Category: Reviews – Concerts

Lucy Gijsbers shines in ‘cello recital at St.Andrew’s

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St Andrew’s Lunchtime Concert Series

Duo Cecilia: Lucy Gijsbers, cello; Andrew Atkins, piano

Prokofiev: Sonata for Cello and Piano in C major, Op.119 (1949)
Andante Grave, Moderato.
Beethoven: Sonata No.21 in C Major “Waldstein”: Allegro con brio
Liszt: Concert Etude in D flat major “Un sospiro”
Kapustin: Nearly Waltz Op.98 (1999)

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 25th March 2015

The first two movements of Prokofiev’s Op.119, chosen to start this programme, put Lucy Gijsbers straight into the limelight from the word go. The beautifully crafted phrases and full throated, rich sound she drew from the lower register of the cello in the opening solo bars showed immediately what an accomplished musician she is. Likewise as she moved up the register in the later reflective episodes, her tone was sweet and warm. The duo shaped the mood in those recurring sections with poetic sensitivity, working with one mind to craft the melodies. This made the contrast very effective when they attacked the allegro interludes with real vigour and a sense of the dramatic. But unfortunately, when the dynamic rose above forte, the pianist simply swamped the cello part. It was a mistake to attempt this work on full piano stick; worst of all it caused the sweeping dynamism and passion of the closing cello passagework to be swallowed up in a maelstrom of concert grand fortissimo. The same problem persisted in forte sections of the Moderato; but at other times the duo captured its lively, puckish mood very effectively, and provided a beautiful contrast in the slow melodic bars. Prokofiev’s startling false harmonics in the coda melody were superbly executed by Lucy Gijsbers – you could have heard a pin drop as the final notes evaporated into the barrel vault.

Andrew Atkins had clearly put a lot of work into the Beethoven movement, but I’m afraid I felt disappointed. That was because he seemed to interpret Beethoven’s direction of allegro con brio to mean “extra fast” allegro. But the term means simply “with spirit, energy, vigour”. The busy, repetitive opening idioms started too fast for clarity and the later cascading runs were further rushed in a number of places. The dramatic sweeping passagework that recurs throughout this movement was doubtless designed around Beethoven’s legendary skills at the keyboard. It requires crystal clear execution and nuance to express the melodic structure concealed in the subtle complexity. There is an amazing musical architecture in there that is all too readily lost in those huge handfuls of notes, and sadly that is what happened here. The Listz was better controlled in the opening piano section, but the fast centralforte section was again too hectic to come across satisfactorily.

Beethoven made a habit of spending time in the countryside, away from his keyboard and quill pen, throughout his life, and this somehow permeates his composition despite its extraordinary demands and complexity. Our local version may needs be the New Zealand bush, but every performer must somehow tap into this dimension, and this is what I hankered for here.

Kapustin’s Nearly Waltz for piano-cello duo opens with a disarming rhythm that alternates almost randomly between 5/4 and 3/4. The duo picked up on its lively whimsical mood with just the right touch, although later forteinterludes again suffered from too much piano volume. However, this capricious three minute gem was wrapped up with a delightful final phrase, finishing in high register with the music simply floating away……It was a great way to finish an interesting and varied programme that was clearly appreciated by the audience.

There are a couple of issues the duo needs to work on if they are to optimise their professional profile. Firstly, the programme information provided was far from satisfactory – only composers and titles were given; no opus numbers, keys, or movement designations. And secondly, an adequate assessment of a venue’s acoustics before each performance must surely go without saying. Every concert room is unique, and performers must play the acoustics just as they play their instruments. A failure to do so can lead to serious imbalance, and no professional musician wants to court that hazard.

 

 

Brief and benign “Spanish Disquisition” on St.Andrews’ Chamber Organ

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

St.Andrews Lunchtime Concert Series:
Spanish organ music from the Renaissance to the Baroque
Ephraim Wilson (organ)

Cabezón: ‘Dic Nobis Maria
Victoria: ‘Sancta Maria succurre miseris’
De Aguilera de Heredia: Tiento Lleno based on ‘Salve Regina’
Bruna: Tiento del segundo tono … Sobre la Letania de la Virgen
Cabanilles: Tiento Lleno

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

 Wednesday, 18 March 2015, 12.15pm

Although relatively short, and not well attended, the organ recital was interesting, in that it introduced an organist new to most of us, was played entirely on the small baroque organ, and consisted almost entirely of Spanish organ music, which I am sure was new to everyone in the audience.

Pedals were not part of the design of Spanish organs (or indeed many others) at the period covered by the programme: Renaissance to Baroque. So we had a total of one pedal note in the entire programme; that in the last piece, by Cabanilles.

After explanatory remarks about the programme, Wilson played the short ‘Dic nobis Maria’ by Antonio de Cabezón (1510-1566). His articulation of ornamentation was very fine, but at the beginning the tempo was rather uneven.

Tomás Luis de Victoria (c.1548-1611) was the most famous of the composers featured. As Wilson’s programme note stated, his complex style of writing created emotional intensity, not a common feature (to modern ears, anyway) of earlier music. Here a little more separation of repeated notes would have been desirable, especially in the melody lines.

The remaining pieces were in the form of ‘Tiento Lleno’, which Wilson described as a Spanish musical form analogous to the fantasia in other traditions, but also having elements of the toccata. The first one, based on the Salve Regina, was more complex than the previous pieces, and was played with a fuller registration. It was by Sebastián de Aguilera de Heredia (1561-1627); the music was very well articulated.

Pablo Bruna (1611-1679) was another new name. The full title of the piece by him is ‘Tiento del seguno tono por Ge Sol Re Ut Sobre la Letani de la Virgen’. Having swotted this up a little, I hazard that ‘Ge’ is the low bass G, which in the system of hexachords (the basis of the sol-fa system of John Curwen in the early nineteenth century) was the lowest note recognised in writing music down – thus the word ‘gamut’, the ut being the bottom note in any scale (now called doh in English-speaking countries).

My Spanish dictionary gives ‘sobre’ as ‘in addition to’ and ‘por’ as ‘from’, so I hazard a guess that the piece’s title might be Tiento on the second tone from A [the second note from G], to E, to B, to A, in addition to the Litany of the Virgin’.

Bruna’s melody at the beginning of the piece, and which recurred throughout was, however, rather akin to Arne’s ‘God Save the King’ (Arne was born nearly one hundred years after Bruna’s birth). The changes in registration, and thus dynamics, employed between the various sections increased the interest of this piece.

Despite the programme note for the final Spanish work stating that the Tiento Lleno “Like the previous tiento (this piece) is intended to be played on full register throughout…”, I think this must have applied to the previous work, Aguilera de Heredia’s Tiento Lleno, since there were many changes of registration in the Bruna piece.

Cabanilles’s was a true baroque composition, and contained drama and excitement. It featured quite a lot of staccato, but again, there was not enough separation of repeated notes.Wilson added a short Bach chorale prelude, but it was not one with which I was familiar. It, too, was played without pedals.

The little organ has quite an incisive, even loud tone, especially on full organ. However, though it was interesting to hear the Spanish works, and on the whole they were well performed; perhaps a little more variety of programming might have made for greater appeal.

Bravos for the second of Freddy Kempf’s Beethoven concerto concerts with the NZSO

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra
Freddy Kempf’s Beethoven

Beethoven: Egmont Overture, Op.84
Piano Concerto no.4 in G, Op.58
Piano Concerto no.5 in E flat, Op.73 (Emperor)

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, conductor and piano soloist, Freddy Kempf

Michael Fowler Centre

Saturday, 14 March 2015, 7:30 pm

You can’t beat Beethoven on a good day – and this was a very good day, with star performer Freddy Kempf as conductor and piano soloist.  It was the second concert in a series of two in which Kempf has played and conducted all Beethoven’s piano concertos was greeted by a full Michael Fowler Centre.

The Egmont overture I have not heard live for a long time, and it was a most welcome opener for the concert.  Very full and poetic programme notes, author unacknowledged, gave the story of Goethe’s drama for which the composer wrote 10 pieces of music in all, in 1809.  While the text is dramatic, the overture can be heard as absolute music, without knowledge of Goethe’s play about the Flemish Count fighting for independence from the Spanish occupation in the 16th century.

The incisive start immediately created a mood, and the full sonority from the strings grabbed attention.  The timpani had a good workout here; Beethoven was apparently particularly fond of the tuned kettle-drums.  The music was noble, yet passionate.

Kempf conducted the overture without a score, and the smaller orchestra for Beethoven’s period was arranged with the second violins to Kempf’s right, with violas next, and the cellos next to the first violins.  (So Julia and Andrew Joyce got to sit next to each other.)  Kempf’s energetic conducting, to be followed by both conducting and playing two concertos, constituted a major physical workout, quite apart from performing all the music from memory.

There was plenty of sound from the players, especially as it reached my ears in the back row upstairs.  This position was excellent acoustically, and much better than the stalls for seeing the whole orchestra.

Kempf came on for the Piano Concerto no. 4 carrying a baton, but apart from the first time he stood to conduct the orchestra, he did not use it – indeed, his having to stand rapidly and then seat himself quickly to continue the piano part made it almost impossible to use the stick.

The first movement, allegro moderato, got off to a good tempo, but not too fast, the revolutionary (for the period) opening on the piano immediately demonstrating the great clarity and broad dynamic range employed by Freddy Kempf, despite this being, as the programme note stated, the quietest of Beethoven’s concertos. The andante con moto slow movement featured wonderful contrasts between strong orchestral passages and the delicacy of the piano phrases.  The playing of the cadenza, Beethoven’s own, was quite brilliant.

