Category: Reviews – Concerts

Pianist Catherine Norton initiates delightful, welcome renaissance in song recitals

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Songbook: an anthology of songs about song from five centuries

Songs by Finzi, Telemann, Josquin, Mahler, Canteloube, Vaughan Williams, Browne, Wolf, Schoeck, Stephan, Rachmaninov, Hahn, Farquhar, Bolcom

Amelia Berry (soprano), Elisabeth Harris (mezzo-soprano), Declan Cudd (tenor), James Henare (bass-baritone), Roger Wilson (bass-baritone), Richard Greager (tenor). Catherine Norton (piano), Terence Dennis (piano)

Adam Concert Room

Wednesday 10 June 2015, 6.30pm

Resounding congratulations are due to Catherine Norton, who is not only a superb accompanist, but also is the initiator of Songbook.   She has fairly recently returned from study and performing overseas, mainly in the United Kingdom.  She has worked with the Young Songmakers’ Almanac, descendant of The Songmakers’ Almanac, an English vocal group which toured here some years ago with Chamber Music New Zealand.  This doubtless gave her the idea of doing something similar here.

The presence of Amelia Berry (like Catherine an alumnae of Victoria’s New Zealand School of Music) and James Clayton, from Australia, as soloists in the recent production of La Cenerentola was obviously a spur.  Unfortunately the latter was ill, and at short notice some changes had to be made; two stalwarts of Wellington’s vocal scene, Richard Greager and Roger Wilson, plus the fortuitous presence in Wellington of that doyen of accompanists, Terence Dennis (now Blair Professor of Music at the University of Otago) outstandingly filled the gaps.

I was delighted to discover such an innovation as this concert.  I have bemoaned for years the lack of live song recitals in Wellington these days.  Occasional lunchtime concerts feature singers, but mostly they sing operatic extracts.

There are thousands of wonderful songs out there, in a variety of languages.  The audience was treated to a programme printed in a very readable typeface, with full texts and translations where required, the latter by Catherine Norton herself.  Another excellent feature of the printed programme was that not only were composers’ dates and opus numbers of the songs given where possible, but also the year of composition of the songs, plus the names and dates of the poets.

An eclectic selection of songs about songs, or songs containing songs was a good introduction to what one hopes will become a series of themed recitals.  Included in the mix of singers were cicadas, a donkey, a cricket, a couple of cuckoos, and a nightingale – not to mention the occasional lover, of course.

Elisabeth Harris had the unfortunate task of opening the concert at short notice, with ‘Intrada’ by Gerald Finzi. Some uncertain low notes hardly spoiled the performance of this song (poem by Thomas Traherne) and were understandable in the circumstances.  The voice has matured and become more sonorous since I last heard it.  Catherine Norton was a simply superb accompanist, here and throughout the concert.

Amelia Berry sang a short song, entitled in English translation ‘A new thing’ by Telemann.  A delicious song, it typified Norton’s enterprise in selecting the programme; the words in translation read “Presenting something new, / not after the old tastes, / will depress anyone / who does not hatch anything new himself. / But what kind of slavery is it / to set such narrow limits? / whether it is old, or new, it’s enough if it’s useful and delightful.”

Josquin’s amusing ‘El grillo’ (The cricket) was sung by a quartet of the four School of Music graduates.  Their blend and matching dynamics, pronunciation and excellent diction in this unaccompanied piece allowed the audience to enjoy it amply.

From Mahler’s Des Knaben Wunderhorn, Roger Wilson and Terence Dennis performed ‘Lob des hohen Verstandes’ (translated as ‘In praise of higher understanding’).  This amusing song about a singing contest between a cuckoo and a nightingale, judged by a donkey, had Mahler writing in picturesque style, especially when it came to narrating the donkey’s judgement.  It was performed with much
gusto by these two splendid musicians; a dramatisation could hardly have given us much more.

Amelia Berry returned to perform a Languedoc folk song arranged by Joseph Canteloube in 1948: ‘O up!’  A cuckoo featured again, and a cicada.  The excellent French and the style with which Berry put it over embodied the humour. She sang next a Vaughan Williams song ‘Orpheus with his lute’.  She has great tone throughout her range, and her phrasing and enunciation of words are very pleasing. Sometimes I found her a little too loud for the size of the venue.

Catherine Norton had chosen two songs by men who died 100 years ago this year, during the First World War, one English, one German.  Richard Greager sang ‘To Gratiana dancing and singing’ by William Denis Browne, to words by Richard Lovelace – a fine poem.  In this the accompaniment was particularly lovely – and not easy.  Like Roger Wilson, Greager demonstrated that he continues in good voice, and sang this enchanting music so well that it was hard to remember it was at short notice.

This range of gorgeous songs, some familiar; others not, did not even touch on the most famous song writers, except Wolf; his was the next song: ‘Was für ein Lied soll dir gesungen werden’, sung by Amelia Berry.  Again, her language was extremely good, and she introduced light and shade into her rendition.

A poem ‘Ravenna’ by Herman Hesse was set by Othmar Schoeck, a Swiss composer who died in 1957.  The words revealed that Hesse was not particularly impressed by the town, and the setting was unusual musically.  However, James Henare sang it well in his wonderfully deep bass voice.

Tenor Declan Cudd performed ‘The canticle of night’ by the other war victim, Rudi Stephan.  Cudd was the only one of the singers to perform his song from memory, and his full tenor voice was very lively; his performance had plenty of volume when required, and the song demonstrated yet again that all these composers set their poets’ words very well.

The best-known item was Rachmaninov’s ‘Vocalise’, written in 1915 (another centenary).  Amelia Berry demonstrated superb breath control, and varied her voice and dynamics beautifully.  Catherine Norton brought out the melodic phrases in the accompaniment splendidly.

Richard Greager gave great feeling and expression to the French song ‘Le souvenir d’avoir chanté’ by Reynaldo Hahn.  (Wikipedia gives the date of composition as 1898; the 1888 given in the programme seemed a little improbable, even though Hahn was a child prodigy – he was born in 1874).

The New Zealand element, ‘Synaesthesia’ by David Farquhar, a setting of a poem by Cilla McQueen, was sung by Elisabeth Harris.  The repetitive nature of the  accompaniment and also of the vocal line were part of an effective and commandingly sung item.  Like Berry, Harris has learned to use her resonators well.  And Norton demonstrated that she is well able to work in a huge variety of styles throughout what was only three-quarters of an hour.

