THE MUSIC OF JOE HISAISHI
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
Thursday November 6 at 7:30 pm
Further blurring the distinction between music worth listening to and music that is over-esteemed for its utilitarian value comes this concert, the first of several renditions of the same content. Joe Hisaishi has become a well-known composing commodity for his contributions to cartoon films from Studio Ghibli, the famous Japanese animation centre. Productions such as My Neighbour Totoro (1988), Spirited Away (2001) and Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989) are spoken of by aficionados with the kind of reverence that was once given to Jacques Tati or the pre-1944 works of the Disney studio. Still, there’s no accounting for lack of taste and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra‘s powers obviously think they’re onto a winner with this visit to the fecund composer’s output, even if the event comes with a caveat: Hisaishi himself will not be attending (whoever said he would?). I assume you won’t be getting visual stimulation even though a gaggle of films are mentioned in the publicity; as well, there will be some ‘straight’ concert-hall compositions. Guest pianist is Aura Go, the whole musical excursion under the direction of Nicholas Buc, and a pair of podcasters – Andrew Pogson and Dan Golding – will be bringing insights under an educationally promising title: Art of the Score. As a mark of this exercise’s popularity, the organisers have inserted a whole new hearing to the originally scheduled three. It’s good money-making, too: full adult prices range from $98 to $170, concession holders and children pay $5 less, and the always-with-us AI forces will get their pound of sashimi with the Hall’s regulation $7 transaction fee.
This program will be repeated on Friday November 7 at 7:30 pm, and on Saturday November 8 at 1 pm and 7:30 pm
INCANTATION
Affinity Quartet
Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Centre
Friday November 7 at 2 pm
Celebrating its tenth anniversary, the Affinity Quartet has retained the services of two founding members in cello Mee Na Lojewski and second violin Nicholas Waters. The ensemble’s first violin, Shane Chen, has enjoyed a peripatetic career, joining the Affinities last year; violist Josef Hanna is probably familiar from appearances in the ranks of the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra and, at one stage, enjoying a membership stint in the Flinders Quartet. All of which is to point out the newly-minted nature of this group, even if most of them have known each other for some time. This afternoon, the musicians present an hour-long recital beginning with Mozart’s Adagio and Fugue in C minor from 1783, then 1788, which lasts between six and seven minutes and is always impressive for its unexpected rigour. Then, in line with the ensemble’s bent for the contemporary, we hear French-British soprano/composer Heloise Werner’s Incantation in 4 parts of 2023, about which I know nothing except that it’s a few minutes longer than Mozart’s adagio/fugue double. Finally, the ensemble offers Debussy in G Minor, written in 1893 and part of an early compositional chain that has ensured the composer’s popularity with audiences and musicians, for whom this work has more attractions than most others of its time. A standard ticket is $55, a concession is $45, and you then have to cope with the sliding scale transaction fee in operation at the MRC of anywhere between $4 and $8.50, the final sum possibly dependent on your independently-assessed moral worth.
This program will be repeated at 6 pm.
THE VOICE OF THE VIOLA: FIONA SARGEANT
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Saturday November 8 at 7:30 pm
After an out-of-town tryout in Nunawading, this program hits the city with some of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra‘s forces, headed by Fiona Sargeant who has been a core viola member of the body for many years. This evening, she heads Hindemith’s viola concerto Der Schwanendreher, written in 1935 and central to the instrument’s 20th century repertoire (or any century’s, really; can you think of anything earlier, other than Walton and Berlioz?). It calls for a woodwind septet, a brass quintet, timpani, harp, a cello group of four and three basses, so that Sargeant has a clear acoustically-exposed run across its slightly-less-than-half-an-hour length. Sticking with Germany, the violist then leads some more reduced forces in the Brahms Serenade No 2 of 1859 which asks for the usual woodwind octet plus a piccolo who has to stick around for the finale only, a pair of horns, and a string force without violins but more numerous than the prescribed number in Hindemith’s work. This is benign, optimistic music – a forward-looking delight throughout. In which regard it makes an ideal match with the swan-turner work. Standard tickets cost between $57 and $105, concession rates are the usual whopping $5 cheaper, and the MSO imposes its flat $7 booking fee on every order for your delight and pleasure.
