Chamber Music New Zealand season opens with exquisite French baroque concert by Les Talens Lyriques

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Chamber Music New Zealand
Les Talens Lyriques (Christophe Rousset – harpsichord, Gilone Gaubert-Jacques and Gabriel Grosbard – violins, Atsushi Sakaï – viola da gamba)

Marin Marais: Suite No 5
Antoine Forqueray: Première Suite
François Couperin: Les nations: ‘La Piemontaise’
Jean-Marie Leclair: Deuxième récréation de musique, Opus 8
Jean-Philippe Rameau: Pièces de clavecin – Troisième concert
Couperin: Le Parnasse ou l’Apothéose de Corelli

Michael Fowler Centre

Wednesday 13 April, 7:30 pm

As a rather excessive Francophile, I was more than delighted at the prospect of hearing the distinguished French baroque ensemble, Les Talens Lyriques, live in my home town. Knowing the strange and sometimes narrow musical tastes of some chamber music lovers whose horizons are often limited to the German and Italian lands, I rather feared that the unfamiliar music of the French baroque might have drawn a rather small audience. But I have misjudged my compatriots: there was a very decent-sized audience in the stalls of the Michael Fowler Centre.

This distinguished ensemble was born in 1991, inspired by its present leader, Christophe Rousset, and their name is mentioned in the company of the English Baroque Soloists, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, Academy of Ancient Music, Musica Antiqua Köln, Concentus Musicus Wien, the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century or their compatriots, Les musiciens du Louvre. Though, being just a quartet on this tour, their repertoire is different from that of larger ensembles.

The programme was somewhat chronologically arranged, starting with Marin Marais, a Suite that reflected one extreme of the French style, melody that was so subtle and unassertive as to be hard to apprehend; its beauty lay in its elusiveness and the finesse and taste (words of Leclair quoted in the programme notes) of its embellishments. Though the dance-derived movements were stronger and of course rhythmic, and melody was of great refinement. It was the remarkable deftness and elegance of the performance however, that was the overwhelming impact of the music. The harpsichord is by nature almost excessively reclusive (we should have been in a more suitable venue, such as the Town Hall, its fixing disgracefully stalled, to capture its sound better) but its important support was audible if you really turned your attention there. The two violins, both in sublime duetting and alone, and above all, the astonishing virtuosity and beauty of Atsushi Sakaï’s viola da gamba held between them the essence of the style.

Most of Antoine Forqueray’s music has been lost but his Suite in D minor, for harpsichord and gamba, one of the five surviving, provided a vehicle for Sakaï’s almost supernatural command of his magnificent instrument which could sound in its upper register, more like a violin than either a cello or a viola ever does. Not only that, but this endlessly complex, fantastically embellished composition was played without the score.

Then we came to Couperin (next time you’re in Paris, visit the church of Saint-Gervais where the family dynasty reigned for generations; behind the Hôtel de Ville in the 4th arrondissement). The first of the two Couperin works was one of the four suites or, as Couperin wrote, Ordres, entitled Les Nations, each celebrating one of the Catholic powers: France, Spain, the Holy Roman Empire and the Savoy dynasty of Piedmont. This was the fourth, La Piémontaise. ‘Each is a combination of an Italianate trio sonata with its free-form virtuosity and a large-scale and elaborate French dance suite’ (quote from a Naxos recording). The first movement dominated the piece, with numerous switches back and forth from pensive to meditative phases, from the French to the Italian style, though the Piedmontese, or Italian, character rather dominated the suite. Again, the performance spoke of a deep-rooted idiomatic understanding of the essential Couperin on the part of Les Talens.

Leclair was the most nearly ‘classical’ of the five composers in the programme: he lived from 1697-1764; the notes refrained from retelling the tale of his death, murdered in a Paris street, believed to be related to his separation from his wife a few years before. (If you’re curious, read Gérard Géfen, L’Assassinat de Jean-Marie Leclair, Belfond, 1990, which offers a solution to the mystery). But there’s nothing shady about the music, the Second Récréation de musique, its full title adding ‘for easy performance by two flutes or two violins’. Bearing clear marks of his country, it is easily placed in its era and nationality, along with other composers of the early 18th century, not excluding Couperin; it contains occasional operatic gestures. The second movement, Forlane, in triple time, was quite an extended piece that carried echoes of German and Italian music of his period. And then came an un-Bach-like Chaconne – danceable, lively. And here was one of the places where I felt the harpsichord was a bit disadvantaged in this space.

Rameau is probably the French composer most familiar with the general musical public through the revival of all his operas, mainly by French companies, in the past 20 years. And indeed the tune in the last movement, Tambourines, reminded me of a tune in one of them. Almost a contemporary of Bach, Handel and D Scarlatti, Rameau’s life before opera, which began aged 50, consisted of theoretical treatises and harpsichord and chamber music. In fact the five ‘concerts’ or suites of the Pièces de clavecin en concerts, published well after the three books of Pièces de clavecin, were the only real chamber music he wrote. They played the third ‘concert’, which called for one violin (Gilone Gaubert-Jacques), gamba and harpsichord, with the latter playing an altogether more involved role than as merely a continuo instrument, and the result was three quite vividly characterized movements, brilliantly played. Particularly touching was the enchanting sotto voce ending of the second movement, La Timide.

And the concert ended with a second Couperin suite, Le Parnasse ou l’apothéose de Corelli, a famous musical excursion which speaks of his admiration for Corelli, the great Italian born fifteen years before Couperin. Here, all four players returned, and it was more entertaining as Rousset read (in French) the little introductory phrases before each short movement, describing Corelli’s reception by the muses as he arrives at Parnassus and he is introduced to Apollo. It seemed to reaffirm the return of French music to the mainstream, after the diversion to a somewhat contrived ‘French’ style cultivated by Lully and his followers.

All one’s hopes and expectations were fulfilled by these superb performers, admirable ambassadors for the revelatory music that they played.

 

 

 

Talented young pianist impresses at St Andrew’s lunchtime concert

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

St Andrew’s lunchtime concerts

Nick Kovacev – piano

Haydn: Sonata in B minor, Hob XVI/32
Bach: The Toccata from Partita No 6 in E minor, BWV 830
Schubert: Impromptu in B flat, D 935, no 3
Ginastera: Danzas Argentinas (1937)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 13 April, 12:15 pm

The New Zealand School of Music is a major supplier of talent to the year-long series of lunchtime concerts at St Andrew’s on The Terrace. Most of those who play are at somewhat advanced degree levels, but this time it’s pianist Nick Kovacev who is in his first year at the school. I had not read the brief note about him in the programme at the start of the recital and had imagined that he was probably about a third year student, such was the polish and confidence of his playing. Even though there were occasional slips, which of course reassures us that we are listening to a live performer and not a highly enhanced recording playing behind an animated papier-mâché model of a pianist seated at the piano.

