Tag: baroque music

Baching at the Moon – ‘Cellist Raeul Pierard at St.Peter’s on-Willis, Wellington

Posted on by Peter Mechen

J.S.BACH – Six Suites for solo ‘Cello
Raeul Pierard (‘cello)

St.Peter’s on-Willis, Wellington

Friday 23rd November 2018

Long and involved stories or series of tales have always attracted me – I’m a sucker for sagas, an enthusiast for epics, a connoisseur of chronicles. In music there’s nothing I like better to involve myself with than something that covers a wide span of time, incident and characterisation. I’m a completist who’s in seventh heaven when about to embark upon things like Bach’s “forty-eight”, Haydn’s “Salomon Symphonies”, Liszt’s “Transcendental Etudes” or Albeniz’s “Iberia”. I could go on, but don’t want to run the risk of getting side-tracked and losing my bearings……

Still, I mention these things because it seems to me that people are presently being encouraged in artistic matters to do the opposite to what I’ve just described – to skip in-and-out of encounters and experiences rather than cast themselves into the heart of things, body and soul, and especially so in music. One has only to tune into Radio New Zealand’s Concert Programme in its present form to experience the increased fragmentation of musical presentation that’s being served up as a kind of “standard” – lately, more often than not we get ”movements” rather than whole works and a preponderance of shorter pieces which suggests an inclination to merely “entertain” on the part of the powers that be, rather than to invite listeners to push back boundaries and undergo any kind of in-depth exploration.

I could go on about this trend as well, so that readers would soon give up on the prospect of my ever getting to the business in hand, that of reviewing a performance of all of JS Bach’s six Suites for solo ‘Cello – but what’s interesting in the framework of what I’ve just been talking about is the reaction of a number of people to my having gone to the performance of these works – things like “Oooh, that’s a LOT of solo ‘cello!” and “Didn’t it all start to sound like the same, after a while?”……..to be fair, there were many comments of the “wish I’d been there” variety, as well…..

As far as the player, Raeul Pierard, was concerned there was obviously no problem, having been inspired by one of his teachers to make a point of regularly performing the complete cycle. Accordingly, Pierard had entitled his concert “Baching at the Moon”, equating the regularity of his performances of these works with the lunar cycle, thus calling each of them a “full-moon event”. It wouldn’t be inappropriate to link the two occurrences as different manifestations of life-forces, bringing together cosmic and human patterns of behaviour as a way of contextualising a significant kind of co-existence, Bach’s music speaking for humanity in tandem with celestial processes.

So, to the concert, given in the remarkably beautiful interior of the Church of St.Peter’s-on-Willis:  a number of things came to my mind as I registered work following work, movement following movement and phrase following phrase – first and foremost was the sheer intensity of the experience, by way of both the music’s amazing variety and depth. I had listened with the utmost interest to Raeul Pierard’s spoken introduction to his playing of these works, taking to heart several points he made which for me further “opened up” both the music’s structural and emotional content, one of them being that his feeling was that the music was “autobiographical”, especially when considering that Bach’s life had ample potential for both joy and sorrow, having two wives, one of whom died; and twenty children, ten of whom did not survive him. Of the six Suites, two of them are set in minor keys and result in “darker” sounds than the other four, while the works numbered as fourth and sixth in the authorised “edition” of the composer’s works are more angular and exploratory of expression than their major-key fellows.

Not that it’s possible to “date” any of the works, Bach’s own autograph manuscript of them being lost, the most ostensibly reliable copy being that made by Anna Magdalena Bach, the composer’s second wife, with no details as to the origin of the works regarding time or place. The other three extant eighteenth-century copies are just as unhelpful, with further confusion arising from their differences, resulting in none of them being regarded as “the” authentic version. Instead, the ‘cellist wanting to play these works has a choice of over a hundred different “editions” offering different solutions to the discrepancies. It would have been interesting to have asked the cellist regarding “editions” and whether he had any particular “models” for his own playing style and/or interpretation (so many great names, from Casals onwards….) – however, I found myself at the end wanting to bring away the “sound” of the music in my head unadulterated by such detail, and so never got to actually talk with him…..

There being a smallish audience (the concert clashed with a sell-out performance of the Beethoven “Choral” Symphony from the NZSO that same evening!) Pierard invited all of us to sit up closer to him, freely talking to us at various places during the recital, but requesting that we restrain from applauding until the conclusion of each of the “halves” of the presentation – we actually got in first at the end of the First Suite and applauded, but no real harm was done! I could understand what he meant, though, and especially in the case of the minor-key works and those in the concert’s second half, where the act of listening seemed in itself a sufficient response to such sounds and the applause a superfluous, almost trite act juxtaposed with these evocations of something ineffably precious and timeless.

The First Suite’s opening allowed us to appreciate the St.Peter’s acoustic to the full, the instrument’s tones rich and focused, and “answered” by the surroundings in an enriching rather than confusing or blurring manner by an ambient glow. The Prelude unfolded under Pierard’s fingers with the utmost simplicity and natural-sounding freedom, followed by an Allemande which seemed to almost extend the opening with added whimsy and divergency, the repeat further deepening the explorations. These being “Suites” the movements were, of course, all dances of various kinds and nationalities (whose characteristics Pierard outlined for us), the following Courante rhythmically engaging from the very opening note, the trajectories impish and impulsive! Then came a Sarabande, a slow dance of (according to the ‘cellist) Turkish origin, one often given considerable gravitas by Bach in his various works, Pierard here bringing out the music’s meditative quality, the sounds having moments of deep wonderment. There’s usually a marked contrast with the following Minuet, though less so, here, the ‘cellist enabling the music’s “more than usual” circumspection of feeling, more poetic of motion than physical of impulse – as was the contrasting minor-key Trio section of the dance. A change came with the Gigue (English – “jig”), which was far more precipitate and impulsive in phrasing and overall movement.

From the very opening, the Prelude of the Second Suite seemed to suggest tragedy, with the three opening notes defining the mood and the following figurations exploring it. Pierard’s tone spoke volumes of eloquence throughout, especially in the piece’s second half where the intensity built to great depths of feeling before suddenly retreating, allowing the emotions some space to realign, the feelings as intense, though incredibly “inward” at the piece’s end. The Allemande brought a different kind of energy to what sounded like a purposeful journey, the Courante even more so with its vigorous phrases and its forthright display passages. Again, the Sarabande was played “con amore”, allowing the measures time and space to indelibly fix their phrases on the listeners’ sensibilities. This time the Menuet broke the spell, with purposeful, energetic playing at the onset on the part of Pierard helping to make really “something” of the shift to the major for the second Menuet. The Gigue was more angular and serious, using a drone in places to both “ground” the music and delineate the intensities with great characterisation, especially over the last few bars before the final ascent flung the music out into the cosmos with a defiant gesture.

After the grittiness of the Second Suite the Third came as a kind of bucolic relief, the drone-notes this time creating an earthy, pesante effect during the Prelude, while the figurations were made by Pierard into something organic and even theatrical at the end, involving elongated cadences and lots of trills! – in other words, quite an adventure. The Allemande here sounded almost like a rock-climbing exercise, delighting in scaling heights and plumbing the depths, Pierard conveying both the music’s vertiginous whimsy and its exhilaration. The Courante, too, was energetic and playful, the music featuring lots of antiphonal jumping about and “call and response”, with the second part even wilder and more varied in dynamics. This time the Sarabande was declamatory and theatrical, its repeat bringing more thoughtfulness and a touch more ambience, the lines drawn throughout with the utmost nobility.

A Bouree made a nice change from a Menuet, the trajectory a bit freer and more spontaneous, less prone to seriousness. The contrasting minor-key section had a kind of absent-minded melancholy, wistful and attractive. The Gigue had one of my favourite “moments” in all of these works, an almost grinding drone voice creating a tense moment before the music nonchalantly skipped away and upwards, illustrating the composer’s sharp sense of humour and mastery of mood, the sequence here strongly played and wryly characterised.

Raeul Pierard compared the Fourth of these Suites to Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night” – something embodying both comedy and seriousness, light and darkness. To begin with we heard the Prelude’s gorgeously leonine tones, the music curiously “mirroring” the First Suite’s Prelude by a series of descending gestures anchored by the final note of each of the phrases. Breaking up the pattern were “flurries” of impulses at the music’s halfway point and again at the end. The Allemande brought playing that brought out the music’s inclination to swing and soar, in contrast to the somewhat volatile Courante, with its “scampering” figure that launched each phrase. But it was the Sarabande which, if anything, brought the “What You Will” feeling to mind – beginning with a long-breathed three-note harmonised declamation that dominated the first part, the movement’s second half then further darkened and intensified the discourse with increased “weight” from the harmonisations, relieved only by a wistful ascent right at the end. Quixotically, the Bouree played with our sensibilities with a four-note flourish instigating each of the dance’s phrases, both ascending and descending, then switching to a portentous, tongue-in-cheek Trio section. In the Gigue we got an almost outlandish “rolling-ball” juggernaut from out of whose path our sensibilities nimbly leapt as we listened, Pierard adroitly bringing out both the claustrophobic and exhilarating alternate characters of the music!