COCTEAU’S CIRCLE
Australian Chamber Orchestra
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Saturday November 15 at 7:30 pm
He got around, did Jean Cocteau, making his presence felt in many corners of France’s artistic world from World War I to his death in 1963. Apart from his collaboration with Stravinsky for Oedipus rex in 1927, the poet’s other contribution to 20th century music came early with his 1917 scenario for Satie’s Parade ballet. For the rest, he was friendly with some members of Les Six and tonight’s program features music by three of them: Tailleferre, Poulenc and Milhaud. As well, Richard Tognetti and his Australian Chamber Orchestra will play some Debussy, and works by Lili and Nadia Boulanger. All mates together, you’d think, sinking the hard stuff at Le boeuf sur le toit. Yes, I’m sure some of them did but it’s hard to reconcile Debussy with Cocteau, especially given the dismissive criticism that followed the great composer’s death. Still, we’ll have the ACO working through these as-yet unidentified works, including some Satie, with guests soprano Chloe Lankshear and Le Gateau Chocolat (George Ikediashi) as maitre d’. The event is directed by Yaron Lifschitz from Brisbane’s Circa company, so we can but hope for general acrobatics being part of the fun. Tickets enjoy the usual extraordinary range in cost – from $30 to $192, depending on your age (student=$30, adult in a top seat=$192), or simply your financial standing. And then there’s the surrealist transaction fee of anywhere between $4 and $8.50, also dependent on how much you’re prepared to fork out for your ticket. Welcome to Melbourne’s arts world, comrade.
This program will be repeated on Sunday November 16 in Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne at 2:30 pm, and again at the Elisabeth Murdoch Hall in the Melbourne Recital Centre on Monday November 17 at 7:30 pm.
CARMEN
Opera Australia
Regent Theatre
Saturday November 15 at 7:30 pm
You can’t accuse our national Sydney company of over-exerting itself for the Melbourne ‘season’. We’re going to get that famous old two-hander in Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice, complete with Circa ensemble distractions, the which production I saw in Brisbane about five years ago from the state company. We’re currently enduring The Barber of Seville in Elijah Moshinsky’s 30-year-old production. Now it’s time for nine presentations of Bizet’s great masterpiece which grips your musical attention from first bar to last. Danielle de Niese and Sian Sharp alternate in the title role, as do Abraham Breton and Diego Torre as Don Jose, and Phillip Rhodes and Luke Gabbedy sharing Escamillo. Micaela is the sole responsibility of Jennifer Black, Richard Anderson portrays Zuniga, the Remendado/Dancairo pairing is presented by Virgilio Marino and Alexander Hargreaves respectively, Nathan Lay gives us Morales, while the Frasquita and Mercedes duo will be sung by Jane Ede and Angela Hogan. Your conductor is Clelia Cafiero, director Anne-Louise Sarks, set and costume design Marg Horwell, choreographer Shannon Burns – an all-female off-stage panel of responsibility. I hear from colleagues that the world of Merimee’s Spain has been updated from its 19th century origins; well, we’ve had Otto Preminger’s Carmen Jones film since 1954 so nothing should surprise. Tickets range from $71 to $295 and move through six levels of desirability. You pay $9.80 as an ‘order fee’, which is well beyond any such charge I’ve come across in this country; but then, the company would be using a highly developed form of digital accounting – that myriad number of foreign guests have to be paid for somehow, don’t they?
