Tag: song recital

Intelligently constructed programme exquisitely sung by Lisette Wesseling

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

TGIF lunchtime recitals at the Cathedral
Lisette Wesseling – soprano, with Richard Apperley – organ and Michael Stewart – piano

Music by Vivaldi, Handel, Mozart, Schubert, Glanville-Hicks, Finzi and Sondheim

Cathedral of Saint Paul

Friday 25 October, 12:45 pm

The Anglican Cathedral is now running two classes of Friday lunchtime recitals. The monthly organ recitals are ‘Great Music’ (even if they are played on the Choir or the Swell manual) and there are others, just called ‘brief recitals’, which are also often at the organ.

I’ve heard Lisette Wesseling several times over the years, though I seem not to have written reviews of the performances. As well as singing in the Cathedral Choir she has, I imagine among much else, sung solos in Bach’s B Minor Mass and a concert that included both Bach’s Magnificat in D and Jesu meine Freude.

Lisette is blind and you will find material on her website and other websites which also discuss what she feels is a much more troubling burden – stammering. Her degree in psychology (as well as music) no doubt helps to make her comfortable in openly exploring her difficulties and her continuing efforts to deal with the stammering; blindness is an affliction for which there are well understood ways by which a ‘normal’ life can be led. But look at the BSA website (www.stammering.org/stammeringblindness.html‎), where she writes in answer to the question which is more difficult: “The answer I give usually surprises people: stammering is much more difficult to live with than blindness.”

Last year, at the production of Smetana’s The Bartered Bride, I was not amused at the depiction of Vašek as a figure of fun, inept and stammering. But that’s how librettist and composer conceive him: what should a director today do with the role? Much like directors’ dilemma with roles like Monostatos who was treated in 1791 by Da Ponte and Mozart very differently from the way he might be today.

Thus she reads both the notation and the words in braille as she sings; though it struck me that with the enhancement of other faculties that blindness develops, her memory would have made reading the score unnecessary.

Here is a bright, accurate, distinctive voice that was demonstrably at home in all the musical style that this short recital covered, from late baroque to Broadway musical. She began with two early 18th century pieces by Vivaldi and Handel. The programme leaflet gave no details of the pieces beyond the bare name of the song or aria.

Both the first pieces were accompanied beautifully by Richard Apperley at the chamber organ. The Vivaldi, the first movement of a sacred motet, Nulla in mundo pax sincera, RV 630 (“In this world there is no honest peace”) is a delightful aria in an almost dancing rhythm, light and high, seeming to be written for her kind of voice, and, as with so much Vivaldi, one is astonished that earlier generations ignored the huge quantity of his music that is so rich in melodic invention.

The same goes for the Handel  aria, Süsser Blumen Abaflocken, one of his German songs (Neun deutsche Arien), HWV204, called in Hyperion’s CD note, “a sensual evocation of the scent of Amber flowers, in which the middle section describing the soul soaring heavenwards bears a resemblance to Cleopatra’s ‘Piangerò’ from Giulio Cesare”. Lisette’s high notes truly relished the range she was called on to inhabit, and I loved the cathedral’s long echo here, giving me more of the voice than she was actually producing.

Mozart’s Idomeneo is no doubt more familiar to opera-lovers than to those who may have come across the previous two songs. ‘Zeffiretti lusinghieri’ (‘Pleasant Zephyrus’), sung by Ilia in Act III. This too revealed a happy, summery atmosphere as Ilia, the daughter of Priam, the defeated King of Troy, sends her love to Idamante, son of Idomeneo the King of Crete. It was yet another song brimming with hope and joy which Lisette obviously relishes and performs in a voice coloured with happiness. The accompaniment here was by Michael Stewart at the piano.

Frühlinsglaube, Schubert’s setting of a harmless lyric by Ludwig Uhland, is also filled with the delights of Spring (‘Faith [or belief] in spring’), one of the best-known, happiest, most guileless songs.  Here her voice floated easily, revealing an instinctive affinity with the Lieder genre.

Next was a song by Gerald Finzi: ‘It was a lover and his lass’ from As You Like It. This was perhaps the only song in the programme that suffered a little from the acoustic, calling for faster speed and given more to harmonic variety which a reverberant acoustic tends to muddy.

But it provided a nice link with the next song, in imitative Tudor/Stuart style.

Peggy Glanville-Hicks (1912-1990) was one of Australia’s earliest woman composers (along with Margaret Sutherland and Miriam Hyde) and her music has found its way into the mainstream of Australian music. Her music is accomplished and attractive, demonstrating an approach that owes much more to contemporary European models than to anything that might suggest Australia.  You can find this song on You-Tube: ‘Come Sleep’ is a setting of a poem by playwright John Fletcher (of ‘Beaumont and Fletcher’, and a collaborator with Shakespeare in Henry VIII and Two Noble Kinsmen) and the setting suggests the style of the Tudor/Stuart composers.

Finally, a song from one of Stephen Sondheim’s most popular works, Into the Woods, which inter-twines Grimm fairy stories. ‘No one is alone’ presents a comforting message along the obvious lines, at the end of the musical. There’s a gentle swing as the melody moves easily in short phrases which Lisette sings with all the clear unpretentiousness that is Sondheim’s secret.

This series of concerts hasn’t yet taken off in terms of audience support. The Cathedral does not have quite the convenience and welcoming atmosphere that St Andrew’s does.

But we should hope that the attention given to the series over the years by Middle C might eventually persuade Wellingtonians whose Fridays weigh heavily on their spirits that here is the answer.

 

Impressive final recital as Isabella Moore prepares for study abroad

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

‘Vivere per Amare’ (Live to Love) – final recital for Postgrad. Diploma in Voice
Arias, Lieder and Songs

Isabella Moore (soprano), Bruce Greenfield (piano)

Adam Concert Room, New Zealand School of Music

Friday 20 September 2013, 6.15pm

A massive thunderstorm, such as we seldom get in Wellington, prevented me from arriving at the recital in time; hail and heavy rain meant I had to stop en route because I simply could not see the surface of the road.  However, it was well worthwhile persisting with the journey.  Isabella Moore has an impressive voice of wide range, an imposing platform persona, and is accomplished across a variety of composers, genres and periods.  She certainly showed us what she can do.

My colleague Lindis Taylor was also at the recital, and has given me some comments on the items I missed: “‘Porgi amor’ had quite careful scene setting before Isabella entered, with Greenfield’s piano introduction.  She entered slowly from the rear, letting her face reveal her emotions as the introductory music continued.  Her voice is not the typical creamy, Kiri-like soprano but quite hard and bright, yet it was fully expressive of her sadness.

“She sang the Ritchie songs with considerable tonal variety, giving each a distinct character.”

The first song I heard properly (as opposed to through the door from the foyer) was Richard Strauss’s Freundliche Vision, Op.48 no.1, the second Strauss lied. What first struck me was the power of Moore’s voice, her clear German language (and this was true also of French, Italian, English and Russian) and her good voice production.  Her climaxes were exciting and her soft passages tender.
Here is another excellent Samoan Strauss singer, like Aivale Cole.