For the Fifth Suite (in the key of C Minor), the ‘cellist needed to retune his instrument, not because of intonation problems, but because Bach used a different kind of tuning for this work, the A string lowered to the note G (a practice termed scordatura). This was to enable certain chords to be played which, on a normally-tuned instrument, would be too awkward to manage. Straightaway this deepened the work’s general sonority, then further so by the composer’s use of harmonies weighted with lower notes – very impressive and imposing-sounding! In this case the Prelude was followed by a fugue, played here with amazing steadiness, implaccable in aspect, but with a lot of variation in dynamics and tone, Pierard’s bowing having a flexibility and variety that brought to my mind qualities associated with the voice of a great singer or actor.

The Allemande was also declamatory in style, but considerably more expansive in manner, after the Prelude, almost like an “inward” version of the music’s outer journey thus far. And the Courante seemed far more severe of mien than those we’d heard already this evening, with lots of dark-browed mutterings, closely-harmonised phrasings darkening the textures. The Sarabande had a different kind of austerity, the music single-voiced and alone in the wilderness, Pierard seeming very much at one with its dark, plaintive quality. After this almost confessional outpouring the Gavotte seemed almost reluctant to dance, the measures awkward and hesitant, with the accompanying Trio almost reptilian-sounding in its slithery, ground-grabbing aspect – one almost breathed a sigh of relief at the dance’s return! Even the concluding Gigue’s exuberance was muted, a kind of expiation of energy rather than a joyous outpouring, with almost uncomfortably intense moments – terrific playing from the ‘cellist here, alive to all of these possibilities!

Of course, what was retuned had to be “detuned” (untuned?), which the ‘cellist then did before tackling the final Suite of the six, in D Major. As might have been expected, the music’s mood was markedly different, with horn fanfares beginning the Prelude in a festive, out-of-doors fashion, and the SOUND of the music brighter and more open, with the player’s hands working higher up on the fretboard than in the other works – properly exhilarating, high-wire stuff! Bach wrote this work for a five-stringed cello, with an E string tuned a fifth above the A string – no wonder the music sounded brighter and more open! As well Bach provided the player with ample opportunity for display over the Prelude’s concluding measures, with sixteenth-notes flying everywhere! The Allemande was declamatory and long-breathed, Pierard making the sounds a pleasure to experience with his command of legato, everything very “viola-sounding” with its higher tessitura. After this the Courante sounded almost “normal”, with its high-energy racing moments, contrasting markedly once again with its companion, a Sarabande, whose opening section gave the ‘cellist a brief moment of uncharacteristically strained intonation, one which Pierard was “waiting for” the second, sweeter-toned time round! The higher-pitched lines gave the music a different kind of intensity which here seemed somewhat removed from the world of the first three Suites. The familiar Gavotte was played with the “scooped” chordings that imparted a colourful, almost “orchestral” character to the music, splendidly setting off the “fairground hurdy-gurdy”quality of the Trio, Pierard subtly softening the phrasing of the dance when the Gavotte proper returned. Finally, the Gigue seemed to return us to the fairground, with earthy energies abounding in the cellist’s ”caution-thrown-to-the-winds” manner, the music’s characterful rhythmic trajectories given their head in a performance that brought out the writing’s buoyancy and daring, leaving us properly exhilarated at the end – bravo!

We thought it was the end, but Raeul Pierard wanted to play us something completely different to us as a kind of “encore”, a piece composed by an ex-pupil of his who was at the concert, one Elise Brinkeman, who had written a piece called “Sad Song”. This was a long-breathed, resonating piece made up of chords of different colours and intensities, sounds which initially reminded me of great tolling bells via a long-limbed swaying rhythm that briefly allowed a melodic line to make an appearance before being overwhelmed by the return of the resonating chords. The figurations intensified, creating an anguished climax-point wholly saturated by the bell-sounds, before dying away and ceasing, more abruptly than I for one was expecting – perhaps part of the piece’s considerable impact was, however subconsciously, reinforced by this relatively rapid plunge into a silence. Though having little ostensibly in common with Bach’s work, the piece certainly had an epic quality which perhaps suited the reflectiveness inevitably generated by the former, and equated with a certain timelessness often attributed to the older composer. It made for an unexpected but powerful postscript, having a “quality” of its own,  and was thus an inspired choice with which to end a remarkable concert.

Eighteenth Century German music from two accomplished Wellington early music specialists

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

St Andrew’s lunchtime concerts

Imogen Granwal (viola da gamba) and Martin Ryman (harpsichord)

Music by Carl Friedrich Abel and Johan Sebastian Bach

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 7 November, 12:15 pm

The musicians had asked that this recital be not reviewed.

We are happy to comply with this request but because Middle C sees itself as both a vehicle for reviewing music, and an archival record of public classical music performance in Greater Wellington, this is simply an opportunity to record what was played. As well as to comment on the good sized audience and the great pleasure this particular audience member found in the performances.

It began with two works by Carl Friedrich Abel for viola da gamba: the Prelude in D minor, WKO 205 (for viola da gamba alone) and the Sonata in G, one of the six sonatas for viola da gamba and continuo written during his prolonged stay in England.

Harpsichordist Martin Ryman played the sixth of Bach’s French Suites, in E major, BWV 817, and the duo then played J S Bach’s Sonata in D major for viola da gamba and harpsichord, BWV 1028.

 

Triumphant performances of choral masterpieces of Vivaldi and Handel

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Tudor Consort and The Chiesa Ensemble directed by Michael Stewart

Handel: Dixit Dominus HWV 232
Vivaldi: Gloria in D, RV 589

St Mary of the Angels

Saturday 1 September, 7:30 pm

Gloria
Vivaldi is believed to have composed three settings of the Gloria; one of them is lost, but the other, RV 588, is extant and sometimes performed. I think both are in the key of D. I can recall hearing it sung in Wellington, 15, 20 years ago. But I don’t have clear memory of it. I suspect it was at St John’s church on Willis Street. If anyone can help my memory I’d be glad to hear.

However, it’s the one we heard, to great delight, this evening that’s the glorious one.

It’s a real bonus that The Tudor Consort often engages a first class instrumental ensemble to accompany them, in accordance with the composers’ intentions for, much as I enjoy organ music it rarely sounds good accompanying choral works not scored specifically for organ. There was, of course, a continuo organ part, played on the William Drake pipe organ, from Victoria University, by Tom Chatterton. The Chiesa Ensemble consists of NZSO players and their professional talents enriched both the Vivaldi and Handel, with energy, refinement and sheer accuracy.

The Vivaldi opens with a strong orchestral introduction that immediately demands attention, and it was soon joined by the choir which inhabited, naturally, the space of the beautifully restored church. Here, Vivaldi’s typically bright, melodious music, in a joyous religious spirit fitting the obvious sense of the text.

In this acoustic its sound was a good fit for a work composed for a church of this size, the convent/orphanage where Vivaldi worked for much of his life, the Ospedale della pietà near the Piazza San Marco.

The piece is in eleven sections, each distinct in character, tempo, composed for varying combinations of choir and soloists.  And the choir, from which very fine solo voices were drawn handled it with affecting subtlety. The second section, ‘Et in terra pax…’ opened quietly with men’s voices, then women’s, plangent, in increasing volume. They seemed to rejoice in its subtle harmonies, with voices so perfectly balanced.

The soloists proved a special delight; first, sopranos Anna van der Leij and Anna Sedcole, in ‘Laudamus te’, their youthful-sounding voices, precise and pure, blending quite charmingly.

Vivaldi’s notion of religious figures is such as to delight even the non-believer: the simple piety of the Gratias, and then the solo aria from Amanda Barclay, introduced beautifully by oboes and basso continuo with its conspicuous organ part.

The triple time, dance-like chorus, ‘Domine fili’, brought another colourful musical element to the piece, again an inducement to belief. And then a lovely cello solo from Eleanor Carter(?) introduced the more subdued ‘Dominus Deus’, with the rich mezzo voice of Megan Hurnard. The fourth soloist was mezzo Eleanor McGechie, singing ‘Qui sedes ad dexteram Patris’ with elegant string accompaniment, again in triple time though in a minor key.

The joyous music that began the Gloria returns for the brief penultimate chorus, ‘Quoniam tu solus Sanctus’ before the only distinctly contrapuntal movement: the ‘Cum Sancto Spiritu’ which sustained the celebratory spirit to the end, with the entire orchestra, including Mark Carter’s brilliant trumpet.