The programme ended with a song by American William Bolcom (born 1938): ‘Over the piano’, a cabaret song.  Amelia Berry sang it in suitable style, leaning against the piano and supplying appropriate gestures and facial expressions.  The poem ending with ‘Goodbye’ made it an apt end to the recital, although another was in the programme which could not be performed given the absence of James Clayton.  However it would have been fitting: a Hindemith setting of words by Francis Thompson, beginning “Go, songs, for ended is our brief, sweet play”.

It was a treat to hear a programme like this.  Thanks to all concerned – do it again soon!

 

Moving performances of three Tudor composers by The Tudor Consort

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Tudor Consort conducted by Michael Stewart
Music by three Tudor composers

Robert Wylkynson: Salve Regina and Jesus autem transiens – Creed (Credo in Deum à 13)
John Sheppard: The Lord’s Prayer; I give you a new commandment; Libera nos’, salva nos (I) and (II); In manus tuas; Media vita in morte sumus
Thomas Tallis: If ye love me, keep my commandments; In manus tuas

Cathedral of the Sacred Heart

Saturday 6 June, 7:30 pm

The Tudor Consort returned to its origins with this concert at the Catholic Basilica (as we used to call it). Its focus was on 500 years ago, and two anniversaries. Robert Wylkynson died that year and John Sheppard was born – both approximatrions. Putting it in historic perspective, as Michael Stewart made short introductory remarks that set the scene, Henry VIII had just come to the throne, after his father, the first Tudor king Henry VII died, in 1509.

Wylkynson was a contemporary of early Renaissance composers like Ockeghem and Josquin des Prez and ?lesser English composers like Robert Fayrfax and William Cornish. His career fell largely during the reign of Henry VII (who won the throne with the Battle of Bosworth in 1485), when Catholicism was still the established religion. Though Protestant movements had been challenging many of the doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church for a couple of centuries – for example with translation of the Bible into vernacular languages. Thus his music is suffused with elaborate polyphony, prolonged melismata, in Latin of course.

Though both Tallis and Sheppard were and remained Catholics, both accommodated themselves to the fairly mild musical demands of Henry VIII’s reign, but had to make much more radical changes during the six years of Edward VI’s reign from 1547. He imposed the far more rigorous (and violent) laws of a more thoroughgoing Protestantism, in both doctrine and liturgy, where Latin was decidedly out. Sheppard died at about the last year of Mary I’s reign (1553 – 1558), when determined Catholicism sought to regain lost ground.

Three of the Sheppard anthems and one of Tallis’s were in Latin, so probably pre-1547, while the English settings of the two composers, The Lord’s Prayer, If you love me and I give you a new commandment were written after Edward’s accession.

So it was Wylkynson’s fine Salve Regina that opened; the first words an arresting exclamation, which quickly calmed with a brief solo soprano that led on to the gentle prayer-like, sentimental if you like, body of the poem. They took care with the expressive dynamics available between the subdued men’s parts and the rest, delighting in their command of a lot of high-lying music for the sopranos. There were many details, involving individual voices, and smaller groups within the choir that I’m sure held the audience’s delighted attention.

It was interesting to compare the expansive and rich sounds of this choir, so beautifully adapted to this acoustic with the less comfortable sounds of the Wellington Youth Orchestra a week before, in a space not designed for them.

The second of Wylkynson’s only four surviving works was the Creed, or Credo, the words looking the same as the Credo of the Mass. This one a canon setting for thirteen male voices: Christ moving among the twelve apostles who were ranged around a bare white cloth-covered table; Michael Stewart himself sang Christ. A 1300 reproduction of the apostles illustrated the piece in the programme, with balloons around the relevant words of each. This too was a much more than plain, hymn-like setting, plenty of rhetoric and dramatic detail, clearly conceived to keep the congregation turned on.

That ended Wylkynson’s contribution. Then came English motets, or anthems I suppose, two by Sheppard and one by Tallis. As well as the diktat demanding the liturgy in English, came the edict against fancy musical setting, burdened with decoration and elaborate polyphony. The change was almost shocking: one note to a syllable which meant you get through the text much faster, and the loss of the magic wrought by an only partly understood language. (No doubt a heretical remark, but I suspect shared by many atheists as well as believers).

So we had, not Pater Noster, but ‘Our Father’, and I give you a new commandment by Sheppard, both sung by a reduced choir of around ten, of men and women, again including Stewart as leader and singer. And they were more straight-forward with less variety of dynamics and colour but beautifully balanced and expressive.

In between came Tallis’s beautiful If you love me, keep my commandments, evidently widely known and performed, witness Wikipedia. Though spare in its numbers of voices, detail and clarity made up for volume and density.

Latin returned for the rest of the concert: two settings by Sheppard of Libera nos, salva nos, probably from before 1547. This was the full choir, the harmonies were still rich and dark, the polyphony elaborate, over the bass that pronounced the original cantus firmus, revelling in the Catholic permissiveness; the other setting was shorter, stylistically similar.

Then two settings, one each by Tallis and Sheppard, of In manus tuas, described for those erudite in Catholic liturgy, as ‘a responsory for the late evening service of Compline’ (Compline is the last office of the day in monastic ritual). Here the choir was again stripped back to about 10, and though in Latin, was a more economical and simply moving. The Sheppard version was a little more lyrical, emitting more warmth, more variety in the use of various parts of the choir, men and women separately at times, much of it calm. The men alone brought it to a hushed conclusion.

The biggest work on the programme was Sheppard’s Media vita in morte sumus. It is a Latin antiphon which the composer has embedded in the separate Nunc dimittis, a traditional ‘Gospel Canticle’ of Night Prayer (Compline).

Stewart’s programme note quoted the surmise that its length and emotional intensity suggested something more than mere liturgical purpose; perhaps for a memorial service. So it moves majestically, in meandering harmonies, where certain words, the Responses themselves, were sung with compelling force: ‘Sancte Deus’ …’Sancte fortis’ … ‘Sancte et misericors Salvator’ …  The Nunc Dimittis stood in sharp contrast, sung in plain chant, before the return to the second part of the antiphon which resumed the sustained sense of religious ecstasy of the earlier part. There was a certain sameness after a few minutes, but then a realisation of the unique strength of the composition and its likely impact on listeners in the 16th century.

