] has already appeared with many of the great orchestras of the world”.  The band of 40 players was nicely sized for the works, and Grams amply demonstrated his talents as he drew from them a sparkling sound, wide dynamic range, and the clean crisp playing so vital to Mozart’s writing.

The opening work was the opera overture to The Abduction from the Seraglio K.384 – seven minutes of glittering brilliance that made full play of the “Turkish” effects in its orchestration, and the wide dynamic contrasts that swept dramatically from whispering piano to full throated fortissimo and back in a matter of moments, with effortless precision. The excitement of this music and the playing immediately captured the audience.

Next was the much loved Sinfonia Concertante in Eb major K.364 for violin and viola, with soloists by Concertmaster Vesa-Matti Leppänen and Principal Viola Julia Joyce. The opening Allegro maestoso showed immediately that both principals and conductor were of one mind about their interpretation, and this was underpinned throughout by impeccable support from the orchestra. The lilting rhythms and melodies of this beautiful movement were woven effortlessly between the participants, and the romance of the phrasing was fully exploited with rubato where appropriate. The double cadenza was executed with great panache.

The central Andante was presented as a beautifully contemplative conversation between the solo instruments, and it was executed with exquisite delicacy. The poetry of these exchanges was further enhanced by the contrast of Julia Joyce’s beautiful misty blue satin gown with Leppänen’s sombre black suit. The audience was spellbound, and you could have heard a pin drop in the auditorium.

While my personal preference is for a reading that maximizes the silken warmth of the violin and has the throaty syrup of the lower viola sound filling the space with Mozart’s luscious melodies, that is very much an individual choice. Having settled on their particular approach, these players held the audience in breathless appreciation.

The sparkling final Presto got off to a galloping start which had me wondering if it could be adequately sustained. The tempo was certainly presto, but the orchestra and soloists literally never missed a beat. What did suffer was Mozart’s wonderful passagework for strings and winds, which was sacrificed to the god of speed to no real advantage. The riveting sweep of the scales missed out on that spine-tingling quality that is imbued by the clarity of every note speaking within the rushing texture. There is magic in every single note of Mozart’s orchestral writing, and it does not deserve to be lost.

When I chatted briefly at the interval to a musician whom I greatly respect, she expressed the view that it was courageous to try and present this Concertante work in such a large space. This perfectly voiced my sentiments. The impeccable musicianship and technical execution of the performance were never in question, but there were times when the soloists, and the  lower register of the viola in particular, were overshadowed by orchestra, despite its modest resources. The work was not composed for the mega halls of modern times, and it lost some of its complexity and emotional richness in the transposition.

That said, the audience was hugely appreciative and called the players back repeatedly to the stage. This surely is grounds enough for offering the public this extraordinary work more frequently.

Mozart’s Symphony no.40 in G minor ‘The Great’, K.550 formed the second half of the concert. The orchestra and conductor were again in perfect understanding, and Andrew Grams’ light touch with the baton confirmed his absolute confidence that the players were responding to every nuance in the music. The Molto Allegro opened with a whisper of string sound before the restless melody which is the famous hallmark of this movement. Its sense of insistence at each reappearance  provided a clearly articulated framework for the excellent string and wind playing.

The following Andante was rendered with due presence and a measure of solemnity, while never becoming heavy; rather it was like a respectful homage to one of the last works that was to come from Mozart’s prolific and remarkable pen.

The contrasts of the following Menuetto:Allegro sections were beautifully balanced, with exquisitely clean woodwind playing in the Trio. The conductor and orchestra then captured wonderfully the boisterous exuberance of the closing Allegro assai, and it formed a great finale to an evening of magical music and music making.

The packed house and hugely appreciative audience must surely demonstrate that the listening public is hungry for more of this repertoire. Wellington is fortunate to have two outstanding orchestras that can do justice to this, yet concerts of this type are regrettably few and far between. Bring on more!

Brief but rewarding guitar recital at Wesley Church

Posted on by Frances Robinson

Winter at Wesley Lunchtime Concert Series presents:

Guitarists Cameron Sloan and Jamie Garrick

Music by Johann Mertz, Giulio Regondi, and anon (Irish and Spanish folk-pieces)

Wesley Church, Taranaki St., Wellington

Thursday 8 August 2013

Cameron and Jamie are graduate students in the NZSM Guitar Programme. They presented a short half-hour recital of solo guitar works, starting with Jamie playing a Poetic Miniature by the Hungarian  Johann Mertz, one of the leading virtuoso guitarists and composers of the mid-nineteenth century. It was indeed a poetic interpretation, with sensitive phrasing and appropriate rubato, underpinned by a sound technique. He followed with Giulio Regondi’s Introduction and Caprice Op.23 which features two sharply contrasting movements – an elaborately embellished Adagio followed by a light-hearted Allegretto scherzando with many virtuostic effects like rapid chromatic scales, octaves, etc. These were all competently accomplished but one felt that they were uppermost in the player’s mind, whilst the shaping and structure of the two movements seemed almost forgotten, hanging somewhere in an unresolved limbo that did not grip or engage the listener.

Cameron then presented a wonderfully gentle, traditional Irish melody with sensitivity and elegance, where the only other possible enhancement would have been a wider dynamic range. He then followed with three Spanish flamenco-style pieces, all showing a very sound technical grasp. But the two outer movements needed a considerably more gutsy, less genteel rendition to fully reflect their folk origins, and the appealing melodies of the middle movement would have been even more lovely with a wider dynamic range.

The large volume of the church really called for a more projected sound on a number of occasions from both players, and this is a not uncommon situation with classical guitar student recitals. Doubtless such projection develops with greater experience and technical confidence, but it is also sound practice to do an acoustic “try-out” with feedback from an experienced ear before any concert.

Despite such minor reservations, it is hugely encouraging to see the wealth of classical guitar talent that is currently being fostered in the NZ School of Music programme. Wellington now enjoys a rich variety of recitals in this area both by professional performers like the NZ Guitar Quartet, and by the students who are learning and benefitting from them. This emerging talent needs to be fostered and encouraged, so it was disappointing to see such a small audience at this concert.