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The Tudor Consort sings Byrd

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Motets from the two volumes of William Byrd’s Gradualia; two organ fantasias; Motet: ‘Domine quis habitabit’

The Tudor Consort conducted by Michael Stewart, with Douglas Mews (organ)

Sopranos Jane McKinlay, Anna Sedcole, Erin King; alto Andrea Cochrane; counter-tenor Dimitrios Theodoridis; tenors Philip Roderick and Richard Taylor; basses Brian Hesketh, Matthew Painter, Richard Walley.

Cathedral of the Sacred Heart; Saturday 13 February 2010

The Tudor Consort’s first concert of 2010 was wholly devoted to vocal liturgical music by William Byrd, apart from the inclusion of two of his keyboard fantasias played by Douglas Mews.

The choir’s director, Michael Stewart, spoke before the concert about Byrd’s two volumes of Gradualia, a term used sometimes used for the settings of the ‘Proper’ of the Mass – the part that varies according to the festivals of the church calendar – as well as for one section within the ‘Proper’; and he distinguished the ‘Proper’ from the ‘Ordinary’ of the mass whose six parts are unvarying: the usual content of musical mass settings. He also spoke of Byrd’s difficult times as a Catholic in the reign of Protestant monarchs Elizabeth I and James I, and the effect it had on his musical settings; and touched on the textual difficulties of Byrd’s publications, particularly of the first Volume of Gradualia.

Though ten members of the choir were on hand, most of the pieces were sung one voice to a part, varying between four and six voices; the final motet, ‘Domine quis habitabit’, demanded nine voices.

Though this was undoubtedly authentic in terms of the forces Byrd was probably limited to in Protestant England, we have no way of knowing whether, if his Catholic liturgical music had been written in times when performances did not have to be very private and small scale, he would not have expected a larger choir. Does it really serve the music well to pursue authenticity in such a literal way?

One voice to a part is undoubtedly a more challenging matter than singing in a larger choir where a good blend is probably easier to achieve and the experience for each singer is no doubt less nerve-wracking; and where the enjoyment of the audience might just be increased.

For the most part rehearsals seemed to have produced reasonable confidence in the singers. These are talented and well-schooled singers, but throughout the concert I was never unaware that the very distinct voices did not blend particularly well to create an illusion of real homogeneity.

The voices that stood out tended to be the high ones: the three sopranos and counter-tenor Dimitrios Theodoridis. In the pieces from the first volume of Gradualia, the strong and penetrating voices of Theodoridis and Anna Sedcole were conspicuous while mezzo Andrea Cochrane’s warm voice seemed rather better adapted to creating a successful blend. She, and the lower men’s voices, created an attractive liturgical ambience.

The ten singers took turns singing in each group of motets, adhering strictly to one voice to a part. The concert took examples of the 109 motets that comprise the two books, for various feasts or festivals: for the Virgin Mary in Advent, for Corpus Christi, for Pentecost, for the Assumption and for Saints Peter and Paul.

Jane McKinlay took over the soprano role in the next group, for Corpus Christi, her voice a little more readily blending, in the calm Offertory and the following ‘Ave verum corpus‘ where hers was the only female voice, supported by the two tenors Philip Roderick and Richard Taylor and bass Matthew Painter; something of a real choral sound was produced. The singing succeeded in reflecting the gruesome nature of the words contemplating Christ’s mutilated body.

Though the range of vocal styles is limited, the subtle differences emerge as the ear and mind become acclimatized; the Sequence from the Pentacost Propers, ‘Veni sancta spiritus’ expressed through lively dotted rhythms, was an interesting case.

I detected some uncertainty in the next motet, ‘Factus est repente’ and raggedness in the Assumption Introit, ‘Gaudeamus omnes’. But the general precision and the scrupulous attention that had been paid to dynamics and intonation were far more noteworthy.

Douglas Mews played two fantasias on the chamber organ; the first, Byrd’s own arrangement of one of his fantasias for viol consort, the other an original organ fantasia. The first, in C, struck me as rather overcome by its subdued character, its interest lying in its slowly evolving textures; the second, in A minor, was probably an early piece, not very sophisticated though technically accomplished; the playing suggested some hesitancy.

The final motet, ‘Domine quis habitabit’, came as something of a welcome change, partly because it uses more voices and offered a wider sonic palette, with less tendency for individual voices to dominate. It too was an early work, as the programme note points out, thus closer in spirit and technique to Tallis, and perhaps not as representative of the mature Byrd as are the Gradualia. Nevertheless the constant, elaborate counterpoint was an impressive statement of the composer’s genius. It was a happy conclusion to the concert, allowing us finally to enjoy the essential strength and skill of the choir.

There is another question that I’m prompted to raise here.

In a time when Christian belief and practice are at a historic low, and familiarity with the terminology of the liturgy and church practice are only vaguely understood by the majority and probably not even very well by many Catholic adherents, is it time that the presumption of understanding of the arcane references to the liturgy and church ritual, without elucidation, was reconsidered? Short glossary notes should be routinely offered whenever such expressions are used.

While Stewart did explain the significance of the Ordinary and the Proper of the Mass, such pains were not routine. To take a few examples of terms for which no explanation was offered. First: the meaning and significance and place in the service of the Gradual, Antiphon, Introit, Offertory, Responsory, Eucharist; and what is ‘a votive mass’? And it should be routine to set down the dates and meanings of the various Christian feasts – Assumption, Pentecost, Advent, Annunciation, etc. There is a great deal more.

As with so much else in the realm of ‘classical’ music, the use of such terms, without simple explanation, is very likely one of the reasons this music is considered ‘elitist’, beyond the reach of the un-trained, the un-lettered: in fact, the great majority of people who are no longer exposed by their families, at any point in their school lives, or subsequently through the media, to religious liturgy or classical music of any kind.

