Author: cliveoconnell

FESTIVAL GALA #3

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Monday December 4 at 7:30 pm

This isn’t the start of Alex Raineri‘s annual galaxy of recitals; they began last month but details came too late to be included in November’s Diary. However, there’s plenty to report for this month’s exercises, which have been condensed to a one-week span. We start with this triptych of stage works, opening with Menotti’s venerable The Telephone of 1947 with soprano Katie Stenzel and baritone Jon Maskell in the thankless role of the suitor trying to be heard by his mental rag-tag girlfriend. No orchestra, but two pianists accompanying in Francis Atkins and the omni-present Raineri. Poulenc rears his sixty-years-dead head with Le bal masque, a 1932 song cycle/cantata with a Stravinskyesque chamber accompaniment, here reduced to Raineri’s piano with baritone Jason Barry-Smith taking on the work’s vocal line. And for the third course we enjoy a new work: Staged, by Raineri and Finnian Idriss which involves soprano Ali McGregor, cellist Daniel Shearer, and Idriss manipulating electronics. Pace Poulenc, I think this last may be the most interesting element of the evening even if – as usual – contextual details are completely absent. Admission to all events in the Festival costs $25 a time; don’t know if any concessions are on offer or if a booking fee is added but I suspect this last is a reality because the handling agency, Humantix, is donating all such fees to disadvantaged children’s charities. Is that any excuse for charging such an impost anyway? Not in my book.

SCHUBERT’S LAST SONATA

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Tuesday December 5 at 7:30 pm

This is, of course, the big Sonata in B flat – well, some of it’s in that key. The work is substantial, even without observing the first movement repeat, and its repetitions and elongations can both inspire and irritate. Whatever you think, it’s a beast for any pianist; few of the great can offer a complete fabric in the outer movements but there’s always hope. I don’t know this evening’s executant, Laurence Matheson; at least, I can’t recall any of his Melbourne appearances. He put in his time at the Australian National Academy of Music, studying with the estimable Timothy Young, but whatever he played there passed me by. Still, he’s a young man and you might as well smash your aspirational head against this sonata as anything else. Which he is also doing by prefacing this Schubert with Chopin’s Grande valse brillante: a rather amorphous title, given that it could refer to the Op 18 or any one of the three Op. 34 compositions. As a gender differential, Matheson has inserted the middle one of Fanny Mendelssohn’s Funf Lieder Op. 10, which is called Abendbild and for which the pianist will doubtless incorporate the original’s vocal line to a text by Lenau. Tickets are $25 with a booking fee.

LIGHTS DOWN LOW # 2

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Tuesday December 5 at 9 pm

Put those lights down too low and everybody will go to sleep. At this recital – focused for some, diffuse for others – festival director Alex Raineri will perform Morton Feldman’s For Bunita Marcus of 1985 – all 75 uninterrupted minutes of it. The composer’s penultimate piano composition, the work hymns his pupil/colleague/partner Marcus while also being a tribute to his mother; as an insight into either woman, it serves as a voluminous veil. Nevertheless, these days few of us have the opportunity to hear a Feldman work live. I’ve heard a few from the Australian National Academy of Music performers of which little remains in the memory but gratified surprise that the experiences proved more incident-rich than I’d expected from a brief encounter with this standard-bearer of the American avant-garde in the 1960s. Full marks to Raineri for expounding this work that sounds so simple and yet keeps the performer on the edge of disaster with its constantly moving time-signature changes and seemingly endless transpositions of limited material. To get in, you pay $25 plus the usual extra fee for daring to exercise your state-given right to a credit card.