I’m sure others were misled too as he proceeded to dazzle the audience with one of Haydn’s more spectacular sonatas, Hoboken’s No 32 in B minor, from memory, as was the entire recital. It was not far removed from the more breathtaking of Scarlatti’s sonatas: staccato, animated, fluent, his playing displayed awareness of dynamic variety, produced through a well-applied palette of articulations. His posture suggested maturity with a flair for the pregnant pause and taste sufficiently cultivated to enrich the shapes of tunes which were never merely repetitious.

The Toccata from Bach’s 6th harpsichord partita provided Kovacev with a different idiom to explore. The improvisatory start and finish lent a sense of spontaneity, as if he was making it up as he went along; it compared strikingly with the sobering effect of a fugue which arrives a rather a surprise. His playing showed purpose and mastery, as he paid careful attention to the evolution of the fugue. The programme notes used the words ‘earnest simplicity’ to describe the next piece, by Schubert and it struck me that it applied to the Bach too.

Schubert’s big Impromptu in B flat (among the two longest of the eight) drew attention to yet another facet of Kovacev’s talent. His ability to sustain the musical line in a major piece of music was very evident; it is a set of variations on one of the rich, poignant melodies in his incidental music for the play Rosamund, and its structure can be compared with Beethoven’s sets of piano variations. The unexpected changes of mood though modulations sounded both inevitable and surprising and the performance proved a rewarding experience. Kovacev dealt skillfully with minor, understandable memory lapses.

If these pieces from memory were not impressive enough, Ginastera’s Danzas Argentinas was a sort of summary of his imposing technical and interpretive accomplishments at present. It begins with a dance by an old herdsman: bi-tonal, dissonant, heavy-footed and virtuosic, then lyrical, feminine and elusive in the second, and finally, to portray the arrogant gaucho: hectic, forceful and deliberately shapeless. It was a rather spectacular demonstration of a young pianist’s achievement and his ambitions for the future.

One will keep an eye on his progress.

 

 

Aroha Quartet revisits Waikanae Music Society with polished, well-balanced programme

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Waikanae Music Society

Aroha String Quartet (Haihong Liu and Simeon Broom, violins; Zhongxian Jin, viola; Robert Ibell, cello)

Haydn: String Quartet in G, Op.33 no.5
Piazzolla: Tango ballet suite
Anthony Ritchie: Whakatipua
Mendelssohn: String Quartet no.6 in F minor, Op.80

Waikanae Memorial Hall

Sunday, 10 April 2016, 2.30pm

It is always a pleasure to hear the Aroha String Quartet and their varied programmes.

The Haydn quartet had a rather sotto voce commencement; the movement was described in the programme notes as a greeting, such as ‘how do you do’. All of Haydn’s jollity and wit were present.

The second movement was enchanting, with a chirpy ending that brought chuckles from the audience. The scherzo was full of changes and interruptions, while its trio was a graceful contrast, with an abrupt ending. The final movement featured a dotted rhythm, and appeared to be a slow dance with variations. It provided a good precursor to the dances to follow.

The sections of Piazzolla’s composition had movement titles, but it was not always apparent where one ended and another began. In a radio interview, Robert Ibell said that he was not aware of the work having been played in New Zealand before; they had difficulty because the supplier of the scores sent only a full score. The parts arrived only days before the performance. So in the meantime they had to cut, copy and paste the full score to create their individual scores.

Contrasting vigorous and dreamlike passages were features of Titulos (Introduction) and elsewhere. Throughout, there was a great variety of writing and of instrumental sounds, all having plenty of individual input. The other sections were: La calle (The Street), Encuentro/Olvido (Encounter/Forgetfulness), Cabaret, Soledad (Solitude), and La calle, again.

There were some great sounds from the viola. A review of a CD of the work found through Google states: ‘The work alternates between vibrant and forceful passages that recall ‘The Rite of Spring’ by Stravinsky and a passionate melancholy for the slower movements. … the “Cabaret” movement … comes closest to mirroring pure tango music.’ The work exemplified the composer’s fusion of tango music with that of the Western classical tradition. One could find echoes of Haydn here, although the music was written only 60 years ago.

Balmy passages quickly gave way to more turbulent ones. As noted by the website, some movements are more dance-like than others. It was remarked to me in the interval that the Aroha Quartet was a little too restrained for this music; bandoneóns would have been more spirited, abandoned and rambunctious.

Anthony Ritchie’s work opened with the most gorgeous sounds, followed by a lilting, dance-like section. Each instrument was distinctive in its part, but when blend was required, it was there. Some parts were modal in tonality, with hints of Douglas Lilburn’s music present.

Mendelssohn’s final string quartet has a spooky opening, the remainder of that movement alternating ‘between rage and lamentation’ as the programme note said, the whole quartet being influenced by his sorrow at the recent sudden death of his sister, Fanny. The melodic invention for which Mendelssohn is noted was ever-present, even lushness of expression, but also a new anger, anguish and tension brought out particularly in the second movement. Quiet passages served to point up this tension.

The adagio recalled some of Mendelssohn’s other slow movements, but its intensity was much greater. I detected Schumann-like elements. The first violinist in particular judged skilfully the rendering of the subtle nuances of this movement, but all played stunningly well. At times there were the most delicate touches; the movement had a peaceful end. Not so the finale last movement. There were solemn, even bitter chords, but also moments of calm contemplation, that soon changed to rapid declamation – perhaps even rejection – with an almost furious ending.

 

It was a most enjoyable concert, with a variety of interesting and approachable music, beautifully played.

Committed and successful concert of Russian classics from Wellington Chamber Orchestra

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Wellington Chamber Orchestra conducted by Rachel Hyde with Helene Pohl (violin)

Khachaturian: Adagio from the ballet, Spartacus
Prokofiev: Violin Concerto No 2 in G minor, Opus 63
Borodin: Symphony No 2 in B minor

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Sunday 10 April, 2:30 pm

I was prevented from getting to the first half of this concert, which, with the tough though splendid Prokofiev concerto with Helene Pohl, would obviously have been the highlight.

But Borodin is no stroll through the birch forest either.

The Prokofiev concerto had an interesting provenance, as the composer later recounted: “The number of places in which I wrote the concerto shows the kind of nomadic concert-tour life I led then. The main theme of the 1st movement was written in Paris, the first theme of the 2nd movement at Voronezh, the orchestration was finished in Baku and the premiere was given in Madrid.”

The second concerto is more attractive and lyrical than the first but there is much that is complex and difficult and it is brave and ambitious for an amateur orchestra to tackle; and no easy matter even for a soloist such as Helene Pohl, one of New Zealand’s most polished and cultivated violinists. It’s a fine, strong work, calling for a fastidious and brilliant violinist and I very much regret having missed it, especially in what I gather was such an emotionally committed performance.