 

Fulcher in Great music at St Paul’s lunchtime

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Ciacona in E minor, BuxWV 160 (Buxtehude); Introduction, Passacaglia and Fugue (Healey Willan); Chaconne (Holst); Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor, BWV 582 (Bach)

Michael Fulcher (organ)

Cathedral of St Paul, Friday 6 November 2009

The second to last in the approximately monthly series of 12.45pm recitals was by the cathedral’s director of music, Michael Fulcher.

In his notes to the programme he remarked how his idea to focus on the passacaglia (and its cousin the chaconne) had awakened him to its scope, which he thinks can easily fill four full programmes. There will be more next year.

Nothing could better illustrate the depth and sheer intellectual potential of the organ repertoire than the many works over the centuries that have been built on the renaissance courtly dance in slow triple rhythm. It has not been confined to the organ of course; The most famous of all chaconnes is no doubt that in Bach’s D minor solo violin partita; and then there’s the great finale of Brahms’s Fourth Symphony.

A good recital seeks to awaken its listeners to music that they probably do not know, and this succeeded magnificently. Buxtehude specialists would have known his Ciaconna, a most engaging piece in which the undulating chaconne theme opens on both manuals and pedals. Though its performance, and that of the Bach later, on a large modern organ which emphasizes the weight and diapason opulence, would have surprised the composer, the music seemed to thrive in that climate; and it was further enriched in the cathedral’s long reverberation.

The second piece was new to me, its composer no more than a name. Healey Willan lived from 1880 till 1968, born in England but lived in Canada from the age of 33; his Introduction, Passacaglia and Fugue was written for a Toronto organ in 1916. Its three sections are distinct, unlike Bach’s piece that followed, where the passacaglia rather merges into the fugue. The Introduction announced the character of the whole work, serious and noble, enlivened by varied registrations, the building of climaxes through the increasing complexity of interesting harmonies and the opening and closing of the swell box.

The fugue, at its start, served to clarify the dense emotional atmosphere that the Passacaglia had created; Fulcher’s dramatic skill then led the music towards a powerful final climax: his note had warned us to expect an exhilarating piece and that quality was vividly present in the fugue’s conclusion.

Before the Bach, Fulcher played an arrangement of the Chaconne from Holst’s First Suite for Military Band, so well disguised that its original as open air band music would hardly have been guessed. Spacious, grand, with its effective use of the slow triple time.

Fulcher invested Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue, BWV 582, with its elaborate structure and variety of rhythms and colourings, with such a sense of being of today that it might have been the most modern piece in the programme. Its emphatic pedal theme can start to be monotonous in the hands (and feet) of a lesser player, but here the combination of a colourful organ and an organist able to exploit varied registrations, embroidered with sensitive rhythmic patterns made it a splendid finale to the concert, which should induce the audience to watch out for further organ recitals from Fulcher – and indeed the several other excellent organists in the city.  

 

A Brace of Troubadours – “Fabulous Guitars” from Caprice Arts

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Charlotte Yates (voice and guitar)

Owen Moriarty and Christopher Hill (guitar duo)

Music by Charlotte Yates, Andrew York, Astor Piazzolla, Isaac Albeniz,

Radames Gnatali, Joaquin Rodrigo, Manuel de Falla, Paulo Bellinati

Congregational Church, Cambridge Terrace, Wellington

Friday 6th November 2009

One would have thought, on the evidence provided by this concert, that time couldn’t have been better spent than listening to the dulcet tones of music for guitar (in fact, mostly TWO guitars!). After all, no less a musician than Frederic Chopin was credited with saying at one time, that “Nothing is more beautiful than a guitar – save, perhaps, two…”. Despite such impressive recommendations, only a handful of people took up Caprice Arts’ invitation to hear a concert of music for (mostly) guitars and for guitar and voice, given by songwriter and performer Charlotte Yates, along with guitarists Owen Moriarty and Christopher Hill, in the Congregational Church along Wellington’s Cambridge Terrace. As with the previous week’s concert with Peter and Mary Barber and Annabel Cheetham, the venue and the small attendance suited the intimate nature of the music and the music-making, but part of one couldn’t help but wish for greater audience numbers and a rather larger-scaled “ebb-and-flow” between performers and listeners.

Charlotte Yates began the programme and immediately invited those of us who were there to “come and sit closer”, a gesture which warmed the ambience and drew us all more closely into the proceedings. She sang three songs from a recent CD “Beggar’s Choice”, the first a ballad-like song “Under Black Water”, reminiscent of Joan Baez’s way with similar repertoire, and a second song “Lost – Blue”, a love-song lamenting the end of a relationship, the emotional angst of the piece expressed by astringent vocals and syncopated rhythms. A third song used words by NZ poet Hone Tuwhare, a poem entitled “Mad”, Charlotte Yates bringing out the heavy beat of the poem’s pulse in her setting, and again using syncopated accents for expressive effect – I had trouble catching the words at times, due to the almost orchestral weight of tones and timbres the singer drew from her guitar.