The whole performance, of one of the most delightful of ‘religious’ works, was sung with idiomatic style, energy, even exhilaration; all of which reinforces the feeling that the 18th century, as well as being the Age of Enlightenment, managed to find the right balance between rational thinking and religious ritual, which found their finest expression in that age before the emergence of the Romantic era.

Dixit Dominus
It seemed almost too much to believe that another, possibly even greater, religious choral work was to follow, with Handel’s Dixit Dominus, written less than a decade earlier. It was interesting to read the programme’s remark that parts are a bit bloodthirsty for modern sensibilities (but they only conform to the narrative in a book I’m currently reading, The Darkening Age by Catherine Nixey, dealing with the torture and murder of non-believers, and the destruction of classical literature, sculpture, art and buildings by the early, and also not-so-early Christians).

However, in the 18th century, ways were found to rejoice in religious ritual and belief in a not so conspicuously cruel, intolerant manner; and this work is one of the most spectacular exemplars.

It’s a more complex work than the Vivaldi, even though Handel was only 22 while Vivaldi was about 37. There’s greater richness and dramatic variety, more contrapuntal extravagance, and the programme did well to quote Robbins Landon remark that it is ‘of staggering technical difficulty’.

Like the Vivaldi, it opens with a string orchestral introduction; and the choir spits out the words ‘Dixit Dominus’ insistently, leaving no room for doubt and the choral part is at once more emphatic, varied, through inter-weaving parts.

Again, the second part,’Virgam virtutis’, opened more calmly, with alto Andrea Cochrane and a solo cello accompaniment, her voice almost prayerful. The soprano aria ‘Tecum principatus’, after a calm orchestral introduction, was sung by Amanda Barclay, comfortable rather than brilliant, though she dealt easily with ornaments.

Then the ‘Iuravit Dominus’ opened and closed with energetic, staccato passage warning of God’s inflexibility, and the more dense and rapid-fire staccato ‘Tu es sacerdos’ that spelled out the priest’s commitments, with fast, challenging, staccato again. The same rapid music accompanied the ‘Dominus a dextris tuis’, now with five soloists: Anna van der Leij, Anna Sedcole, Anna Cochrane, John Beaglehole and Matthew Painter; a very singular and challenging movement that again drew attention to the choir’s skill and taste, and the same talents, plus commanding leadership and interpretive gifts of conductor Michael Stewart. The movement ends with one of the most individual passages, the stammering ‘conquassabit’ which was entertaining.

Van der Leij and Sedcole took solo parts again in the ‘De torrent in via bibet’, more peaceful and comforting than much of what had gone before, with striking dissonances making a singular impact; it slowly and almost magically, fades away. Finally, the last chorus, ‘Gloria Patri et filio’, was a last opportunity to demonstrate the fruits of, I imagine, extended and scrupulous rehearsal, with its fast contrapuntal, virtuosic singing that went on and on, showing no signs of exhaustion.

These were triumphant performances of two works that need to be heard, live, regularly, just to remind us of the genius of both composers as well as to illustrate the fertile environment in which they worked. Finally, right till the end, there was scarcely any sign, in the choir’s performance, of the music’s challenging difficulties.

 

Ensemble Zefiro a breath of fresh, tangy air in Wellington

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Chamber Music New Zealand presents:
ENSEMBLE ZEFIRO

Alfredo Bernardini , Paolo Grazzi – oboes
Alberto Grazzi, Giorgio Mandolesi – bassoons
Dileno Baldin, Francesco Meucci – horns

HANDEL – Due arie HWV 410,411
Marcia in F Major HWV 346
FASCH – Sonata in G Minor, FWV N:g1
TELEMANN – Ouverture in F Major TWV 55:F9
HAYDN – Parthia in C Major Hob.II.7
MOZART – Divertimento in E-flat, K.252/240a.

Michael Fowler Centre,

Friday 10th August, 2018

I’ve copied out the titles of the pieces as per programme, which accounts for the unusual names for aria (arie), overture (ouverture) and partita (Parthia), the last of which I thought at first was some kind of misprint. But no – there it was – Parthia, an alternative form of “partita”. So as it was something I didn’t know before I thought it was worth committing to review! However I must admit to being a little bemused by something else in the programme, the description of the Greek God Zefiro (whose name the ensemble has adopted) as “tender and Kind”, when I knew the legend of the same God’s jealous petulance which prompted the mean-spirited act of using his powers to blow a discus off course to disrupt a game between Apollo and a young boy, Hyacinth, whom Zefiro fancied – which ploy went horribly wrong when the object hit and killed Hyacinth! – the best-laid plans, etc…….still. there are so many conflicting stories regarding these deities, it’s a case of “pick-and-choose” when it comes to identifying with certain personalities and their traits. (hmmm – I’d better get on with the review, I suppose…….)

I loved the ensemble’s playing, right from the beginning, though I must admit that Handel’s music is one of those phenomena happily available to all and sundry that simply can’t help inducing a sense of well-being and contentment on contact! Here, straightaway, we in the audience (a decently-stocked ground floor at the MFC) were simply buoyed along by the energy, wit and charm of the composer’s seemingly limitless invention, fully realised by the ensemble’s playing. And what made the music even more endearing on this occasion were those characterful “authentic-instrument” sounds, the arrestingly nasal oboes, the throaty bassoons and the fruity (if occasionally asthmatic) horns. The point of the exercise seemed to me to refreshingly differentiate and contrast, rather than blend and smooth over, the different strands, the distinctive voices.  Why, I found myself thinking, as the music went along, would you want to “blend” sounds in a way that negated so much character and individuality, of the kind that was on show here?

Well, as Ecclesiastes says, there’s a time for everything, a time to blend and a time to differentiate (to coin an extremely unpoetic phrase!). It was simply refreshing to encounter an evening’s playing which seemed to proclaim “Vive la difference!” rather than seek to contain, control and smooth out differences in sounds. Not that Ensemble Zefiro couldn’t “blend” when they wanted to – but even when they did no individual strand or timbre disappeared or lost any of its character. It’s a quality I sometimes encounter when playing older orchestral or wind ensemble recordings, on which one hears sounds that are individual to the point of being quite “ornery” at certain moments – afterwards, turning to recordings of almost any 21st-century orchestra one finds oneself at a loss to discern any individual “character” in the actual sound, however skilled the playing might be.

Another quality that the authentic instrumental timbres underlined in the music was its “out-of-doors” aspect, and not only regarding the horns – in the second of the Handel “Arie” (HWV 411) I felt a kind of “spaciousness” about the sounds, a ready evocation of the “al fresco”, to do with, perhaps, a number of things, the players standing in a line accentuating the music’s antiphonal aspect, and the spaciousness of the Michael Fowler Centre, not to mention the horns in particular having “outdoor” associations anyway. But regarding the last point, both oboes and bassoons here took on more of a rustic character than I often associate with them – and in fact, the group’s spokesperson, Alfredo Bernadini, alluded to this “out-of-door” association, ironically when introducing a very different work by the evening’s second composer, Johann Friedrich Fasch (1688-1758).  Bernadini described Fasch’s piece, a Sonata in G Minor for two oboes and bassoon, plus bassoon continuo, as much more “chamber” and intimate in style.

The piece opened with a Largo movement,  the tones sombre and plaintive, and the instrumental timbres expressive and gorgeously fruity. One could hear before long why it was that JS Bach had a high regard for Fasch’s music, with the piece moving steadily and unerringly towards an expressive climax immediately leading to the second movement Allegro. Here was zest and bounce aplenty in the writing, the oboes offering chattering melodic leads and the bassoon delicious stepwise counterpoints. The composer replicated his markings for the following two movements, the second Largo enabling the bassoon to demonstrate its engagingly wheezy lyrical tones, working with its continuo partner in figurations an octave apart, and sounding like a pair of ancient, characterful voices! The Allegro finale really put the onus on one of the bassoons with an insanely virtuosic part, the notes literally flying from his instrument!

Telemann’s music then made an appearance, an “Ouverture in F Major”, a work written along the lines of JS Bach’s Orchestral Suites, consisting of an initial piece also called an “ouverture” followed by a number of French dances – while Bach wrote only four such words for instrumental ensemble, Telemann produced well over a hundred. This particular Ouverture (or “Suite”), for two oboes, two horns and bassoon continuo, was nicknamed “The Hunt”, referring in part, perhaps, to the prominence given the pair of horns in the work.