Spies told me that, although there were inevitable glitches in the concerto – in the orchestral playing, it was considered a great success, very well received by the audience and certainly an achievement and rewarding experience for orchestra and conductor.

The concert had opened with the famous (‘Onedin Line’) Adagio from Khachaturian’s Spartacus which was well within the capacities of the orchestra; as someone said, it just played itself.

I was impressed at once by the richness of the string ensemble that opens Borodin’s best-known symphony; quickly followed by carefully articulated horns – four, as scored, and then more general wind entries. I gather that the four horn players are using new instruments, and their work, for an amateur orchestra, was surprisingly accomplished.

Rachel Hyde achieved a really characteristic Russian sound that lay somewhere between Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov; perhaps it occasionally lost its grip after the development phase got under way, but there was a clear feeling for the music’s shape. The second movement is a Scherzo of intriguing irregularity with a strikingly different Allegretto in the middle, and that was exploited satisfyingly.

The orchestra stopped to retune between second and third movements, breaking the flow a bit; but the reward was an Andante movement of considerable charm, opening with nice playing by clarinet and harp and soon a fine horn solo; and other wind players also had rewarding solo opportunities. The strings led the long, warm melody that rather dominates the movement which, at the end, merges curiously into the last movement without a break. The Allegro finale had striking energy, characterized by repeated short motifs of a pentatonic character that chased each other from one section to another.

Although Borodin thinned out the brass parts when he revised the symphony two years after its 1877 premiere, a performance like this in a limited acoustic, does not produce sounds from brass and percussion that are exactly refined or subtle. Nevertheless, listening between the notes, so to speak, the playing emerged as well-rehearsed, committed and energetic.

Though I had not heard what I guess was really the most interesting, even exciting, music in the concert, what I heard was admirable, and what I heard about, even more so.

Superb song tribute for the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, from the resourceful Nota Bene

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

“The Cloud Capp’d Towers”: Shakespeare in the Land of the Long White Cloud

Nota Bene, directed by Peter Walls, with Nigel Collins (the Bard), Fiona McCabe (piano) and Joel Baldwin (guitar); vocal soloists from the choir

Salvation Army Citadel

Saturday, 9 April 2016, 7.30pm

Despite the title of the concert, the song referenced appeared in the printed programme as ‘The Cloud-clapped Towers’. Some of those in Christchurch certainly were, although the tall buildings on the cover of the programme represented Auckland and Wellington.

Joking aside, the programme presented was a marvellous conception by Peter Walls and Jacqueline Coats. Peter Walls has taken over as Nota Bene’s new musical director; he’s a busy man, having just at Easter directed the Tudor Consort in their Good Friday presentation, and travelling frequently to Hamilton to conduct the Opus Orchestra.

As a commemoration of 2016 being the 400th year since Shakespeare’s death, this was a superb tribute; the fanciful idea of Shakespeare dreaming of ‘Terra Australis incognita’ (including New Zealand) was perhaps a little too contrived, and unnecessary. New Zealand composers included in the programme needed no special pleading for their presence.

The many wonderful settings of Shakespeare’s inspiring words, plus dramatic speeches from some of the plays, made a satisfying and rewarding evening of words and music, in the acoustically alive Salvation Army Citadel. The disadvantage of this feature was that it picked up every sound and error.

Vaughan Williams’s marvellous Three Shakespeare Songs were interspersed through the programme: one at the beginning, one later on, and one at the end. The first, ‘Full fathom five’ from The Tempest, was sung from the gallery. There the men sounded rather sepulchral; the tone needed to be produced further forward and they needed the spontaneity of the women’s. The sound changed when the choir came downstairs to sing on the platform, where the men had their backs to the wall. The first speech was from the same play. Nigel Collins was costumed, and sat at first at a desk, complete with quill pen and inkwell; later he stood in various parts of the auditorium to deliver his lines, which he did with expression and understanding, revealing his skill in the actor’s art.

We moved to Othello, and the famous Elizabethan setting of ‘The Willow Song’, sung by Juliet Kennedy with Joel Baldwin accompanying on guitar. It was a pity not to have the originally-advertised Stephen Pickett playing ‘Renaissance lute, theorbo and guitar’, for greater verisimilitude. Juliet Kennedy sang the song attractively, but it was a little strange to have printed ‘Her hand on her bosom, her head on her knee’ when the original is ‘his’, and that is what was sung. More words were printed than were actually sung.

Three Shakespeare Choruses by American composer Amy Beach (1867-1944) set words familiar from other composers’ settings. They were for women only and were inventive and very pleasing, involving complex interweaving parts. The third, ‘Through the house give glimmering light’ (A Midsummer Night’s Dream) featured lovely lilting rhythms. This time, more words were sung than were printed. It was good to have almost all the words printed in the programme, but Nota Bene could note well the recent Tudor Consort concert, for which the printed programme had been arranged so that it was unnecessary to turn the pages during the items, thus avoiding noisy rattling.

A speech from A Midsummer Night’s Dream was followed by the choir descending to sing from the platform; firstly three choruses from Purcell’s The Fairy Queen, a semi-opera derived from the afore-mentioned play, the first with soprano soloist Inese Berzina, and all accompanied by Fiona McCabe, stepping out from the choir to play the piano. Unfortunately, the piano was too loud for the soloist, though the choir’s singing was good. The second featured bass soloist John Chote.   His tone was sometimes on the raw side, and he was unable to produce effective tone from the low notes. The choral parts were very fine, and Purcell’s music bloomed beautifully.

The next, unaccompanied, section began with the second of Vaughan Williams’s songs: ‘Over hill, over dale’. It suffered from a poor start, the singers not being together, and appearing unconfident. After a bit, all was well. Following another stirring excerpt, this time from Henry IV, part II, music not setting Shakespeare’s words, but written by musicians who were the bard’s contemporaries, were performed: ‘Lord, make thy servant Elizabeth’, by Byrd and ‘What is our life’ by Gibbons. The former was an intricate piece, sung well, though the bass part was at times too dominant. In the latter, a small group was made up of good voices, but they did not always blend well. When they did, a fine sound was produced.

The men then disappeared, and after a splendid Caliban from Nigel Collins, the women sang Five Shakespeare Songs by David Farquhar. These characterful songs illustrated the bard’s words well, with music that evoked the moods. They were not easy, and very different in nature from the remainder of the concert. The final one, ‘Clown’s Song’ (“When that I was and a little tiny boy”) struck me as difficult to bring off unaccompanied, but it worked.

Following the interval, David Hamilton’s A Shakespeare Garland, set seven of Shakespeare’s texts on “botanical and/or seasonal” themes, six of them well-known. The composer’s 1999 composition set the words ‘in a variety of parody styles ranging from jazz to car-chase music.’ They differed markedly from their more familiar settings, especially ‘Hark, hark, the lark’ (Cymbeline) if compared with Schubert’s setting of the German translation. These songs were accompanied by guitar and piano, but I seldom heard the former due to the latter, despite sitting on the guitar’s side of the audience, and observing that the guitarist had a microphone and thus was being amplified.