At the end of this moving performance the choir sang a tribute to Jack Body who had died a fortnight earlier: the fifth of his Five Lullabies, written in 1989.

 

 

Admirable, heart-warming concert closes an inspiring NZSM chamber music weekend

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Combined Final Concert of the 2015 NZSM Queen’s Birthday Chamber Music Weekend
The culmination of the weekend

Adam Concert Room, Victoria University

Monday 1 June, 1:30 pm

The New Zealand School of Music helped keep the Queen’s Birthday road toll down by attracting scores of secondary and tertiary students to a sort of immersion programme that would prepare secondary school competitors in the NZCT Chamber Music Contest and general tuition for chamber music groups in a communal atmosphere, and keep them off the roads.

It had been a busy week for many of the participants, as I noticed the names of about ten of the players in the Wellington Youth Orchestra on Friday evening were among those at this Monday afternoon concert.

The Chamber Music Weekend had coincided and in some way combined with the school of music’s Classical Saxophone Festival, and student saxophonists as well as a couple of tutors contributed to the concert. Otherwise the programme consisted of a series of string and piano trios. While Debbie Rawson led the saxophone section, Helene Pohl and New Zealand String Quartet colleagues Douglas Beilman and Rolf Gjelsten led in the general chamber music area.

The School of Music Saxophone Quartet opened the concert with a couple of pieces that they’d played in the Wednesday concert of the school’s Showcase at St Andrew’s on The Terrace. Excellent individual performances, though I felt that their sound would have coalesced better if they had placed themselves further back from the audience.

Almost all the groups announced their music, some well projected, some not so well; but the practice is very important, for to be a live musician involves more than just musical skill and talent. Delivery: speech comfortably paced; don’t gabble composers’ names and musical terms and titles; make it sound as if you’re really interested.

A string trio was next, by Taneyev (stress on second syllable – Tanyéyev), and played by the eponymous group. Though written early in the 20th century, for two violins and a viola, it sounded remarkably Haydnish, showing little of the influence of Tchaikovsky, his teacher and life-long friend. Here was a creditable performance from a promising young trio of a piece that was not overtly very interesting.

The Alsergrund Trio (cellist Tessa told us that’s the Vienna suburb when Schubert was born), played their namesake’s first piano trio and made a very good job of it, both individually and as an ensemble. Their playing of the first movement was bold and confident, fully justifying their courage in taking on one of the great masterpieces of the repertoire.

It would have come as a pleasant surprise to many to hear the set of three songs by Glinka (we hear too little Russian song), attractively arranged for piano and two violins – the violins making as if the songs really were lovely duets. (I wondered why the title of the three songs was in German: I don’t see a group of Glinka’s songs so-named).  All three players acquitted themselves beautifully.

The first half ended with the opening movement of Smetana’s anguished piano trio in which the oddly named Melodious Thunk (what connection with the great jazz pianist?) captured the drama and the close-to-the-surface emotion. All players were in command of it, though the piano was a bit loud: I was tempted single out cellist Bethany Angus, in particular, but it would be invidious to attempt singling out.

A solo saxophone piece opened the second half: Tomomi Johnston demonstrated an understanding of Piazzolla’s style, and we could hear the breathing challenges that she managed very well.

The rather forgotten but slowly being revived Benjamin Goddard has not been known for much other than his opera Jocelyn; famous for a lovely Berceuse. These movements from Six Duettini, were charming music which the three very young-looking players, called Trio Souvenirs, handled sympathetically and very musically.

The Debussy Trio played his very early and unfamiliar piano trio (only rediscovered in recent years); all three captured the tone of the work, which reflected Fauré’s very strong influence, in a performance of, was it two or three(?), movements. The three players didn’t blend very comfortably, but I suspect the reason lay more with Debussy’s inexperience in his teens; nevertheless they played with impressive confidence and accuracy.

Two of the weekend’s saxophone tutors broke the domination by violins and pianos with three amusing Conversations by Richard Rodney Bennett: two baritone saxophones exhibited accord and sympathy and mild dissent.

To play Saint-Saëns’s second piano trio, a particularly impressive group, named after the composer, awakened me to the first movement of a piece I didn’t know: another persuasive exhibit for the defence and rehabilitation in the court of his reputation.

Finally came the ‘other’ piano trio of Shostakovich; that written when at the Leningrad Conservatorium in 1923. Lyrical, light-hearted though far from straight-forward, with several moments of curious complexity, it has been called “the most romantic music that Shostakovich ever wrote”. It too was revelatory, in the hands of Trio Glivenko (Who? S. fell in love with Tatyana Glivenko as he was recovering from tuberculosis in Crimea, and dedicated the work to her). The trio included two musicians who’d greatly impressed me earlier, Bethany Angus and Claudia Tarrant-Matthews (now at the piano, having been the accomplished violinist in the Debussy), plus the equally talented Shweta Iyer: confidence, in total command.

I had hoped to discover more details about the music, about the groups that performed, where they came from, which ones were competitors in the forthcoming NZCT Chamber Music Contest, which were at university level. And I’d wondered why there were no groups of wind instrument players.

However, this was an admirable initiative which I hope becomes a regular event. School of Music director Euan Murdoch remarked during the interval that the high achievement of young New Zealanders in the field of chamber music is admired internationally. The work of Chamber Music New Zealand and the various programmes undertaken with the universities, particularly Victoria, are helping compensate for the increasing neglect of the arts in general, and classical music in particular, by most primary and secondary schools.

 

A new Baroque ensemble on a cold evening at Wesley Church, Taranaki Street, musical strengths, but…

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Camerata: Haydn in the Church

Handel: Concerto Grosso, Op.6 no.9
Alessandro Marcello: Oboe concerto in D minor
Haydn:. Symphony no.1

Camerata, led by Anne Loeser, with Peter Dykes (oboe)

Wesley Church, Taranaki Street

Thursday, 28 May 2015, 5.45pm

Camerata is a new, small chamber orchestra.  Anne Loeser is a violinist in the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, where Peter Dykes also plays.  For the first item, the group consisted of four violins, viola, cello and double bass; only the latter two instruments were played by males (not counting Peter Dykes).

Its programme was attractive, but the hour-long concert did not attract any more than a small audience.  Other negatives were the lack of a printed programme, and above all, the fact that the church was not heated.  On a cold winter’s night, that made the experience much less enjoyable than it should have been.  I was tempted to leave between items on this account alone; my feet, neck and hands were very cold, despite a woolly jumper and a thick coat.