ANGELUS

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Wednesday December 6 at 7:30 pm

Four performers in four works, two of which enjoy their premieres in this country: exactly what you want from a chamber music festival offering a wide range of experiences. First up is the evening’s title work from approaching-Grand-Old-Woman-status Mary Finsterer; written in 2015, it was inspired by Millet’s painting of two field-workers pausing for the mid-day prayer and will involve the talents of clarinet Dario Scalabrini, cello Katherine Philp, and pianist Alex Raineri. An Australian writer working in London, Lisa Illean wrote fevrier to a commission for Radio France (hence, you suppose, the linguistic barrier-crashing title) and it involves the same instrumentation as the Finsterer composition. Next comes a world premiere from local jazz saxophonist Rafael Karlan; no details yet (isn’t that always the way with your true improvisation-wielding performer/composer?) but I’m almost certain it will involve the clarinet and piano. Finally, it’s just a local premiere for Irish writer Judith Ring. Her fine feathers far below the blue floor makes plenty of contemporary sounds and involves Scalabrini, Raineri and viola Nicole Greentree as well as the airing of a supportive tape. Tickets are $25, plus a booking fee of unknown proportions.

MAHLER 4

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Thursday December 7 at 7:30 pm

We’ve become habituated to Erwin Stein’s reduction of this symphony which omits the bassoon and horn lines but introduces piano and harmonium (shades of Herzgewachse). Nothing so flash here. The instrumental forces are reduced to two pianos – Laurence Matheson and Alex Raineri – with Katie Stenzel‘s soprano taking on that theologically glutinous finale. The arrangement is for two separate instruments by Jestin Pieper, an American organist, conductor and arranger who published this version in 2010. At least it’s not another version that I came across written for piano four-hands, which would have condensed the action to the point of claustrophobia. Still, not much is gained by Pieper’s reduction, least of all the variety of timbres that Mahler crafted, especially for his concertmaster in the second movement. But it will make the last movement lied all the more welcome and Stenzel will enjoy minimal dynamic competition. Then there’s the point of mounting this work in the first place, with its hints at the composer’s smaller-scale-than-most technical schemata and instrumental arrays. Anyway, good luck to all concerned with this slightly-less-than-an-hour complex; it will certainly be of interest to those who know the original well. Tickets are $25 each, with the usual handling fee superimposed.

DECLASSIFIED

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Friday December 8 at 7:30 pm

Adam Herd is an Australian musician, originally from Coffs Harbour, who is currently living and studying in Finland. Well, he’s not alone in following that path as the Helsinki-Australia connection seems to get stronger as the years pass. Today he is presenting a piano recital, one that will already have been performed at the Espoo Cultural Centre in Tapiola country on November 12. What do we and the more aesthetically aware Finns get? Herd begins with three of the 1984 Eight Concert Etudes by Russian writer Nikolai Kapustin: Pastorale, Intermezzo and Toccatina. This composer fused classical and jazz, they say, although that was probably a big deal in his country. We move to the politically polar opposite with some Earl Wild versions of Gershwin songs, now become 4 Virtuoso Etudes: Embraceable You, Fascinatin’ Rhythm, The Man I Love, I Got Rhythm. A bit of a Scandinavian detour gives us three pieces (all preludes) from Norwegian composer Trygve Madsen’s 24 Preludes and Fugues Op. 101. Back in Finland, Herd plays two folk-song arrangements by Oskar Merikanto: Jos voisin laulaa kuin lintu voi (If I could sing like a bird can), and Iso lintu merikotka (A big bird, the white-tailed eagle). Finishing off an avian trilogy comes the pianist’s own arrangement of McCartney/Lennon’s Blackbird from the 1968 White Album. All that certainly denotes declassification . . . unless Herd is simply asking us to detour into non-Classical zones. Admission is $25 plus the usual ticket tax.