Owen Moriarty and Christopher Hill began their first-half bracket of items with a contemporary work, Andrew York’s “Sanzen-in”, a piece inspired by the composer’s visiting a temple in Japan, The music had a kind of canonic feeling, accentuated by the exchanges between the instruments, everything beautifully and subtly voiced. Interestingly the sounds weren’t pentatonic, and so avoided any feeling of pastiche, bringing out what seemed an inward, individual response to the experience by the composer. We were then whisked a good half-a-world away to the Iberian peninsular, and to Isaac Albeniz’s evocation of “Sevilla”, played here at a quick, challenging tempo, but with tremendously adroit articulation, the players negotiating the many little touches of rubato with near-perfect ensemble, apart from a momentary hiccup at the reprise of the opening section. Next were two pieces by Piazolla, the first, “Zita”, a transcription of a piece for larger ensemble, featuring a spiky opening with astringent harmonics and syncopated accents, and in places generating terrific momentum. The second piece “Whisky” was a scherzo-like dance movement, woven of gossamer thread at the opening, digging into a more trenchant middle section, and then quixotically going into a kind of “twilight zone” of deep thought, before gradually reawakening and revitalising the textures and rhythms. Most entertaining.

Charlotte Yates returned after the interval with two more songs from the “Beggar’s Choice” CD, performing these with the engaging informality that one would perhaps encounter in a club or a bar. Described as a “gentle pop” number, the first song delineates a fruitless search somewhere in Spain for a flamenco club, while the following “Blood Red Moon” in classic ballad style, described the effect of the previous year’s lunar eclipse – a stirring number , delivered with great panache and whimsy, of all of her performances, the one I responded to the most readily and pleasurably.

The Guitar Duo took up the reins for the concert’s remainder, beginning with a piece honouring a composer written by another composer – Radames Gnatali from Brazil paid homage to his composer-peers in a four-movement suite, each part dedicated to a colleague or mentor or inspirational figure. Here, the Brazilian composer Ernesto Nazareth was honoured with a movement entitled “Valsa”, a piece that began with attractive flourishes and introductory gesturings, before leaning into a waltz-rhythm with a lovely, sinuous melody. Contrasts were afforded by exciting accelerandi and occasional breathtaking sotto voce voicings, the ensemble between the two players, supple, flexible and tensile throughout, bringing off the piece’s ending with winning poise and elegance. Perhaps the most popularly well-known composer for guitar is Joachim Rodrigo, whose “Tonadilla” was next played, a work written for the husband-and-wife guitar duo of Alexander Lagoya and Ida Presti, names I remembered from my early days of record-collecting. This was a wonderful piece, engaging and wide-ranging across three movements – a scherzo-like beginning with pinging “wrong-note” harmonies, a “Minuetto Pomposo” whose droll rhythms give way to a baritonal trio melody spiked by ascerbic chords, and a concluding allegro vivace, a deceptively lazy beginning setting the scene for more astringent harmonic clashes and declamatory posturings, everything nicely “debunked” by the return of the attractively relaxed trajectory of the music.

Another well-known Spanish composer is, of course, Manuel de Falla, whose Spanish Dance from “La Vida Breve” figures in all kinds of instrumental arrangements, but works beautifully for two guitars. This was a more restrained, less overtly macho “take” on the music which I thought brought out a more volatile and elusive quality, the notes flickering like firelight, and the tones not so much threatening in places as strong and certain, but with a sense of power in reserve. Finally we were given another Brazilian work, “Jongo”, by Paulo Bellinati, a piece whose “game-of-chase” aspect between the instruments and occasional percussive effects (quite elaborate at one point) provided a brilliant and entertaining finale to the programme. After such guitaristic fireworks, the Duo generously played an encore to settle our pulse rates, a lovely “Evening Dance” by Andrew York, whose “American in Japan” piece we had already enjoyed in the programme’s first half. A pity more people weren’t present to witness this “triumph of the guitars”, fully living up to the sentiments expressed by the concert’s title.

Eugene Onegin straight from the heart…

Posted on by Peter Mechen

TCHAIKOVSKY – Eugene Onegin
an Opera in Three Acts
Libretto by the composer, after Pushkin

NBR New Zealand Opera
The Genesis Energy Season

Cast: Anna Leese (Tatyana) / William Dazeley (Eugene Onegin) / Roman Shulackoff
(Lensky) / Patricia Wright (Madame Larina) / Kirstie Darragh (Olga) / Martin Snell (Prince Gremin) / Wendy Doyle (Filipyevna) / Andrew Glover (Monsieur Triquet) / Roger Wilson  (Zaretsky)

Chapman Tripp Opera Chorus
Vector Wellington Orchestra
Conductor: Alexander Polianichko
Director: Patrick Nolan

St James Theatre, Wellington: 10th Oct 2009 to 17th Oct 2009

One of the loveliest of all operas, Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, a setting of Pushkin’s tale of innocent ill-fated love, received a strongly-conceived and finely-executed production from NBR New Zealand Opera on the opening night of its 2009 Wellington season at the St.James Theatre. Its pivotal stage-figure was soprano Anna Leese in the role of Tatyana, the girl who at the story’s outset declares her love for the opera’s eponymous hero, and then, having been wounded by his rejection of her, marries someone else. For this role of Shakespearean range and depth a consummate artist is needed, and as a singer Anna Leese has developed into just that – throughout, her voice for me vividly evoked all of the various moods and developments of the character, every utterance recreating a young girl’s romantic dreaminess and impulsiveness at the story’s beginning, and a deepening of womanly understanding as the story’s tragedy unfolds.

Occasionally I thought her stage movement needed more fluidity, matching what the music was doing (parts of her well-known Letter Scene I thought too static, where she seemed confined by her writing desk, instead of spontaneously expressing with her movements what she was singing) – but her voice alone conveyed so much of what her character needed that such criticism seems quite ungracious. She conveyed to us all of her bitter disappointment and disillusionment at Onegin’s rejection of her, and went on to develop strength and resolve as a worldly-wise woman at the story’s end, as, after admitting to Onegin that she still loved him, she in turn spurns his belated declarations of love to her.