The Handel concerto grosso is a most appealing work.  I did not hear all the introductory comments from the lectern, although there seemed to be some connection with the composer’s organ concerto that is usually given the subtitle ‘The Cuckoo and the Nightingale’.  Perhaps it was too cold a night for these birds; I was not aware of them.  Wikipedia says “The second and third movements are reworkings of the first two movements Handel’s organ concerto in F major, HWV 295, often referred to as “The cuckoo and the nightingale”, because of the imitation of birdsong.

The playing was fine, and idiomatically baroque.  The contrasts between the movements was delightful.  The fast final movement was not quite as accurate as the earlier ones.

Next, oboist Peter Dykes entered, to play Marcello’s oboe concerto – the one commandeered by Bach for a harpsichord concerto (no.3).  This was splendid oboe playing, with appropriate ornamentation according to the practice of the Baroque period.  Marcello was roughly contemporaneous with J.S. Bach.  The adagio slow movement is particularly beautiful.

After its solemnity comes the delightful third movement, presto.  Again, lots of flourishes ornamented the movement gloriously.  The piece is not easy; it is pitched high in the oboe register throughout.

Then came the Haydn in the Church: his Symphony no.1.  Now two horn players were added to the chamber orchestra.  I could hazard a guess at their names, but as one was hidden behind the viola player, I couldn’t be sure.

This is a very bright and enchanting work.  The oboe and horns play in the first and third movements but not in the andante second movement.  The whole was played gracefully with a splendid variety of dynamics. In the second movement for strings alone, I couldn’t help remembering the Baroque Players of old, founded and directed by Peter Walls – a former Wellington-based chamber orchestra.

Intonation was not always perfect, particularly in this movement.  I wondered if the players’ fingers were cold.

The presto finale had the winds back in fine fettle. Altogether, this was a series of creditable performances.  More credit would have accrued if the church had been heated.

 

The strings of the School of Music take turn with wonderful Bach programme for St Andrew’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand School of Music Showcase Week at St Andrew’s

The string players in an all-Bach programme

Violin sonata No 1 in G minor, BWV 1001 – Adagio played by Katie-Lee Taylor
           Fugue played by Matt Cook
Cello suite No 2 in D minor, BWV 1008 – Prelude played by Olivia Wilding
Violin Partita No 3 in E, BWV 1006, Loure and Gavotte en rondeau – played by Grace Stainthorpe
Brandenburg Concerto No 3 in G, BWV 1048 played by the above students plus 15 others

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Thursday 28 May, 12:15 pm

This was the last of the four concerts devoted to student players from the university School of Music.  Perhaps in future years we’ll also have concerts from woodwind and brass players, and singers, even organists and harpsichordists and percussionists; but these four have shown that it’s possible to attract good audiences more than just once a week. The limitation is no doubt the level of energy that the unpaid concert manager Marjan van Waardenberg can call up, and the availability of the church. (And it also should be pointed out that all musicians perform unpaid at the lunchtime concerts).

The first half hour of the concert was taken up with individual violinists and a cellist playing movements from Bach’s unaccompanied suites and sonatas.

Violinists Katie-Lee Taylor and Matt Cook began playing, in turn, the first two movements, Adagio
and Fugue, from the first violin sonata, in G minor. It was an admirable performance of the Adagio, with all the signs of careful tutorial guidance and music intuition on Taylor’s part, scrupulous attention to dynamics and the shaping or ornaments. There was interesting variety of tone and an organic feeling of life as if the music was breathing.

While she had played with the score before her, Matt Cook played from memory and paid a small price for that in the middle of what is certainly a difficult and complex fugue; so his courage and demeanour were to be admired in his recovery and persistence, though the experience somewhat affected the freedom and elasticity of his playing for a little while. The audience applauded him warmly.

Another minor key piece was the choice of Olivia Wilding – the Prelude from the second cello suite in D minor. Her handling of the bow created a lovely tone, mellow (at one point I craned my head to see whether she had put a mute on) and varied in dynamics, and she allowed herself attractive freedom in her tempi. She used a score.

Grace Stainthorpe ended the solo section of the concert with the Loure and the most popular movement from the violin sonatas and suites, the Gavotte en rondeau, from the third partita. Bravely, she dispensed with the score, with only a minor glitch during the Gavotte. Her playing was careful, and like the others, showed fastidious attention to its phrasing and rhythms, though I thought she might have exploited her opportunities for emphatic bowing occasionally.

There was a lot of stage rearrangement to accommodate the full ensemble – the five cellos (though six were named in the programme) arrayed at the front while violins flanked the violas in the middle of the back row.

While a couple of programmes in this series taxed their audiences (and themselves) by playing unfamiliar music, the strings made no apologies for playing great music, most of which was pretty well known by the average lunchtime-concert-goer. Few works are more loved than the Brandenburg concertos, and No 3 might well be at the top. The music might have almost played itself, but there was no missing the special affection that the players managed to convey in their buoyant, spirited performance. Professor Donald Maurice conducted and he introduced the concerto briefly to draw attention to the Calvinist environment of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen where Bach composed this and much other instrumental music. There was no choir or organ, but a musical Prince who valued Bach who wrote little other than instrumental music for the court.

Maurice noted that the non-existent middle, slow movement was to be supplied by a cadenza played by the orchestra leader, Laura Barton and it was indeed a chance for another excellent solo presentation, involving a splendid crescendo.  Much of the liveliness and warmth of the performance was inspired by Maurice’s expansive, richly expressive conducting, with plenty of cues; whether it did or not for the players, it contributed a fine visual element that the audience enjoyed, and applauded enthusiastically.

 

Revival of Victoria Voices for all-comers a welcome return

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

New Zealand School of Music Te Koki

Music by Mozart, Fauré, Seiber, Hatfield, Krommer, Saint-Saëns

Victoria Voices, conducted by Robert Legg; chamber music ensembles

Hunter Council Chamber, Victoria University of Wellington

Wednesday, 27 May 2015, 7.30pm

The varied programme was presented to a modest-sized audience.

Victoria Voices  was promoted as a new ensemble, but in a sense it is a revival; the School of Music has had choirs before, but not for a number of years.  Of course, the students in it were probably not in its predecessors. There are approx. 50 singers in this all-comers choir of students and staff from various faculties of the university (previous incarnations were auditioned).

