One should never underestimate the power of headlines as attention-grabbers! Experience suggests that some of these printed declamations are blatantly untrue, some patently absurd, and still others somewhat far-fetched (the few that are left have the merest grain of verisimilitude). In the present case, equating Douglas Lilburn's 1951 song-cycle Elegy with Schubert's Winterreise might be an impertinence for some people - in which case they will qualify the heading of... read more

It’s a few years since I heard either of these singers in a solo recital of any kind. This lunchtime concert was such an enterprising and attractive event that I felt real regret that the audience was so small, though not very different from the audiences that usually come. The real sadness is the failure of the Lower Hutt City Council to save the Laing’s Road Methodist Church... read more

Three sopranos whose taste and dispositions span the song repertoire from classical through the musical and film hits to old-fashioned ballads and folk songs took their turn at Old St Paul's regular Tuesday lunchtime concerts.

The early part of the concert included a few opera arias. None of the three singers would lay claim to polished operatic voices that would meet the expectations of the professional world of opera... read more

An enthusiastic and appreciative, though not large, audience greeted these three very experienced and accomplished musicians.  It was a treat to have a substantial lieder recital like this – and only a day after senior students of the New Zealand School of Music performed lieder at St. Andrew’s on The Terrace.

The programme began with Richard Greager and Bruce Greenfield performing six of Schubert’s songs:... read more

With an interesting programme, this concert had added appeal for the opportunity to hear and see students from the New Zealand School of Music performing lieder.

So much the better that the singers were accompanied by an accompanist marked by sensitive and musical playing; the piano lid being on the short stick seemed just right when the accompanying... read more

It was delightful to hear Aivale Cole singing lieder and other songs, but it was a great pity that so few thought so. Insufficient advertising may be partly to blame, since I have discovered that several people I thought would be interested in these artists and the programme were unaware of the performance. Certainly the Schumann song cycle was heard recently, sung by Joanna... read more

Richard Greager and Marjan van Waardenberg and their supporters are to be congratulated on the variety and excellence of the concerts they are presenting in this year’s ‘Season of Concerts’ running for ten days from the date of this first presentation. It is a pity that there was not greater patronage: approximately 30 people attended this recital, into which so much work had been put. Among these it... read more

It was a delight to hear Joanna Heslop again, with her Serbian-born accompanist. Schumann’s exquisite songs were in safe hands with these two accomplished women.

Heslop’s German pronunciation and faultless diction conveyed the songs so clearly. Her variety of tone and timbre to suit the nature of each individual song, demonstrated the value of the time she has spent studying in St. Petersburg and elsewhere... read more

The last five songs of this performance in Waikanae by Keith Lewis and Michael Houstoun of Schubert's song-cycle Winterreise brought us right to the heart of this great work - that numbed, essential bleakness of spirit was tellingly conveyed by both singer and pianist, not with histrionics or gloom-laden darknesses of tone, but with a kind of other-worldliness symbolized by the traveller's "passing-over" into the realm of the ghostly... read more