William Dazeley’s baritone provided a near-perfect foil for Leese’s Tatyana, with singing and acting that captured the essentials of Onegin’s character, his aloof charm and supercilious arrogance in the early part of the story, and his growing disillusionment with life and final despair at losing Tatyana forever at the opera’s thrilling denoument. This was great theatre, made possible by the sheer commitment shown by both singers to their roles, and underpinned by full-blooded playing from the Wellington Orchestra under Alexander Polianichko. Earlier in the story, where Dazeley’s Onegin was elegant and contained, Russian tenor Roman Shulackoff’s Lensky was all youthful ardour and boisterous spirits, readily demonstrating an impetuousness of manner that was to bring about his own tragic death at the hands of his friend.

As Olga, Kirstie Darragh sang winningly, though I thought her stage-character needed a bit more flirtatious spunk in order to convincingly drive her lover, Lensky, into the jealous rage that pulsated the story’s heart of darkness. By contrast Patricia Wright was superb in every way as Madame Larina, Tatyana’s mother; and convincing cameo roles were also taken by Wendy Doyle as the nurse, Andrew Glover as Monsieur Triquet, and Roger Wilson as Lensky’s duelling second, Zaretsky. A show-stopping appearance in Act Three was that of bass Martin Snell as Prince Gremin, his aria extolling the virtues of Tatyana, his young wife deeply sonorous and beautifully touching.

Occasionally the chorus was hampered by a stage set that crowded its movements, as in the Act Three Polonaise, where the use of chairs by the company did nothing except make the setting seem even more claustrophobic – though, as with the second-act Waltz, the movement  of the dancers gradually cleared the oppressive spaces and opened up the vistas. The Wellington Orchestra seemed to make heavy weather of parts of this score, and took time to “settle” under conductor Alexander Polianichko, with strings occasionally sounding unhappy in exposed passages and winds sometimes fallible in ensemble work – still, conductor and players got things together sufficiently to deliver the drama’s knockout punch in the final scene with thrilling impact, supporting the singers to the utmost.

The production had the virtue of recreating a scenario approximating to the work’s original conception, one which the audience had not a whit of trouble relating to or getting involved with. I occasionally found the visuals cast unduly on the dark and sombre side – the monolithic columns at times seemed more appropriate to something like “Aida” or Act Two of “Die Zauberflote” than to a Russian country estate – but in general I thought director Patrick Nolan did a wonderful job, working with Bernie Tan’s lighting to make creative use of the space and reflect the emotional complexities of the drama. A case in point was the work’s brief overture, during which Onegin was shown reflecting on his life and its troubles and complexities. For a first-timer’s encounter with the work, NZ Opera’s production must have been a great experience, and if not faultless in every respect, could hardly have been more satisfactorily or enjoyably presented by all concerned.

Blythe Press, violin, in Chausson, Prokofiev and Pärt

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Chausson: Poème, Op 25; Prokofiev: Five Melodies for violin and piano, Op 35b; Pärt: Fratres

Blythe Press (violin) and Emma Sayers (piano)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace. Wednesday 23 September 

Don’t ever overlook the lunchtime concerts at St Andrew’s! Of course, they vary widely, in genre, between instruments and voices and sometimes other things, in musical experience and skill, but more often than not, there’s a real treat in store.  

Every so often a concert comes along that deserves a much bigger crowd and perhaps a more prestigious venue, though that’s a factor I fight; for one thing, it is being used as a principal criterion by The Dominion Post for publishing music reviews, with some unfortunate results.

Wednesday the 23rd was a special one.

I’ve been observing Blythe Press, violinist from the Kapiti Coast, since he was a notable performer in the Schools Chamber Music Contests. After starting studies at Victoria University he gained sufficient awards to enable him to complete a music degree at Graz, in Austria. His record of competition triumphs is already, at 20, impressive.  

I fancy this is my first hearing of Chausson’s Poème, in the piano version. It sounds so different, with the violin standing tonally more distinct when accompanied by the piano (I cannot find a piano arrangement listed in Chausson’s entry in New Grove or on the Internet: it must be a publisher’s arrangement).

Yet its warm romantic spirit remained intact in the hands of these two players; nothing sentimental, or exaggerated, but rather, taste, sincerity of expression, and a considerable technique – I mean of both players – that was unobtrusive, and at the disposal of the music. It consists of several short sections, thematically linked but varying in character, and each, even the somewhat light-weight section hinting at the salon, emerged with honesty, in this context.

Prokofiev’s Five Melodies are a surprising product of the composer’s years of exile, this written in California. No hint of the wild young man of forbidding dissonance and ferocious technical demands, these pieces are to enjoy, and their choice could well serve to remind listeners that not all music after the first World War sought to poke the audience in the eye.

Yet they are by no means child’s play, though Press made them sound fairly plain-sailing. Nevertheless, the melodies would hardly have arisen in the imaginations of earlier composers, such is the strong personality of Prokofiev’s music and Press negotiated all the writhing, complex lines.  

Prokofiev is not a composer to be in the proximity of, say, some of his English contemporaries, who might sound flaccid and insipid in the same room (are my prejudices showing?). The playing of both musicians was arresting and their virtually flawless and riveting performances simply held the audience – bigger than normal – spell-bound.

As if two small masterpieces were not enough, the pair then played what has become one of the best–loved chamber pieces of the past 30 years. Fratres is an extraordinary piece in several ways, one being its non-specific instrumentation; its original incarnation was for string quintet and wind quintet, but the version played here is one of the most effective, allowing its clear musical character to emerge independent of the crutch of colourful combinations. Press’s fast opening cross-string arpeggios established his authority at once, and with the emphatic piano chords, a wonderfully gripping experience held the audience. The mystic passages that followed evoked the monastic atmosphere that Pärt sought, monks moving about dark gothic aisles, and finally the piano chords punctuating the violin’s great oratorical statement, were so impressively and movingly expressed by these two instruments.