‘It was a lover and his lass’ was sprightly, good fun. ‘Come buy of me’ (The Winter’s Tale) demonstrated Hamilton’s mastery of choral writing; a gorgeous song. The choir produced lovely resonance on the ‘m’ consonants. After a high-speed ‘Hark, hark, the lark’ came the much-loved Sonnet 18: ‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day’, sung by women only, with guitar; this was a delight. ‘I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows’ (A Midsummer Night’s Dream) was another delight, redolent with images from the bard’s wonderful words, most of which here and elsewhere could be heard clearly. This and the remaining two songs were accompanied.

‘When daisies pied’ (Love’s Labours Lost) was particularly jazzy, lively and fun – nothing like the well-known setting, which seems like a stroll in the park in comparison. The last song in the cycle, ‘Under the greenwood tree’ (As You Like It) was not the expected gentle pastoral setting. Again, I could not hear the guitar. Perhaps the men were tiring from so much standing; their tone was rather raw when singing loudly. They had their reprieve; after another oration from Nigel Collins (Lorenzo, The Merchant of Venice), the choir got to sit while two soloists gave us Shakespearean songs of quite different characters: Stephanie Gartrell (alto) sang with piano ‘Falling in love with love’ (Rogers and Hart’s 1938 The Boys from Syracuse) that again had only some of the words printed, but it was most effective, sung with clear diction.

Jeltsje Keizer sang with guitar ‘Take, O take those lips away’ (when will programme compilers realise the difference between the ‘O’ of invocation and the ‘oh’ of mild exclamation? I admit I have not consulted the First Folio! [I have, however, as proud owner of a facsimile edition; the learned Heminge – or Heming, Hemminge, or Hemmings – and Condell, the compilers and publishers of the First Folio, knew their ‘O’s from their ‘Oh’s, and it appears there as ‘Oh’ L.T.]). The programme gives it as ‘Anon.’, but both my Alfred Deller recording and Grove cite the composer John Wilson for this song from Measure for Measure. After a very moving speech by Lear on the death of Cordelia (King Lear), the choir sang ‘When David heard that Absalon was slain’ by Thomas Tomkins, continuing the theme of loss of a child. Some awkward harmonic clashes were negotiated with ease; this was complex contrapuntal writing, but sung exquisitely.

One of Prospero’s stirring speeches from Act V of The Tempest followed, and then a Latin motet by Byrd ‘O magnum misterium’ (usually spelt ‘mysterium’) made a glorious sound, though the basses again were a little too dominant at times. Nevertheless, it was a very fine performance. Douglas Lilburn’s setting of ‘The Willow Song’ followed, sung by Juliet Kennedy, accompanied on the piano. This song has received sundry arrangements; I have heard it on radio not infrequently, played on guitar. It was good to hear it with the words.

After a final oration from Prospero, we came to the wonderful song that named the concert. Although the choir was not quite together at the opening, the blend improved. This is surely one of the most gorgeous choral songs in the English language. The words are integral to the sound; obviously Vaughan Williams was much inspired by Shakespeare. It made an uplifting end to an evening’s entertainment of excellent quality.

 

Beautiful lunchtime with a flute and piano at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Rebecca Steel – flute and Diedre Irons – piano

Poulenc: Flute Sonata
Franck: Flute Sonata in A (transcription of the violin sonata)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 6 April, 12:45 pm

I’ve heard Rebecca Steel at least three times over the past year, playing with a pianist or as part of a trio, in interesting music, often adapted from music for other instruments: Debussy piano pieces, Piazzolla, Chopin, or authentic flute works such as by Bach or Villa-Lobos or Persichetti.

This time we heard what is perhaps the most famous and attractive flute sonata of the 20th century: Poulenc’s; and one of the several adaptations of César Franck’s Violin Sonata which is so lovely that everyone wants a piece of it. And here, with her partner, one of New Zealand’s finest pianists, we heard a version that proved just how universal is its pertinence.

Both performances were world-class; a reminder that St Andrew’s had gained such a reputation that the country‘s top musicians find it worthwhile (not in a pecuniary sense) to play there. There was an audience of nearing 100, and I could sense that their applause recognized that they knew they were hearing music both memorable and splendidly played.

Poulenc, though nearing the end of his life, produced here a piece that, though its first movement is marked Allegro malinconico, is a little slower than ‘allegro’ and not all that melancholy. It was full of vitality and melodic piquancy, and the dynamic attack and variety of articulation and colour had the audience sitting upright, with smiles on their faces. The second movement begins with a slowly rising arpeggio, and like most of Poulenc’s music, blessedly tonal, its face turned away from the strictures of the avant-garde. Nevertheless, its idiom could be of no time but the mid 20th century. Then the third movement, Presto giocoso, presents a sudden, almost shocking attack delivered equally by the two instruments. But it doesn’t persist, reverting for a moment to the calmer spirit of the first movement, with reference to what is somewhere referred to as ‘Poulenc’s trade-mark motif’, only to plunge back into the boisterousness of the first part to bring it to an end.

Franck’s sonata always raises the question in the minds of listeners, why didn’t he write lots of music in this gorgeous, melodic vein? Well, of course there is other music that supports his claim to be among the 20 greatest composers (make your own lists).

And it’s one of the pieces that seems to survive rearrangement for other instruments with no damage. I don’t think I’d heard a flute arrangement before, and was immediately won over, partly because of the strength of the music in melodic and structural terms, and partly through the brilliant and tasteful performance, by both flutist and pianist. The flute spun a lovely, lyrical line that banished any feelings I might have had about the ability of the flute to create the kind of legato phrases that come naturally to the violin. The duo allowed a subtle rubato to emerge, accelerating and slowing along with the rise and fall of the music. I feared that with the sparkling climax at the end of the second movement, applause might break out, but we had an audience that was sensitive to what the music was saying.

The following Recitativo movement was calm and beautiful, allowing the melody slowly to find its way, making us listen. I even had the inadmissable feeling that the flute was creating a more memorable impact, capturing the music’s essence more successfully that a violin would; it was so calm and peaceful.

The melody of the last movement is so sublime – it has stuck with me since I first heard it, played by a fellow student one sunny afternoon at a famous University Congress at Curious Cove in Queen Charlotte Sound long ago. The soft, velvety sound of the flute, immaculately matched by the piano, might have sounded, for a moment, a bit off-hand as the end approached, but the spell was nevertheless sustained.

It brought an unexpectedly beautiful recital to an artless, heartfelt conclusion.