Certainly the opening piece gave the pair ample opportunity to make their presence felt, mostly by interrupting the more garrulous oboes at every possible opportunity, reminding them that they were still “here”. The Allegro section of the opening was spectacularly marked by the horns with a fanfare-like figure, again keeping a watchful ear on what the oboes and bassoon were doing. Throughout, the bassoon seemed almost an intermediary between the garrulous Montague-like oboes and the volatile Capulet-like horns, calling the ensemble to order when things got outlandish (particularly the occasional hi-jinks from the Capulets!).

Right through the course of the dances, the instrumental detailings gave us great delight, chirpy phrases galore from the oboes and occasional blasts of wind from the horns during both of the Passepied sections, a lovely glow illuminated with horn calls during the Sarabande, fanfares and giggles at the ends of phrases further enlivening the Rigaudon, and a dignified, regal sweep and grandly processional poise accompanying the concluding Le Plaisir. The ensemble certainly gave us “moments per minute” during this varied and entertaining sequence.

An interval later we were taken into the classical world of Haydn and Mozart, necessitating a change of instruments for the oboe- and bassoon-players. Thanks in part to the cheekiness of Haydn’s writing for the ensemble in the first movement of his Parthia in C Major, we didn’t notice as sharply as we might have the change in actual “engagement” of the instrumental sound, the tones smoother and more elegant-sounding in themselves, though here employed by the composer in ear-catching ways with writing whose wit and sparkle recalled  certain of the composer’s piano sonatas. The first of the work’s five movements featured a fanfare-like leading motif being tossed about in gay abandon, and given extra pomposity by the horns, and finishing with an abruptly-turned phrase which left a single low note unashamedly exposed (I involuntarily snorted with laughter, and had to apologise to my companion at the next break in the music!).

A regal and dignified Menuet-and-Trio began with oboes only, before turning to a Trio section with delightfully emphatic horns, all of which preceded an Adagio with a lovely, easeful rhythmic carriage, the oboes rhapsodising, the bassoons gently jog-trotting and the horns contributing answering or “rounding-off” phrases – everything so beautifully and expressively played. Then came ANOTHER Menuet-and-Trio, this time lots of minor-key staccato strutting, completely different in character to the one before. Haydn then rounded off the work with an unbuttoned presto gallop across the fields for all concerned, the bassoons performing miracles of articulation and repeated-note playing, and horns whooping in delight, the piece finishing with a Beethovenish “take that!” gesture!

The Mozart Divertimento K.252/240a in E-flat concluded the programme in style – the ensemble generated an engaging “swing” to the rhythm over which the oboes sounded the melody, the horns and bassoons easefully alternating between chordings and “echo phrases”. The Menuetto was a sprightly dance with gloriously “burbled” horn-writing, exhilaratingly performed, before a rather strange Trio section with a repeated descending figure, here played faster than the main dance, for some reason – it sounded merely as though the players wanted to get it over with so they could get back to the real fun!

Then came, rather unexpectedly, a Polonaise, its rhythm catchy and foot-tapping, like a popular dance number – some lovely antiphonal writing here, which the ensemble coloured nicely with varied dynamics, the horns making much of the rhythm’s syncopations. Presto assai said the finale, and the players responded with energy and wit, finishing with a flourish! We thought the players would by then have “blown themselves out”, but they generously came back for an encore – one, moreover, with a difference, a work entitled “Homage to Haydn” (sitting some way back from the platform as we were, neither my friend nor I could quite make out the announcement of the actual composer’s name).

Beginning with and establishing an infectiously strutting march reminiscent of Haydn’s “Military” Symphony, the music reached what we all thought sounded like a concluding cadence, but then continued, despite one of the bassoonists standing up, bowing, and then leaving the platform and coming down into the auditorium as the others played on. After another sequence had finished, one of the horn players did the same thing, followed a few measures later by the second horn player, leaving the oboists and one of the bassoonists continuing to play! One by one, each oboist finished a phrase, and then stood up and left the platform, with the single bassoonist left – he played a doleful-sounding minor-key cadenza-like passage finishing with a trill, and then stood up, acknowledging our laughter and applause, as did the others who rejoined him.  It was all great fun, and completely in accord with the delight we’d experienced and enjoyed throughout the concert.

 

Admirable exploration of challenging Purcell and gorgeous Fauré from Nota Bene

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Nota Bene, the Chiesa Ensemble and Tom Chatterton (organ), directed by Peter Walls

Fauré: Requiem
Puccini: Requiem
Purcell: ‘O sing unto the Lord’; Music for the Funeral of Queen Mary; ‘Rejoice in the Lord Alway’

Sacred Heart Cathedral

Sunday 8 July, 3 pm

Looking back through Middle C’s archive, I was a little surprised to discover that Nota Bene was founded as far back as 2004; we have reviewed 18 of their concerts since our beginning in 2008. It was founded by Christine Argyle, and has been under the direction of several others since, including, quite often, Peter Walls.

Concerts are usually constructed round a theme, and the theme here was death and the celebration of death. Such a theme lends itself to a huge variety of approaches and differences of style dictated by history. The juxtaposition of funeral music by Purcell and that of Puccini and Fauré might have seemed eccentric; but that merely means that the rewards for finding and thinking up connections between disparate things are so much more intriguing. It might encourage making judgements too, and I think the second half, largely dominated by the Fauré Requiem, was the more successful.

It is hard to say whether one should be more admiring of performances of music that are delivered with ease, where all the circumstances come together happily, than of music that is intrinsically challenging, the idiom and style harder to come to terms with; is being tackled by voices few of which are professional, and perhaps in a space, the Catholic basilica, in which every little flaw, lack of balance and ensemble weakness can be heard.

It is hard to say whether one should be more admiring of performances of music that are delivered with ease, where all the circumstances come together happily, than of music that is intrinsically challenging, the idiom, technical demands and style harder to come to terms with.

Purcell: O Sing unto the Lord 
The latter environment affected the three anthems by Purcell. O Sing unto the Lord is described as a “relatively late work” – 1688: he was an elderly 29 years old! And it’s one of his literally hundreds of choral works; making Purcell’s achievement more comparable to Schubert’s or Mozart’s, also dead by age 35, than to any other composer.

Its elaborate orchestral introduction was most impressive, not perhaps as an exercise in authentic Baroque musical performance, but certainly for its beautiful warmth and period feeling, and sheer opulence, placing him clearly in a position equal to the finest Continental composers of his time.

I had intended to get to the pre-concert talk but a family matters intervened. My own reading of the usual sources (e.g. notes to a Hyperion recording) indicate that the prominent bass voice and the scoring for a large string orchestra suggest a special occasion. The same source remarks that “Although the writing is overtly celebratory, behind it is the deliciously wistful quality”, and this indeed was the character of the performance.

After a long and fairly elaborate orchestral prelude, the imposing, solo bass episode, sung by Daniel O’Connor, unusually rotund and well projected, was a striking start to the anthem proper. Then the body of the choir entered with ‘Alleluia’, in contrasting triple time. After another orchestral section, the choir created markedly distinct contrapuntal lines in their singing of the rest of the first verse. It is clearly hard to capture properly, in spite of the triplet rhythm one might have expected to carry it confidently along. A charming duet between soprano and alto, ‘The Lord is great’, created another atmosphere in this constantly varying music. And a more subdued choral dialogue followed in the next verse, ‘O worship the Lord’. The formal variety continued with alternating phrases between O’Connor and the body of the choir in the final section.

I’m sure that it’s easier to achieve a smooth, well integrated performance from a larger choir; and one might have wished that performance by a small choir, probably more like what was available to Purcell, would produce more refinement and sensitive shading of articulation and harmonies; a big challenge that wasn’t quite met.

This rather overlong consideration has found its way into my description mainly on account of the remarkable fecundity and inventiveness of Purcell’s work. Nor did the following anthems present fewer hurdles or complexities to unravel.

Funeral Sentences for Queen Mary
Music for the Funeral of Queen Mary of 1695 (less than a year before his own funeral) was of course less ‘celebratory’; here again the challenges of this sophisticated music were audible, but the choir, sounding thin, faced with the task of creating a regal lament of high seriousness, really struggled.

My memory of first hearing this piece was at a concert maybe 20 years ago by a Victoria University choir, probably conducted by the then Professor Peter Walls in the Adam Concert Room, which impressed me, imprinting it in the memory; there, I may have been moved, uncritically, having no earlier performance to compare. Here I couldn’t help feeling the absence of a richer, more opulent ensemble, and that a rather larger choir was needed, or at least one that had been able to achieve more perfect ensemble through persistence and devotion, more rehearsal than an amateur choir can be expected to get. Perhaps it would have been better if the whole choir had sung certain passages for single voices.

However, here was the opportunity for the horns to shine and for the support of the organ to be heard, but I have to say that the long instrumental postlude cried out for the greater spiritual impact that sombre brass instruments might have provided. Nevertheless, there was sufficient musical power in this careful and faithful performance to be moved by the greatness of the music.