The final movement, rondo, is a jolly romp – cheerful and tuneful.  It was taken a shade faster than I am used to, but not excessively so.  There was great precision from the orchestra while the piano’s lyrical episodes interspersed beautifully.

Some people in the audience found Kempf’s getting up to conduct the orchestra then quickly seating himself again to play passages, to be a distraction, but I did not.  The flow of the music was never interrupted.  At any rate, the audience was very attentive.  I believe that in my exalted perch I heard the bass sounds better than one does on the ground floor; I heard the cellos and double basses very well, while seeing the entire orchestra added to the interest.

The ‘Emperor’ concerto was not titled thus by Beethoven.  Misnamed as it might be, given the composer’s abhorrence of Napoleon’s excesses, it nevertheless stands as royalty among piano concertos.  Concerto no.5 features the majesty and the melody of a supreme work of musical genius.  However, the greater use of brass and timpani than in the previous concerto confirmed a certain military presence, as does the somewhat swaggering opening.

Intensity and superb articulation were features of the playing, particularly on the part of Freddy Kempf.  Perhaps the pace of the opening allegro lost the work a little of its grandeur, but tasteful rubati
soon banished the thought.  It was an exciting performance, the noble melodies and the delicious detail, clear and sonorous as they were, provided almost ecstatic listening.  The great attention to phrasing, and Beethoven’s marvellous use of syncopation kept both orchestra and audience on their toes, while Kempf’s playing continued to have extraordinary clarity – never the slightest blurring.

The slow movement, adagio un poco mosso, is such a remarkable song of quiet assurance, especially where the upper strings play as the piano gives the soft theme while the lower strings do pizzicato – just sublime.

Only occasionally the ensemble strayed just a little.  Otherwise, orchestra and piano were unanimous, even in those passages where Kempf was too busy at the piano to do any more conducting than moving his body in time, to keep everything together.

The rondo: allegro ma non troppo finale relieved us from the emotion of the adagio.  At the end, enthusiastic applause broke out, many audience members rose to their feet, and the orchestral players applauded much more than is usual for them.  The audience’s ovation went on many times longer than normal.  Mercifully, we were spared an encore; that would have removed the mood of elation created by the concerto.

Even for those of us who go to many concerts, this was a very significant musical experience.  Bravo, as my neighbor shouted several times.

 

 

 

 

Pianist Nicola Melville’s visit home with a diverting entertainment and a tribute to her teacher

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Chamber Music Hutt Valley
Nicola Melville – piano

Chopin: Nocturne in B, Op 62 No 1
Schubert: Sixteen German Dances, D 783
Debussy: Estampes (Pagodes, La soirée dans Grenade, Jardin sous la pluie)
In memory of Judith Clark:
      Gareth Farr: Gem
      Ross Harris: In Memory
Eve de Castro-Robinson: Chat
Jacob TV: The Body of Your Dreams for piano and boom box
William Albright: Dream Rags – Sleepwalkers Shuffle and The Nightmare Fantasy Rag – A Night on Rag Mountain

Little Theatre, Lower Hutt

Thursday 5 March, 7:30 pm

The first recital in the 2015 series from Chamber Music Hutt Valley presented former Wellington pianist Nicola Melville. Nicola was raised in Tawa and took her bachelor’s degree at Victoria University and later studied at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. She now teaches in Minnesota.

Last month I heard her in a concert at the Adam Chamber Music Festival in Nelson where she played several of the pieces we heard at Lower Hutt (see my review posted on 8 February).

The theme, or rationale, of the recital was Nicola’s affection for her piano lecturer at Victoria University, the late Judith Clark who had a profound influence on a generation or two of Victoria students. Three of the pieces were commissioned by Nicola from composers who’d had contacts with Judith, others were pieces that she’d played under Judith’s tutorship.

Nicola is a splendid representative of the increasingly common kind of musician who’s determined to communicate, unpretentiously, occasionally self-deprecating, and who wants her own fairly obvious love of her job to be shared by her audience. Speaking of which, while there were quite a few young people and of her composers (Farr and Harris) in the audience, the number of ordinary citizens could have been larger

Nicola changed the order of pieces in the programme, and the Chopin item was changed from the advertised Mazurkas to the not-so-familiar Nocturne in B, Op 62/1, which she had played while a student of Judith Clark. It’s an interesting piece with a somewhat tentative, arpeggiated opening soon followed by a gentle melody. It was nocturnal and lyrical apart from sudden break-aways, with sprints up and down the keyboard.

Schubert’s sixteen German dances revealed several that were familiar as individual pieces that crop up in student tutor collections. The early ones were simpler, more closely connected with the soil, with heavy-footed peasants and they became more sophisticated, calling for more elaborate, exhibitionist playing (and dancing). Though no doubt all would be classed at Ländler, the triple-time forerunner of the waltz, they display much variety and Nicola’s treatment was playful, light-hearted, brusque, energetic, some moving to the minor key towards the end: not always perfect but played with gusto and delight in the flourishes, ornaments, and unpretentiousness that is both Schubert and Melville.