Conductor Robert Legg spoke to the audience, but it was a pity he didn’t tell us a little about the less familiar composer: Stephen Hatfield (19156-). Wikipedia tells me that he is a Canadian choral composer and conductor.  His website contains many plaudits.

Legg was very much in charge of the choir, and drew from its members a very pleasing tone, excellent Latin pronunciation in Mozart’s well-known and well-loved Ave Verum Corpus (K.618), together with a most musical performance.  He needs to be aware that too much physical movement from the conductor is distracting for audiences, particularly bending at the knees frequently.  The piano accompaniment from Chelsea Whitfield could have been a little softer.

Fauré’s Cantique de Jean Racine (Op.11) was written when the composer was only 19 years old.  It is a very lovely piece, and delightful to sing.  Here, particularly, the dynamics were well managed, with good attention to detail, but there is yet insufficient blend.

Mátyás Seiber’s  Three Hungarian Folk Songs, the first of which is repeated after the second song, were sung in English, which enabled the audience to understand the humorous words.  These songs, plus the following item, were sung unaccompanied.  There was good attack and articulation in the Seiber, in both words and notes.  The choir obviously has learned the music well, and sang in an appropriately spirited manner.  Here again, the tone was engaging, and now the blend was better.

The Hatfield piece, Living in a Holy City, began in unison – this is often dangerous territory, but the choir managed it well.  This quite complex music was written in multiple parts as the piece
moved on.

Although there were breaks in the programme, there was no interval; this was rather too long a concert to leave the audience sitting without an opportunity to stretch the legs!

Promoted as the launch concert of Victoria Voices, it nevertheless seemed to me that the chamber music content was rather larger than the choral.

The first chamber music item was actually two: Oboe Quartets by Franz Krommer (1759-1831).  I did not completely hear the spoken introduction, but heard that there were four movements; it appeared that there were four movements in total, so perhaps not all of each quartet was played.  The first began as quite straightforward music; the oboe playing was very fine and the violin good, but not always on the spot intonation-wise.  The lower parts seemed relatively easy to play. There was an attractive tone from all players.  A movement in a minor key was played very expressively, and playing passages with detached notes was done with considerable delicacy.

The final quick movement was very will articulated.  This was playing of a high standard, of music that was not the most complicated, but there were tricky passages.  Annabel Lovatt (oboe), Grace Stainthorpe (violin), Craig Drummond-Nairn (viola) and Elena Morgan (cello) performed with considerable accomplishment.

France was to the fore in the rest of the programme, firstly with Nicole Ting (piano), Matthew Cook (violin) and Lavinnia Rae (cello) playing two movements of Piano Trio no.2, Op.92 of Saint-Saëns
(Fauré’s teacher).

In the opening section the piano-playing was far too blurred (i.e. too much pedal), and had neither enough clarity nor sufficient volume to match with the other instruments.  The strings were strong and confident, with good dynamic range; the players had the feel of the work.  The piano came into its own in later loud passages, and then the players really became a trio.  Themes were treated in subtle fashion.

The second movement featured a gorgeous opening theme from the violin, followed by the piano.  Later, the cello took it up sonorously.  There was much fast finger-work for the piano, with very quiet pizzicato accompaniment from the strings.  The movement had plenty of variety, rhythmically as well as melodically.

Now to the pupil: Fauré’s Nocturne and En Prière for violin (Laura Barton) and harp (Michelle Velvin).  What could be more French than the harp?   Michelle wore a short dress, and thus the audience could see her feet changing the pedals.  It was a slow piece but both performers played it very well.

The second piece, like the first, required a lot of independence in the parts; both players produced gorgeous tone.

The Saint-Saëns Fantaisie for violin and harp was understated, but full of meditative gestures, and some drama as well. The two young women (in red dresses, as against the dull black of the other instrumentalists) are both fine musicians.  There was lots of double-stopping for the violin and glissandi for the harp.  It was quite a long work, and seemed to me to run out of inspiration.  However, the playing revealed great rapport between the musicians, and they did the piece proud.

Music of all kinds is in good heart at the School of Music, as this week’s numbers of concerts reveals.

 

Ensembled delights from the NZSM Saxophones at St.Andrew’s

Posted on by Peter Mechen

St.Andrews Lunchtime Concert Series 2015
Te Kōkī New Zealand School of Music Saxophone Orchestra

The players:
Ryan Hall, Reuben Chin (soprano sax)
Genevieve Davidson, Laura Brown (alto sax)
Giles Reid, Elizabeth Hocking, Nick Walshe (tenor sax)
Graham Hanify, Kim Hunter, Simon Brew (Baritone sax)
Director – Debbie Rawson

The music:

ASTOR PIAZZOLLA – Tango Suite for Saxophone Quartet
ROGER MAY – Sax Circus for Saxophone Orchestra
PHILIP BUTTALL – Eclogue for Saxophone Orchestra
ANTONIN DVORAK (arr. Doug. O’Connor)

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

 Wednesday 27th May 2015

There’s more “classical” music written for the saxophone than you might think exists – after all the instrument has been around since 1846, and as such is more “established ” than its twentieth-century prominence in jazz might suggest. Still, there remains an “exoticism” about the instrurment’s particular sound for classically-attuned ears such as mine(!), and one which I find particularly exciting whenever I hear it, be it solo, in a chamber ensemble or in an orchestral context.

So, I found myself looking forward to the NZ School of Music’s Saxophone Orchestra presentation at St.Andrew’s. I wasn’t REALLY expecting to hear my favourite pieces for the instrument, Eric Coates’s Saxo-Rhapsody, and the opening movement of Sergei Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances, with its haunting middle  section “owned” by the instrument – both, after all, have orchestral accompaniment. But I was hoping for something comparably luscious, albeit on a smaller scale.

The concert began with Astor Piazzolla’s Tango Suite, played by a sax quartet, two movements of Latin “soul”, at the outset with lovely, distinctive timbres, particularly the lower echelons – a gentle melancholy, wistful in character, the music embroiled in what sounded like some private emotion. The players balanced everything beautifully, allowing the middle voices their easeful, engaging trajectories, the phrasings never having to be forced or over-cooked to make the music’s point.