This performance will be repeated on Monday November 17 at 7:30 pm, Tuesday November 18 at 7:30 pm, Wednesday November 19 at 7:30 pm. Thursday November 20 at 7:30 pm, Friday November 21 at 7:30 pm, Saturday November 22 at 12:30 pm, Monday November 24 at 7:30 pm and Tuesday November 25 at 7:30 pm
PIOTR ANDERSZEWSKI
Musica Viva Australia
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Tuesday November 18 at 7 pm
This notoriously self-critical pianist is concluding the year’s national cycle for Musica Viva Australia with as eclectic a program as you can imagine, outside the challenging confrontations provided by those artists with a dedication to the living contemporary. Piotr Anderszewski hits the regular repertoire, although not with well-worn material. For instance, he begins with selections from the last four compendia for piano by Brahms: the seven Fantasies Op. 116, the Three Intermezzi Op. 117, the Six Pieces Op. 118, and the Four Pieces Op 119, all of them published in 1892 and 1893. Our exponent is playing twelve of them – a little over half the number available. If his preceding appearances in Europe and Shanghai are any indication, these will take up the evening’s first half. Then he picks out some more blocks from Bach’s Well Tempered Clavier Book 2 of 1742; in Shanghai, he’s playing two – the E Major and the G sharp minor, both of which appear on his recording of 2021 where he performs half of the 24. Then comes the Beethoven Sonata in A flat Op. 110 of 1821 which, despite its many meanderings, only lasts about 20 minutes. This is an Anderszewski favourite as he’s recorded it three times – 1996, 2004, and 2008; as far as I can see, no other sonata by this composer appears in his discography. Standard tickets cost $65, $92, $125, or $153; students and concession holders pay $56, $80, $110, or $135; Under 40s can get in for $49, but not in the top rank seats; and, if you’re in a group of 10 plus, you pay between $2 and $3 more than students and concessionaires. You’ll have to dig a little bit extra for the $4 to $8.50 transaction fee which is the Recital Centre’s idea of a progressive tax.
RYMAN HEALTHCARE SPRING GALA: JOYCE DIDONATO
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
Thursday November 20 at 7:30 pm
Judging from her discography, American soprano Joyce DiDonato has recorded lots of Berlioz: Les Troyens, Benvenuto Cellini, La Damnation de Faust, Romeo et Juliette. She has also sung the female lead in Beatrice et Benedict. Further, she has offered Les nuits d’ete at various points in her substantial career. So you’d anticipate a highly informed interpretation tonight of the six-part song cycle from 1841 that follows the requisite Romantic love journey from a lilting Villanelle to the mature rhapsody of L’ile inconnue. As is the norm these days, DiDonato will sing the complete work; you rarely get obedience to the composer’s direction that the labours be shared, the problem yet again exacerbated by flying in the face of an absence of the soprano voice in Berlioz’s stipulations. Still, it’s a bright light in an otherwise populist night, proceedings opening under Jaime Martin conducting his Melbourne Symphony Orchestra in Rossini’s William Tell Overture of 1829 – the composer’s last operatic gasp. And if that piece’s final galop isn’t enough for you, there’s a double Respighi in store: the 1917 effervescent Fountains of Rome will be succeeded by the Pines of Rome that concludes with your best Mussolini-celebrating Fascist march of 1924, complete with flugelhorns, saxhorns and organ (a difficult commodity to source in Hamer Hall). Your standard tickets range from $81 to $138, concession card holders paying $5 less, never forgetting the $7 transaction fee that continues to beggar belief for what you get: nothing but a carried-over expense from the ticket-sellers.