POULENC TRIBUTE #2

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Saturday December 9 at 10:30 am

Good luck for the French composer who is being celebrated just on his own merits, not for any notable anniversary of birth, death or lifetime achievement. This program comprises works that I’ve never heard live – a situation that I believe may also be the case with other festival patrons. Cellist Daniel Shearer appears tonight in order to play the Cello Sonata with either Alex Raineri or Francis Atkins; the score occupied the composer off and on between 1940 and 1948 and the result is generally considered disappointing. One of the pianists (or perhaps they’ll divide the labour) will play two of the 15 Improvisations: No 7 in C Major and No 13 in A minor. Then one of them will outline the Soirees de Nazelles: eight variations and a cadence, surrounded by a prelude and a finale, all of which occupied Poulenc between 1930 and 1936 and comprise portraits of friends in the best Enigma mode. At night’s end, both pianists will be engaged in the Sonata for four hands of 1918, a three-movement and brief (6 minutes?) product of the composer’s late teens. That’s the point of a tribute, I suppose: you have to take the not-so-good as well as the outstanding – following our national trait of being all-inclusive as witnessed by the recent referendum. Tickets retail for $25 with an additional charge for having the cheek to buy them.

HELLISH CELLIST

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Saturday December 9 at 1 pm

What can we make of this? The cellist in question, Daniel Shearer, is taking, as the basis of his expedition, Bach’s Suite No. 1 in G. He is theatricalizing it, promising us a journey to emulate that of Virgil and Dante, while he himself (presumably: no other performers are cited) takes on an ‘unadulterated character’ – which throws up all sorts of questions, the chief one being: who says you were adulterated in the first place? Whatever shape the dramatic interpretation takes, the musical one is going to give Shearer a big problem in that the suite itself lasts about 20 minutes. As the recital is scheduled to stretch between 1 pm and 2 pm, is he going to work through it three times? Or will there be infernal interludes to illustrate the Nine Circles? That would be a big ask of a composer who was known to be Lutheran conservative, not given to Italianate excess. By the same token, Bach could arrive at gripping depictions of Hell’s menace (Sind Blitze, sind Donner, for instance) and the consequences of sin. All of this speculation does nothing to prepare us for the reality which could be truly disturbing; I hope so. If you want to see this, it will cost you $25, along with a booking fee for your impertinence.

NOTES FOR TOMORROW

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Saturday December 9 at 2:30 pm

In this recital, patrons are treated to three works of some relevance to the program’s title and one definite throwback in Poulenc’s aggressive Bagatelle in D minor of 1932 for violin and piano; in this performance, Courtenay Cleary and Alex Raineri respectively. As for the prospect of tomorrow, we’re greeted by Gerard Brophy‘s new score that gives the evening its title; this also involves Cleary and Raineri. Composed in 1995/6, Olga Neuwirth‘s Quasare/Pulsare also asks for violin and piano (prepared); there’s no hesitation in my mind at nominating Cleary and Raineri for the performance. Now, the odd one out is a song cycle by American writer/guitarist David Leisner. His Confiding for high voice and guitar, written during 1985-1986, sets ten poems ‘mostly Emily Dickinson and Emily Bronte’, that have to do with fluctuating relationships. In fact, Leisner sets four Dickinsons, four Brontes, and one each by Americans Elissa Ely and Gene Scaramellino. To handle this work, we’re to hear Blue Stockings – luckily, a voice-guitar duo comprising Alison Paris and Chloe Hasson. For this partly-futuristic cornucopia, you’ll be charged $25 admission, with an extra fee on top to show that – like the world to come – nothing is as it seems.

THE FIREBIRD

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Saturday December 9 at 4 pm

Plainly, the high-point of this recital should/will be Stravinsky’s ballet suite. Actually, you won’t hear all of it: just the Infernal Dance, Berceuse and Finale in a colossal transcription by Guido Agosti which should test the recital’s executant, pianist/festival director Alex Raineri. Before entering this maelstrom, he’ll perform Rachmaninov’s Sonata No. 2 in one of its various incarnations; no matter which, this is a much-neglected marvel for the instrument that I must have heard only once live in a long span of concert/recital exposure. A few Poulenc gems are embedded as a continuation of the festival’s homage to the French writer; in this case, the Pastourelle of 1927 (the composer’s contribution to the ten-composer ballet, L’eventail de Jeanne), and the 1934 Humoresque in G Major – both brief and illustrative of the composer’s brilliant facility. To open his innings, Raineri will play the Australian premiere of Jakob Bragg‘s latest production for piano solo: Fourteen piano transcriptions from across the plane (plain). This was given its first outing during February of this year by Raineri in Huddersfield where the composer is writing his Ph. D. Bragg describes the work as ‘a surveying of the geography of the piano across a unique x-y axis notational model’; well, you can’t say fairer than that. You want in, it’ll cost you $25, as well as the usual churlish booking fee.