The third Purcell anthem, the well-known Bell Anthem, ‘Rejoice in the Lord Alway’, ended the first half. Such a different and obviously less deeply felt piece again employed solo voices quite extensively in the verse sections: Virginia Earle, Paddy Geddes and Shawn Condon; their contributions were agreeable and significant, even though a certain tentativeness again suggested inadequate rehearsal.

Two Requiems
It was interesting if not revelatory to hear Puccini’s truncated part of the Requiem – the opening section, Requiem aeternam, written in 1905 for the 4th anniversary of Verdi’s death. In a suitably pious tone, with organ joining the orchestral accompaniment, there were, naturally, distinctive traces of the operatic Puccini. The choir seemed better attuned to it than they had been to the Purcell works.

Then Fauré’s Requiem.  The rich opening chords from the orchestra presaged a performance that was faithful to Fauré’s original conception, and thoroughly suited the church’s acoustic (it was premiered in Fauré’s own church, the great Madeleine in the middle of Paris); it included the church’s main organ too, sustaining a prolonged pedal note in the Introit under the pianissimo full choir.  There was much to admire and genuinely to enjoy; consoling men’s voices singing the repeat of the words ‘Requiem aeternam’ were lovely. And the unaccompanied soprano moments in the following Kyrie touched the emotions.

The benefits of a fine orchestra were very clear in the opening of the Offertorium, and later, before the calming entry of sombre voices; and the tremulous solo from baritone Daniel O’Connor, with ‘Hostias’, followed by the reprise of the first passage’s choral writing, sung in exemplary ensemble, created a rich and satisfying statement.

In the magically spiritual Sanctus Anna van der Zee’s violin solo soared over particularly lovely high voices, momentarily disturbed by the dramatic men’s voices in the concluding ‘Hosanna in excelsis’, an episode that offered a very special emotional commentary.

The organ introduces the solo soprano (Daisy Venables) voice in the Pie Jesu, which was a particularly successful episode that in no way calls for larger forces than were available here.

Men, tenors only I think, sang the first section of the calm Agnus Dei, followed by the full choir repeating the first passage, gently becoming more intense.  One of the most arresting yet magical episodes, one that came off very well was the change of gear for the final lines, ‘Requiem aeternam’, switching back to the home key of D minor.

Baritone O’Connor enjoyed another lyrical solo episode opening the Libera me; and though we are told that Fauré avoided the punitive ‘Dies Irae’ which is intrinsic in the normal Requiem setting, a brief statement of it appeared, with horns at hand, in the latter stage of the Libera me.

And no matter how familiar the In paradisum has become, it too, with a more conspicuous organ accompaniment and the high soprano voices by themselves, worked its magic, certainly on me, and I’m sure on the entire audience.

While the Purcell pieces had presented certain difficulties, whatever challenges the Fauré offered were handled with the deepest sensitivity, quietude and conviction.

 

A revelatory Bach X 2 lunch recital on piano and organ by Jonathan Berkahn

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Jonathan Berkahn (piano and organ)

JS Bach: Fantasia in C minor, BWV 906
Lute suite in C minor, BWV 997: Sarabande and Gigue
CPE Bach: Sonata for Organ in D, Wq. 70/5
JS Bach: Toccata and Fugue in F, BWV 540

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 20 June, 12:15 pm

Jonathan Berkahn is a versatile musician, happy to play any keyboard instrument, including the piano accordion. In this recital he played three J S Bach pieces on the Steinway, then moved to the pipe organ in the gallery to play an organ sonata by CPE Bach and a final Toccata and Fugue by Bach père.

The Fantasia in C minor is a splendid piece which sounds as bold and inspiring on the harpsichord as on the piano; Berkahn’s playing had all the fluency and energy one could look for. His playing doesn’t prioritise subtlety or finesse; yet his playing was accurate with no more than insignificant smudges, but more importantly for me, it conveyed a sense that the pianist admired it greatly and was able to give it a performance that communicated that belief to his listeners.

That was followed by two pieces from a lute suite in C minor that seems to be more played these days as a guitar piece than on lute or keyboard. The entire suite comprises Prélude, Fugue, Sarabande, Gigue et Double, and he played just the Sarabande and Gigue (without the ‘Double’). The first had an unpretentious dignity that began with a certain ambiguity, a study in slow-moving semi-quavers that rather evaded a conventional melody. Berkahn took the Gigue only a little faster, hardly allowing it to inspire anything other than fairly sedate dancing. And though I suspect these pieces are not felt to have quite the weight of the suites for keyboard, for solo cello and other solo instruments or ensembles, they can be invested with much more weight and gravitas simply by the way they are played – the persuasivenss of the player. That’s what Berkahn achieves for me.

C P E Bach 
Berkahn explained that Bach’s eldest son didn’t follow in his father’s organ footsteps, and that he left very few organ pieces. At the church’s main organ he used registrations on separate keyboards that struck me as somewhat too distinct, which created the impression that the bolder, diapason sound came from somewhere out in the middle of the nave. His playing was staccato in character, and hinted at playfulness and even if it didn’t convey evidence of a gifted organ composer, once one had retuned one’s hearing to 50 years later, to the ‘galante’ musical environment of the court of his monarch Frederick the Great, Emanuel Bach finds a respectable place. The middle movement, Adagio e mesto, did offer hints as to Emanuel’s musical inheritance; yet Berkahn’s playing, thoughtful and careful as it was, showed well enough how his father’s genius could never be recaptured, in a different environment, just half a century later.

The very different character of the later 18th century – the ‘rococo’ or ‘galante’ style even more marked – was audible in the final Allegro. I felt that the boisterous triplet quavers in 4/4 time seemed to call for rather more flamboyant registrations and brilliant playing than might have been possible on the St Andrew’s organ .

Toccata and Fugue BWV 540 
Berkahn remained at the gallery organ to play J S Bachs Toccata and Fugue in F, which I found I hardly knew. The toccata is a startling piece, a sort of perpetuum mobile with endless semiquavers on the manual over prolonged pedal points, which became a virtuoso semi-quaver exhibition on the pedals. It must have been an impressive exhibition for those who’d responded to Berkahn’s suggestion to go upstairs to watch.

It certainly sounded splendid from the ground, and I found that I’d scribbled remarks like ‘impressive pedal work’ ‘it seems to lose a bit of what one thinks of as Bach the church organist’; ‘the 21st century organist takes charge’.  (They don’t all survive as considered views). What a contrast then, as the slow, meditative Fugue began, using more sober registrations for an ordinary fugal subject as it began; but one nevertheless sensed the potential for a build up to a level of excitement that might match the toccata; and indeed it did. The fugal figures moved between manuals and pedals with increasing complexity, calmly gaining in fugal elaboration but in unvarying tempo.

The piece was a bit of an eye-opener for me, and I rather look forward to hearing it on a really big organ: how about hurrying up the Town Hall rebuild! In the meantime, this was a rather splendid recital that offered some fresh insights, both into C P E and into a J S Bach work whose unfamiliarity (to me) was a matter of considerable surprise. It was a very rewarding lunch break.

Impressive and stylish performance of Bach’s great Mass in B minor celebrates choir’s 50 years

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Celebrating 50 years: The Bach Choir of Wellington, conducted by Peter Walls

Bach: Mass in B minor

With Nicola Holt (soprano), Maaike Christie-Beekman (alto), Lachlan Craig (tenor), Simon Christie (bass), Douglas Mews (organ) and the Chiesa Ensemble

Sacred Heart Cathedral

Sunday, 13 May 2018, 3.00pm

A handsome A4-size printed programme with a good size of typeface greeted the almost capacity audience at the concert.  Inside was a potted history of the choir, and good programme notes, credited to the internet source, plus entire libretto of the Mass, with English translations.

This work, one of the pinnacles of the choral repertoire, is Bach’s only Mass, though made up partly of a number of earlier pieces, written independently.  It is fraught with difficulties for all participants.  Scholarship has waxed and waned somewhat over the 50 years of the Bach Choir’s life, as to the ‘correct’ techniques for singing and playing this baroque repertoire.  However, with baroque expert Peter Walls at the helm, the style was consistent and the performance was vigorous and stylish.

A large part of the success of the performance was due to the Chiesa Ensemble.  This orchestral ensemble was made up of professional players from the NZSO and Orchestra Wellington, 21 in number.  Their playing was always good, and often brilliant.  The team of soloists was also very fine, and thoroughly in tune with the demanding requirements of their roles.

The 50-strong choir acquitted itself well, for the most part.  It began in fine form with the Kyrie clearly enunciated – ‘k’ is a difficult consonant to get over when singing, but there was no doubt about it here.  It only took a moment for me to think ‘Now we’re in for a good time’.  Excellent bassoon playing soon made itself felt (Robert Weeks, David Angus), conversely, as so often with amateur choirs, the tenors were somewhat weak at this stage.

