It is always good to welcome back Wellington musicians studying or working overseas.  This is the case with cellist Christopher Hutton. However, overall I found this concert disappointing, given the very high standard always demonstrated in the Wellington Chamber Music Trust series.  At the beginning of the Mozart sonata the violin was a little off pitch; this recurred at various times throughout the concert.  The beautiful piano part was for... read more

A concert featuring two world premières is not a common event in New Zealand.  However, this was the case on Wednesday. The concert began, though, with a work from 1977, of Edwin Carr.  It was titled Two Mansfield Poems, and the two beautiful poems by Katherine Mansfield were included with the printed programme: ‘Sanary’ (1916) and ‘Sleeping Together’ (1908).  The first piece echoed the sunny day of the first poem ... read more

With some surprise I read in the Stroma program booklet that this was in fact the SECOND "Mirror of Time" Concert presented by the Ensemble, following on from an occasion in 2012 - had I recently awakened from a kind of "Rip Van Winkel" sleep, or something? I had been to and reviewed a couple of Stroma concerts that year, but I couldn't remember a "Mirror of Time" title... read more

For some reason I hadn't really registered before this concert just how big a space at St.Andrew's Church a small ensemble has to fill with sound, both behind the musicians and above them. It seemed to my ears when the Aroha Quartet began their Beethoven which opened the concert that everything was set back, as opposed to "being in one's face", and that the instrumental timbres were more than... read more

The music of theUnited States, in the common perception, is so dominated by jazz, spirituals and various other kinds of popular music, that I have to confess to a degree of surprise to encounter music that might have been written in Europe. And that, in spite of my perfectly decent familiarity with a lot of the classical music of theUnited States.  The first two pieces were for flute and piano... read more

Each of the seven concerts in which Michael Houstoun plays all of Beethoven’s piano sonatas is high-lighted by one of the famous ‘name’ sonatas.  It is a device with far more value than mere marketability. The order of the sonatas Many in the audience will have wondered whether Houstoun had a theme or some sort of musical pattern in mind in his choice of what to put in each programme: whether... read more

The present recital, featuring violinist Martin Riseley and pianist Jian Liu, was one of a series of concerts organized this year by the New Zealand School of Music. Martin Riseley has on at least one previous occasion given me short-term lockjaw in the open position, when he played the 24 Caprices of Niccolo Paganini at a concert I attended in Wellington a little over three years ago. Playing those works... read more

"…..a musical reunion? - ooh, yes, a lovely idea! Remember some of those things we unearthed and played, and had so much fun with? Yes, they'll sound great, especially with a few wines, and plenty of yummy food - what's that? A concert? You mean, the real thing? - an audience? - Ooo-er! - eh? - what was that? - No, not at all! - I'm on if you... read more

I was sorry that a larger audience was not present to hear this brilliant and enchanting recital on a little-known instrument. The programme covered works written for a variety of instruments, but all beautifully rendered on the triple harp, made by Robin Ward himself, also the transcriber of many of the items.  Playing any harp seems pretty skilled to me, but to have three rows of strings surpasses merely skilled! All... read more

The Kronos Quartet got an extremely warm reception at the end of their Wellington concert - and they responded with no less than four encores! Still, opinions among people I knew in the audience varied afterwards - simply marvellous, said one friend; while another lamented that the group played only one thing he liked, the Silvestrov Quartet. A third thought it all a bit self-indulgent, three "veterans" and a... read more