COURTENAY CLEARY IN RECITAL

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Saturday December 9 at 6:30 pm

The young violinist is expending her gifts on a solo program that stretches over a lot of ground. She begins with a formal flourish in Bach’s Sonata No. 1 in G minor BWV 1001: all four movements, including that well-used second movement Fuga. Leap forward 300 years and we come to local string teacher Stephen Chin‘s Three Capriccietti which I can’t find in the composer’s voluminous catalogue; perhaps it’s a score confided to Cleary alone. We move to a more senior Australian voice with Ross Edwards and one of the versions of his White Cockatoo Spirit Dance; in Cleary’s version on YouTube, she sets in train an electronic background of high twitters before she starts on the work itself. Anyway, this is familiar Edwards in Maninyas mode, the piece written in 1994. Back a bit to 1947 for Prokofiev’s much-decried Sonata in D Major; actually, I find it remarkably sunny and easy-going, particularly when you consider the constant menace facing the composer at this time. Now come forward two decades for French writer Eric Tanguy‘s Sonata breve in three movements across an 8-minute time-span. In the end, Cleary leaves unexplored the period between 1720 and the end of World War Two; well, it’s performer’s choice and this artist is playing to her strengths. You can hear her for $25, plus a charge for your charging it.

ROMANCE BY THE BOOK

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Sunday December 10 at 10:30 am

Here is one of the festival’s more well-organized song recitals in which soprano Katie Stenzel partners with pianist/festival director Alex Raineri. They are working through eleven songs in total, four from musicals/operetta, Britten’s four Cabaret Songs, and an art song each by Liszt, Debussy and (the inevitable) Poulenc. I know Glitter and be gay from Bernstein’s Candide because of the delight that every aspiring coloratura takes in yodeling through its arpeggiated arabesques. No big deal that I know Kern’s All the things you are which has been assaulted by everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Carly Simon; a favourite of jazz combos for all its 7th chords, or so I’m told. As for Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 by Dave Malloy, it’s clearly a slab of Tolstoy’s novel and No One Else should be sung by Natasha rather than Pierre. Somehow, I’ve seen Into the Woods (Victorian Opera?) but have no memory of On the steps of the palace but, if it’s Sondheim, it’s more challenging than most in the genre. As for the Debussy, it will be C’est l’extase, one of the Ariettes oubliees; the Liszt is Oh! quand je dors; Poulenc’s submission takes the form of a sentimental waltz, Les chemins de l’amour. I’m not as enthusiastic these days about Britten’s Auden settings, probably because they try to hard to be louche and were published well past their relevance date (if there actually was one). But they please popularly – well, a good deal more than the Michelangelo or Donne Sonnets. And they slot in well with the Broadway material. You can have all this for $25, plus the added financial hurdle of a service fee.