Jenny Wollerman at Wanganui Spring Festival

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The vocal parts of The Wanganui Spring Music Festival (intended for publishing n New Zealand Opera News)

Five concerts by Jenny Wollerman (soprano), Murray Khouri (clarinet), Simone Roggen (violin), Edith Salzmann (cello), Petya Mihlova and Phillip Shovk (piano)

Royal Wanganui Opera House

Saturday 12 to Monday 14 September 2009

This review may be very belated; and it was not an opera festival, but because it was a rather important initiative which could in future encompass opera (perhaps in association with the regular January New Zealand Opera School), it report is justified.

At this first festival the vocal aspect was represented by operatic soprano Jenny Wollerman.

It happened in one of New Zealand’s most charming old opera houses, a wooden building dating from 1899, familiar to many opera-lovers who attend the concerts of the Opera School.

Nelson has been New Zealand’s top classical music festival town since 1992; next to Nelson as a festival candidate is Wanganui: its history; its river, a good museum, one of the country’s best art galleries, it was spared the worst impacts of 1980s growth with many century-old buildings (though too many are still being lost), and of course there’s the 1899 opera theatre.

Wellington clarinetist Murray Khouri has been running a small, successful chamber music festival in Bowra, a small town south west of Sydney.

A year or so ago Murray decided to try a similar festival in a comparable New Zealand town. Wanganui seemed to have the necessary attributes. The sort of town that, in the northern hemisphere at least, appeals to festival crowds.

Though this first one failed to attract the crowds it deserved, particularly from the city itself, perseverance will pay off.

Naturally, the festival was dominated by chamber music, splendidly played by the top-line artists assembled, including Khouri himself, particularly striking in Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time.

There were five concerts over the weekend, The players were three New Zealanders, an Australian, a Bulgarian and a German resident in New Zealand; Every concert held something special.

Wellington soprano Jenny Wollerman is too little heard in her home town; many of the songs that she sang in her recital, by Mozart and Schubert, were familiar but the experience of hearing them sung with such intelligence and charm, and so delicately accompanied by young Bulgarian Petya Mihneva was like hearing them for the first time.

The Mozart programme was a striking demonstration of the composer’s role in the creation of the German Lied tradition, to show that Schubert did not emerge from nowhere, but that the ‘through-composed’ song that Schubert mastered, existed in a song like Das Veilchen. If Abendempfindung was one of her most beautiful performances, the most striking was the passionate ‘Als Luise’ (K520).

But her programme also showed Mozart as predecessor of the French mélodie, with ‘Oiseaux, si tous les ans’ and ‘Dans un bois solitaire’ (which I heard later, in the Adam Festival in Nelson, from Swedish mezzo Catrin Johnsson). French song was slower to develop because there was no Schubert in France at the time; but a decade or so later Berlioz’s Les nuits d’été was the catalyst (pity he didn’t write as many as Schubert).

Jenny’s evident aim was to show Mozart’s polyglot character, and her recital concluded with a couple of Italian songs: ‘Ridente la calma’ and ‘Un moto di gioia’, which at once seemed to adopt the colour of the contemporary Italian opera.

The Schubert half of the programme likewise showed Wollerman’s characteristic intellectual curiosity. After that most gorgeous of all songs, An die Musik, which she lit with seductive, complementary body-movement, there was delight, pensiveness (with ‘Du bist die Ruh’), passion, engaging narrative (Die Einsame) and simple pleasure in the familiar Die Forelle and Gretchen am Spinnrade.

Though this first festival could have been better supported, it will surprise me if Wanganui’s attractions and the chance to hear top-rate musicians in great and beautiful music does not bring much bigger audiences in future. Make a diary note for next year’s festival!.

 

The Tudor Consort – an afternoon of choral filigree

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J.S.BACH – The Six Motets BWV 225-230

Tudor Consort, directed by Michael Stewart

St Andrew’s on-the-Terrace, Wellington

Saturday September 12 2009

Review by Anna McGregor

Seats were scarce at St Andrews on the Terrace on Saturday afternoon as the Tudor Consort presented their programme of six motets attributed to J.S. Bach. Admired by generations of musicians, these works have been described as ‘a pinnacle of absolute vocal music’, and greatly influenced the choral music of Mozart, Mendelssohn and Brahms. This was a rare opportunity to experience all six works in succession and provided the listener with a unique platform to compare the facets of each.

Under the direction of Michael Stewart, the Tudor Consort produced a well-blended and clean sound, successfully negotiating highly demanding vocal lines with stamina. The 21-strong ensemble split into two antiphonal choirs for the first half of the programme, opening with Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied (BWV 225), accompanied by Douglas Mews on chamber organ and Emma Goodbeheere on baroque cello. The balance and colour between the choirs was well matched, enabling the ensemble to smoothly interplay during alternating passages. Unfortunately the continuo was often overwhelmed – subtleties of articulation and timbre may have become more apparent with the addition of a small string section.

The group re-united in the second half for the centrepiece of the programme, Jesu, meine Freude (BWV 227) with soloists Anna Sedcoe, Erin King, Andrea Cochrane, Richard Taylor and Richard Walley emerging from within the ensemble. Almost in defiance of its conception as a funeral motet, this is a colourful and highly emotive masterpiece as well as a gauntlet of textural demands for any ensemble. The Tudor Consort shifted with ease and breadth of expression between highly contrapuntal fugues to reduced chamber sections to strident but lyrical chorales.