 

 

 

Circa Theatre Revisits Home-Grown Chronicles

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Circa Theatre presents
“Joyful and Triumphant” by Robert Lord

Director: Susan Wilson
Designer: John Hodgkins
Lighting: Marcus McShane

Cast: Jane Waddell (Lyla)
Catherine Downes (Alice)
Michele Amas (Rose)
Peter Hambleton ((George)
Katherine McRae (Brenda)
Gavin Rutherford (Ted)
Lyndee-Jane Rutherford (Raewyn)

Circa Theatre, Taranaki St., Wellington

playing until May 7th 2016

Something very special is being currently re-enacted at Circa Theatre in Wellington – a revival of Robert Lord’s play, Joyful and Triumphant.

First performed at Circa Theatre in 1992, in the company’s original premises in Harris Street, the play, directed by Susan Wilson, was one of the great successes of the fourth Wellington Arts Festival, winning both festival and national awards. The production then undertook a New Zealand tour and subsequently was presented in Australia and in London.

Now, almost twenty-five years later, a new production features the same director, and no fewer than three members of that original 1992 cast, each one playing a different role to that created the first time round.

Joyful and Triumphant presents a series of Christmas Day vignettes in the life of a “typical” New Zealand family over a period of forty years, beginning in 1949.

Playwright Robert Lord managed to chronicle both family history and the wider social, cultural and political history of New Zealand over the duration. Something I didn’t pick up at the time of first hearing about the play was its apposite subtitle – “An Incidental Epic”. I also didn’t know, until coming to write this review that the playwright didn’t live to see his work premiered, but died just before the production was staged – he was 46.

There was absolutely nothing glamorous, flashy, epic or earth-shattering about this play, and that was its strength – it sought to present an ordinary New Zealand family’s Christmas as it would have been in 1949 and how things developed for those same people over the years. As a new-born forty-niner myself, my memories of the opening ambiences were understandably dim, but I readily connected with all of the subsequent depictions, the characters and their attitudes, and their surroundings, as if I were a kind of Ebenezer Scrooge taken back by a “ghost of Christmases past”.

One of the actors in the original production, Catherine Downes, commented on her feelings as a present-day cast member, this time round: “Approaching it this time, a huge difference is that the entire play is set well in the past. When we first did it in 1992, it brought us up to date. Now, it’s almost a time capsule at what was going on. Not just in New Zealand politics, but social history, and what views were at that time, towards racism, religion, women’s roles.  It’s utterly fascinating, and even more so now, looking at it from a great distance.”

The dialogue kept on for me evoking memories of the television series of the 1970s Close to Home – here was the vernacular, expressed in a recognizably authentic way, characterful and wry-humoured, but free from any self-conscious cleverness. Interestingly, Downes commented that the dialogue and situations appeared to “travel” without any difficulty – when the original cast took the play to Australia and to England people who attended the performances seemed to her to enjoy the work as readily as did home-grown audiences.

In almost every instance, the actors seemed to fit their characters as hands fit well-worn gloves.  Undoubtedly director Susan Wilson’s experience both in a specific work-based sense and in general enabled her to bring out this “playing oneself” aspect in each of the characters in a richly-rounded way. Only in one case did I have difficulty recognizing and thus warming to a character in a kind of “familiar” sense, a circumstance which could well reflect my own internal struggles with like people in day-to-day situations! – but more of this anon.

The song “Blue Smoke” set the scene most evocatively for the first and earliest of the vignettes, the strains permeating the ambiences and resounding among the configurations of the times – a wonderful beginning, underpinned by subtle dialogues between characters which allow them to tell us who they are as people putting their best foot forward for Christmas, and in more unguarded moments expressing their insecurities and disappointments. Katherine McRae’s Brenda, who was the family’s daughter-in-law, for most of the time unprepossessing and embarrassingly anxious to please, undertook a “moment” in which she deliciously described her daughter Raewyn as “thirteen and too far advanced! – I did have a chest like that until I was twenty…she just grew the thing to annoy me!”

The characters developed both by osmosis and stimulation, bringing their personalities and resulting styles to the interactions – until the arrival of the youngest family member Raewyn in the second Act, the two most startling and lively figures were, on the face of things diametric opposites – George, the head of the Bishop family, and the well-to-do neighbour, Alice, a widow, who goes to church with Lyla, George’s wife. Politics spiced this particular interaction, George’s socialist beliefs occasionally locking horns in a (mostly) good-natured way with Alice’s true-blue inclinations.

Peter Hambleton’s George was a vividly-projected larger-than-life character, very much down-to-earth, apart from his romantic inclinations in kissing his wife Lyla under the mistletoe (after an accidental-cum-engineered piece of flesh-pressing with the wrong woman!), as well as his indulgence in flights of fancy, such as pretending, most convincingly, to be Bing Crosby during the course of the latter’s singing of “White Christmas”. More than a match for him throughout was Catherine Downes’ feisty, true-hearted Alice, the widowed neighbour whose circumstances over-rode any divisive political ideologies which might have kept her at a distance – her and George’s interactions when practicing their dancing steps provided a source of ever-so-slightly risque merriment for all those in attendance, especially the idea of their capturing the “Blue Ribbon for General Rhythmic Excellence” as a dance-floor team.

Opening the play was Michele Amas’s Rose, a sensitive, low-keyed but deeply-wrought portrayal of a young woman trying to generate an independent life in the wake of losing her wartime fiancee, and struggling to do so, with utterances along the way such as “I don’t know where I left my life, but it’s not here!”, and the occasional family skirmish, such as with her brother Ted (Gavin Rutherford) over the state of each other’s respective lives. Originally, Amas played Raewyn, the rebel teenaged daughter – “It was a big part of our lives for eight years, off and on. So it was like returning to a family you hadn’t seen for a long time, the family picture was there, but slightly different. Being back with the others is pure joy. We never thought we’d have the opportunity to do this again.”

Rose was originally played by Jane Waddell, who took the role of “Mum” (Lyla) this time round, her coiffure resplendent at an early point in the play via a possibly neighbour-inspired blue rinse, which would have made husband George see redder than usual! Lyla’s subsequent debilitating stroke caused as much bathos as pathos through her attempts to communicate with the family with barely intelligible squawks (the true nature of laughter disturbingly exposed, perhaps). But previously, Waddell and Catherine Downes together made something rich and strange out of their characters’ “chalk-and-cheese” neighbourly interaction – like many things in “Joyful and Triumphant”, best relished, I’ve found, in retrospect, things having continued to work and grow long after one has left the theatre.

Playwright Lord tapped into the “blood is thicker than water – but at a price” principle with his characterizations of both Ted and Brenda, son and daughter-in-law. Gavin Rutherford’s portrayal of Ted, in places so yummily gauche and self-inflated, if ready to burst like a bubble when put to the sword, excited our derision and sympathy at one and the same time. This was especially so in the context of Ted’s interaction with his father, George, the pair’s disagreement regarding the events of  the 1981 Springbok tour fuel for deeper-seated conflicts and existential angsts, especially to do with Raewyn, Ted’s and Brenda’s daughter.