CONCORD

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Sunday December 10 at 1 pm

Alex Raineri isn’t presenting a peace-inspiring program, filled with charitable wishes concerning conflicts in Gaza, Ukraine or anywhere more local – like Townsville. His Concord is the Massachusetts town, famous denizens of which place made source material for Ives’ massive Piano Sonata No. 2: Emerson, Hawthorne, the Alcotts, and Thoreau. I grew up with the recorded performance by Aloys Kontarsky which for me stands out for its authority and impetus amid a plethora of interpretations, from Ives himself to Phillip Bush. Raineri is serious about living up to the composer’s demands by employing the short-lived services of Tim Munro on flute for the Thoreau finale and a viola from Nicole Greentree for the briefest of appearances in the opening Emerson movement. The entire Concord is a draining experience for any listener, but festival director Raineri has added to our aural burden by giving the world premiere of Australian writer Lyle Chan‘s Sonate en forme de cri, which may also employ the services of Munro and/or Greentree (and/or Raineri, so non-existent is the information about this new composition by a writer who apparently delights in giving nothing away). As with several other programs in this second grouping, Concord is a splendid example of real festival fare. All you need to hear it is $25 and a strongly-exercised forbearance in tolerating the credit-card-use fee.

TEN OF SWORDS

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Sunday December 10 at 2:30 pm

The recital’s title puts us in in Tarot territory, this card signifying defeat or resignation to your lot – as well as the more optimistic reading (and there always is at least one) of recovering from disaster by pulling yourself together and striving against the world’s negativity. What any of this has to do with the afternoon’s music-making will become clear, I’m sure, as the program continues. To begin, the Blue Stockings duo of soprano Alison Paris and guitarist Chloe Hasson are presenting songs of their own creation. Whether these connect to the Major or Minor Arcana is anyone’s guess but it’s more probable that the Stockings are linking in with the mystical pack than anything that follows. Which showcases clarinet Dario Scalabrini and pianist Francis Atkins in three duets: Elena Kats-Chernin‘s Grand Rag of 2021 and nobody enters into the ragtime spirit with as much enthusiasm as this composer; Schumann’s Drei Fantastiestucke Op. 73, that multi-varied collection which can also be heard with violin or cello as the non-keyboard element; and a Fantasy on themes from La Traviata, Verdi transmogrified by Donato Lovreglio, a southern Italian flautist who arranged several Verdi-based fantasies – none more flashy than this one which treats Ah! fors e lui, the Libiamo with a Di quell’amor from Un di felice interlude, and a final flashy splurge on Sempre libera. In other words, Lovreglio didn’t get beyond Act 1; still, there’s plenty of lyrical matter there, God knows. To hear this split-level program, you pay $25 along with a ticket tax of still-unknown proportions.

JINGLE FINGERS

Brisbane Music Festival

FourthWall Arts, 540 Queen St.

Sunday December 10 at 4 pm

A Christmas concert of sorts, to give the festival an emphatically seasonal spirit, this program comprises works for two pianos, with artistic director Alex Raineri and Adam Herd taking us through the late afternoon. They begin with a work by the newly-discovered American composer Amy Beach who has been transformed into a significant figure in that country’s musical development by people who should – and probably do – know better. Here is her 1924 Suite for Two Pianos Founded upon Old Irish Melodies. Four movements – Prelude, Old-Time Peasant Dance, The Ancient Cabin, Finale – give you a virtuosic set of arrangements on some defenceless tunes that get subsumed in the composer’s generously applied decorations/ornamentations. Then comes the festival’s final Poulenc salute: the Sonata for Two Pianos of 1953. This is a solid, sometimes clangorous construction that raises for me the spartan concentration of the Dialogues of the Carmelites, begun in the same year. It certainly makes for a bracing contrast with the ephemeral nature of the other Poulenc pieces we’ve heard in this second tranche of the festival. To end, we are treated to traditional Christmas Carols arranged by pianist Herd; perhaps he’ll confine himself to Finnish ones, including (if the recital’s title is being taken into account) a Scandinavian equivalent to Jingle Bells. On the bright side, you can hope for a sing-along to really get you in the mood for the commercial orgy that is to come. All this is available to you for $25 plus a handling fee to Humanitix for charitable purposes – the only way to do business.