It is perhaps a moot point whether the singer should modify her volume to the size of the room in which she is performing, or whether, for the benefit of those grading her diploma recital, she should show what she is capable of in terms of power and volume.  Certainly I found some of the singing too loud for the acoustic, but it was a case of power, not forcing or shouting.  I believe I have noted in a previous review that Isabella Moore uses her resonators so well; tone production is beautiful, and resonant, without a huge effort (apparently), and without a wide open mouth.  Her low notes are full of emotion, often well into the mezzo-soprano range, and her high notes are controlled.

Wagner followed: two of the Wesendonck lieder: ‘Der Engel’ and ‘Schmerzen’.  It was impressive to consider the variety of songs performed in the concert, and the sheer amount of work required to memorise them and master their performance.
Moore coped well with this demanding repertoire, though it would be pushing her voice to perform Wagner in an opera house at this stage of her career.  Both consonants and vowels were beautifully made and the powerful declamations were all in place.

After the first of two short intervals, we heard an aria by Jules Massenet: ‘Pleurez, pleurez mes yeux’ from Le Cid.  Here, as elsewhere, Bruce Greenfield’s tasteful and highly musical accompaniment was a joy.  Moore’s communication of the emotion of the piece with the audience was splendid, partly through her excellent enunciation, and her observation of the contrasts in the words.

Liszt’s song ‘Oh, quand je dors’ was convincingly performed.  I’ve always been told that singers should not exhibit teeth; that the teeth inhibit the production of tone and its full expression. However, while we saw quite a lot of incisors etc. in this song
particularly, I did not notice any effect on the quality of the sound.  The song could have sustained even more feeling and emotion.

Berlioz wrote wonderfully romantic works, and was rather ahead of his time in his invention, orchestration and word-setting. Near the top of the list is Les nuits d’été (Summer nights), and from this song cycle (usually with orchestra) Isabella Moore sang ‘Le spectre de la rose’, a setting of a poem by Gautier.  There was no strain in the voice, even on a high crescendo – but this fine song will grow more magnificent as the singer matures.

The Rachmaninov songs featured hugely expressive and demanding accompaniments, as befitted their composer, a top international pianist.  The first song, ‘Oh, never sing to me again’ was a setting of words by Pushkin.  This is a very dramatic song, and hearing it in Russian added to the effect.  The others were ‘Before my window, Lilacs‘, and In Spring Waters.  In these, found the sustained high volume too much. Yet Moore proved again that she can do delicacy too, notably in the second song.

To opera next, and Bellini’s ‘Casta diva’ from Norma.  As elsewhere, Bruce Greenfield was a one-man orchestra.  It was a very lovely rendering, but I’m not sure that bel canto is Moore’s ‘thing’. However, Lindis Taylor said “I was pretty impressed by her Norma performance which was clearly intended to be the show-piece and it was. The way she dramatically shifted gear for the cabaletta, from the pure sacred utterance, and then the prayer specifically asking for the return of her lover. And her ensuring that we understood the meaning of the words as distinct from aiming simply to astonish us with her vocal histrionics; they were certainly impressive.  The whole thing certainly made a dramatic impact.”  There were a few inaccuracies, but apart from that, Moore demonstrated the flexibility of her voice.

In the lighthearted final item, Flanders and Swann’s ‘A word in my ear’ Greenfield was the miming fellow-comedian.  This item included a ‘Farewell’, then just as the audience (and the adjudicating lecturers!) thought it was over, we were stopped, and the song became ‘I’m tone deaf’, a hilarious travesty of a singer – but hard to manage to sing out of tune, after all that training and practice!

A pity after putting so much work into a sizeable printed programme, to have it marred by mistakes, words missed out, and howlers, such as Strauss ‘paved the way for his predecessors’, and the muddling of Salzburg and Vienna, and their respective roles in Mozart’s career. A glance at an atlas could have cleared this up, and passing the notes to someone else to read through would, hopefully, have got rid of the mistakes.  Apparently people recall the opera by Massenet by the one aria, yet in the next line “it seems to have been forgotten”!

Worse than these was perhaps the use of the translations. I looked up the relevant website that was the source of most of them, out of curiosity (using the names of the translators to get to it).  It stated, over the name of Bard Suverkrop “Copying of the text (cut and paste) not permitted” and that the web address and name of the author should be given when public use was made of the translations.  We had the names, but… was copyright permission obtained?  If it was, this should be shown.  If not, the law has been broken.

 

A rare, delightful Lieder recital from two seasoned musicians at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

A recital of favourite Lieder by Schubert and Brahms

Roger Wilson (baritone) and Martin Ryman (piano)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday, 18 September 2013, 12.15pm

Here were two seasoned musicians, in contrast to the many recitals at St. Andrew’s from emerging performers.  It was a delight to hear lieder; in Wellington we all too seldom have an opportunity.

The two opening Schubert items were well-known: “Der Wanderer an den Mond” and “Auf dem Wasser zu singen”.  It was a delight to have both German words and translations printed; even though Roger Wilson’s German pronunciation is impeccable and his projection of the words first-class, it underlined the fact that the meanings of the songs and the extent of the composer’s brilliant word-setting cannot be fully appreciated unless the hearers understand the words’ sense.

There was some slight variability in intonation in these songs and elsewhere, and also the odd occasion, particularly in a couple of songs, where the performers were not quite in synch. Nevertheless, it was great to hear these wonderful songs
live.  “Ganymed” is less well known; as a longer song, it allowed for more development and expressiveness, which it received.  Again, there were clear words, and caressing of beautiful phrases.

A break for the singer was provided by Mendelssohn’s: Song Without Words, Op.19 no.1. The flowing quality of this piece echoed that of the songs.  Ryman played with finesse in this acoustic,
which is sometimes difficult for the piano.

Next came “Der Wanderer”, which was performed with considerable sensitivity to the words – a feeling of isolation was the pre-eminent mood.  Schubert’s superlative setting of poetry was
most notable here, but also in the following “Fischerweise”, a more joyful song.  In the first verse, the piano was a little too loud for the light tone Roger Wilson adopted.

We turned now to Brahms. “Wir melodien zieht es mir” immediately demonstrated the difference of this composer’s writing from that of Schubert.  The breadth of melodies and wider expressive scope distinguishes Brahms from the more intimate songs of Schubert that we had heard so far.  The setting of “Sapphische Ode” was perhaps a little low for Wilson’s voice.  Though sung with tenderness, we couldn’t get its full impact when the lowest notes could not be fully delivered.

Another piano solo was Brahms’s Intermezzo in A Op.118 no.2. Well-loved indeed, as the programme note stated – I heard it played on Radio New Zealand Concert only the previous night – it was given a fine interpretation, bringing out its nostalgic quality, the pianist caressing the piano to reveal beautiful sounds.

Schubert’s “Prometheus”, setting words by Goethe, is a ‘dramatic monologue’ with various sections, each of a different character, rather than a lied.  It has a grandiose opening, and depicts Prometheus’s defiance against Zeus.  The truculence of the words in many of the verses was eminently portrayed in the music, and in the performance; quite unlike most Schubert songs.

The recital ended with the delightful “Die Taubenpost”.  As Schubert’s last song, its travelling theme has perhaps additional significance.  The gorgeous accompaniment, with its continuous momentum, was impeccably played.  The song made a lovely ending to the concert.

 

Gorgeous concert of New Zealand commissions for voice and harp

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Te Koki New Zealand School of Music:
Pluck; a concert of New Zealand music for harp

Works by Anthony Ritchie, Graeme Downes, Pepe Becker, Lyell Cresswell, Gillian Whitehead, Chris Adams, Claire Cowan, Ross Carey and Mark Smythe.

Helen Webby (harp), Pepe Becker (voice)

Adam Concert Room, New Zealand School of Music

Friday, 13 September, 7.30pm

Everyone at ‘Pluck’ would have been delighted by what they heard.
The works were commissioned by an enterprising Helen Webby, with support from Creative New Zealand.  Most of the composers are New Zealand residents, but several are currently based
overseas.  All the works were written for full-size orchestral harp – pedal harp – unless otherwise stated below.

Anthony Ritchie’s Angels Flow was certainly apt to its title: evocative, misty, and at the end, feeling unfinished, as if it wafted off into spiritual worlds.  It was an appropriate piece to commence a recital of harp music, but more excitement was in store for the moderately-sized audience (there was musical competition elsewhere in the university precinct).

Also based at Otago University, Graeme Downes is an expert on Mahler, and on rock music.  I had not heard any of his compositions before, but despite the rather technical programme note, it proved to be an interesting and varied piece: Introduction and Scherzo.  It opened in a minor
mode, then changed quite abruptly.  There were many delicious moments of arpeggios and techniques of playing at varying levels from top to bottom of the strings. The tempi were quite fast, and the music was jazzy in places.  Towards the end, it struck me as pianistic in character.  Overall, it was a very attractive work.

We are certainly familiar with Pepe Becker as a singer; although I knew she composed also, I had not heard anything of hers for a long time. Her piece was titled  Capricorn I: Pluto in terra.  Knowing little of astrology, much of the programme note was over my head.

The work opened with the strings stopped by a piece of paper between them, giving a tonal quality
rather like pizzicato on a violin.  Then there were low wordless vocal tones from the harpist, and a melody for the left hand, while the pizzicato continued from the right hand.  The paper was removed (in an act of sleight of hand), but the same fast rhythms continued, as did the vocal tones, plus knocking on the soundboard.  All of this made for a dramatic and interesting piece – and difficulty for the performer, but nevertheless she succeeded without problems, it seemed.

Lyell Cresswell, who has lived in Edinburgh for many years, maintains his links with New Zealand.  He wrote his piece based on words by the poet Fiona Farrell, which were written after the February 2011 earthquake.  They had particular relevance, since the poet had been playing “with a harp ensemble under Helen’s tutelage”.  The words related the reaction of the harp and of the cups and plates when the earthquake happened.  Telling, and amusing were the lines about
harps making fine companions in disaster. “You can float on a harp as the ship goes down” and “You can hold onto a single string/ Find your way through a broken city.”

Pepe Becker’s singing was incisive yet smooth in this dramatic piece, which was played with great
panache and a range of fortes and pianos. The disaster was splendidly depicted.

Last in the first half of the concert was Gillian Whitehead’s Cicadas, the vocal part setting a text by Rachel Bush.  Naturally, the insects were depicted in the music, as Whitehead “focuses on the life cycle of the cicada and its mesmeric song.” Whitehead proved yet again to be superb at setting words to music, and also at bringing out the theme through the music.  We heard the cicadas emerging from the ground, and their rhythmic vibrations accompanied the words, epitomising the part that said “…say to themselves over and over.”  At one point Helen Webby used a kind of vibrato on the high notes, employing both hands to achieve this, then smoothed over the strings with both hands, giving an eerie effect.  Such ‘twentieth century harp techniques’ were credited in the programme note to great French-American harpist Carlo Salzedo, who died in 1961 at the age of 76.

I found the singing of the words rather shrill in the bright acoustic of the Adam Concert Room.  However, this was a very skilled composition, and performance.

Following the interval we heard Strata by Chris Adams (another composer with strong Otago University connections).  It employed, in addition to the harp, a ‘loop pedal’.  This is an electronic device, operated by the harpist using a pedal, which can play a loop of the music (the loop could be earlier recorded, or recorded during the performance, I learned later, and is much used by pop musicians). The performer could play with the loop as accompaniment, or without it, or activate the loop on its own, playing its part over and over, with no ‘live’ intervention.

The piece began with what sounded like a medieval melody, modal in nature.  The charming melody was played over a repetitive bass accompaniment.  The disadvantage of using the loop was the clicking noise as the pedal was depressed and the electronics started and stopped.

Claire Cowan’s piece was The Sleeping Keeper, for lap harp and pedal harp.  However, since Helen
Webby couldn’t play two harps at the same time, the loop pedal was employed again to activate the electronic version of the lap harp’s part.  At one point, she used the metal tuning key on the strings to produce a sustained metallic sound from them.  As the programme note said “the piece conjures up… the constant movement of water…”; the resonant sound in ACR was right for this evocative piece, full of the atmosphere of dreams.  However, I believe there was amplification in those piece employing the loop pedal.

The repetitive bass was most effective; the use of the loop pedal made for more complex, and louder, textures than the harp could conjure up on its own.

Ross Carey’s … valse oubliée… was for a wire-strung harp of 22 strings.  This small harp 22 metal strings was placed on a high padded stool and Helen Webby played it standing. What an incisive sound this harp has compared with the pedal harp!  Carey was the only composer to use this smaller instrument.  His piece was in an improvisatory style, with pleasing turns of phrase.

Finally, we heard Moto Mojo from Mark Smythe (Pepe Becker’s brother).  In tonality and rhythmically the piece was similar to Pepe’s composition.  It was true to the title, and to the note “to make the listener feel a sense of momentum” but it was certainly not without melody and charm.  I can believe in amplification used like this – it truly enhanced what can be a very quiet instrument.  The piece made a beautiful ending to a gorgeous concert.  It’s not always that you
can say that about a programme of totally new music.

 

English sacred and secular song, choral and organ music at Saint Paul’s Cathedral

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Choir of Wellington Cathedral of St. Paul, conducted by Michael Stewart, with Thomas Gaynor (organ), Jared Holt (baritone) and soloists from the choir

Music of twentieth-century English sacred choral and secular solo music

Wellington Cathedral of St. Paul

Saturday, 17 August 2013, 7pm

These are unconventional times; before the music could commence, Michael Stewart, Director of Music at the Cathedral, had to give the audience instruction on what to do in an earthquake, while reassuring us about the strength of the building.  The back page of the programme had printed details about such procedures.

Following this, Stewart gave brief but informative and humorous spoken introductions to the items.

Entry to the concert was by donation, to support the purchase of a Steinway piano from the former TVNZ studios at Avalon.  Although not titled on the programme, it was a concert of English sacred choral and secular solo twentieth century music.

In honour of the centenary of Benjamin Britten’s birth, the first three items were his Hymn to St. Peter, Hymn to the Virgin and Hymn to St. Columba.  The first began with loud brass tones from the organ, introducing a slow processional-style hymn.  It incorporated similar introductions to each verse.  This was quite taxing music for choir and organist.  Phoebe Sparrow sang magnificently in the solo passages, to a delightful quiet organ accompaniment.

Hymn to the Virgin is better known than the other two.  This piece was sung unaccompanied, with an antiphonal quartet placed in a balcony above the north transept.  All the singers produced great clarity of notes and words.  A louder section of the music introduced some harsh tone from the men occasionally, but otherwise it was a fine performance.

Hymn to St Columba included an organ part, described by Stewart as ‘fiendishly difficult’, but played with no apparent problems by Thomas Gaynor. This was a gorgeous piece.

Jared Holt sang two of Roger Quilter’s lovely songs: ‘Go, lovely rose’ (words by Edmund Waller), and ‘Now sleeps the crimson petal’ (words by Alfred, Lord Tennyson).  Quilter was a master at setting English poetry; I always think it a shame when, as in this case, the poets are not credited in the printed programmes.  Lieder and song could not exist without the marriage of words and music.  These songs suited Jared Holt’s voice very well, and his performance both vocally and in interpretation he was admirable.

I could not say the same about the piano.  Although sitting near the front, and thus not catching too much of what has been described as the ‘bathroom echo’ in the Cathedral, I found the sound soon became an undefined mush when it left the instrument, i.e. there was a lack of definition, whereas my companion found the tone ‘tinny’.  This was not the fault of the pianist (Michael Stewart) nor, presumably, the instrument, but in the first case, caused by the vast and high space, and the second, by the concrete floor under the instrument.  Perhaps it would be better to keep use of the sustaining pedal to a strict minimum.

One of two major choral works on the programme by Ralph Vaughan Williams, his Mass in G minor, written in 1921 for double choir and dedicated to Gustav Holst and his Whitsuntide singers, was unaccompanied. The influence of Tudor music, was noticeable, especially echoes of William Byrd’s masses.

The performance featured beautiful sustained phrases, refined tone and excellent intonation. There were rich harmonies, especially in the Gloria and a quartet of solo voices interspersed the passages for the full choir of around 30 voices here and in later movements.  The soprano and tenor were strong and clear.  The counterpoint section was bright, lively and intricate.

The Credo was full of delicious contrasts.  The choir’s balance was excellent, especially in the quieter passages.  Vaughan Williams’s word-setting was amazingly varied.  The quartet of soloists again made a significant contribution, and the Amen at the end contained elaborate writing, triumphant in mood.

The Sanctus was perhaps the most contemporary (twentieth century) sounding of  the whole work, with interesting harmonies – always resolved.  Significant dynamic variation was incorporated.  A soprano solo introduced the Benedictus where the voices blended beautifully.  The Agnes Dei was another wonderfully varied movement, sung with assurance, accuracy and affecting attention to tone, clarity of diction and gradations of dynamics.

It was a memorable and superb performance of supremely exquisite English church music.

Following the interval was James MacMillan’s ‘A new song’, a choral piece with organ accompaniment.  This exhibited delicacy and robustness by turns.  And there were some tricky turns for the singers, accompanied by pianissimo chords from the organ, which were followed up by loud ones at the end.  However, I did not find the piece very interesting.

Next we heard the one piece on the programme that was written just before the twentieth century (1895), Elgar’s Andante espressivo (Organ Sonata in G major, Op.28), played by Thomas Gaynor.  This I found rather ho-hum – not the playing, nor the choice of tone colours, but the music, which was rather improvisatory in style and did not seem to have much to say.  It became grand and flashy, but with attractive registrations. Elgar wrote very little other organ music, most of it unpublished; perhaps there was nothing in English organ music of the twentieth century with a greater claim to be included in the programme.

Vaughan Williams’s Five Mystical Songs are great favourites of mine.  A large part of their beauty stems from the poems of George Herbert (1593-1632, again not credited). I have always marvelled at the incomparable language used by this remarkable poet.  The composer’s highly sensitive settings, using a modal opening to several of them, are complemented by magical accompaniments, here, the organ substituting for the original setting for orchestra..

I thought that the second song, ‘I got me flowers’ needed a little more variation of tone and dynamics from the soloist, Jared Holt.  The wordless choir part was ethereal, followed by a strong unison ending.
‘Love bade me welcome’ was for soloist and organ only.  Here, there was more subtlety, and a good range of registrations on the organ.  Words were very clear, and the singer’s tone was warm and earnest.  A wordless coda from the choir accompanied the soloist’s final words.  A high pianissimo ending from the organ was marvellously euphoric.

The setting of ‘The Call’ (Come my way, my truth, my life – quoting words from the New Testament) featured modal tonality.  The final, big choral item, ‘Antiphon’ (Let all the world in every corner sing) is
often performed separately from the rest of the cycle.  Its demanding organ part is like triumphant bells.  It is grand and joyous.

Michael Stewart elicits from his choir an energetic sound, with notable flexibility, especially in its superb dynamic range. Most of the singers looked committed and involved in the music, but a few looked completely bland.  Nevertheless, well done, all – not least young organist Thomas Gaynor, home on a break from his studies in the USA.

 

Terfel’s style and musicality offer something for everyone in varied concert

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

NZSO and Bryn Terfel: A Gala Evening

Wagner: Excerpts from Tannhäuser, Das Rheingold, Die Walküre
Boito: ‘Son lo Spirito: from Mefistofele
Songs by Kurt Weill, Rogers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe, Bock and Harnick, and Traditional, arranged by Chris Hazell
Lilburn: Aotearoa Overture

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra with Bryn Terfel (bass-baritone), conducted by Tecwyn Evans

Michael Fowler Centre

Friday, 3 May 2013, 6.30pm

One wonders if all the words that can be said about Bryn Terfel have already been said: his magnificent voice, his control of dynamics and vocal nuance, his infinite variety of vocal colour, his resonance, his communication with his audience.

He has been gifted with a splendid voice, which he uses with the utmost musical intelligence. 

The Michael Fowler Centre had but few empty seats on Friday evening.  Not only was there a great singer to hear, but the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra was in outstanding form.  We don’t often have the opportunity to hear the orchestra play Wagner, but on this showing the musicians are very good at it.

The horns were in marvellous fettle for the opening of the Tannhäuser overture, with lovely tone and phrasing; the cellos followed in like fashion.  The players proceeded with a wonderful build-up and range of dynamics.  There was choice woodwind to enjoy, and the woodwind choir playing the theme was beguiling, against the mysterious, rapid violins.  Then the theme was punched out in a masterly manner by cellos and brass.  It all added up to a fine and totally convincing performance.

The beautiful aria ‘O! du mein holder Abendstern’ is perhaps the most well-known solo in all of Wagner’s œuvre.  Wagner’s fondness for chromaticism is most apparent here.  Bryn Terfel’s was a gentle introduction, his low notes benign.  His breath and vocal control were wonderful to behold, as was his enunciation, and the contrast between his pianissimos and strong, ringing top notes.  The cellos echoed his tone superbly.  Wonderful too, were the delicious harp passages.

In a radio interview earlier in the week, Terfel said that he considered himself a lyrical Wagner singer, and that he wasn’t there to sing loudly, but to give colour and dynamics to the solo parts.

‘Abenlich strahlt der Sonne Auge’ from Das Rheingold enabled the depiction of quite a different character.  The horns again, along with trumpets, got us into the mood.  Trombones and tuba were added to the mix, making a formidable sound for Terfel to encounter.  His stylish declamation came across despite the huge amount of noise created; some of the sound bounced off unexpected places in the auditorium.

Horns to the fore in Die Walküre, of course.  ‘The  Ride of the Valkyries’ was described in the printed programme as ‘one of the most famous moments of music ever composed’.  Certainly, but it has been so often parodied that I found it hard to banish some of these treatments of it from my mind.

‘Wotan’s Farewell and Magic Fire Music’ gave both singer and orchestra their heads.  Its dramatic character was belied by Terfel’s ‘stand and deliver’ concert stance, with few gestures, and little facial expression, relying on his voice and outstanding, indeed flawless, diction to get over the message.  The performance was characterful and commanding, the singer producing huge sound, supported by an orchestra in top gear – including the playing of the ear-piercing anvil! 

Everything changed after the interval.  Bryn Terfel spoke to the audience between composers, his large speaking voice reaching throughout the auditorium without difficulty.  He spoke of the words of Boito’s aria and their meaning (better than did the printed translation, which substituted the word ‘through’ for ‘throw’).  As he said, bass-baritones get to sing the evil guys.

Here, facial expression and gesture helped to convey the evil of Mephistopheles, as did the brilliant, loud, whistling that interspersed the aria.  Another nice touch was the singing of the word ‘No’ in a high, childish voice the second-last time it occurred.  The whistling at the end was imitated by some of the audience; Bryn Terfel told us ‘See why the dogs went crazy when I rehearsed this on my father’s farm!’

Kurt Weill’s ‘Mack the Knife’ from Die Dreigroschenoper (The Threepenny Opera) is more familiar to us in English, but Terfel sang in the original German.  It begins with just piano accompaniment, then gradually percussion and brass are added, then pizzicato strings.  Back to piano, and the same process happens again.  This was all totally pleasing on the ear; the singer’s soft notes were quite lovely.

Oklahoma’s overture and most famous song, ‘Oh what a beautiful mornin’’ followed.  A charming xylophone was a feature of the suave and smooth overture.  Terfel played around with the rhythm in the song – why not, in something like this?  The orchestra sang the second chorus – then we all joined in. 

Lerner and Loewe’s Camelot is not as enduring as some of the other shows.  Terfel portrayed a quite different character in the winsome ‘How to handle a woman’, that featured sprechstimme.

‘If I were a rich man’ is another winner, from Fiddler on the Roof.  Here, Terfel was acting through his voice – shading the tone, making the sounds for ducks, geese and turkeys, and using an appropriate accent for Tevye.  At the end, he bounced off the stage to the rhythm of the piece. 

The orchestra played what is probably my favourite Lilburn piece: Aotearoa Overture.  The singer would have needed the break, but the piece was somewhat out of character with the rest of the concert.  It was impressively rendered.

A series of traditional songs came next, arranged by Englishman Chris Hazell.  The first, ‘Passing By’ had rather strange harmonisations, but ‘My Little Welsh Home’ included appropriately, the harp, and lovely oboe passages.  In the last of these, ‘Molly Malone’, the audience was again invited to sing along in the chorus.

A standing ovation obtained several encores: ‘Shenandoah’ in a beautiful arrangement with lots of flute and delightful pianissimos; ‘Ar hyd y nos’ (‘All through the night’) sung in Welsh with notable cor anglais in the orchestra – and a verse sung directly to the people seated behind the stage, and finally, ‘Pokarekare ana’.  Not every Maori vowel was correct, but it was a beautiful arrangement (I assume these arrangements were also by Chris Hazell) and a fitting finale to a wonderful evening of superb music from a great artist.

Bryn Terfel is totally in command of a magnificent voice, and of all the characters he portrayed.  He comes over as a jovial and friendly human being.

 

 

A world in a grain of sand – Pepe Becker and Stephen Pickett at Futuna

Posted on by Peter Mechen

COLOURS OF FUTUNA presents:

MUSIC FOR AWHILE……

15th, 16th, and17th Century Songs of love and life,

from Italy, England, France and Spain

Pepe Becker (soprano)

Stephen Pickett (lute and chitarrino)

Futuna Chapel , Friend Street, Karori

Sunday 9th December 2012

All that was needed for perfection to be had in this concert was a more substantial audience – but for one reason or another, people stayed away. Perhaps it was the weather – when Wellington turns on a beautiful day, it’s a place to be out and about like no other, and the prospect of an indoor concert, however felicitous, becomes proportionally less inviting. Still, it was an event whose qualities led one to recall those reproving words from Henry V – “and Gentlemen of England now abed / shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here….”

True, there’s been a superabundance of great concerts in the Wellington region throughout the year, and faced with the delights of such weather, many otherwise committed concert-goers could well have reflected upon cups that “runneth over” and chosen something different this time round. But the much bandied-about “arts capital” epithet which Wellingtonians are certainly proud to own by dint of location did receive a dent, or at least a paintwork scratch in this case, in my opinion. Whatever may have been the alternatives, world-class performances such as what we handful of audience members present heard from Pepe Becker and Stephen Pickett deserved better support than this.

This was my second visit to Futuna Chapel for a concert of recent times, and the venue again worked its unique magic, helping to impart a timeless feeling to the musicians’ explorations of music from distant times and places, and bringing the sounds triumphantly to life for our twenty-first century ears. The acoustic and general ambience admirably suited Pepe Becker’s voice and Stephen Pickett’s accompaniments, catching all of us present up in the music’s world and allowing its full force and flavour, thanks in equal measure to the skills of these performers.

The concert began with a short instrumental solo played on the lute by Stephen Pickett, a Ricercar by Joan Ambrosio Dalza, whose was a composer-name new to me – the work was published in 1508, which goes some of the way towards explaining my ignorance. From this uncommonly elegant beginning we moved to the first song, by Antonio Caprioli, Quella Bella e Bianco Mano (“That fair white hand”), in which love is depicted as both a wounding and a healing experience – beautifully performed.

Pepe Becker welcomed us graciously to the concert, expressing pleasure and gratitude at our attendance (for our part, as an audience, I think we felt embarrassed at our lack of real numbers, but both musicians quickly put us at our ease!). In fact, we were treated like kings and queens throughout, with song following beautiful song as if in some kind of “dream-ritual”. Especially evocative was this first “Mediterranean” bracket, with the soft, musical Hispanic word-sounds in particular adding to the general romantic effect – the last two songs of the group presented different aspects of the Spanish character, the first, by Miguel de Fuenliana, Passevase ei rey moro, a lament for the “Alhambra” in Granada, declamatory and serious in intent; and the second energetic and celebratory, Juan Encina’s dance-like Hoy comamos y bebamos, (“Today we eat and drink”), a roistering song complete with clapping and dance movements.

Stephen Pickett changed from the guitar to the lute for the bracket of English songs, introduced by a piece for solo lute Go from My Window, and followed by John Dowland’s Flow My Tears, with Pepe Becker opening the vocal throttle and suffusing the ambience with glorious resonant tones. If the singer paid rather less attention to word-pointing and more to a sense of  flooding the listeners’ sensibilities with sorrowful sounds, the latter carried the day triumphantly. Robert Johnson’s Hark, hark ,the Lark was also splendidly delivered, with a trio of lovely bird-like ascents to the tops of the phrases, each better than the last. A stratospheric Willow Song from the Dallis Lute Book of 1583 completed the bracket in beautifully bell-like style.

“Charlatans and Mountebanks” was the intriguing title of the next bracket (courtesy of a description (1619) by Michael Praetorius of music made by comedians and clowns), beginning with a solo by Stephen Pickett on the guitar-like chitarrino, and then plunging us into the no-emotional-holds-barred world of Barbara Strozzi, with the singer declaiming wonderfully melismatic lines high and low, stressing different rhythm-points in a way that created occasional mini-tensions, all to a passacaglia-like accompaniment – like much of this fascinating composer-performer’s music, the lines wept, raged and just as quickly dissolved once again. An instrumental Fantasia terza by Melchior Barberiis nicely effected a contrast with the following dance-song, Amor ch’attendi by Giulio Caccini, the singer augmenting the music’s energy and colour with a drum.

With Music for a While by Henry Purcell the musicians concluded eponymously both the final bracket of items and the entire concert, a section which featured as well works for voice by Merula, Monteverdi and Strozzi (again). Some of these were the most overtly expressive of the afternoon, Tarquinio Merula’s Canzonetta sopra la nanna for one, an extraordinarily doom-laden and fate-ridden lament by a mother made over a sleeping child, to an insistently “sighing” lute accompaniment, singing and playing which I found riveting in its intensity. Another was Claudio Monteverdi’s Ohimè, ch’io cado, energetic and volatile, with Pepe Becker demonstrating an exhilarating combination of force and focus over a wide-ranging terrain of emotion. The third of the “trio of intensity” was Barbara Strozzi’s somewhat suggestively-titled L’eraclito Amoroso, a conceit for despairing lovers, with different rhythmic trajectories underlining the spontaneity of thought and impulse, and words like “piangere” brought out and beautifully coloured by the singer. Altogether, a real “tour de force” of vocal expression from Pepe Becker, alternating beautifully “held” lines, with passionately delivered recitative, and holding us in thrall throughout.

As well that Purcell came to the rescue of our somewhat tenderized sensibilities at the very end – here was emotion cleansed of all excess, and rarefied as a pure stream of melody. No wonder he was so esteemed by his contemporaries – his setting of Dryden’s and Nathaniel Lee’s words, presented here by singer and player, persuaded we listeners that , indeed, “beauty is truth, truth, beauty…” and seemed to soothe for a brief time in our lives the sea of the world’s troubles.

 

 

 

 

 

Lisa Harper-Brown frames fine Opera Society recital

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Lisa Harper-Brown (soprano) in Concert with Christie Cook – mezzo soprano, Stephen Diaz – counter-tenor, Cameron Barclay – tenor, Kieran Rayner – baritone
Bruce Greenfield – piano

Songs by Debussy and Rachmaninov, Montsalvatge, Brahms and Elgar; arias and ensembles by Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Bizet, Rossini, Saint-Saëns, Handel, Monteverdi, Bach, Bellini and Bernstein
(Vocal recital by New Zealand Opera Society, Wellington Branch)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Tuesday 20 November, 7.30pm

Once upon a time the Opera Society used to present regular recitals, every month or so. Then, as opportunities multiplied for singers to appear in professional and amateur productions and in recitals at the university schools of music, the screening of opera films slowly became more common and the society’s recital programme diminished. Instead, there are monthly screenings of operas on DVD.

British-born, Lisa Harper-Brown has worked in Australia for some years and has recently been appointed to a position in the vocal department of the New Zealand School of Music. She provided the professional element in the recital, singing no opera but instead, brackets of songs by Debussy and Rachmaninov.

Judging that most of the audience was probably unfamiliar with Debussy’s five 1889 settings of Baudelaire poems (called ‘Cinq poèmes de Baudelaire), Lisa spoke about them, singing them in pairs. Her remarks were scholarly and perceptive, touching on Debussy’s affinity with Baudelaire, with symbolist poetry, the impact of Wagner and philosophical thought of the time.  Though the songs come early in Debussy’s career, before any of the best known piano and orchestral music, it is good to be reminded that before this set, in his first decade of work – the 1880s – he wrote around 60 songs.

Her opening of the first song, Le balcon, burst on the audience like a thunder clap; it demanded attention but also suggested that she did not at first have the measure of the acoustic, and almost at once modified her delivery. As the song continued (it is very long) it also became clear that Lisa had a complete grasp of the young composer’s aesthetic and his command of wide dynamics and huge pitch range. The singer encompassed it, if not with ease, then at least with astonishing virtuosic skill, none of which obscured the essential voluptuous, and sometime decadent, quality of Debussy’s creations.

The songs tax not only the singer; they also make huge demands of the pianist whose task is to simulate an orchestra, for in them the recent impact of Debussy’s visit to Bayreuth as well as the influence of eastern music can be heard, in both voice and piano. Bruce Greenfield’s contribution was highly impressive, exhibiting subtlety and luminous Impressionist colourings.

Christie Cook graduated on music from Otago University and is now studying with Flora Edwards, planning to do further study overseas. She sang three widely varied songs: one of Montsalvatge’s Five Negro Songs (Cuba dendro de un piano) capturing well enough its singular quality; then Brahms’s Die Mainacht, which seemed to have been perfumed oddly by the previous song, giving it an unbrahmsian voluptuousness; and then one of Elgar’s Sea Pictures (Sea slumber song) which seemed to me free of a routine English contraltoesque quality; instead she invested it with her experience of singing in foreign languages.

Later in the concert Christie returned to sing Isabella’s fear-filled aria, ‘Cruda sorte’, from The Italian Girl in Algiers. Her excellent lower register and the sheer weight of her voice were more evident here, and I was reminded of a comparable voice such as Marilyn Horne’s, as she handled this taxing aria. The second-most-familiar aria from Samson and Delilah, ‘Printemps qui commence’, followed; her duplicitous role was quite persuasively portrayed, in an excellent performance. A stylish, risqué  number (The Physician) from Cole Porter’s Nymph Errant ended her bracket, the musical line well done though clarity of diction might have been better.

Cameron Barclay is an Auckland graduate but has been heard this year in striking performances of Beethoven’s Missa solemnis and the concert performance of Candide in Wellington. He sang ‘Il mio tesoro’ from Don Giovanni, in well-judged character, and a pathos-tinged Eugene Onegin aria: Lensky’s ‘Kuda, kuda’, contemplating his likely fate in the duel.

Kieran Rayner joined Barclay next to sing the duet from The Pearl Fishers. It came off splendidly, the two voices blending beautifully even though (perhaps because) the two have timbral similarities.

Rayner’s other offerings came in the second part of the concert. His sturdy baritone was a fit instrument for Bach’s ‘Grosser Herr, o starker König’ from the Christmas Oratorio. If this displayed his capacity in a joyous religious context, his bel canto offering from Bellini’s I puritani (‘Ah, per sempre io ti perdei’) offered profane matter into which he injected a degree of passion.

The runner-up in this year’s Lexus Song Quest, Stephen Diaz, entered to sing two arias: ‘In se Barbara’, a trouser role for contralto, sung by Arsace in Rossini’s Semiramide; and ‘Verdi prati’ from the castrato role of Ruggiero in Handel’s Alcina which he sang in the wonderful production by Opera in a Days Bay Garden earlier this year. Both arias were among the best things of the evening and brought expected vociferous audience response.

Christie Cook returned to sing with Diaz the duet ‘Pur ti miro’ from The Coronation of Poppea.  I can’t help hoping that modern scholarship is mistaken in the belief that it’s not by Monteverdi – it’s one of the loveliest pieces in the opera! The pair sang it with a rapturous beauty that totally disguised the couple’s villainous behaviour that got rewarded with happiness (brief in the event), and earned another outburst of enthusiasm.

Lisa Harper-Brown returned to conclude the concert with three Rachmaninov songs (Lilacs, Op 21:5; In the silence of the night, Op 4:3; Spring Waters, Op 14:11) which she sang in Russian, without a score in front of her. Both her impressive diction and her well-conceived musical interpretations suggested suppressed passion as well as classical elegance. The last song, Spring Waters, with its keenly evocative piano accompaniment (in case we needed reminding of the near uniform excellence of Greenfield’s playing), was a powerful testament to the genius of Rachmaninov as a song writer, making me wonder why his name is not included routinely when people speak of the world’s great lyrical composers.

The ensemble piece (Cook, Diaz, Barclay, Rayner in ‘Some other time’) from Bernstein’s On the town was a sort of anti-climax after the beauties of Rachmaninov and a great many of the earlier pieces. Recalling those affirmed this as an exceeding happy experience.

 

Interesting, themed recital by vocal quartet at Old Saint Paul’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

‘The Hunter and the Hunted’

Janey MacKenzie (soprano), Jody Orgias (mezzo soprano), Jamie Young (tenor), Justin Pearce (baritone) and Robyn Jaquiery (piano)

Arias and songs by Tchaikovsky and Handel

Old Saint Paul’s, Mulgrave Street

Tuesday 18 September, 12.15pm

The programme notes were prefaced by the words: “Some hunt for sport. Some hunt for revenge. Others are searching for love.”

Sometimes the search for a theme that might bring to a recital some kind of common thread that seems to make the whole greater than the sun of the parts, is useful, sometimes not. This fell somewhere between, though the ground was well covered by what we heard.

Janey MacKenzie and Jody Orgias opened with two duets by Tchaikovsky.
‘In the garden, near the ford’ opened with rippling piano sounds that accompanied the two very different voices which, however, blended most attractively. In authentic-sounding Russian, their singing lifted the spirits. In a second duet, ‘Dawn’, the two voices evoked a quiet religious air in a chant-like melody, perhaps suitable for the Orthodox equivalent of Matins, in slow waltz time, and they reflected the brightening day in lines than rose in pitch and clarity.

Handel occupied the central group of the recital: three pieces from Giulio Cesare, one from Semele, and one, the trio ‘The flocks shall leave the mountains’, from Acis and Galatea.

Tenor Jamie Young sang ‘Where’er you walk’ (Semele) in a voice that was slightly brittle but more seriously, in a manner that tried too hard with needless ornamentation. As a result it was difficult to conjure an air of gentle longing. Jamie reappeared in the trio from Acis and Galatea, singing the role of Acis which framed his voice to better advantage among other singers. Janey MacKenzie sang the Galatea while Justin Pearce as the nasty Polyphemus interrupted matters with a fine, threatening confrontation.

Here, and throughout, the need to use the scores detracted a little from the creation of an atmosphere seeking to evoke theatrical performance.

The three items from Giulio Cesare came together well; first with Jody taking the alto part of Cornelia to Janey MacKenzie’s Sextus in ‘Son nata a lagrimar’ in Act I where the murdered Pompey’s wife, Cornelia, and their son Sextus lament their predicament, caught up in the political and sexual web through the designs of Ptolemy and his retinue. The emotion was well portrayed.

Earlier in that act, Caesar has been offered duplicitous blandishments by Ptolemy and Caesar invokes a hunting simile in his solo ‘Va tacito’ to hint at the revenge he seeks against the Egyptian king. Jody illuminated the castrato role of Caesar (these days a great role for counter-tenors David Daniels and Andreas Scholl) with the right emotional quality.

The beautiful aria ‘Piangero la sorte mia’ is sung by Cleopatra at the beginning of Act III after Ptolemy’s army has defeated Cleopatra’s forces and she is imprisoned, but dreams of revenge which she and Caesar achieve with Caesar’s surprise defeat of Ptolemy in the last scene. Janey MacKenzie created a convincing Cleopatra both vocally and even visually.

The recital reverted to the late 19th century with another song and two arias by Tchaikovsky. The curtain rises in Eugene Onegin with Tatiana and her sister Olga singing a duet and these two voices simulated the peasant simplicity of the two rather affectingly.

Between the two arias Justin Pearce sang what is probably Tchaikovsky’s best-known song, ‘None but the lonely heart’, a Russian translation of the second of Mignon’s songs from Goethe’s Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahren, ‘Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt’.

His voice is perhaps a little unyielding for the real emotional force of the song to emerge but the tone or regret and longing were there.

Then from Tchaikovsky’s penultimate opera, The Queen of Spades, the two again took very similar roles, Lisa and Pauline, children of landed gentry, sweetly adopting a peasant song for their pleasure.
It brought to an end an attractive and unusual group of songs in a setting that helped simulate the atmosphere of the theatre.

 

 

Nature, Life and Love – Pepe Becker and Helen Webby

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Chamber Music Hutt Valley presents:

Pepe Becker and Helen Webby – Love’s Nature

Pepe Becker (soprano)

Helen Webby (harps)

St.Mark’s Church, Woburn, Lower Hutt

Wednesday, 5th September, 2012

As soon as both singer and harpist made their antiphonal entrances from each side of the platform, we were spellbound, caught up in a rainbow of enchantment between the two performers, one whose contours had already begun encircling the enraptured audience. With sweet and true singing, supported by the softest, most beguiling harp-tones, the musicians conjured up sounds which gave these visual illusions substance, even if at times the tones took on an ethereal, unearthly quality that belied their worldly origins. All of this was without any help from extra-musical effects – what immediately came to my mind was that the musicians could have entered by candlelight, and/or the church’s lighting could have been dimmed at the outset, and gradually brought up as the performers advanced towards the centre. Still, the music was the thing – if one had shut one’s eyes it would have been easy to imagine those sounds wafting and undulating towards one’s ears from across the ages.

From the very outset Pepe Becker’s voice was sweet and true and Helen Webby’s harp-playing deliciously evocative. The opening music was a well-known Sequentia composed by the wondrous Hildegarde of Bingen, the eleventh-century composer, poet, abbess and mystic, someone whose music has come to define the typical sound of music-making in the middle ages, at once austere and richly-laden, simple,yet resonating with meaning – as the program note put it so succinctly, “a rapturous chant of devotion to the Virgin Mary”, O viridissima virga, the sounds as miraculous as the subject-matter. Cut from similar “old” cloth was a love-song by Guillaume de Machaut, Comment-qu’a moy lonteinne, lovely “modal-scaled” melody, the harp following the voice, but enjoying several solo-instrument sequences. The song’s triple-time metre meant that the music danced as well – and having the texts and translations in the program gave we listeners even closer proximity to the music’s actual substance and meaning.

The singer welcomed the audience to the concert at this point, talking about the places the musicians had already performed the program and where they were about to go next, describing for us the undertaking by the pair as a “road tour”. Introductions and overviews completed, bardic harp was then exchanged for a bigger, less mobile concert instrument, and the performers gave us two delightful Italian madrigals. The first by Francesco Landini, Fa metter bando (Let it be proclaimed), dating from the 14th Century, was a droll pronouncement regarding lovers’ behavior. The second, by Cipriano da Rore, Ancor che col partire (Though on departing), written two centuries later, played with the contrasting idea of lovers’ pain at parting enhancing the pleasure of reunitement. Silken vocal lines wafted beautifully over the harp’s resonances throughout, the feeling at once touching and dignified, expressed within a kind of ritual processional.

I hadn’t heard Pepe Becker sing in English for some time; and felt that, during the Purcell item If Music be the Food of Love, beautiful though her tones were, she needed to give the words’ consonants more emphasis, as the effect was a shade bland – it didn’t feel to me that the words were being “savoured” enough. Whether speakers of Italian would feel the same way when listening to her Monteverdi or (as here) Handel singing, I can’t say – but the effect of listening to an exerpt from the opera Rinaldo was, to my ears, enchanting all over again, Handel’s heroine Almirena bemoaning her fate at being captured by the sorceress Armida, and separated from her lover, Rinaldo.

Helen Webby then “wowed” us with a harp instrumental, a Fantasie in C Minor by Louis Spohr, dark, dramatic and gothic throughout the opening, and reminding one of Beethoven’s “Tempest” Piano Sonata with its recitative-like flourishes, everything modulating freely and wondrously – virtuoso stuff, right to the end. The composer wrote the work for his wife, Dorette Scheidler, a virtuoso harpist, who must have been thrilled and truly grateful at receiving something so overtly spectacular to play. From this “Sturm und Drang” outpouring, it was but a short step to the world of Robert Schumann, in an exerpt from his Requiem. Pepe Becker brought a distinctive timbre to this world of dark, romantic feeling – at first, I must confess, I thought her tones too pure, too unequivocal in colouring to convey the music’s rich darkness, in fact, too much like a boy soprano. But she sustained her line beautifully with great intensity, and some spectacular high notes, at one point blinding us with the beauty of such a sequence around a particular phrase in the middle of the song.

Again in the French settings, more particularly in the first, a song by Andre Caplet, Doux fut le trait (Sweet was the dart), I thought the voice had a purity slightly at odds with the sensuality of the experience described in the poem (but could someone then explain to me how the same instrument, when singing Monteverdi madrigals, seems to have sensuality to burn?). More suited to her voice was, I thought, the Ravel song, Chanson de la mariée (Song of the Bride), the first of the composer’s “Cinq Mélodies Populaires Grecques”, the jeweled elegance of Ravel’s superbly contrived art so exquisitely realized, here, by both singer and harpist.

After the interval we enjoyed three of Philip Cannon’s “Five Songs of Women”, with texts by the composer’s wife, Jacqueline Laidlaw. The songs exist in both in French and English versions, the latter being performed here. Pepe Becker actually tore into the first one The Angry Wife with great gusto, relishing the words and giving us virtuoso singing. Though she put across the second song The Widow with touching pathos, fining her tone down to a ghostly-voiced conclusion, I still felt she needed to give those consonants a bit of real sting in places, to give the feeling more readily of “owning” each and every word. The effect in the third song was much the same – beautifully -shaped vocalizing, the line pitched to perfection, but the effect overall just a shade bland. It occurs to me that much the same used to be said of Joan Sutherland’s singing on the operatic stage, the exquisite tones somewhat unrelieved by a lack of sharp-edged consonants, depriving each word and its meaning of a properly-contoured shape. (But, in Monteverdi……)

New Zealand composer Helen Bowater wrote Hihi in 2007, a Messiaen-like piece depicting both the call and the environs of the native hihi, or stitchbird, presented here by Helen Webby with many magical, haunting touches – the harp’s strings activated in so many different ways. Then it was Pepe Becker’s turn, with an unaccompanied setting of an anonymous Japanese text, Hoshi no hayashi, dating from the 8th Century AD, a mesmeric evocation of the workings of the skies, the effect not unlike Sibelius’s Luonnotar, in places. Still more New Zealand music was featured, with Gareth Farr’s Still Sounds Lie, vivid settings of somewhat ingenuous words by Carolyn Mills, the NZSO’s harpist, recounting holiday-inspired thoughts and impressions, and with attractively energized accompanying figurations carrying an interest of their own for the ear (Elgar performed the same kind of musical alchemy for much of the poetry in his song-cycle “Sea Pictures”).

The concert concluded with a section devoted to folk-song, arrangements of both traditional Irish and Scottish tunes, featuring the talents of such luminaries as Josef Haydn and Hamilton Harty. Helen Webby told us, by way of introducing the segment, of Haydn’s generosity towards an impecunious English music-publisher, William Napier, the great composer gifting his arrangement of a number of Scottish songs to the hapless Napier, who had been threatened with debtor’s prison. Singer and harpist put across both of the Haydn settings, Secret Love, and On a green day with a winning mix of art and spontaneity, as did Pepe Becker’s realization of Hamilton Harty’s arrangement of the Irish air, My Lagan Love. Before this, and the singer’s wonderfully plaintive delivery of another Irish song, Black is the colour, we got a couple of “harp jigs”, then afterwards an arrangement of Sting’s Fields of Gold made by Helen Webby and an older “jig” by Machaut obviously connected to the song heard earlier in the concert, as it shared the same name, Comment qu’a moy.

And, to finish, singer became fellow-instrumentalist and harpist became fellow-singer in the pair’s arrangement of the Irish song The little drummer. So the harp was joined by a drum and two voices intoned the song’s final verse, celebrating the triumph of love and the joy of whole-hearted music-making. We in the audience saluted the pair with all the applause we could muster at the end, in return for an excellent evening’s entertainment and delight.