Friday night’s opening concert of  Michael Houstoun’s Beethoven sonatas reCYCLE 2013 in Wellington brought home to me yet again that a live concert is one hundred times better than listening to recordings. One of the marks of genius in musical composition is that the composers’ works can stand endless recycling; as Michael Houstoun has said, he learns more about Beethoven and more about himself through playing the works again, his... read more

Aside from the circumstance of this being the THIRD Mozart Requiem performance offered the Wellington concert-going public this year so far (after all, it's only August!), I thought the program of this concert by its own lights adventurous and challenging. And, regarding the combination of Mozart and Rachmaninov, a well-known French saying - "Vive la différence" can easily put it in an acceptable context. Looking at things more closely than... read more

This benefit concert was presented to give a little help to Anna van der Zee, a first violinist in the NZSO, and her family (Christiaan, a violist, and their daughter) who had lost everything, including musical instruments, in a house fire two weeks before. It was hosted by the church, as explained by the parish priest, Father Barry Scannell, because of Anna’s contribution to the performance of live music... read more

Students at New Zealand schools of music, and those at the school in Wellington in particular are fortunate in working in an environment that both encourages original composition and its performance, and encourages the exploration of not so new music. Obviously, that is not at the expense of furnishing students’ memories with the great music of the past, though many will have come from secondary schools where exposure to very... read more

May 29        Paul Rosoman – organ June 5          NZSM Guitars June 12        David Trott - organ June 19        Megan Corby -  VoxBox vocal group June 26        TBA July 3          Capital Harmony Chorus July 10        City Jazz July 17        Carolyn Mills - Harp July 24        Duo Tapas – guitar and violin July 31        NZSM Woodwind August 7    Valerie Rigg & Richard Mapp – violin & piano August 14    Klezmer... read more

I Musici is famed for its recordings, particularly a recording of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons made early in the group’s career, which helped to create the great popularity of these concertos. The musicians are aided by the fine instruments they play.  There was one Amati violin, two Guaneri, and a Storioni cello.  Most of the violins and the two violas were made in the seventeenth century; both cellos were from the... read more

A full Town Hall auditorium and a stage crowded with a great orchestra of some 85 players, put me in mind of the Town Hall concerts that an NZSO of 30 years ago could sell out. An entirely French programme was the perfect response to the Wellington Orchestra’s encounter with the wonderful Swedish mezzo who has indeed cultivated a special gift in the language and music of France. As Marc Taddei... read more

The usual substantial audience defied the weather, and came to hear Felix the Quartet, made up of prominent members of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. There was a change to the programme: the music for the work by Esa-Pekka Salonen is somehow lost in transit, Leppänen explained, and so John Psathas’s piece was substituted. It and the Beethoven Op 59 no.1 Quartet were played recently by the... read more

One of the reasons for going to this concert was the patriotic impulse to hear a Wellington musician who’s making good in Europe. Nicholas Hancox took his B Mus (Hons) at Victoria University and has now completed a master’s at the University of Michigan. Learning never ends: he has moved to Munich for post-graduate work at the Hochschule (Academy) für Musik und Theater. The group’s violinist Christobel... read more

 

The remarks by both Euan Murdoch and Douglas Mews on the tuning, instrument characteristics and performance techniques in the late 18th century were very illuminating for the audience, both those with some familiarity with and knowledge of the issues, and others... read more