THE SOUND OF CHRISTMAS

The Queensland Choir

The Old Museum, Bowen Hills

Saturday December 16

You can’t purchase tickets for this event until December. I can understand such reticence; who would want to be organized too far ahead? A little more worrying is the lack of decision about a time of day. But, by means of intrepid research, I’ve concluded that this will have to be an afternoon concern because Josh Daveta and the Sequins are taking over the space at 7:30 pm. Also, the organization’s previous two concerts have been presented at 3 in the afternoon and I can read a pattern as closely as the next code analyst. Still in the guessing game, I’d propose that the conductor will be Kevin Power, since he’s one of the two choir personnel noted on the group’s website. By exactly the same token, the accompanist (no organ at the Old Museum, so it’ll most likely be piano) is Mark Connors. There’s no way of predicting what these office-bearers and their forces will consider to be Christmas sounds but the outcome will most likely be the usual collection of British standards with some forays into the American seasonal repertoire. All seems rather vague? Well, what I know, you know – and, at present, that’s all there is to know.

4MBS CHRISTMAS SPECTACULAR

Brisbane Chorale

Brisbane City Hall

Sunday December 17 at 3 pm

The Chorale is not alone at this concert but will be in collaboration with the Brisbane Symphony Orchestra under conductor Stefanie Smith. This afternoon’s soloist will be soprano Mirusia Louwerse, familiar to many from Andre Rieu’s extravaganzas. And what will patrons hear? As with The Queensland Choir above, details are lacking. Everything will fall under the generic heading of ‘Christmas Carols and other traditional Christmas fare’, which last seems to be a promise of food appropriate to the feast-day. At least this event has a definite time of day, unlike the concert listed above. But I note that this event isn’t listed online among the concert activities of the orchestra; either their contribution is too slight to bother mentioning, or perhaps their administration is unaware of the ensemble’s participation. However, counterweight that with the booking of the Town Hall – so they’re expected. Once again, I’m predicting the customary stolid British content that prevails during this country’s Christmases: comfortable, Anglican, spiritually numbing. Tickets are available for between $25 and $85; wherever you sit and whatever your concession/status, you attract a $1.25 tax that is just applied without explanation or justification.

SONATA PROJECT 1

Yundi Li

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Wednesday November 1 at 7:30 pm

Yundi Li, laureate in 2000 at the Chopin Competition in Warsaw and the youngest performer to win that distinguished event, began a world tour in 2019. In that year, he presented sonatas by Schubert, Chopin and Rachmaninov. He’s back again with a new, all-Mozart program: the K. 331 in A Major with the Rondo alla turca finale; the just-as-popular K. 310 in A minor; and the K. 457 in C minor which prefigures Beethoven’s Pathetique, they say. These latter two exhaust Mozart’s output of keyboard sonatas in minor keys. As well, Li will give us the hefty Fantasia in C minor K 475 which was published simultaneously with the K. 457 work. That’s quite a solid night, exhibiting the kind of concentration that most artists avoid, and it’s particularly interesting coming from an artist not known for his Mozart. Li has recorded the delectable K. 330 Sonata in C Major and he played the A Major Concerto K. 488 with the Staatskapelle Dresden during a 2017 tour of Germany and China. But his most sustained efforts have gone into Chopin with a little spattering of Liszt. Tickets range from $59 to $179; mind you, I tried booking just now and was met with an ‘error’ message every time I followed directions to make a reservation. Nevertheless, what I do know is that QPAC will still charge its disproportionate booking fee, no matter where your seat is.