Though hearing Debbie Rawson’s spoken introductions  was a difficulty in the venue with a microphone that was a “sometimes thing”, I did register the programmme rearrangement from what was printed – so that we got Roger May’s madcap Sax Circus next, three additional players appearing like Cheshire Cats for the performance, and immediately making their mark with a kind of jolly circus opening to the music.

Enormous fun was generated on both sides of the performer/listener divide, poking huge holes in the gauze through which the sounds galloped and romped and our appreciation (I’m sure) registered. Our popcorn was forgotten as we were regaled by a baritone sax kick-starting a rumbustious gallop, which divertingly morphed into subsidiary episodes, as far-removed as elephantine ploddings, but returned us to the energies of the opening by the end.

Philip Buttall’s Eclogue restored our sonic equilibriums with the piece’s patiently-unfolding, almost ceremonial tapestries of sound, giving the soprano sax the melody atop beautifully-balanced osmotic harmonies. Then it was the alto saxes’ turn with the tune, as the sopranos counterpointed with high-wire variants – all very beautiful and deeply-felt.

To conclude the programme came an arrangement of the Dvorak Serenade for Winds, the work of somebody called Doug O’Connor – and even more players turned up for this item! So it was a very merry company indeed, which began the work, led by Debbie Rawson, the opening Tempo di Marcia barely able to contain itself in the excitement of the occasion. Amid all the thrusting energies I did feel it all needed a bit more “Moderato”, as something of the music’s bucolic swagger was sacrificed at such an insistent tempo. With the movement’s coda came the breadth that I was hanging out for, a glow settling over the playing, the musicians given the elbow-room to voice their phrases beautifully, right to the end.

The following Minuetto had all the grace and charm necessary for the music to bloom, the ensemble creating some lovely colours, and beautifully droll accompaniments, readily evoking the dance – but wow! – at what a lick the music’s “trio” section was taken! – hats off to the players for managing their notes without falling off the musical tightrope! Exciting, but for me just a bit of a blur, more breathless than truly exhilarating – to my mind relying a little too much on sheer speed rather than rhythmic “pointing” to be truly delicious!

This arrangement having omitted the original work’s Andante con moto movement, the players went straight into the Allegro molto finale – here most thankfully not rushed off its feet, but at a tempo that gave the players time to articulate their phrases with a sense of fun, rather than sheer desperation – the main tune was jolly and rumbustiously delivered, and the “gurgling” accompaniments were a delight! I was reminded of the story I heard of a wind player’s remark about playing Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloe, that “you just waggle your fingers and hope for the best!”. But these young players seemed to have no such fears, so exuberant and whole-hearted were their own finger-wagglings!

Dvorak’s marvellous finale has as well, of course, a delicious accelerando passage, a quasi-pompous return to the work’s opening, and an exciting coda, complete with stirring fanfares, all of which were delivered with great élan. So, it was pretty wonderful stuff from the ensemble, the student musicians having obviously, from this showing, been expertly schooled, and thus made ready to take their instruments and make a great and pleasing noise in the world.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NZSM Piano Students impress at St.Andrew’s

Posted on by Peter Mechen

St.Andrews Lunchtime Concert Series 2015
Te Kōkī New Zealand School of Music Piano Students

Joy Sun – BEETHOVEN : Piano Sonata No.18 in E-flat Op.31 No.3 (Ist Mvt.)
SCHUMANN-LISZT – Widmung

Choong Park – RACHMANINOV – Piano Sonata No.2  (Ist.Mvt.)

Hana Kim – SCHUBERT – Impromptu Op.90 No.2 in E-flat

Nicole Ting – BEETHOVEN – Piano Sonata No.30 in E Op.109 (Mvts. I and II)
CHOPIN – Scherzo No.2 Op.31

Xing Wang – DEBUSSY – Children’s Corner (Suite)

(NZSM Piano tutor: Jian Liu)

St Andrew’s on-the-Terrace, Wellington

Tuesday 26th May 2015

What a pianistic feast this was! – more appropriately so for a lunchtime concert, with nothing given us that was too large-scale or difficult to digest easily. Which is not to suggest that the repertoire chosen by the students was anything less than challenging, both technically and interpretatively.

Each of the performers impressed with their intense involvement in the music-making – I felt they all to a creditable extent made music from “inside” their particular pieces, and conveyed a sense both of enjoyment of detail and awareness of the music’s overall “reach”, allowing each quality to readily speak.In every instance the music’s “character” was to some degree conveyed most readily.

I was unaccountably hampered during the concert by not having a pen that worked, and was thus unable to make notes as “reminders” for later – my apologies if my remarks seem not as detailed as is usually the case. Fortunately each of the students had a distinct “way” with his or her playing, which I found helpful as well as refreshing and exciting.

Joy Sun began the concert with a sympathetic and sensitive reading of the first movement of Beethoven’s Op.18 E-flat Sonata. She shaped the music beautifully, giving the impression of “going with” the work’s explorations as much as driving the music’s course herself – nothing was unduly forced, and her aspect at the keyboard was fluid and organic.

I was similarly impressed with her shaping of Liszt’s equally loved-as-maligned transcription of Schumann’s song “Widmung”, stressing the poetry and lyricism ahead of the music’s more obviously virtuoso aspects, especially in the latter stages. Her building up towards the “grand manner” from the central episode’s gentleness was nicely managed, as was the work’s quietly-ecstatic conclusion.

More poetry, this time of a brooding, Slavic kind came from the expert fingers of Choong Park, playing the opening allegro agitato from Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Sonata. It all came to life in this performance most vividly, from the opening downward plunge, through the gentler D Major episodes, before building up to the tremendous evocations of churchbells that were a trademark of the composer. Choong Park seemed completely at home in the work’s textures, and his patient unfolding of the music suited the piece’s improvisatory aspect, allowing it to unfold as night follows day.

A welcome antidote to such intensities was provided by the sparking, rippling performance by Hana Kim of Schubert’s delectable Impromptu Op.90 No.2 in E-flat. One or two tiny hesitations apart, the pianist kept the “spin” of the piece going most beguilingly throughout. She allowed the more declamatory “trio” section enough heft and space to point the contrasts before gliding, gossamer-like back into the reprise of the diaphanously-woven opening.