What better way to spend an afternoon than fully immersed in Bach – credit to the Tudor Consort for fantastic programming and a very fine performance.

Wellington Regional Aria Contest: Dame Malvina Major Prize

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

 

Wellington Regional Aria Contest Final: Hutt Valley Performing Arts Competitions Society; Adjudicator: Angela Gorton. Finalists: Rose Blake, Kieran Rayner, Amelia Berry, Elitsa Kappatos, Olga Gryniewicz. Pianists: Catherine McKay and Emily Mair

St Andrew’s on The Terrace. Sunday 23 August 2009

In recent years what used to be the Aria Contest of the Hutt Valley Performing Arts Competitions Society has struggled to survive. For many years it was The Evening Post Aria, but after The Dominion and The Evening Post merged in 2002, the paper dispensed with that responsibility. It has now been taken under the wing of the Dame Malvina Major Foundation and the first prize is now a generous $4000.

That being so, it was surprising that there were only five entrants to the aria competition, compared with more than 20 in some earlier years. There was a clash with the aria contest in Dunedin and there were other apparently competing events that prevented many singers from other parts of the country from taking part this year.

The adjudicator was Angela Gorton. The accompanist Catherine Norton who gave the most sensitive support to all but one of the singers; Emily Mair accompanied Kieran Rayner.

All singers were between 20 and 22 years of age, and all but one of them had appeared in the New Zealand School of Music’s production of Semele.

The first contestant was Rose Blake who was the alternate Semele. She chose Marzelline’s aria from Fidelio, ‘O wär ich schon mit dir vereint’. It is usually hard to take the first position in such a contest and nervousness and probably inadequate warming up affected her voice which, though proving quite strong, was tight and her phrasing uneven. It was no surprise that her second aria, ‘I’ll take no less’, from Semele, found her in much better shape, more practised and confident in her gestures as a result of the stage experience.

Kieran Rayner, who had sung the role of Athamus in Semele, made a singular impression at once, singing the aria ‘Mein Sehnen, mein Wähne’ from Korngold’s Die tote Stadt, letting the audience realize that there’s more to it that the familiar Marietta’s Lied. He showed a naturally attractive voice, with comfortable delivery, never under pressure. His second aria showed similar accomplishment, from a contrasting opera style, Ambroise Thomas ‘other’ opera, Hamlet: ‘O vin, dissipe la tristesse’ (not something that you’ll find in the Shakespeare version). He sang with flair, in good French, his rhythm, phrasing and dynamics all under fine discipline. I had no doubt that he would be hard to beat in this small field.

Amelia Berry was the Semele that I saw on the opening night but she refrained from making use of that experience. She sang the charming, lyrical aria ‘Ruhe sanft’ from Mozart’s unfinished opera Zaïde and later, ‘Una voce poco fa’ from The Barber of Seville. She failed to articulate the top notes in the Mozart; perhaps her choice had taken her out of her natural register, or perhaps it was simply nerves. So I was not surprised with a more comfortable performance of her Rossini, lying a little lower though with more bravura, which she carried off with agility and accuracy. In this it was easier to gauge the quality of her voice, and I thought she might win one of the prizes.

Elitsa Kappatos did not have a role in Semele. Though she chose pieces that are very familiar, pieces that make considerable demands, her performances were creditable. ‘O mio babbino caro’ was a little shrill, but her intonation was accurate and she made a nice personal impression. She gave herself every advantage in the Habanera from Carmen, with an appropriate costume, she refrained from excessive gestures, yet carried off the confident, strong-willed, mezzo role with a certain flair.

Olga Gryniewicz had made a vivid impression in Semele, as Iris, and she chose one of her main arias in the contest: ‘Endless pleasure’. It was a shade less striking here, removed from the theatrical setting, the line a little too staccato, and her voice monochrome. But she did well to tackle Norina’s fine, coloratura aria from Don Pasquale, ‘Quel guardo il cavaliere’. Her voice coped with its high, airy, innocent character, her Italian was good, and rhythmic sense – rubato – well cultivated. She draws attention as a spunky, characterful singer; but an underlying strain is audible, reflecting a voice production difficulty.

Nevertheless, I had thought she would get a mention among the prize winners.

Angela Gorton awarded the Dame Malvina Major Foundation prize and the prize for the singer displaying the most consistent standard, as well as the Jenny Wollerman award for the best song or aria in French to Amelia Berry. Kieran Rayner was given the Rokfire Cup for the most outstanding singer in the senior vocal class and the Robin Dumbell Cup for the singer with the most potential. In effect he was runner-up.

Finally, I must draw attention to the longstanding devotion to the aria contest’s survival by its almost single-handed manager, Betty Bennett, for the Hutt Valley Competitions Society. It is high time that others concerned with singing in Wellington took a share of the responsibility for the contest. Contests may not be favoured in certain quarters but they still represent, in a career that is based in public performance, an important way to gain attention in a frighteningly competitive scene.

Let us remember that Wellington’s own competitions society collapsed in the 1970s; since then the society in the Hutt Valley has filled the gap. It must not be allowed to stumble.

Pia Palme – Austrian Connections from Caprice Arts

Posted on by Alan Wells

Pia Palme (contrabass recorder), Dylan Lardelli (guitar), Bridget Douglas (piccolo), Ben Hoadley (bassoon), Nicholas Hancox (viola), Donald Nicolson (piano), Philip Brownlee (synthesizer), Niky Clegg (vocalist).
SOREN EICHBERG: “4 Pieces for Bassoon and Piano”;
PIA PALME: “AXE.WHO.TREE”, “Noneuclidian Playgrounds”;
DANIEL DE LA CUESTA: “Fachwerk”;
PHILIP BROWNLEE: “The Length of a Breath”, “As if to Catch the Fleeting Tail of Time”;
MICHAEL NORRIS: “Amato”;
JACK BODY: “Aeolian Harp”;
THIERRY BLONDEAU: “Non-Lieu”.