However, above all, the sheer majesty and complexity of Bach’s contrapuntal writing is mind-blowing.  Confidence and accuracy built up after a bit, and soon the singing became as resplendent in its grandeur as was the score.  Christe eleison is a duet for soprano and alto.  The voices of the two women matched amazingly well, while the accompanying string-playing was notably fine.  Here and elsewhere during solos the choir got to sit down – the men at the rear of the sanctuary, the women on seats along the sides of the church.  They moved quickly and unobtrusively in and out of position each time, as the soloists in turn moved in and out of their respective positions.

The repeat of the Kyrie began with basses, making a solid sound, though they were not as flexible as the women’s voices.  This section was more harmonically interesting than the first iteration.

The Gloria featured a wonderful brass opening section; the trumpets of Mark Carter, Barrett Hocking and Toby Pringle sounded splendid in this responsive acoustic.  The movement was taken quite fast.  Lilting passages helped to convey the meaning of the words, such as ‘…on earth peace to men of goodwill’.  Continuously florid passages were handled superbly well by the choir.  The trumpets celebrated with great élan.

Next came the beautiful solo aria: Laudamus te.  It was sung at a faster pace than I have heard it before, but all the florid twists were beautifully negotiated.  Accompaniment from strings and organ was splendid.  Though not playing baroque era instruments or modern copies, the strings played in baroque style.  The chorus’s Gratias agimus tibi was magnificently sung, with trumpets and timpani (Laurence Reese) again to the fore.

Then soprano and tenor soloists sang the lovely duet Domine Deus, with a gorgeous flute obbligato (Kirstin Eade, Nancy Luther).   Lachlan Craig proved to have a very pleasant voice, while the flute playing was wonderful; the whole effect was most uplifting.  The choir returned for Qui tollis, which appropriately employed a lower pitch, and subdued and even anguished tones.  The musical lines conveyed this, while contemplatinh Christ’s redemption of man’s sin.  Significantly, the final chord resolved back into a major key.

There followed a solo for alto, Qui sedes ad dextram.  Maaike Christie-Beekman’s words were very clear.  Every run and turn was beautifully executed.  Bass Simon Christie followed with Quonism tu solus sanctus.  He sang this difficult aria most competently, with conviction.  The choir returned to sing the final chorus in this movement, and in this half of the performance: Cum Sancto Spiritu, in very lively and joyful fashion, with a brisk pace.  It was rhythmically strong, and tenors acquitted themselves well here, however the sopranos were not fully in agreement on the top note.  The final ‘Amen’ was sung with an emphatic flourish.

After the interval came the Credo.  It had a calm opening.  The choir’s intonation was a little rusty after their break, in Credo in unum deum.  It took a little time to get back into full fettle.  The two women soloists excelled in Et in unum Dominum.  They had a delightful orchestral accompaniment, featuring particularly the sumptuous oboes of Stacey Dixon and Louise Cox.  This was one of the finest moments of the afternoon.

The chorus Et incarnatus est began with smooth, reassuring music, but soon changed at the Crucifixus.  The intervals and chords employed expressed suffering and anguish, only to be abruptly overtaken by Et resurrexit’s joy and jubilation.  There were so many strands in the chorus’s line Cujus regni non erit finis – perhaps depicting the many souls in heaven.  The chorus contribution was very grand.

Simon Christie sang the splendid bass aria Et in Spiritum Sanctum, with lovely back-up from oboes and bassoons.  Perhaps a bigger voice would have made more impact, but Christie sang with great clarity and accuracy, and pleasing timbre.  Confiteor unum baptisma had a flowing style, but the choir sounded a little uncertain in places, and also in Et expecto resurrectionem.

Bach gave the Sanctus a rousing and imposing character, unlike the text’s treatment in numerous other masses.  At the beginning it was treated harmonically rather than contrapuntally; it had the weight of majesty about it.  As it proceeded, the music became more florid; Pleni sunt coeli haa a fugal setting, very fast.   An exultant Osanna ended the movement.

Benedictus was sung by the solo tenor accompanied by a gorgeous flute and continuo.  It was very gracefully sung.  The choir did not start together in the repeat Osanna, and the singers were almost overwhelmed by the brilliant trumpets and organ (mainly, Douglas Mews played a quiet nd tasteful continuo).

The Agnus Dei  was an aria for alto, and was sung exquisitely by Maaike Christie-Beekman with marvellous strings accompanying.  The final chorus Dona nobis pacem had grandeur about it; the jubilant Amen ended the concert with the choir still singing very well.  It takes stamina to last the distance; all performers and especially Peter Walls, had it in spades.  The audience applauded with great enthusiasm.  Well done, all, but especially J.S. Bach.

 

 

Vivaldi triumphs in the NZSO’s Italian celebration

Posted on by Peter Mechen

The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra presents:
VIVALDI – The Four Seasons Op.8 Nos 1-4 *
BERLIOZ – Roman Carnival Overture Op. 9
RESPIGHI – Pini di Roma (Pines of Rome) 1924 **

Angelo Xiang Yu (violin) *
Brett Mitchell (conductor)

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra
Members of the Wellington Brass Band**

MIchael Fowler Centre,
Wellington

Saturday, 12th May 2018

What a boringly predictable world it would be if everything in it turned out as one anticipated! I sat pondering this earth-shattering truism during the interval of Saturday evening’s NZSO concert in the wake of the most inspiring and life-enhancing performance of Antonio Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” I’ve heard since first encountering New Zealand violinist Alan Loveday’s now-legendary recording of the work with Neville Marriner’s Academy of St.Martin-in-the-Fields, from the 1970s. Just as that performance blew away the cobwebs and reinvented the work for its time, so did Angelo Xiang Yu’s absolutely riveting playing of the solo violin part and the NZSO players’ galvanic response do much the same for me on this occasion, in the concert hall.

In fact I was expecting very little to come from this, my latest encounter with the work, for the simple reason that I’d heard it played on record so many times and, of course, misappropriated over the years in a thousand different ways – could I face the prospect of those Bremworth Carpet TV ads of the 1960s coming back to haunt me yet again? I felt somewhat “jaded” at the thought of it all, and had difficulty imagining what yet another performance would bring to the music that could be of any new and compelling interest.

My focus in the concert itself on this occasion was firmly centred on what I expected would be the evening’s highlight, Respighi’s Pini di Roma (Pines of Rome), a work I’ve remained violently in love with ever since being “blown away” by my first hearing of the work in concert, some time during the 1970s. And Berlioz’s music, too, had become something of a passion for me, ever since my somewhat bemused initial encounter with an LP containing a number of “Overtures” all of which seemed distinctly odd-ball, the music volatile and angular, though strangely compelling – I persisted, and grew to love their idiosyncrasies, attracted by the composer’s uninhibited use of dynamic and spontaneous contrasts between sheer brilliance and ravishing beauty.

“Lord, what fools we mortals be…” wrote some obscure playwright or other; and my expectations of what I would cherish from the experience of hearing this particular concert were completely confounded, almost right from the first note of the Vivaldi work. I listened to the thistledown-like opening, and straightaway pricked up my ears at its wind-blown, spontaneous-sounding quality, replete with inflections of phrasing and dynamics that suggested the musicians seemed to really “care” about the music.

Both Angelo Xiang Wu and conductor Brett Mitchell readily encouraged the playing’s “pictorial” effects suggested by the music’s different episodes, which followed the descriptions written in a set of poems, presumably also by the composer, which were intended to give listeners precise detailings of what the music is actually “about” – unfortunately these weren’t reproduced in the written programme. I thought I’d go a little way towards making good the omission, by including the English version of the verses that accompanied the opening Concerto, “Spring”.

Allegro
Springtime is upon us.
The birds celebrate her return with festive song,
and murmuring streams are softly caressed by the breezes.
Thunderstorms, those heralds of Spring, roar, casting their dark mantle over heaven,
Then they die away to silence, and the birds take up their charming songs once more.
Largo
On the flower-strewn meadow, with leafy branches rustling overhead, the goat-herd sleeps, his faithful dog beside him.
Allegro
Led by the festive sound of rustic bagpipes, nymphs and shepherds lightly dance beneath the brilliant canopy of spring.

Thus we heard the brilliant birdsong, shared and echoed between the soloist and the leaders of each of the two violin sections  – enchanting! The “thunderstorms” were allowed their full dynamic effect, with the playing almost “romantic” in its flexibility of phrasing and pulse, very free and spontaneous-sounding. In the slow movement, the exquisitely-moulded ensemble textures beautifully “caught” the rustic beauty of the “leafy branches” over the “flower-strewn meadow”, with a doleful, repeated viola note depicting a dog’s disconsolate barking besides its sleeping master. Angelo Xiang Yu’s delicious and freely “pointed” solo playing then beautifully complemented the “festive sound of rustic bagpipes”, the playing by turns jaunty and gently yielding in its “end-of-day” ambience.