As with the recital’s first two items, the contrast with the next pianist and repertoire (Beethoven’s Op.109) was almost palpable. Nicole Ting was a “big” player with grandly-conceived gestures, some of which provided thrills and spills of an almost palpable order, though nothing unremarkable in the context of the pianist requiring the music to achieve its fantastic, virtuoso character. What inaccuracies and breakdowns there were in her playing could have been attributed to nerves as much as a “throwing caution to the winds” aspect (which I really enjoyed), and certainly didn’t conceal the fact that she “knew” how the music ought to go, even if she occasionally snatched at phrases in the Op.109’s second movement. I relished the wholeheartedness of her playing amid all of the thrills and spills.

And the Chopin Scherzo which followed was a tour de force – here was a young player already “tagging” these classic pieces of music as if wanting to create a brave new world of her own. Once more I felt invigorated by her approach, being put in touch by her with the piece’s originality and power and inherent danger. Of course, one can achieve these things with a lower attrition rate than here, and I would hope she would be able to eventually achieve even more “finish” in her presentations – though ideally, not at the expense of those qualities which enable the listener to sit up and take notice of what the music is actually trying to say.

Finally, fluent, and sparking playing of a high order was given us by Xing Wang, with Debussy’s delectable “Children’s Corner” Suite. Apart from a tendency to rush the music in places (she made, for me, a little too much of the “mechanus” aspect of “Dr.Gradus ad Parnassum” and could have entrusted the effect more to the tongue-in-cheek aspect of the music’s natural “spin”, rather than to speed) she evoked these childhood vignettes with real feeling,  dreaming sweet dreams with Jimbo, for example, and also dancing exuberantly with the snowflakes.

Again, I thought Golliwog’s Cakewalk a bit too mechanical – there’s a delicious drollery to be found in these rhythms which she will one day take the risk and put her trust in, and not perhaps feel the need to crank the piece along quite so much, which includes more playfulness in the piece’s ending.

Piano tutor Jian Liu expressed his pleasure to me at the recital’s end in working with these students – he was obviously proud of what they’d achieved, and of what they’d be able to go on and do, just as surely. The students’ enjoyment of and imaginative individual approach to what they played, was, I thought, a great and nicely-realised tribute to his tutorship and own example.

 

 

 

 

Guitar students deliver impressive performances in spite of relative inexperience in tough field

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand School of Music Showcase Week at St Andrew’s

NZSM Classical Guitar Ensemble (Joel Baldwin, Toby Chadwick, Jake Church, Amber Madriaga, Lucinda Ng, Emma Sandford, Royden Smith, Dylan Solomon, George Wills)
and the NZSM Classical Guitar Quartet (Church, Smith, Solomon, Wills)

Music by Tylman Susato, Andrew York, Piazzolla and Jürg Kindle (the Ensemble); and Bizet and Boccherini (the Quartet)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Monday 25 May, 12:15 pm

The first of the four programmes arranged by the enterprising manager of the St Andrew’s lunchtime concerts, Marjan van Waardenberg, with the New Zealand School of Music in an effort to draw more particular attention to the school’s contribution to Wellington, downtown.

As was to be expected, the audience was somewhat smaller than that for the usual Wednesday concerts, but it was by no means an embarrassment. Guitars, though still not quite classical mainstream, have a strong appeal, especially when they play music that has survived in the repertoire for a century or so, including much music of the Hispanic world that seems to invite transcription ‘back’ for the instrument that probably inspired its creation: Albeniz, Falla, Barrios, Villa-Lobos, Tarrega, Brouwer…

This programme really offered none of that, apart from a transcription of Piazzolla’s Primavera Porteña. It opened with a set of three Renaissance dances by Tylman (Tielman) Susato who lived from around 1515 to 1570. (So this might be around his 500th birthday). He was a calligrapher and printer in Antwerp, the first in the Netherlands to use moveable type for printing music. Antwerp was a leading centre of printing in the first century after its invention by Gutenberg. (Last year I spent a fascinating three or four hours in the Plantin-Moretus Museum of printing in Antwerp).

Susato was also a composer of motets and masses as well as chansons and dances, either arranged or original tunes. Here we had dances: a Pavane, Gaillard and Ronde. Their arrangement left the Pavane in what I felt was a somewhat ponderous state, though dynamics were carefully and enjoyably studied; the triple time Gaillard and the more lively Ronde, felt better adapted for dancing.

Andrew York’s two pieces were quietly interesting, the first, Pop, starting with chords that hinted at Theodorakis’s sirtaki, or hasapiko, from Zorba the Greek, but soon went its own way. Brajamazil had a comparably quiet pulse, that used the eight-part ensemble in two parts, one providing a repeated riff, under a tune that varied somewhat; all played with the same care for ensemble as the set of Susato dances. It may have been the acoustic, but I missed something of a resonant bass that might have underlain the rather uniform quality of the whole ensemble.

Piazzolla’s Primavera Porteña (originally for bandoneon, violin and guitar I suppose) is an attractive and fairly well-known piece, partly in triple time, but often rhythmically obscure (to me), which the ensemble played skilfully. Finally, a couple of pieces by a composer I had not heard of, Jürg Kindle, entitled Funky and Techno, which Jane Curry suggested (if I heard correctly) represented a style of music that had only brief vogue. Funky needed precision, solid rhythm as well as a certain freedom; it was rather a work in progress.

Techno perhaps suffered from the limitations of what it was imitating, but the attempt to invest it with a little sophistication left it somewhat morbid.

The large ensemble was then replaced by a quartet of the four more advanced players. They played arrangements of three of the dances from Carmen, which had the advantage of deriving, at least, from the home of the guitar. Rhythms were reasonably lively though again they suffered through the care and restraint with which they were played. The first, Aragonese, essentially a rather elegant, restrained dance, was the least handicapped by that sobriety; so it expressed that dignity quite well. But the Seguidilla which Carmen dances in high frustration as she faces Jose’s timidity, his overwhelming fear of letting go, his sense of duty to the army, was a tough one. At this stage, these players were not really up to capturing the sexuality that the dance expresses.

They ended with an Introduction and Fandango by Boccherini which lay quite well for the guitars. Though the Introduction passed without much impact, the Fandango came off well since it was drawn from the famous guitar quintet La retirata di Madrid. Throughout, their obvious pains over notation precision and dynamics were always conspicuous, and the performances showed proper attention to the basic challenges that face players of this instrument, in these not always very rewarding pieces, from which there is nowhere to hide.