his program will be repeated on Saturday November 22 at 7:30 pm
NIGHTINGALE
Melbourne Chamber Orchestra
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Thursday November 20 at 7:30 pm
For this program, the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra takes on a guest director in harpsichordist Donald Nicholson who asks his players to jump all over the repertoire, the soloist (apart from himself) an often overlooked member of any ensemble. Naturally enough, there’s some dashes of old music by way of Purcell’s Fantasia upon one note (written about 1680) which has the tenor viol playing Middle C throughout while everybody else – the other four lines – enjoy themselves. Nicholson proposes himself as soloist for the Bach Harpsichord Concerto in D minor BWV 1052, which modern scholars opine was originally an organ concerto from about 1723-4. Whatever its gestation, it remains the most familiar of the composer’s keyboard concertos. Giving the program its title is Barbara Strozzi’s L’usignolo, which is probably the composer’s four-voice madrigal, Quel misero usignolo, her Op. 1 No. 5 published in 1644. Corelli brings things to a close with the Concerto Grosso No 4 in D, one of the more popular components from the mighty Op. 6 collection of about 1680/90. As for the odd concerto, that features the MCO’s double bass Emma Sullivan who takes the solo string line in Henry Eccles’ Sonata in G minor, originally published in 1720 as part of a miscellany of violin works, themselves of dubious provenance as Eccles simply took other composers’ works for his own use. As well, the orchestra plays two Australian works: first, Colin Brumby’s 51-year-old The Phoenix and the Turtle for harpsichord and strings, taking no flight at all from Shakespeare’s poem; then a new work by Melody Eotvos which also involves Nicholson’s instrument and the MCO strings. Normal ticket prices run $72, $98, $124, and $144; seniors and concession holders pay $52, $78, $109, and $129; Under 40s pay $40 for the lower two of the four price divisions; students and children get in for $30; groups of 10+ are up for a variable rate between full and concession. And there’s the sliding scale transaction fee of between $4 and $8.50 if you pre-order, or you can chance it and show up at the box office before the performance.
This program will be repeated on Sunday November 23 at 2:30 pm.
EPIC DIVA
Selby & Friends
Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Cntre
Wednesday November 26 at 2 pm
Finishing the year in expansive form, the Selby and Friends enterprise this time around involves four musicians, as opposed to the usual piano trio structure. Pianist and director Kathryn Selby hosts violinist Elizabeth Layton, cellist Julian Smiles, and a fresh face in violist Isabella Bignasca. All combine for a set of three piano quartets, the first offering giving the program its title. This work is by Matthew Hindson, is 13 years old, and springs from 1970s disco; no surprise, given the composer’s penchant for fossicking in popular culture. This is followed by Faure No. 2 in G minor of 1886 which shares one feature with the Australian composer’s piece in that it opens with the strings playing in unison. Actually, there are more unison passages in the first movement but the general trend is towards a rich blend of timbres in warm harmonic language that pivots around its home-key effortlessly. And don’t get me started on the piano-led scherzo. Finally, the musicians take on the mighty Brahms No. 2 in A of 1861, the longest of the composer’s chamber works and a formal triumph; for once, the exposition repeat is a model of melodic fluency, bringing to your attention vital points that you might have missed the first time around. And the work entire is a rebuttal of those who find the composer gloom-laden. Adult tickets cost $81, seniors $79, concession holders and students pay $63 – and you have the MRC’s individual $4-to-$8.50 booking fee to contend with if you book online.
This program will be repeated at 7 pm.
NEW WORLDS: JAIME CONDUCTS CHEETHAM FRAILLON AND DVORAK
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
Thursday November 27 at 7:30 pm
Even with the kindest of considerations, that title’s pairing is strikingly uneven. I know that the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra has a good deal of time for Deborah Cheetham Fraillon, who was its composer in residence for 2020 and then took on a five-year stint as the orchestra’s First Natives Creative Chair. Tonight, we hear the premiere of a new work commissioned by the orchestra: Treaty. I think most of us can guess the nature of this composition, and possibly its intent, given the composer’s catalogue. Another indicator is that it features didgeridoo player William Barton. Don’t think Westphalia; forget Versailles; this concordat relates to Victorian citizens over the coming weeks, but also to all of us in this country and our pitifully Trump-indebted response to the Voice referendum. But then, in an extraordinary imbalancing act, Jaime Martin takes his musicians into optimistic territory with the night’s other offering: Dvorak’s 1893 Symphony No. 9 From the New World. Well, that particular world was inured to fighting political corruption by the time the composer put in his few years there, but the music of his work is uplifting and very familiar to all of us. Standard tickets range from $51 to $139; concession holders pay $5 less; anyone under 18 gets in for $20. Everybody pays the inevitable transaction fee of $7 when ordering – a little extra that gnaws away at your sense of justice even while you’re coughing it up.
This program will be repeated in Costa Hall, Geelong on Friday November 28 at 7:30 pm and back in Hamer Hall on Saturday November 29 at 2 pm.
O'Connell the Music 