Which brings me to confess my one difficulty regarding “recognizing” each of the play’s characters – this was with Lyndee-Jane Rutherford’s assumption of Raewyn, and perhaps was as it should have been, in any case, with a rebellious teenager! At first I found the portrayal alien and seeming over-wrought, as if deriving from an American television soap, and thus seeming to me not to “connect” (even in a dysfunctional way) with the parents, the wider family and the times – however, as the saga amassed the years and brought about a kind of “epiphany” for the family over the birth of a grandchild, Rutherford’s character seemed to put down roots and grow more recognizable (comfortable?) foliage. Perhaps I also grew in some ways along with her character, with each of the interactions – as one has to, willingly or otherwise, in real life!

Rich, redolent and recognizable – this was a production greater than the sum of its parts, one which Susan Wilson’s direction, John Hodgkins’ evocative sets and Marcus McShane’s oh so nostalgic lighting helped bestride the ages, giving us all a glimpse of whom, what and where we had come from, and why it all was so very worthwhile to remember.

A view of the world – Edo de Waart and the NZSO

Posted on by Peter Mechen

MAHLER – Symphony No.3 in D Minor

Charlotte Hellekant (mezzo-soprano)
NZSO Chorale / Wellington Young Voices
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra
Edo de Waart (conductor)

Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington

Saturday 2nd April 2016

Gustav Mahler’s famous assertion to his fellow-composer Jean Sibelius, that “symphony is like the world – it should contain everything” is nowhere better demonstrated than in the former’s Third Symphony, significantly the longest of the composer’s essays in this form. The music seeks to acknowledge every natural creative force in the universe throughout its six movements – in fact, Mahler originally intended to go further and include a childlike vision of afterlife based on a poem from Des Knaben Wunderhorn called “Das Himmlische Leben” (The Heavenly Life), but eventually thought better of the scheme, saving his setting of the poem for the Fourth Symphony instead.

To go with this symphony’s vast duration, the composer called upon a large orchestra, joined by a mezzo-soprano soloist, womens’ voices and a childrens’ choir. With such forces expounding along such lengths, one couldn’t help but feel awed by the range and scope of the experience in listening to the work – and especially when, as with the performance we witnessed on Satruday evening in Wellington, the response from orchestra players, voices and conductor thrillingly matched the composer’s vision in intensity, brilliance and depth of feeling.

I thought the key to this occasion’s success lay with conductor Edo de Waart, who, making his Wellington debut with the orchestra as its Music Director, enabled orchestral playing which brought out the work’s sheer range of expression, from rapt stillnesses and breathtaking beauties to rumbustious energies and, in places, disturbingly raw, almost panic-stricken upheavals – indeed, a performance in which, to quote the composer’s own words once again, “the whole of nature finds a voice”.

Right from the start the playing gave notice that the performance meant business, with horns vigorously awakening at first the percussive instrumental textures, and then the deep, black-browed heavy brass, their grim mutterings punctuated by upward-rushing fissures of agitated string-tone and sombre calls from the watchful trumpets, alert to all dangers. From these seismic upheavals grew the subterranean seeds of a march-rhythm, at first held in check by a superbly-voiced trombone solo (stunningly delivered by David Bremner), but then eventually bursting forth and dominating the whole movement.

My overriding impression of the opening was of elemental forces being unleashed, a process which seemed to gather focus and intensity as the music proceeded – however rapt and hushed the ambience in certain places, the weight and energy of that which had gone before was picked up in a trice, with no signs of exhaustion over an enormous time-span. Though occasionally interrupted by violent outbursts and episodes of brooding calm, the music’s course was not to be denied, with conductor and players bringing things to a kind of fever-pitch of ecstatic joy by the movement’s end.

Then came a complete change of mood for the second movement, originally titled “What the Flowers tell Me” – where there had been granite-like strength and exuberant energy, there was now tenderness and delicacy, the wind-playing properly “pastoral” (NZSO principals Robert Orr, Bridget Douglas and Patrick Barry readily evoking the composer’s beloved meadows and wildflowers), spiced with occasional details from elsewhere suggesting occasional thistles and stinging nettles, with insect life and sudden wind-flurries giving an extra edge to the pleasures in places. After some scherzando-like interactions,  everything was rounded off most romantically by the strings, with Vesa-Matti Leppänen’s violin having the last word.

Over pizzicato strings the winds again dominated the opening measures of the “Forest Creatures” movement, the clarinet perkily sounding the octave-leap call whose resonances came to haunt every far-flung corner of this sound-world. For the moment there were rumbustious triplet-rhythmed sequences jauntily bounced along by the strings and percussion and answered by shouts of glee from the brass. The transition from these good-humoured high-jinks to a state of almost “charged”, breath-held expectancy was beautifully managed by conductor de Waart, the strings beautifully preparing the way for the off-stage flugelhorn, sounded as if from the realms of enchantment by Michael Kirgan with superbly-controlled playing (from where I was sitting I thought the sounds just a tad TOO distant – but better that, I think, than their being too close!). Whatever the case, the playing and the atmosphere created was, purely and simply, to die for.

As happens at the conclusion of the scherzo movement in the composer’s previous  “Resurrection” Symphony, there’s in THIS scherzo a similarly rapid gathering-together of forces resembling an oncoming hurricane or tidal-wave, one which here broke across the orchestral soundscape, scattering all idyllic imageries and feelings, and alerting us to nature’s power and grandeur – as one commentator puts it, the presence of the great god Pan is here made manifest, and so it seemed on this occasion,  though without reaching QUITE the extremes of  elemental force that my mind’s ear could have imagined. No matter, for it was sufficiently forceful and disturbing to banish the day and evoke the deepest and darkest part of the night – the composer’s setting of the “Midnight Song” from Nietzsche’s “Also Sprach Zarathustra”.

This was as great a contrast with what went before as was the second movement of the symphony to the first – we were plunged by the “Midnight Song” into the deepest recesses of our consciousness – and if the depths of those silences carried some resonances from the frenetic pop-music activities taking place adjacent to the concert hall along the waterfront, the wonder of it was (we afterwards marvelled) that  these thudding pulsations had such minimal impact upon our Mahlerian sound-world. I caught myself throwing occasional glances at the percussion to see whether the bass drummer was making a pianissimo roll of which I was unaware – but that was the only distraction, thanks in part to the compelling intensities of what OUR musicians were doing throughout.

Mezzo-soprano Charlotte Hellekant, a native of Stockholm, Sweden, brought an appropriate deep-voiced dignity to her tones, ably supported by the NZSO horns, the ambience suitably dark and subterranean, the sounds from the world’s depths – “Die Welt is tief und tiefer, als der Tag gedcht!” (The world is deeper than the day can tell). If some of her softer singing was difficult to “catch”, the sound still conveyed much of her words’ meaning – and she delivered a heartwarming surge of emotion together with the strings at “Doch alle Lust will Ewigkeit, will tiefe, tiefe Ewigkeit” (For Joy wants all Eternity, deep and profound”), which beautifully subsided into the silence as the “Bimm-bamm” of the childrens’ choir began.

The singing from both the NZSO Chorale and the Wellington Young Voices was exemplary – I’ve previously heard no finer performance of this, either live or on record. The timbres of each choir at once blended and contrasted with those of the other so very deliciously, alternating beautifully with the mezzo’s tones; and the brighter flecks of texture and colour provided by winds, brass and percussion, including the orchestral bells, raised high above the orchestra, completed the celestial effect. All credit to the choir trainers, to Mark Dorrell with the NZSO Chorale, and to Christine Argyle and Anya Nazaruk with the Wellington Young Voices, for their performances.

To my initial alarm, Maestro de Waart kept  the choirs standing for the first few minutes of the orchestral finale – but then, having preserved the rapt mood of the whispered strings-only opening to the finale, did what I hoped he would eventually do, which was to motion them to sit at the beginning of a new orchestral “episode”.** Only Mahler could get away with a finale such as this, but the conductor’s ability to sustain the line of the music certainly helped with generating a sense of its unity and eloquence – we were aware of de Waart’s grip of the piece’s architecture throughout, and of how each section grew out of the one before it, so that there was an inevitability about the coda’s arrival which felt like a proper “homecoming”. This having been done most resplendently, the reception accorded the Maestro at the end was heartwarming – flowers, coloured streamers and a general sense of festivity and true significance helped make the occasion a festive and memorable one, and, of course, whetted the appetite most positively for the music-making yet to come.

**I mention this because I’ve never forgotten the first performance of this symphony “live” that I ever heard, given by Franz-Paul Decker with the NZSO, during the course of which he refused to allow his choir to sit down throughout the WHOLE of the finale –  instead, leaving them standing there for we in the audience to sympathize with to the point of distraction regarding the music, and thus completely negating the purpose of the exercise!

Breaking the song recital drought with a fine, adventurous recital of unfamiliar songs by great composers

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Songbook: ‘Stormy Weather’; songs of the wind

Songs by Wolf, Massenet, Poulenc, Vaughan Williams, George Crumb, Lilburn, Copland, Gurney, Brahms, Rimsky-Korsakov, Frank Bridge, Debussy, Schubert, R. Strauss, Schoenberg, Fernando Sor.

Barbara Paterson and Barbara Graham (sopranos), Elisabeth Harris (mezzo-soprano), Ben Reason (baritone), Simon Brew (saxophone), Catherine Norton (piano)

Adam Concert Room, New Zealand School of Music

Friday 1 April 2016, 7.30pm

Another concert by Songbook, mainly featuring different singers from those in the concert I reviewed favourably last June. The laudatory remarks I made then apply again. Despite the theme, which may have seemed appropriate for Wellington (there was little wind at that stage of the evening, though some light rain), there was huge variety in the programme, not least in the length of the songs, from very short to quite long. The concert attracted a good-sized audience, including numerous singers.

It was a well-constructed programme (would such a concert have been possible pre-Google?) that held the attention throughout. Of the 18 songs presented, three were by Wolf, being settings of poems by Eduard Mörike. Other items were ‘one-offs”. Even Schubert was only represented once. It was splendid to hear a concert consisting of so many unfamiliar songs by leading composers.

Again for this concert, the printed programme had all the words and English translations clearly printed in fine type-faces on quality paper, and dates for composers and poets were given. (I’m horrified that CD booklets do not always give the dates, or poets’ names, even for recordings of famous singers.)

To open the programme, Barbara Paterson sang ‘Lied vom Winde’ by Wolf. It was an exciting song, and given an exciting and accomplished performance by both musicians. The accompaniment Catherine Norton played was quite astonishingly demanding and brilliant. Barbara Graham was up next, singing ‘Pirouchette’ by Jules Massenet, a conversation between a little girl and an unknown person, about the Mistral wind. This was another lively song – the evening’s winds were certainly speedy, so far! It was a wonderful performance, with subtlety and Barbara Graham’s accomplishment in the French language was a delight that continued in the next song, Poulenc’s ‘Air vif’, that lived up to its name.

We then heard from Ben Reason, a younger singer. He has a good, strong voice, but perhaps could have been a little more contemplative in his rendering of Vaughan Williams’s ‘On Wenlock Edge’. The Adam Concert Room is quite a small auditorium; full voice can be a little hard on the ears. Another little point: the way he sang the short ‘i’ vowel, as in ‘it’ and ‘in’, is rather ugly.

Elisabeth Harris sings better each time I hear her, and the George Crumb song ‘Wind Elegy’ suited her voice; she used the words beautifully. Lilburn’s setting of James K. Baxter’s ‘Blow, wind of fruitfulness’ was sung by Ben Reason, accompanied by piano and saxophone (the original setting is for viola), the latter played by Simon Brew. Ben’s tone was pleasing, though the ‘i’ sound again was not quite right in the word ‘wind’. It was a tasteful, interesting and attractive saxophone part. The music sympathetically set Baxter’s marvellous poem, and all the words were very clear, as they were from the other singers throughout the evening.

Barbara Paterson returned to sing Aaron Copland’s ‘There came a wind like a bugle’. From here on, music scores were used for most of the performances. This was very understandable in this case; the music was all over the place in this setting of words by Emily Dickinson. The singer coped well. (Sorry!) ‘Black Stitchel’ by Ivor Gurney was sung by Ben Reason. I would have liked a slightly lighter manner of rendition for this song, from both voice and piano, even though some of the words (by Wilfrid W. Gibson) were quite serious. Again, the singing was overblown at times for this venue.

‘Geistliches Wiegenlied’ by Brahms is a lullaby of Spanish origin, in which the poet (the German Emanuel Geibel) exhorts the wind to be still, because the child is sleeping. The translation was beautiful. Elisabeth Harris sang it, with saxophone obbligato (again, the original was viola). She displayed excellent control of dynamics, and her words were very clearly pronounced. The saxophone was played sensitively, with subtlety appropriate to the theme.

Now for some Russian music; Barbara Paterson sang the language well and confidently, in Rimsky-Korsakov’s ‘It was not the wind’; words by Tolstoy. It was a very touching song. A short song ‘Far, far from each other’ by Frank Bridge sung by Elisabeth Harris featured the saxophone (viola) again. It was attractively considered, with meaning given to both words and music.

Barbara Paterson returned with ‘An eine Aeolsharfe” by Wolf. The Aeolian harp was effectively conveyed in the music, which was given dramatic variation by the singer. It ended with a lovely piano postlude. A short Debussy song, ‘Zéphyr – Triolet à Philis’ received from Barbara Graham excellent treatment of the language, and a lively interpretation.