Salvation Army Citadel, Friday 14 August 2009

This concert organized by the enterprising Caprice Arts Trust featured an adventurous array of contemporary music.

At the more conservative, conscientiously-constructed end of the spectrum, Denmark’s Soren Nils Eichberg’s “4 Pieces for Bassoon and Piano” effectively showcased the artistry of their commissioner, New Zealander Ben Hoadley. Much of the first piece involved the bassoon in a dialogue with itself across its different registers, from deep and mellow to high and plaintive. The second was a lively unison dance for both instruments. In the third, the piano set up a stalking funeral march beneath the bassoon’s lugubrious lament, while the fourth was rather like a busy “Bumblebee” for bassoon.

Towards the opposite extreme, Austrian Pia Palme’s “AXE.WHO.TREE” employed almost all the available resources to create a complex, changing sonic environment which included water-like electronic sounds, minimalistic piano chords, and the vocal agility of Niky Clegg. The result had something of the feel of free improvisation (a little too much so for my taste).

Palme is not only a composer: the Viennese virtuoso also plays the contrabass recorder. Her Swiss-made Kueng instrument, standing at over two metres tall, resembles nothing so much as an orphan organ pipe (and the organ is, after all, basically just a consort of recorders with delusions of grandeur). This modern adaptation of a medieval prototype is perhaps the most recent addition to the woodwind sub-bass range, joining some (less common) members of the saxophone family, the more established contrabassoon and contrabass clarinet, and (from the 1980s) the contrabass flute. The soft sound of the instrument benefits from discreet amplification, which makes it ideal for use with electronics. Palme’s other composition (a premiere), “Noneuclidian Playgrounds”, included guitar and electronic transformation of the giant recorder, and progressed to hatch a surprising drum-beat rhythm at the end.

The contrabass recorder was heard to good effect in the solo “Fachwerk”, from the Mexican-Austrian Daniel De la Cuesta. A strict palindrome, it began (and, of course, ended) with the “pizzicato” effects of tonguing, developing into a high-register melody with a low pitched accompaniment, and on to a pivotal core of multiphonics and organ-like depth.

Wellingtonian Philip Brownlee’s 2009 “The Length of a Breath” showed another side of the contrabass recorder, challenging Palme to produce exquisitely soft, mellow notes over the wide range of the instrument. Along with his other premiere in this concert, “The Length of a Breath” marked a welcome return to composition for Brownlee. Also written this year was the even more impressive “As if to Catch the Fleeting Tail of Time” for an ensemble of piccolo, bassoon, viola, guitar and piano. Here Brownlee’s timeless world of carefully placed gestures, unsuspected colour blends, and delicate Webernian klangfarbenmelodie distributed among the players, was enough (just) to sustain one’s interest, despite any perceivable thrust of forward momentum. (One intriguing technique was a microtonal scale achieved by successively plucking a guitar string while simultaneously pitch-bending it.)

Another premiere from another Wellingtonian was Michael Norris’s 2008 “Amato”. As sensitively rendered by pianist Donald Nicolson, this proved one of Norris’s most immediately attractive works to date, as it evolved from its rarefied opening to gradually fill the keyboard space out to its extremities, on towards a fortissimo explosion, and then to a mysterious close.

Jack Body’s “Aeolian Harp” from 1979 is almost a classic, in its versions for violin or cello. Somewhat rarer was the recension for solo viola performed by Nicholas Hancox. A study in harmonics, this piece evoked a wind-harp playing the most primordial of all scales.

“Non-Lieu” by French composer Thierry Blondeau also began as an essay in harmonics, expertly elicited (in rapid-fire staccato) from the guitar, by Dylan Lardelli. Further techniques introduced within this ingenious (if overlong) composition included live detuning with the tuning pegs, closely-beating intervals, and, during Lardelli’s theatrical exit (reflecting the interest in the use of space found also in Blondeau’s piece for a “moving chamber orchestra”), swinging the guitar to produce Doppler-effected pitch changes.

Pinchas and Players – Wellington’s Zukerman Experience

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Pinchas Zukerman (violin) / Jessica Linnebach (violin)
Jethro Marks (viola) / Ashan Pillai (viola)
Amanda Forsythe (‘cello)

KODALY – Duo for violin and ‘cello Op.7
BEETHOVEN – String Quintet in C Op.29
DVORAK – String Quintet in E-flat Op.97

Wellington Town Hall, Wednesday 12th August 2009

Known primarily as one of the world’s top virtuoso violinists, Pinchas Zukerman has also developed a reputation as a chamber musician, firstly in association with Daniel Barenboim and Jacqueline du Pre on recordings of music by Beethoven; and more lately with a group formed by the violinist in 2002, the Zukerman Chamber Players. Here in New Zealand for the first time to take part in “The Zukerman Experience”, the NZSO’s latest concert series, Pinchas Zukerman is also on tour with his group for Chamber Music New Zealand, taking with them two programmes nationwide. Wellington concertgoers heard the first of these programmes at the Town Hall on Wednesday evening.