Debussy’s three Estampes capture his flair for putting a sophisticated European stamp on traditional music from other places. Most marked in Pagodes where the characteristics of the gamelan can be heard, though hardly such as a Balinese or Javanese might recognise. Then Grenade (the Spanish city, which the French spell with an ‘e’, to confuse it with the Caribbean island), with a slightly jazzy episode; and finally in a French garden under the rain. Some hammering notes suggested a pretty heavy downpour, but more general were dancing flurries of pluvious notes.

The three pieces written to honour Judith Clark followed the interval: Gareth Farr’s a rather gentle, intimate piece that suggested Debussy, but also no doubt, Lilburn; Ross Harris’s Gem was a reflective piece that expressed a sadness and poignancy, in which I found myself contemplating its structure, its thematic ideas and their development, without much success.

Eve de Castro-Robinson’s Chat was a contrast: spiky and lively, capturing the sort of penetrating, alert conversations one could have with Judith Clark, perceptive, careful, aware of a possible differing opinion.

A piece by Dutch composer Jacob ter Veldhuis who calls himself Jacob TV in the States, called The Body of your Dreams: a satire on the consumer society, the obsession with thinness and fitness, advertising, the piano accompanying a recording of a TV advert for a miracle weight-loss programme. The cajoling, dissembling American voice and the piano fitted together well; it was funny and though musically unimportant I guess, it used music as a permissible and seductive vehicle for ridicule and satire. Nicola’s own enjoyment fed that of the audience.

Finally a composer with whom Nicola had studied, William Albright, whose interest in ragtime may well have sparked or at least coincided with Nicola’s own, and her flair with the Scott Joplin idiom. The two pieces called Dream Rags were punchy, rhythmically emphatic;  Nicola showed herself very much at home with them, certainly an update on the turn-of-the-century originals with harmonies and fractured phrases that might have alarmed Joplin. But there was no alarm in the Little Theatre: a general delight in this and in the entire concert.

 

Four feasts forward – Catherine McKay and Peter Barber at St.Andrew’s

Posted on by Peter Mechen

St Andrew’s Lunchtime Concert Series presents:
Catherine McKay (piano) and Peter Barber (viola)

Music by Schumann, Enescu, Rachmaninov and Brahms

St.Andrews-on-the-Terrace, Wellington

Wednesday 4th March, 2015

At the beginning of the concert Peter Barber announced a change to the printed programme, one involving both a rearrangement of the existing order, and an additional item. So, Brahms’ FAE Sonata Scherzo Movement, which was to have opened the programme now became its concluding item; and an arrangement of Rachmaninov’s Vocalise for viola and piano was introduced, here put just before the Brahms.

It all seemed to work marvellously well, even if, right at the concert’s beginning I was troubled by the venue’s lively, somewhat over-insistent acoustic which blurred the lines in the first of Schumann’s four Märchenbilder”(Fairy-tale Pictures), the one marked “Nicht Schnell”. Always the most sensitive and accommodating of musical partners, pianist Catherine McKay seemed here to be made to produce a sound too richly-upholstered in places, so that the reticent tones of the viola were often lost in the exchanges.

Happily, the following “Lebhaft” seemed to restore those balances more fairly – perhaps the performers had by this time “gotten the pitch of the hall” – with more tone and presence from the viola, the piece’s “swagger” was given full play, the music’s excitement made palpable for us as a result. I still thought the “scherzando” episodes could have done with a lighter touch, as they tended to blur a little in the acoustic.

The third piece “Rasch” excitingly galloped its way into the sound-picture, with the pianist’s playing most skillfully accommodating the viola’s lines as required throughout the music’s narratives, without the music’s edge being at all lost or dimmed. What a marvellously haunted piece this was – and what balm for the senses was the “trio” section, the players beautifully “covering” their tones, wanting to make the greatest possible contrast with the spooky gallopings,  which returned to scalp-prickling effect

After all this, the final “Langsam, mit melancholischem Ausdruck” seemed like a prayer of homecoming.  We got lovely, limpid sounds, together with gently, lullabic lines on the violin – very “Brahmsian”  in effect, I thought. Despite that comment, for the most part it was music that could have been by no other composer than Schumann.

Interestingly, Peter Barber told us (wisely, at the work’s end) that the composer had noted down his inspiration for each of the pieces – the first two from the Rapunzel legend, the third from the story of Rumpelstiltskin, and the last one the Sleeping Beauty!