From this the playing and its “engagement factor” simply went from strength to strength throughout each of the remaining concerti. The opening of “Summer” brought forth sounds whose charged, anxious quality was almost portentous in its impact, which the furious beginning of the allegro vividly supported. Together with Andrew Joyce’s solo ‘cello-playing, Xiang Yu’s violin vividly conveyed the restless quality engendered by the heat, and the growing fearfulness caused by the oncoming storm, the players relishing the adagio/presto alternations of the middle movement, depicting flies, gnats and the oncoming tempests. And the concluding presto was quite simply a tour de force of sound and fury, the notes flailing and stinging in a tremendous display of both virtuosity and focused interpretative intent.

“Autumn” afforded us considerable relief on this occasion, the opening jolly and bucolic, the interactions between solo violin and the ‘cello again delightful with  Xiang Yu’s playing exhibiting such characterful humour in places (in fact I couldn’t help chortling out loud at his impish hesitations at one point, which, I’m sorry to say, startled my concert neighbour!). And while, throughout the slow movement, we got nothing like violinist Nigel Kennedy’s infamous “nuclear winter” realisation in his 1989 recording (he’s recorded a more recent version, incidentally, called “Vivaldi – the New Four Seasons” one even more “interventionist”, for those who crave adventure!), the “sleep without a care” sentiments of Vivaldi’s poetry was certainly given instrumental voice from all concerned. Afterwards, as befitted the refreshment sleep gave, the music awoke to plenty of bounce and energy – fortunately, the musical depictions of the hunters harrying their unfortunate prey weren’t as graphic and piteous as the poem’s words suggested.

Came Winter, with its bleak, spectral timbres suggesting snow and ice – I loved the palpable “shudder” with which Xiang Yu concluded each of his opening “shivering” solo flourishes, and enjoyed the dramatic crescendi generated by both the violinist and the ensemble as the movement ran its course. The Largo gently scintillated via delicate pizzicato strings and Douglas Mews’ crisp harpsichord continuo playing, as the violin sang of the joys of contented rest by the fire, though the final movement returned us to the elemental fray, via the “icy path” and the “chill north winds”,  if not without some brief reflection on winter’s “own delights”. However, those same chill winds had the last word, the soloist conjuring up a mini-tempest which the ensemble catches onto, driving the music to a brilliant, no-nonsense conclusion!

I never expected to write so much about this performance, but I simply had to try and convey something of the thrill of engagement with the music-making that I felt, all the more telling for me through its unexpectedness, of course! After deservedly tumultuous applause, Xiang Yu came back and played us, unaccompanied, some Gluck, the Melodie from Orfeo et Euridice, the playing evoking its own unique world of stillness and resignation.

Undoubtedly the stunning impact of this first half went on to play some part in my reaction to what followed – and I did think that, for all its merits, the performance of Berlioz’s most well-known Overture , Roman Carnival (Le Carnaval Romain) never quite attained that level of focused intensity which made the Vivaldi such a gripping experience. For me the most memorable moments were the lyrical sequences which dominated the overture’s first half, including a lovely cor anglais solo, played here by Stacey Dixon – whose name wasn’t listed among the NZSO players in the programme. The more energetic episodes in the piece’s second half were delivered with skill and polish, but I felt that the music’s dangerous “glint” and sense of “edge” hadn’t entirely escaped the comfort zone, so that we weren’t lifted out of our seats and carried along amid waves of wild exuberance – the efforts of the percussion, for instance, I thought wanted more ring and bite (though partly a fault of the MFC’s acoustic difficulty in  effectively “throwing” the sounds from the rear of the orchestral platform up and into the audience’s spaces).

Having said all of this, the spectacular opening of Respighi’s Pini di Roma (Pines of Rome), had plenty of impact, conductor Brett Mitchell keeping the music’s pulses steady, thus allowing the players space in which to generate plenty of weight of tone, and flood the ambiences with that barely-contained sense of excitement suggested by the opening Pines of the Villa Borghese. As the tempi quickened, everything came together in a great torrent of sound, as overwhelming in its insistence as tantalising in its sudden disappearance, leaving a vast, resonating space of darkness and mystery.

Conductor and players here enabled those spaces to be filled with properly subterranean sounds of breath-taking quality, as if the earth itself was softly resonating with its own music – strings, muted horns and deep percussion allowed winds to intone chant-like lines as if we could hear the voices of dead souls who were continuing to plead for salvation, music of Pines near a Catacomb. An off-stage trumpeter (Michael Kirgan) delivered a faultlessly beautiful recitative from the distance, just before the chant-like music seemed to us to swell up from underground and raise a mighty edifice of sound, capping it with a terrific climax!

From the fathomless gloom of the aftermath came pinpricks of light in the magical form of piano figurations, awakening the chaste limpidity of a clarinet solo, floated with fairytale enchantment by Patrick Barry and carried on by the oboe and solo ‘cello amid great washes of impressionistic hues and colours – Holst, Debussy. Ravel and Richard Strauss were all there, amongst the Pines of the Janiculum! – the reappearance of the clarinet brought forth the nightingale’s song to charm and enthrall us just before the onset of distant warlike sounds, a steady, remorseless tramping of marching feet whose purposeful trajectories announced the coming of the Emperor’s legions, passing the Pines of the Appian Way en route to the Capitoline Hill.

For this performance the NZSO enjoyed the sterling services of a number of players from the Wellington Brass Band, whose body of tone with that of the full orchestra’s at the piece’s climax had an almost apocalyptic (I almost wrote “apoplectic”!) effect! A pity, though, I thought, that those first distant trumpet calls couldn’t have been that much more more spatially placed, perhaps made from offstage, to give an even greater sense of distance and expectation and impending glory at the climax. As he’d done throughout, Brett Mitchell controlled both momentums and dynamics with great tactical and musical skill, holding the legions in check until they actually swung into view in the mind’s eye, and came among us, amid scenes of incredible splendour and awe. Respighi actually wanted the ground beneath his army’s feet to tremble with the excitement of it all, and conductor and players triumphantly achieved that impression over the piece’s last few tumultuous bars! Bravo!

 

Orpheus – a Dance Drama – beautiful, complex and thought-provoking work from Michael Parmenter

Posted on by Peter Mechen

New Zealand Festival 2018 presents:
ORPHEUS – A DANCE OPERA
Conceptualised and choreographed by Michael Parmenter
New Zealand Dance Company
Co-produced by the Auckland Arts Festival, the New Zealand Festival
and the New Zealand Dance Company
The Opera House, Wellington

Friday, 16th March, 2018

The “Orpheus legend” is obviously one of the seminal “stories” which has contributed towards western civilisation’s view of itself and its place in the world down the ages. Orpheus himself is a multi-faceted figure whose qualities and exploits have been variously treated and interpreted at different stages, a process that continues to this day, as witness choreopher Michael Parmenter’s ambitious and wide-ranging “take” on the character’s far-reaching exploits.

Most people who know of the name of Orpheus straightaway associate it with that of his lover Euridice.  Their tragic story has been represented variously in practically all of Western art’s different disciplines, notably that of opera – in fact it figured prominently throughout opera’s very beginnings, with Jacopo Peri’s “Euridice” appearing as early as 1600, and Claudio Monteverdi’s “L’Orfeo” in 1607.  Virgil and Ovid are the two writers from antiquity most readily associated with the early forms of this story, though there are various other Orphic strands which Parmenter’s work alludes to, such as the hero’s exceptional musical skills, his association with the Voyage of the Argonauts,  his rejection of the love of women after the death of Euridice, and his own death at the hands of the Maenads.

Considering this plethora of material it was no wonder Parmenter was drawn to the story and its variants, the scenarios seeming to offer ample scope for elaboration and reinterpretation in the light of more contemporaneous human experience, as with all mythological archetypes. Using a core group of dancers supported by a larger “chorus” whose movement consistently created a kind of cosmic rhythm involving both naturalistic and metaphorical ebb and flow, the production consistently and constantly suggested order coming from and returning towards an unfathomable chaos which frames the human condition as we know it, a beautiful and magical synthesis of both natural patternings and human  ritual.