In the programme, a quote from English critic David Denton summed up fairly what we heard from the group, with their programme of Kodaly, Beethoven and Dvorak – Denton talked about the Players’ “self-effacing musicianship never standing between the listener and the composer”, a sentiment which seemed to be echoed in the comments of people I spoke with who had also attended the concert. I would agree entirely, while at the same time wondering why on some occasions this self-effacement on the part of performers, often set up as an ideal by connoisseurs and critics, can in fact short-change the musical experience. In relative terms, the performances throughout by the Group were extremely classy; and in at least one instance, that of the Kodaly Duo, I felt thoroughly caught up with the music-making, finding the performers’ engagement with the sounds an enthralling experience. Elsewhere, I felt one step removed, as it were, as if a gloss or a sheen had been applied to the beautifully-finished product, keeping me in the bystander realms, the “spectator-line” in front of the art-work placed a little too far back, as it were.

So, what was different about the performance of the Kodaly Duo that engaged me to an extent that made the experience a stand-out one? First of all, there was a sense, right from the first note, that both Zukerman and his ‘cellist partner, Amanda Forsythe, were living the music – the interplay between them was palpable, the authoritative, “digging-in” opening giving way to a wonderful sense of the players exploring the sound-spaces and stimulating each other’s sensibilities, both using pizzicato motifs to goad the other into responses both of the utmost delicacy and beguiling richness. Then there was the sheer variation of tone-colour, gossamer figurations set by turns alongside full-blooded outpourings, the sounds at times resembling that of a string orchestra, the cellist with simple arpeggiations ravishing our senses with the glorious tones of her instrument.

The slow movement featured song-like sweetness at the outset, but with a central section whose character was almost surreal, as if a gentle dream had suddenly been hijacked by phobia-ridden angst, the tensions gradually melting-down with lovely Aeolian-harp-like strummings from the ‘cellist, and rapt responses from her duo partner. The finale began gloriously, with Zukerman and Forsythe generating an exultant, rhapsodising mood, then plunging into the dance, alternating dark, earthy Hungarian rhythms with more stratospheric flights of fancy, the episodes growing out of one another. I got the feeling that both musicians were throwing themselves into the intricacies of interaction and contrast that the music affords, with a wonderfully adrenalin-led burst of energy at the coda, leaving behind the concert-hall ethos and revelling in a richly-detailed out-of-doors spirit that left us exhilarated.
After these intense out-of-door explorations, the Beethoven Quintet seemed to inhabit another world of sensibility altogether. At first I liked the contrast set up by the more “orchestral” feel of the ensemble, but as the work progressed I began to miss in the playing that sense of involvement with the music that Zukerman and Forsythe had exhibited so tellingly during the Kodaly. Throughout the first movement I kept wanting the ensemble to “dig in” a little more to the string textures, perhaps at a slower, more “pointed” tempo. Interesting that I found the work as a whole somewhat reined in considering that the same composer at this time (1801) was working on other,  more revolutionary pieces that were challenging classical norms and structures in different genres such as the piano sonata (the Op.27 Sonatas, and the “Pastoral”).

I liked the contrasts afforded by the slow movement, the development section “breaking out” from the constraints of the opening, and the players nicely catching the humour of the “false ending”, at what seems like a concluding cadence suddenly plunging back into the turmoil, before slowly restoring a sense of calm. But contrary to the programme note’s description of the Beethoven finale as “pure drama”, I thought the ensemble brought out the music’s urbanity and elegance more than any kind of elemental connections. Detail was beautifully filled in, from the elfin ambience of the tremolando accompaniment at the opening, to the deftest of violinistic touches from Zukerman himself in the more withdrawn Andante episodes; while the Players obviously revelled in the music’s pacy minor-key sections, delivering the notes with plenty of snap and polish, and nicely contrasting the polarities of activity and circumspection throughout. Still, for me, the impression remained of a performance that never really “let go”, so that the Beethoven we were presented with remained a drawing-room composer, albeit an interesting and occasionally surprising one.
The Dvorak Quintet is justly regarded as one of the great glories of the chamber-music repertoire for string instruments – and in a sense, Zukerman and his Players performed it like that, with beautifully-modulated tones and tight rhythmic control throughout, allowing the work’s greatness as an absolute piece of music to shine through, even if there were no folk-singers intoning the tunes and clogs stamping to the rhythms. If my bias extends towards a performance ethos of this kind of music that makes earthier connections than we heard from these musicians, I’m not denying the virtuosity and beauty of tone that emanated from the Wellington Town Hall stage throughout. The musicians gave full-throated voice to the work’s lyrical opening, and expertly spun the syncopated rhythms of the ensuing allegro. Brilliant though their playing of the scherzo was, I missed the chunky “folk-fiddle” ambiences of my mind’s ear, and thought some of the music’s character had been ever-so-slightly dulled with too generalised a response. The Players came into their own with the hymn-like measures of the slow movement, lines gorgeously intertwined, and contrasting sections beautifully characterised, the ‘cello-playing from Amanda Forsythe always ear-catching, especially in the major-minor contrasts of some of the movement’s variations.

The work’s finale bottoms out a bit compared with the other three movements, its contrasting rondo-like episodes needing strong characterisation to provide sufficient contrast with the all-pervasive jig-rhythms of the principal theme. I thought the ensemble gave the music plenty of energy, but didn’t sufficiently “colour” the contrasts enough for there to be a real sense of “homecoming” at the return of the jig-like rhythm each time. But the movement’s conclusion was exhilarating, with dotted rhythms giving way to triplets and building the excitement towards the last, grand lyrical statement – and even if this was delivered more with drive and rhythmic purpose than full-throated joy, the excitement kept us buoyed up right to the end.
Pinchas Zukerman and his Players responded to the warmth of the audience’s appreciation with a movement from a work in the group’s “other” programme, the Andante movement from the Mendelssohn B-flat String Quintet, a supremely elegant coda to an absorbing evening’s music-making.