I didn’t know the next item, George Enescu’s Concertpiece. It appeared to be in a  single movement, but made up of two distinct sections – the first, headed, “Assez animé” established a winsome, “out-of-doors” feeling at the start, leading towards declamatory phrases (fanfares from the piano), and then followed by misterioso chromatic figurations, all of these moods coloured and characterized beautifully by the players. A return to the opening brought more celebratory flourishes, and “thrills and spills” moments which here played their part in conveying the extent of the musicians’ commitment to the task – after the energies had been spent, the viola soared aloft to a tender harmonic and a gently-plucked concluding chord.

At which point the music moved strongly and more darkly into a new “Animé”, with textures rather more stark and focused – these sequences were contrasted with passages in which the pair enchanted us with their lightness of touch and lyricism of phrasing. The tensions very satisfyingly built up amid moments of full-throated lyricism turning into energetic flourishes. Each player supported the other – the piano trumpeting and celebrating as the viola gathered momentum, and the string energies helping the piano to make a brilliant impression. As it would have been “new music” for many listeners, I thought it received wonderful advocacy.

I’d never heard Rachmaninov’s Vocalise played by a dark-hued instrument before – and the performance here was a revelation! Away from the brilliance and stratospheric freedom of the soprano voice, the piece took on the quality of an out-and-out lament, growing out of something meditative and deeply-felt, and transcending its mere “wordless song” association. Particularly telling in this performance was the interweaving of lines, with viola and piano tightly integrated and thus underscoring the intensity of it all. For one repetition of the melody the viola took its line up an octave, but it was the music’s deep-voiced intensities that in the end impressed most profoundly. After this, for me, the piece will never be the same again.

That left the Brahms Movement to “return us to our lives” – though in the event it was more a state of “separate reality” to which we were taken here, rather than any semblance of normality. What a wonderfully gutsy opening to a piece of music! And it was all fuelled by playing whose energy and incisiveness was just what the doctor ordered. I like the way the “schwung” of the opening took in both melody and rhythm without stinting, with just the right amount of skin and hair flying about to make a proper “cheek-by-jowl” contrast with the music’s relatively serene trio section.

However, the trio sequence still resonated with fragments of the opening rhythm, whose full force returned with almost Brucknerian power (what would Brahms have thought of THAT comparison, I wonder?). Music and playing fused feeling, energy and commitment into something grandly celebratory at the piece’s end – and the lunchtime audience was quick to express its appreciation of the performers. It was a good attendance, too, which bodes well for the 2015 season of one of the capital’s most highly-regarded musical series.

 

 

 

Ecstatic applause for Freddy Kempf’s first three Beethoven concertos with the NZSO

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New Zealand Symphony Orchestra with Freddy Kempf, Piano/Conductor

Beethoven:
Piano Concerto No. 1 in C major, Op.15
Piano Concerto No. 2 in B flat major, Op.19
Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, Op.37

Michael Fowler Centre

Saturday 28 February, 7:30 pm

The NZSO undertook this programme with significantly pruned string resources, making a nod towards  the size  of orchestra Beethoven would have performed these works with himself. The balance and sympathy between the sections was, as always, exemplary and the concert was marked throughout by superb solo playing from wind and brass principals alike, and the impeccable string work that audiences never fail to hear from the NZSO.

Born in London in 1977,  Freddy Kempf made his first solo appearance with the RPO at the age of eight. In the intervening thirty years he has forged a reputation as an outstanding musician who performs to a punishing schedule all over the world.  His formidable dexterity at the keyboard encompassed the composer’s demands with complete aplomb and accomplishment, yet it was Beethoven’s  contemplative writing where, for me, Kempf’s talents most sang. He shaped the opening bars of the first concerto with great delicacy, which made the following tutti outburst a contrasting tour de force that was quite riveting. Likewise the Largo second movement opened with great tenderness that blossomed into a conversation of complete understanding with the orchestra. The Rondo finale was taken at breakneck speed, but both piano and orchestra imbued it with playful lightness, delicacy and clarity.

The pinnacle of the second concerto was again the beautiful central Adagio movement, whose melodic nuances were expressed with exquisite artistry in both phrasing and dynamic. The Rondo finale burst into life with its puckish syncopated rhythms almost gleeful in their exuberance. Despite the breakneck
tempo there was not the slightest loss of clarity or precision from either keyboard or orchestra.

The third concerto was likewise highlighted by the beautifully crafted melodies of the central Largo,
imbued with a clear sympathy of vision between solo and orchestra. The Rondo finale took off at an attractive bouncing tempo that concluded by catapulting headlong into a bold and hectic coda.

Despite the quality of the music, however, and moments of sublime stillness in Kempf’s slow movements, the performance was marred overall for me by the constant intrusiveness of Kempf’s conducting. In theory he was “conducting from the keyboard” as Beethoven was in the habit of doing. But in practice he was constantly leaping up and down between seated and upright, and sometimes
playing high speed runs with one hand while waving the other about in the air.

Nevertheless, the climax of the Final of No 3 brought ecstatic applause from the large audience, many of whom got to their feet. Kempf rightly acknowledged the various section leaders  and instrumental groups, all of whom had contributed so outstandingly to the music making.

 

Opera Boutique with a boisterous Pergolesi double bill

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Pergolesi: Livietta e Tracollo and La Serva Padrona

Boutique Opera, Directed by Alison Hodge, with Musical Director, piano accordion and keyboard, Jonathan Berkahn.  Performers: Barbara Graham, Roger Wilson, Charles Wilson, Stacey O’Brien, Alix Schultze and Salina Fisher (violins)

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

Saturday 28 February 2015, 7.30pm

Boutique Opera has not performed for a number of years; it was pleasing to see them back, with light-hearted material as last time – though Edward German’s Tom Jones was very different from the current offering.

Giovanni Pergolesi had a short life: 1710-36.  He wrote a number of operas, some more successful than others.  Both the works performed in this programme were written as Intermezzi, the light-hearted works performed as interludes in more serious operas by the same composer. Obviously the opera-goers in Italy at this period had the appetite for quite a long evening out, since each of the Intermezzi was approximately three-quarters of an hour long.

The first of the two has an alternative title, La contadina astuta, and was an intermezzo for Pergolesi’s opera Adriano in Siria.  The piece was new to me, whereas I have heard the second offering before, and it is relatively well known.

Jonathan Berkahn played the piano accordion for the overture and throughout Livietta e Tracollo as the ‘orchestra’.  It seemed an odd choice of instrument, and it is not one of which I am a fan, but one had to admire his multiple skills.

The operas were sung in English.  Barbara Graham (soprano) took the female lead roles in both, and she was in fine voice.  Her foil in the first was Charles Wilson, who began as Tracollo in disguise as a woman.  His father, Roger Wilson, and Stacey O’Brien both had non-singing roles – but they contributed substantially to the drama, especially the latter, as Fulvia, a friend of Livietta.  Roger Wilson was designated as a servant to Tracollo, but his old crone did not appear capable of much activity!

I found that I had written about Charles Wilson in Tom Jones (2011), the following, which with adaptation of the character’s name, fitted exactly this time around too: ‘Charles Wilson made the most of his role as Tracollo, his acting exactly fitting for a farce, and raising many a smile.  Vocally, too, he was more than adequate, characterising his voice appropriately.’  However, he did have difficulty in that numbers of notes were set too low for his voice.  But his presentation of his role in the drama was realised with great feeling, appropriately overplaying the melodrama of the story of Livietta’s and Tracollo’s tortured relationship.  All ends well, however.

The disguise of Livietta as a French boy was very apt for Barbara Graham, who has won awards for French song; she got an opportunity to exercise that language.  Just as Charles is the son of a very experienced singer and singing teacher, so Barbara is the daughter of Lesley Graham, similarly qualified.  She sang and acted with great assurance; her voice was a delight to hear.

It was a pleasure to hear the two violins and pseudo-harpsichord accompanying the second opera, which was a much livelier work than the previous one – though that, too, had its moments.  Nevertheless, it must be said that Jonathan Berkahn performed wonders of tone and dynamics in the first opera.

A remarkable feature was the clarity of Roger Wilson’s words in La Serva Padrona, which had not always been the case with the characters in the previous piece.  His singing was strong and the voice was produced with full tone and great expressiveness; his acting, too, was convincing and full of amusing detail.

Director Alison Hodge can be pleased with her efforts in both works. There was plenty of amusing stage business in both operas. Costumes for Livietta e Tracollo would pass as eighteenth century, whereas those for La Serva Padrona were 1930s-1940s.

Simple props were adequate and appropriate.

Barbara Graham made a luscious maid on the make.  Hers was quite a demanding role. Her acting was lively and funny, while her singing in the many florid passages was lovely.  Her demeanour was perfect for the part of the devious servant.

Pergolesi’s music was full of energy and wit, and provided a fine vehicle for Graham’s talents as an actor as well as a singer. Instrumental parts underlined the solos deliciously, especially in Roger Wilson’s (Umberto’s) soliloquy in which he contemplates whether or not to marry his maid Serpina (her aim all along).  His low notes were meaty and meaningful.  The mock serious music was fully realised by the soloists, and Pergolesi must have had fun writing the charming final scene between master and maid.

The bright and humorous music and story, and the quality of the singing and acting created a most entertaining evening for the rather small audience – no doubt the entertainment coinciding with the NZSO and Freddy Kempf at the Michael Fowler Centre deprived Boutique Opera of potential audience members.

The season continues on Sunday 1 March at St. Andrew’s on The Terrace at 2pm, on Sunday 8 March at Expressions in Upper Hutt at 2pm, and on Sunday, 22 March at 2pm at Te Manawa Gallery Palmerston North.

 

Violin and harp in enchanting lunchtime concert at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Tabea Squire (violin) and Ingrid Bauer (harp)

Massenet: Meditation from Thaïs
Saint-Saëns: Fantaisie for violin and harp, Op 124
Mozart/Dittersdorf/Eberl/Thomas: Air with Variations and Rondo Pastorale for solo harp
Pärt: Spiegel im Spiegel

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 25 February, 12:15 pm

The harp seems to be asserting itself at present. Though it’s been a pretty standard orchestral instrument since the early 19th century, and a much loved solo instrument both in its many ethnic forms as well as in its larger, more sophisticated character, there doesn’t seem to be a very large body of chamber music involving it.

This recital may well have been inspired in part by the presence of Helen Webby’s harp at the Adam Chamber Music festival in Nelson in January-February. For both the Massenet and the Saint-Saëns were heard there. The transcription for the harp of the Meditation from Thaïs was played in Nelson by Helene Pohl, leader of the New Zealand String Quartet, and Helen Webby. It is particularly beguiling, and while there might have been a difference in the level of experience and sophistication between the performances in Nelson and here, Tabea brought a big romantic sound to her playing, while the harp seemed to be a perfect medium for such a quintessentially emotional piece, a more natural partner than a piano perhaps.

Saint-Saëns was drawn to the harp, I suspect by the same factors that drew both Debussy and Ravel to it, respectively, in the Danse sacrée et danse profane and the Introduction et Allegro. This Fantaisie was played in Nelson by the first violinist of the Ying Quartet, Ayano Ninomiya and Helen Webby; it is hardly in the same class as the pieces by his younger colleagues, yet there is enchantment and variety in its four fairly distinct sections; it lies beautifully for the two instruments and both explored its interesting emotional states with sensitivity.

The next piece was a real curiosity, put together by 19th century Welsh harpist, John Thomas, from pieces by Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf, Anton Eberl and most importantly, Mozart. The process was clearly one that would be abhorred by today’s scholars and many musicians schooled in doctrines of historical authenticity, but if the test is simply the agreeableness of the result, condemnation would be hard to justify.

In any case, the first part, the Air with Variations, offered the harpist scope for a variety of diverting techniques, strongly contrasting dynamics and what seemed to be a muted passage. The second part, the Rondo Pastorale, was the last movement of Mozart’s great Divertimento in E flat for string trio, K 563: one of his most beautiful compositions. Here was pure enchantment; it’s hard to imagine that Mozart would have disapproved of such an enchanting adaptation , so beautifully played.

The last item was one which, like a lot of Arvo Pärt’s music, seems to invite adaptation for different instruments: his Spiegel im Spiegel, which may be the equal of his Fratres in popularity and affection. As with her other introductions, Tabea Squire spoke with careful precision and sensitivity about its basically simple character, a study in triads in various inversions and keys, at each stage of which the home key seemed to be imminent but elusive. The violin carried long sustained notes while the harp suggested that here was the sound that Pärt had really been searching for.

 

St Andrew’s lunchtime concerts resume for 2015 with a piano quintet

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Xing Wang and friends

Schubert: Sonata for piano and violin in A, D.574, “Grand Duo”
Schumann: Piano Quintet in E flat, Op. 44

Xing Wang (piano), Xin (James) Jin and Haihong Liu (violins), Zhongxian Jin (viola), Robert Ibell (cello)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday, 11 February 2015, 12.15pm

An attractive programme brought a good-sized audience to the first St. Andrew’s lunchtime concert for 2015.  Many people are grateful to the church and to Marjan van Waardenberg, for providing so many
marvellous concerts.

Unfortunately, another engagement meant that I was able to hear only the Schubert in its entirety.  The opening allegro moderato of the sonata featured very lively, bright playing, as did the scherzo: presto that followed.  The andantino slow movement displayed gorgeous tone from the violin, while the allegro vivace finale was executed with brilliance by both performers.

It was pleasing to have very full programme notes for the two works.  As the programme note for the Schubert stated, the sonata exhibited ‘…rich and beautiful melodic inventions, subtle harmonic colourings, and Viennese dance elements.’  There was much hard work for Xin Jin to do in this work, but all was carried off with accuracy and sureness of intonation and expression.

The Schumann piano quintet promised much from the robust, joyful opening of the allegro brillante first movement that I heard. Later I was told that it continued in the same warmly expressive vein, and that the cello playing of Robert Ibell was particularly noteworthy.

The concerts now continue on Wednesday lunchtimes without a break; much interesting music is promised over successive weeks.  Look up St. Andrew’s website, www.standrews.org.nz, and go to the ‘Coming Events’ listings.