INAUGURAL PADEREWSKI TOUR

Friends of Chopin

Old Museum, Bowen Hills

Saturday November 4 at 7 pm

A group that’s new to me, the Friends are commemorating (a bit early) the Australian 1904 tour by Paderewski, the famous pianist/composer/prime minister of Poland who was the most famous of the post-Liszt virtuosi who came to this country to be met with a wave of riotous enthusiasm. As with most events presented at the Old Museum, details are there on the website, but scant. For example, participants in this recital will be the Orava Quartet – expert and amiable locals – alongside pianist Aleksandra Swigut whose main claim to fame in the Chopin stakes is her experience on historical instruments. Hard to tell what she’ll be using for this exercise but I’m pretty sure it won’t be a Pleyel, Broadwood or Erard. Now, what are these musicians playing? Two of the names are familiar: Chopin and Penderecki; Swigut will be exercising her gifts on the former, the Oravas on the latter – in fact, the third (2008) one of Penderecki’s four quartets. The third composer is Wojciech Kilar, once a part of the New Polish School along with Penderecki and Gorecki, but turning his back on all that to write your normal harmonically conservative, sometimes folksong-inflected compositions including a string orchestral work, Orawa, which ties in neatly with our string quartet. As for Swigut’s contribution, that will consist of the Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, probably with the orchestra reduced to the available four strings. Tickets move between $40 concession (with a $3.35 fee for nothing) and $70 full (shackled to a $4. 86 fee – the $30 difference in price makes such a difference in handling?).

SPOTLIGHT ON THE DOUBLE BASS

Brisbane Symphony Orchestra

Brisbane City Hall

Sunday November 5 at 3 pm

Billed as this orchestra’s final concert for the year, the BSO takes over the Town Hall for this program that highlights Queensland Symphony Orchestra principal double bass Phoebe Russell taking on the solo part in Bottesini’s Double Bass Concerto No. 2 in B minor of 1853. Not that anybody should have anything against the bass but this piece is interesting mainly for its relationship to the cello concertos of its time and a little later; from the first solo notes (and they come pretty quickly), we’re in the Romantic world of quiet complaint and melancholy, which obtains through a substantial slow movement, changing to something more aggressive for a polonaise-rich finale. Still, it’s great to hear this instrument treated as a lyrical voice, for once (no, Mahler: you don’t count). As far as I can tell, only the first movement was scored for full orchestra (11 wind plus strings) and most through-performances feature string accompaniment only. Conductor Paul Dean finishes the afternoon with Sibelius’ Symphony No 5: an unadulterated joy from first to last of its three movements, with an unforgettably sprawling conclusion: Finland at its most triumphant. The event will probably begin with James Ledger‘s Signal Lost, commissioned by the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra for a premiere in June this year and here enjoying its Queensland debut. It sprang from considerations of Beethoven’s deafness coming on him about the time of the Eroica, and a parallel loss of communication outlets for us all during the COVID crisis. From the composer’s notes, cantus firmus/passacaglia/ground bass (to repeat myself) seems to be the main operating fulcrum. This piece asks for the largest orchestral forces among the scores being essayed. Tickets range from $20 to $40 with no credit-charge-managing fee, as far as I can tell.

ORGAN RECITAL

Simon Nieminski

St. John’s Anglican Cathedral

Thursday November 9 at 7 pm

In a building of this type, you’re bound to have a few recitals for this Norman and Beard/Hill, Norman and Beard/Simon Pierce instrument, if only to expose its extensive four-manual range. This time round, we have Nieminski visiting from St. Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney where he is assistant director of music, working under the newly-appointed Daniel Justin, one presumes. As far as I can see, the recital consists of one work: Rachmaninov’s Symphony No. 2 in E minor, as transcribed by this performer. Well, that’s a 50-minute extravaganza, well-known to Melbourne Symphony Orchestra patrons of a certain age because of Hiroyuki Iwaki’s enthusiasm for it. You’d have to suppose that Nieminski will enjoy himself finding the variety of colours needed to animate this sometimes voluptuously expansive score; I’m thinking of that broad-beamed A Major Adagio and the ejaculation-rich E Major finale. Good luck to him; as far as I can find, nobody else has made another such transliteration of this score. Tickets range from $20 concession to $35, school students admitted free; there’s a 50-cents booking fee, which sounds about right, if you have to charge such a thing at all.

CHOPIN & THE MENDELSSOHNS

Australian Chamber Orchestra

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Monday November 13 at 7 pm

Rounding out our Chopin piano concerto experience for this month, here comes Polina Leschenko with the No. 2 in F minor, also in an arrangement for string support only. There’s precedent for this, with an arrangement for string quintet being published by Breitkopf und Hartel in 1836; added to which, the composer has suffered from being faulted as an orchestrator for nearly two centuries. As for the Mendelssohns, we first get to enjoy Fanny’s String Quartet in E flat Major of 1834, a work her brother disapproved of for its formal eccentricity (what a Victorian prude he was) but of which she changed not a note. We’ll be hearing a string orchestra transcription but so far I can’t find a name behind this expansion of forces. To end, we have Richard Tognetti, the ACO’s artistic director, collaborating with Leschenko in Felix’s Concerto for Violin and Piano in D minor. This will be the original version with string accompaniment only, as distinct from the later orchestration involving winds and timpani. Mind you, this work was a product of the composer aged 14, so don’t expect too much; it’s sturdy enough but, to my ears, completely unmemorable. Seats are priced between $59 and $149 with an astonishing $8.50 ‘handling fee’, which sounds like an extra service from a brothel, although there you get value for money.

MICRO-MASTERPIECES

Queensland Symphony Orchestra

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Friday November 17 at 11:30 am

To kill off the year in its regular venue (as opposed to the Lyric Theatre where the players will congregate for three rounds of the Wagner Ring in December), the QSO is being controlled by chief conductor Umberto Clerici. As part of an unremarkable observance that takes in the last three Mozart symphonies over three years (really?), the program glories in the Symphony No. 39 in E flat which may see the repeats observed in its finale. Clerici begins with Rossini’s Overture to The Barber of Seville – a joy in any context, even this specious one: the Italian is his country’s answer to Mozart. Also in this collection of small chefs d’oeuvre we find Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 1, called Classical. More Haydn than Mozart, this score is a diatonic marvel which demonstrates the composer’s melodic felicity and brilliantly appropriate orchestrational skill. In his QSO website puff-piece, Clerici talks about the Schubert Symphony No. 5 and this composer’s admiration for Mozart; but the work is not included in the program list below these prefatory remarks. If it were, the program would blow out from about 50 minutes’ worth to over 77 – improbable as the event is scheduled to take 65 minutes without interval. Tickets move between $45 for a student to $130 full price, both despoiled by the $7.20 hyper-charge for employing the only currency available: credit card.

This program will be repeated on Saturday November 18 at 7:30 pm.

A JOYFUL NOISE

Brisbane Chorale

Brisbane City Hall

Sunday November 19 at 3 pm

For this afternoon, patrons can be assured of two works, the first being Vaughan Williams’ Five Mystical Songs. I’m assuming the version being offered is that for baritone solo (and who would that be?) with SATB choir and orchestra. For this afternoon, the only musicians mentioned are the John Coulton Brass Ensemble and organist Christopher Wrench – along with regular conductor Emily Cox. I’m sure something practicable will be cobbled together, if stretching the sources specified by the composer. As well, we’re to hear John Rutter’s Gloria for choir, brass, percussion and organ (or orchestra if there’s one lying around). which has for me reminiscences of Belshazzar’s Feast, if not as dramatic or daring. Both these add up to about 40 minutes of listening experience, but the promotional material offers ‘ . . . and more!’ Such a prospect dizzies with its suggestiveness and I question what could cap these two British choral gems but more of the same? You can buy tickets for between $15 and $60, with a ‘Fees & Charges’ tax of $1.25; I suppose this is small enough, especially when compared to other organizations’ unreasonable levies, but why have it at all?

WILDSCHUT & BRAUSS

Musica Viva Australia

Conservatorium Theatre, Griffith University

Wednesday November 23 at 7 pm

This violin/piano duo is here at the half-way point of a national tour. As far as I can see, Noa Wildschut (violin) and Elisabeth Brauss (piano) have no long-standing relationship, if you judge by their published schedules. Following the practice of many another Musica Viva guest ensemble,, they are presenting two programs, although there’s only one major difference between them. