Author: Steven Sedley

Brass septet produces haunting and enjoyable chamber music at the MFC

Posted on by Steven Sedley

Septura Brass Septet: An American in Paris
(Chamber Music New Zealand)

Ravel: Ma mére l’Oye (Mother Goose)
Debussy: Preludes
Gershwin: Three Piano Preludes; Songbook; An American in Paris

Michael Fowler Centre

Tuesday 30 April, 7:30 pm, 2019

Three trumpets, three trombones, one a bass trombone, and a tuba is not the usual combination for a chamber music concert, but seven principal brass players of London Symphony orchestras got together to demonstrate that brass is capable of producing chamber music. Horns, such an integral part of the brass section of an orchestra, were missing. They might have added a mellower sound to the ensemble, but obviously this was not what these players had in mind. Simon Cox and Matthew Knight, the two artistic directors of the group arranged the music for them. Their guiding principle was that the music should sound as if it was originally written for brass.

The audience was challenged to leave their preconceived ideas of what the music should sound like at the door and listen with fresh ears. The pieces in this programme are well known and familiar, but played by a brass ensemble they all sounded new.

Ravel and Gershwin knew each other and held each other in high esteem; they were both influenced by Debussy. It was this relationship that was the theme that held these works together.

The Mother Goose Suite, arranged from the piano duet rather than the orchestral version sounded colourful. It had a depth that cannot be attained on the piano. The special effects were enhanced by the innovate use of mutes. The beautiful rich sound of the brass was specially effective in the chorale sounding last movement, The Fairy Garden.

The Debussy Preludes for solo piano are lovely miniatures and played by the brass they attained a different, richer sound. The rich brass chords, the underlying bass of the trombones and tuba underscored the well-known melody of the Girl with the flaxen hair played on the trumpet. The trombones produced the humorous sound effects appropriate for the Minstrels. The Sunken Cathedral had beautiful bell like sounds produced with layer upon layer of brass sound. This was a different Debussy.

The second half of the programme was devoted to the music of Gershwin, arrangement of the Three Piano Preludes, short little pieces from the Songbook and the major work, An  American in Paris. Gershwin created a colourful world of his own which encapsulated the jazz age, the frivolity of the 1920s, and these pieces sounded particularly appropriate for a brass ensemble. It was an era after the First World War in which people believed that life was short, people had to make the most of it, live it up, seek happiness in gaiety, but underlying it all there was a touch of melancholy. This was captured by the joyful yet sensitive performance.

Britain has a great tradition of brass music, but this concert was a world away from the usual sound of brass bands. This group had a flexibility that tested the limits of the players’ ability and together they produced a sonority seldom heard. They shed new light on familiar music; one came away from the concert with the haunting sound of beautiful brass playing. It was a concert with a difference, but very enjoyable.

 

Maria Mo: a fine recital by a promising artist at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Steven Sedley

Maria Mo – piano 

Beethoven: Piano Sonata in C, Op.53 (Waldstein)
Albeniz: Iberia, Book 1
                Evocación; El Puerto; El Corpus en Sevilla

St. Andrews on The Terrace

Wednesday 17 April, 2019

Mario Mo is a talented young pianist at the threshold of her career. She has won awards and scholarships, studied with Katherine Austin at the University of Waikato and then at the Vienna Conservatory and the University for Music and Performing Arts in Vienna. She has had a thorough grounding. She played an ambitious programme.

Beethoven stretches the limits of the piano in the Waldstein Sonata and apart from a few glitches Mo coped with these challenges capably. The problem was that because the work is so well known it is hard not to draw comparisons with performances by some of the great pianists. Mo is a thoughtful performer who paid a lot of attention to the phrasing, the dynamic contrasts and melodic flow of the piece. I am sure that with greater experience and maturity her playing will acquire greater fluidity.

The Albeniz pieces were more successful. Albeniz, virtuoso pianist, one of the foremost composers of the latter years of the 19th and the first decade of the 20th centuries had a significant influence on composers of a younger generation, Debussy and Ravel among others. His piano pieces were based on Spanish folk idiom. The best known of these works is Iberia. Mo played these pieces with a delightful freedom bringing out their lovely Spanish lilt. Evocación set the spirit of the work, El Puertocaptured the busy port, expressed through the use of the zapataedo, a lively traditional Andalusian dance. El Corpus en Sevilla is the longest and most dramatic of the three movements. It is a colourful depiction of the Spanish celebration of the feast days of Corpus Christi with its solemn march, religious fervour and ecstasy. It called for a great tonal range and sharp contrasts. Mario Mo gave an enjoyable account of these pieces. This was a fine recital by a promising artist.

Soloists steal the show with Mozart’s K.364 at Wellington Chamber Orchestra’s inspiring concert

Posted on by Steven Sedley

Wellington Chamber Orchestra presents:

MENDELSSOHN – Overture “Ruy Blas” Op.95
MOZART – Sinfonia Concertante in E-flat Major for violin, viola and orchestra K.364
BRAHMS – Symphony No. 1 in C Minor Op.68

Soloists: Monique Lapins (violin) and Gillian Ansell (viola)
Conductor: Rachel Hyde
Wellington Chamber Orchestra

St.Andrew’s on The Terrace Church
Wellington

Sunday, 7 April, 2:30 pm

Being part of an orchestra of some 60 players is a wonderfully uplifting experience for an amateur or semi-professional musician. You get carried away with the flow of the music, you are part of a large team with a common purpose. You do your best, you put your heart and soul into the music. You don’t set out to compete with the great symphony orchestras, you do it for your own love of music and you perform for your family, your friends, and those who make a point of supporting your endeavours. St. Andrews, where the audience is close to the orchestra and can feel part of the action is just the right venue for such a concert.

 

The highlight of this occasion was Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante with the soloists, Monique Lapins, violin, and Gillian Ansell, viola, the two middle voices of the NZ String Quartet. It was a rare opportunity to hear these well-known musicians step out from their ensemble and show their skills as soloists. This is a major work with great depth, at times with reminders of the dramatic moments of the operas. The two string instruments, the soprano and the alto, engage in a dialogue above the symphonic foundation of the orchestra. The two soloists played with deep understanding, bouncing melodic passages off each other, with a twinkle in their eyes reflecting Mozart’s humour, but also with with passion when that was called for in the slow movement. Elegance is the word that springs to mind to describe their performance. Their playing lifted the playing of the whole orchestra.

 

Brahms’s First Symphony is a challenge for any orchestra, and to their great credit the Wellington Chamber Orchestra did it justice. They produced a lovely tone that captured Brahms’s rich chords, with fine wind playing and rich string sounds. Rachel Hyde conducted it at a controlled, restrained, spacious tempo that let the powerful melodies soar. It was a great experience for players and listeners alike.

 

The Mendelssohn overture set the mood for the concert. Unfortunately the acoustics of the church did not favour the orchestra. The sound of the wind and brass reverberated and overwhelmed the strings and the subtlety and the lyricism of the work was somewhat lost. This is the downside of a venue at which the audience feels almost part of the orchestra. With all that however, this was a most enjoyable concert.

 

 

Exhilarating piano duet delight at St Andrew’s lunchtime concert

Posted on by Steven Sedley

The Blue Danube and Duo Enharmonics

Duo Enharmonics – Nicole Chao and Beth Chen (Piano music for 4 hands)

St. Andrews on the Terrace

Wednesday 3 April, 12:15 pm

Some years ago both Nicole Chao and Beth Chen studied with Thomas Hecht at the New Zealand School of Music. They formed a piano duo partnership and have been close friends ever since. They went overseas, studied further, came back, and carried on playing together.

Four hands playing on one keyboard is a very difficult form of chamber music. There is no contrast, no different tone colour or timbre to separate or contrast the voices. The two pianists have to think and play like one. Such unanimity was evident in this concert. It started with Debussy’s charming, well known Petite Suite, though better known in its orchestral version. It is a playful piece and was played with lovely sonority and clear phrasing.

Then came the huge, taxing, four-hand version of the first movement of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring. I imagined the two friends, very accomplished pianists, getting together and saying ‘Let’s have some fun’. ‘What can we play to test the limits of the piano?’ and they opted for The Rite of Spring. The one piano, four hands, has to capture the vast kaleidoscopic range of a large orchestra, with its full tonal and colour range. The music moves from powerful, loud, fast passages to contrasting gentle, lyric melodies. Nicole Chao and Beth Chen played with forceful energy, and captured the magic of the ballet.

This challenging work left the audience with a sense of exhilaration. But that was not all. The concert was capped with Greg Anderson’s arrangement of the Blue Danube Waltz. Forget a gentle cruise down the Danube, or twirling to the tune of a gentle waltz in some crystal illuminated ballroom. Greg Anderson completely deconstructed the well known work of Johann Strauss. He embraced Heavy Metal, popular American music, and a whole range of contemporary sounds with rhythmic echos of old Vienna.

It was great fun. Let’s have more of this, let’s hear this talented pair again.