 

Great New Zealand tenor Keith Lewis in rare recital

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Fundraiser for The New Zealand Singing School (Hawke’s Bay)

Songs by Scarlatti, Caccini, Durante, Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert, Bellini, Bizet, Tchaikovsky, Guridi and Piazzola, aria by Cilea and aria and duet by Puccini

Keith Lewis (tenor) with Susan Melville (piano) and Tania Dreaver (soprano)

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

Tuesday, 10 February 2015, 7.30pm

Keith Lewis presented the audience with an evening of great artistry, ably accompanied by Susan Melville, a Hawke’s Bay musician.  Current doyen of New Zealand tenors, he is little heard, or even known, in his own country.  He gave lovers of the singing voice much to enjoy.  The word ‘mellifluous’ was invented for voices like Keith Lewis’s.

Right from the outset, in Scarlatti’s appealing song Le Violette, Lewis impressed with his enunciation of the words (in six different languages through the course of the recital) and his supreme control and beautiful tone on soft, high notes.

Although the church was fairly well filled, it is a pity that there were not more people present to hear this marvelous singer.  A side benefit of more audience would have been to absorb some of the resonance, which for me was a little too much at times.  Not that Lewis sang too loudly, but the acoustic of the church enhances the sound of the singing voice.

In Amarilli by Caccini (1546 – 1718) Lewis told the story of the love song beautifully, with top notes ‘to die for’, exquisitely projected in the softest of pianissimi. Francesco Durante (1684 – 1755) wrote Danza, danza fanciulla.  It was sung energetically, but tone never suffered.

Switching from Italian to German-Austrian repertoire, Keith Lewis began by singing in English.  The words of Shakespeare from Twelfth Night ‘She never told her love’ were delightfully set by Haydn.  Like so much of Shakespeare, the words ‘like patience on a monument’ have become a frequently used expression.  Here, every word was sung expressively and with meaning.

Beethoven followed, with the wonderful, varied song Adelaide (not with the Australian pronunciation).  The romantic poem was by Friedrich von Matthisson.  Another love song was the well-known Im
Frühling (In Spring) by Schubert.  The gorgeous, lilting piano part added immeasurably to the effect of the song.  The sentiments were beautifully conveyed.

With a return to the Italian language, we heard three Canzone from Sei Ariette by Bellini.  After a robust, spirited opener Malinconia, ninfa gentile, Vanne, o rosa fortunata had the singer varying voice and words enchantingly.  The soft tones were more supremely lovely than I have heard from other tenors.  Following the third song, Ma rendi pur contento we turned to French songs by Bizet, which the singer told us he felt particularly close to; they were ‘like little jewels’.  La chanson du fou (Song of the clown) employed  considerable vocal range that was readily encompassed by Lewis.  The language was projected with model enunciation. The song had much character in both the vocal and piano parts.

The second Bizet song, Ouvre ton coeur (Open your heart), was in the style of a Spanish serenade; Bizet’s fame rests largely on the opera Carmen, set in Spain and employing much Spanish idiom.  This song, too, was full of character.

After the interval, we moved to Russia, with Lensky’s aria from Eugene Onegin.  Susan Melville did her best to be an orchestra, and in the main she succeeded.  Lewis gave us much feeling and expression of Lensky’s thoughts and the drama of his situation, facing a duel with his old friend.

Still with opera, we then had two arias from soprano Tania Dreaver, a participant in last year’s New Zealand Singing School.  She sang, from memory, an aria from Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur, then
Mimi’s aria from La Bohème (‘They call me Mimi’), which was succeeded immediately by her singing the following duet with Rodolfo (Keith Lewis).  While Dreaver’s vocal technique seemed good on the whole, some of her top notes were slightly metallic and strained, and there were occasional lapses of pitch.  She has plenty of power to deliver the notes and words, but needed more variation of timbre and volume, in what is admittedly a difficult aria.  The duet was sung by a meltingly gorgeous Rodolfo, but again, Dreaver seemed to be straining and forcing at the top, and again there was variation of pitch.  Susan Melville’s accompanying in the Puccini items was particularly fine.

The Spanish song, no.4 of Canciones Castellanas by Jesús Guridi (1886-1961), demonstrated Lewis’s marvellous projection, and also what I was once told: “Do something with every note”.

Another Spanish song followed, by Astor Piazzolla (1921-1992): Milonga Carrieguera, from  an operetta of his.  The emotions of the song came over clearly, and there was much lilting light and shade.  The bitter-sweet mood was perfectly conveyed.  Lewis’s amazing breath control was particularly apparent in this song.

As an encore, Lewis sang an arrangement by Susan Melville of Pokarekare ana, in which birdcalls featured.  It was certainly a different, and attractive, arrangement.

A few criticisms of the printed programme: a few composers’ names were misspelt, and none of their dates were given; it is always helpful in placing lesser-known composers in historical context.  Also, I always appreciate being given the names of the poets whose words the composers set.  After all, songs are a marriage of poetry and music.  The one inspires the other, so it is good to know who has written the former as well as who has composed the latter.

The recital tour continues in Nelson (16 February), Christchurch (22 February), Hastings (27 February) and Auckland (3 March).