 

An evening’s enjoyment of wonderful things in Lower Hutt

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Hutt Valley Chamber Music presents:
Vesa-Matti Leppänen (violin)
Julia Joyce (viola)
Andrew Joyce (‘cello)
Diedre Irons (piano)

HAYDN – String Trio in G Major Op.53 No.1
FRANCK – Sonata for Violin and Piano (1886)
BRAHMS – Piano Quartet in C Minor Op.60

Little Theatre, Lower Hutt

Monday 25th May, 2015

The programme devised for this concert certainly made the most of the music and the performers, as well as pleasing the audience no end – having works for variously two, three and four musicians provided plenty of variety, while the performances established and maintained levels of skill, intensity, beauty and enjoyment that would have graced a recital platform anywhere in the world.

On the face of things, hardest-working of the quartet of musicians was violinist Vesa-Matti Leppänen, usually concertmaster of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, but here as fully involved in duo, trio and quartet partnerships, his playing a common and unifying thread throughout the evening’s music.

And what colleagues he had! – two of his orchestral colleagues, both (like Vesa-Matti) leaders of their particular sections in the NZSO, violist Julia Joyce and ‘cellist Andrew Joyce (partners in real life, of course), and the incomparable Diedre Irons at the piano – all, incidentally, local musicians!

The Haydn Trio began with a variation movement, lovely, lilting phrases, the dance firmly, but also winningly characterized – the composer again and again showed his inventiveness in creating delightful discourses from such deceptively simple material, with each instrument getting its chance to cheekily counterpoint the basic, unprepossessing theme. Then in the second and final movement, the pace quickened to a scamper, punctuated by pauses and dynamic contrasts – now tender and touching, now brilliant and decorative, the trio’s teamwork exemplary.

A good thing I’ve never grown tired of hearing Cesar Franck’s deservedly well-loved Violin Sonata – because, despite its technical difficulties and emotional “stretches” it regularly comes up in recital programs. Here, for me, the most fascinating aspect of the performance was the interaction of what might have seemed like two temperamentally different musicians, charged by cosmic circumstance with bringing the work to life.

While admiring the elegance and skill of Vesa-Matti Leppänen’s violin playing on the occasions I’ve heard him demonstrate his art, I’ve always though of him as a cool, somewhat detached and “contained” player – different sorts of qualities one would expect of an ideal interpreter of this work. And now, here he was, about to perform it with a colleague whom I’ve long regarded as one of music’s greatest and warmest communicators, pianist Diedre Irons.

As it turned out, each player was a near-perfect “foil” for the other in this music – and in any case the composer’s history as a “young virtuoso lion” of the keyboard meant that the writing’s focus often swung towards the pianist – no mere “violin with accompaniment” with this work! This fusion of styles I thought enriched the performance, with whole episodes seemingly given over to each player’s strengths and beautifully weighted by both in overall terms.

What did delight me the most, however, was hearing the violinist respond to his partner’s red-blooded manner at appropriate places – so full measure was given to the exhilaration of the second movement’s concluding measures, as well as the “deeply-dug” recitatives and the inwardness of the introspections in the slow movement. And I loved Vesa-Matti’s “full-bow” treatment of the return of that movement’s “big tune” in the finale – which moment, of course, Diedre Irons’ playing magnificently orchestrated, before scampering back down the hills towards the more circumspect undulations of the opening, and the ritual of its final canonic dance.

All hands came upon deck for the evening’s final work, Brahms’ epic C Minor Piano Quartet. Though this was the third such work written by the composer, and with a later opus number than its companions, the three quartets were sketched out at the same time – the C Minor work reflects Brahms’ involvement with the Schumanns, Robert and Clara, from the time that Robert had been committed to the asylum.

Brahms took twenty years to work through his various and contradictory feelings regarding what the music was trying to express. Originally set in C#Minor, the work’s key was changed to C Minor, Brahms developing his feelings from those of a hopeless lover (C#Minor was E.T.A.Hoffman’s famous character Kreisler, one whose influence on Schumann was evident in his piano suite “Kreisleriana”), to heroism amid struggle (exemplified by Beethoven’s frequent use of C Minor). These two feelings make themselves known, cheek-to-jowl, right at the pieces’ beginning, with the piano’s octaves (forceful expression) and the string’s “dying fall” motif perhaps representing characters in the drama to follow.

Drama it certainly was here, in huge shovelfuls, with powerful outbursts of concerted energy having their say, before giving way to a beautifully-extended and lyrical second group, weaving the opening descending figure into the argument in both minor and major modes, as well as contrasting the tragic with the heroic. The players, together and separately, conjured up massive trenchant utterances in contrast to the tenderness they also found in more lyrical moments, a beautiful exchange between viola and violin causing the piano to sing with the utmost pleasure in response.

The piano leapt first into the scherzo’s fray before the others took the plunge – though the music seemed uncertain whether to exult or snarl in places, the group roller-coastered all of us up and over the movement’s formidable hill-crests in exhilarating style. And no sooner had we regained our breath than the loveliest ‘cello-playing one could imagine was upon our ears courtesy of Andrew Joyce, introducing the slow movement with sounds that fell as gratefully as sunbeams on previously storm-tossed flowers of the fields.

Vesa-Matti Leppänen’s violin then added to our pleasure with its own voice  extending the melody in duet with the ‘cello. Not to be left out, the viola deftly and mellifluously duetted with each of its string-partners, Julia Joyce’s tones as transparent as a violin’s in places, and as mellow and mysterious as a cello’s in others. And Diedre Irons surely and sweetly marked the  piano’s place in the movement’s “continuous melody” by a tenderly-phrased reprise of the melody as sensitive and atmospheric as any.

Urgency and anxiety drove the ensemble at the finale’s beginning, the piano’s “perpetuo mobile” breaking off only momentarily for some hymn-like chords from the strings which were picked up and swept away once again in the maelstrom of it all. The players caught the “throes” of the music at its heart, by turns skittish and impulsive, with the sinuous lines frequently losing their momentum and having to regroup their energies – what intensities were carried through by the drive of the piano figurations and the sonorous string utterances!

One felt at the end a kind of “haunted relief” in the music, besides some Brahmsian exultation – ironically, the kind of ambivalence that Schumann would have recognized, as befitted his own struggles with life and art. A great and moving performance, then, of stirring, deeply-etched music, part of a rich and variegated evening’s enjoyment of wonderful things.