Schubert’s appearance in the programme was with ‘Suleika’, sung by Barbara Paterson. The busy accompaniment underlined the theme of the wind; the song was full of character. The next song (from the same singer) was ‘Begegnung’ by Wolf, who seems to have written a lot of songs about weather.

Strauss tackled the weather, too, with ‘Schlechtes Wetter’, a poem by Heinrich Heine, sung by Barbara Graham. Her low notes in this song were very good; the charming nature of the song was highlighted by the piano accompaniment, especially at the end. Schoenberg may not be particularly noted for his songs, but ‘Einfältiges Lied’ was an amusing song about a king going for a walk. Barbara Graham emphasised its humorous nature, singing it with exaggerated drama, not least in her facial expressions.

Finally, the three women sang an arrangement of a Spanish song by Fernando Sor: ‘Cuantas naves’, or ‘How many ships. This was a light-hearted end to a fine concert of song. Catherine Norton’s accompaniments were simply outstanding. Thank you, Catherine, for giving us another song recital, breaking the drought there has been in this genre for years. (Time was when we had such recitals in the Festival!) Bravo Songbook!

Cervantes’ quadricentenary through diverting music of the 17th to 20th centuries

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

A Tribute to Cervantes

Spanish music from the 17th to the 20th century
Gaspar Sanz, Boccherini, Enrique Granados, and songs by Federico García Lorca (presuably words and music) and by Manuel de Falla, Antonio Alvarez Alonzo, Manuel Lopez Quiroga, Santiago Lopez Gozalo, Pascual Marquina

Manuel Breiga – violin and Adrian Fernandez – guitar

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Sunday 27 March, 6 pm

This year is the 400th anniversary not just of the death of Shakespeare, as the whole world knows, but also of Miguel Cervantes. Not only the same year, but also the same month – April – and even more surprising just one day apart! S. on 23 and C. on 22 April.

Cervantes was longer-lived, having been born in 1547. In an introduction it was pointed out that the two players were, serendipitously, from La Mancha which was the home of Cervantes’ hero.

The concert was supported by the Spanish Embassy in Wellington and the Spanish and Latinamerican Club,

Violinist Manuel Breiga introduced each bracket (in Spanish, and his words were translated). Evidently he gave no information about the composers or their music, other than the titles, which were, in any case, in the printed programme. Perhaps, given that it was a free concert and much of the audience was there for Spanish rather than musical reasons, this was acceptable.

The celebration of Cervantes was marked with the use of music written around 70 years after his own time. Don Quixote was written between 1600 and 1613 while Gaspar Sanz was born 24 years after Cervantes died (Sanz’s dates: 1640 to 1710) and most of his music was written between 1670 and 1700.

It was interesting to hear the six pieces by Sanz, since I had been awakened to his significance by the concerts given at the 2014 festival by the American lutenist Hopkinson Smith who played a number of Sanz’s pieces, some of which were used by Joachim Rodrigo in his charming Fantasia para un gentilhombre. At least three of the pieces Rodrigo chose were also played at this concert.

Tunes from the first dance, Españoletas, the fourth, Fanfarria de la caballeria de Nápoles and the sixth, Canarios, were all used in the Rodrigo Fantasia. They were divertingly varied in style, rhythm, mood, from the forthright Españoletas, to the more lively Gallarda y Villano and Rujero y paradetas, the latter enlivened with a shift to a skipping, triple time, in a middle section.  Though the violin led the way most of the time, the guitar had a long solo passage in a dance in six/eight, dotted rhythm.  The big confident sound produced by the amplified instruments gave a very different impression of music from an age of discreet taste, though not one that would have seemed inappropriate to most listeners; and it’s not merely a question of using early music in a modern way on modern instruments; Rodrigo did that very successfully.

The passacaglia movement from the famous Boccherini quintet, Op 30 No 6 (Música nocturna en las calles de Madrid, to give its title in Spanish) lay well for these two instruments – it survives all sorts of arrangements.

Only a fortnight ago the violin/guitar duo, Duo Tapas played at St Andrew’s, and they played one of the Granados dances that these Spaniards chose: the Oriental from his Twelve Spanish Dances. This evening we also heard No 5 of that set, Andaluza, the most popular of them. Even though they were written for the piano, the latter dance has become so familiar on the violin that Breiga’s performance sounded perfectly idiomatic; the Breiga-Fernandez duo played both Granados pieces splendidly.

Then they played a group of Spanish folk songs by Federico García Lorca. They were all from the Trece canciones espanolas antiguas – ‘13 old Spanish songs’. Breiga referred to Lorca as both poet and composer which came as a surprise to me. My impression from glancing at Internet references, was that the music was either traditional or by others; after all Lorca called them ‘old’. However, the website IMSLP states categorically that the composer is Federico García Lorca. The pieces were characteristic, genuine, perfumed in various ways, though they did rather cry out for a voice; they are all sung beautifully on YouTube by Teresa Berganza, and a few are also sung by Victoria de los Angeles. While the violin and guitar did them reasonable justice, their García Lorca inspiration was diminished without the words.

The final group of five songs and dances, were varied, though all speaking of aspects of Spain and its rich popular culture. They began with the Miller’s Dance from The Three-cornered Hat by De Falla, which was carried off with gusto; then Suspiros de España, ‘Sighs of (for?) Spain’, by the short-lived Antonio Alvarez Alonzo, plaintive with its falling phrases.

Maria de la O by Manuel López-Quiroga had a deeply traditional air, though it looks as if its origin was in a 1958 film. Again, sung versions had a passion that the more subdued violin and guitar performance could not really generate.

However, the taste of these recent Spanish songs and access to impassioned and persuasive sung versions has provided me with an hour or so of unexpected pleasure as I write this. A traditional, trumpet-led tune called Gallito by Santiago Lopez Gozalo, and España Cañi by Pascual Marquina ended the concert, apart from an encore of the tenor favourite, Granada.

The sound this very accomplished duo produced was not what we are used to hearing today in music of this kind. While it is normal to amplify a guitar except in a domestic situation, it is unusual to amplify the violin. Here both instruments were amplified to an unnecessary degree, which rather changed the character of the music and imposed a sometimes deadening uniformity of tone where the variety available in a natural acoustic would have been more interesting.

The duo’s style clearly suited music of the 19th and 20th centuries better than that of earlier periods: amplification there seemed more acceptable. So I found the second half of the recital more enjoyable than the first, which I had not really expected.

But it would have been interesting to have developed the Cervantes theme rather more, through music more closely associated with the Spain of the 16th century.  I wonder about the early 17th century, baroque flourishing of the Zarzuela and its association with the great dramatist Calderón, whose career lay between Cervantes and Sanz.