Lighting, costuming and staging throughout the opening sequences wrought a kind of “dreaming or being dreamt” wonderment, as a bare, workmanlike stage was unobtrusively but inexorably clothed, peopled and activated in masterly fashion. As if summonsed and borne by divination, a platform on which were seated a group of musicians playing the most enchanting music imaginable, literally drifted to and fro, as if in a kind of fixed and preordained fluidity, in accordance with the magical tones produced by these same musicians and their instruments. Not unlike the dancers, the singers grouped and regrouped with the action’s “flow”, effectively choreographing  sounds in accordance with the whole. The music was largely from the baroque era, from the world of Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Jean de Saint-Colombe, Antoine Boesset, Michel Lambert, Etienne Moulinie and Jean-Philippe Rameau, hauntingly sung and played by singers and musicians from both sides of the Tasman. Their efforts were interspersed with the sonicscapes of composer David Downes, whose elemental interpolations at key dramatic points underpinned the powerful fusion of immediacy and other-worldliness of the baroque sounds with something inexplicably primordial in effect, a sense of interplay between order and chaos far beyond human control.

During the work’s course I was stunned by the range and scope of expression wrought by the dancers, their bodies both individually and collectively driven, it seemed, by a compelling energy and physicality whose expression spoke volumes – I felt hampered by not being able to get a reviewer’s programme, for some inexplicable reason (there were still some on sale when I asked but I had insufficient money to actually purchase one), and thus found myself “in the dark” in situ regarding some of the specific intents of the stage action, particularly in the work’s second part – borrowing a copy from a friend afterwards helped to clear up some of the moments where I felt myself not quite in synch with the stage action at the time.

In the light of the comments made by Parmenter and his team in the booklet I would wish, if I could, to go back and explore more deeply the layers of action, thought and suggestion which the show embedded beneath the basic stories. Some people I spoke to afterwards shared my feeling that the production’s content seemed TOO overlaid, and that less would have meant more – I remain equivocal in my reaction to the effect of things such as the “storming of the ramparts” representation, to give but one example, even after considering Parmenter’s idea of a “knocking down” of a bastion of male ego by the female agents of being, in the story.

Still, what endures for me is the memory of the dancers and their skills – approaching transcendence in their fluency and articulation, as well as conveying incredibly layered and interactive meanings both in individual and concerted movement and gesture. Assisted by the flowing effect of Tracy Grant-Lord’s costumes, the characters’ bodies enacted eloquent and atmospheric chiaroscuro play between clarity and concealment, whose visual tensions everywhere enhanced the power of the story-telling. While readily feeling the power of presence of the two principal name-character dancers, Carl Tolentino as Orpheus and Chrissy Kokiri as Euridice, I was equally taken with the individual characterisations of their colleagues (see below), even if, towards the end I thought the distinctiveness of their movements lost a little of their cutting edge through repetition (perhaps I was the one who was tired by this time, trying to make better sense of the cornucopia of stage incident!).

Full credit, then to this company of dancers who supported the efforts of the two leads already mentioned – Katie Rudd, Sean McDonald, Lucy Marinkovich, Eddie Elliott, Bree Timms, Toa Paranihi and Oliver Carruthers – as well as to the dedicated work of the local “movement chorus” (all of whom were volunteers). Enabling Tracy-Lord-Grant’s costumes and John Verryt’s inventive settings to display their full effect was the atmospheric lighting of Nik Janiurek, whose stated purpose was keeping “the flow of light across the stage” in accord with Orpheus’music. Michael Parmenter’s engaging choreography did the rest in tandem with his dancers’ and musicians’ focused efforts.

No one work of art will reveal all of its secrets in one encounter or during one performance – and the subjective nature of any one critical response is a moveable feast when put against others’ reactions. Michael Parmenter’s creation, I freely admit, took me by surprise in its range and scope of expression, by turns striking things truly home and taking me into places where I felt some confusion – all of which leads me towards expressing the hope that it might be re-staged at some time in the near future, and that certain aspects of the presentation might come to seem clearer in their overall purpose. Parmenter himself admitted that not every theatrical image in the work was “a complete success” in response to a more-than-usually dismissive reaction from another review quarter – but so much of “Orpheus” was, I thought, powerful, innovative and challenging theatre, deserving to be thought and rethought about. It’s certainly a theatrical experience to which I doubt whether anybody could remain indifferent.

Artistic Director and Choreographer – Michael Parmenter (and the Company)
Dancers – Carl Tolentino, Chrissy Kokiri, Katie Rudd, Sean McDonald, Lucy Marinkovich, Eddie Elliott,
Bree Timms, Oliver Carruthers, Toa Paranihi
Singers – Aaron Sheehan, Nicholas Tolputt, William King, Jayne Tankersley
Musicians –  Donald Nicolson, Julia Fredersdorff, Laura Vaughan (Latitude 37)
Polly Sussex, Sally Tibbles, Miranda Hutton, Jonathan Le Cocq, David Downes
Sound Score – David Downes
Producer – Behnaz Farzami
Set Designer – John Verryt
Costumes – Tracy Grant Lord
Lighting – Nik Janiurek
Rehearsal Director – Claire O’Neil
Chorus Director – Lyne Pringle
 

 

 

 

Berkahn shows how you can have fun with Bach

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

St Andrew’s lunchtime concerts

Jonathan Berkahn and friends: Bernard Wells (guitar, whistle, piano); Megan Ward (fiddle, viola); Karla Norton (Fiddle); Emily Griffiths (fiddle); Tom Stonehouse (bodhran)

The Daughters of Invention: music based on the thematic material of Bach’s Two-part Inventions
Jonathan Sebastien Berkahn: movements from a suite: Allemande, Courante, Gavotte
 J S Bach: Two-part Inventions 1 in C BWV 772, 2 in C minor BWV 773, 3 in D BWV 774, 10 in G BWV 781, 11 in G minor BWV 782, 12 in A BWV 783, 13 in A minor BWV 784
Berkahn‘s Digressions on each of the Bach inventions

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 28 February, 12:15 pm

This was one of those concerts that looked enigmatic from the outside, and I wondered whether it was going to deserve a review – not that I’ve ever failed to be greatly entertained by all my previous encounters with the multi-talented Berkahn.

The secret here was to take several of Bach’s Two-part Inventions and respond to what Berkahn takes to be Bach’s suggestion, taking them as starting point to turn “their thematic material to wholly un-Bachian ends, in genres mostly derived from the Irish traditional music I play with friends every Tuesday night at the Welsh Dragon”; in Berkahn’s words.

They began with three of Berkahn’s typical Bach suite movements, such as found in the keyboard Partitas and suites for orchestra, violin, cello and keyboard. An allemande, courante and gavotte; they were played by Berkahn and his cellist son Samuel. They were not bad imitations of the real thing, charming and very agreeable.

Then came seven of the Funfzehn Inventionen as they are called on the facsimile title page (in the Fraktur font) found in my Dover edition of Bach’s keyboard music. Designed as exercises for Bach’s eldest son Wilhelm Friedemann, these ‘Inventios’, as Bach calls them, are very approachable, not necessarily impossible for the amateur, melodically attractive.

They do not often feature in ordinary keyboard recital programmes, and I have to confess to being rather delighted at their charm and plain musical interest, and I certainly admired their performance. Berkahn’s approach was lively, fully aware of whatever shafts of wit might be found and I find that I wrote the words ‘exemplary playing’ with respect to the first two. And No 3 enjoyed a gentle triple metre.

Bach’s advertisement suggested that with dedication to these studies the conscientious student could acquire “a strong foretaste of composition”. And that was clearly enough to give Berkahn licence for his delightful elaborations. His first Digression made use of the ideas in both the first and second Inventions which he combined nicely, sounding comfortably idiomatic. The other players were employed in varying combinations: in the first, Berkahn played his own piano accordion and Bernard Wells the guitar; the three violins (he pointed up his intended folk-style by calling them fiddles) joined one by one. It all sounded perfectly natural and not all that distant from what Bach might have done if his purpose had been more light-hearted.

Wells gave a nice folkish colour to the third Digression with his whistle and Tom Stonehouse contributed his bodhran – a percussion instrument. In the 11th Digression, entitled ‘waltz’, instruments changed hands again with Wells at the piano, Megan Ward changed to viola, and Berkahn again played the piano accordion. Hardly a Johann Strauss copy, it moved gently, evolving in a most natural way. No 10 followed, merging into a jig, with Ward now borrowing the whistle, to create a nice Irish feeling.

And so it went: entertaining playing, with evident enjoyment by all the participants and casual, droll comments from Berkahn; it built to a finale – the Digression on No 12 in the happy key of A major, turning into a reel. All joined in, including cellist Samuel Berkahn. Hereabouts in my notes I wrote ‘these inventions are such fun’; not the sort of insightful, penetrating remark proper music critics should make.

Concerts involving Jonathan Berkahn (in this case a relative of his named Johann Sebastien Berkahn) are generally likely to have an unorthodox or surprising aspect as well as being fun. This one was all of that.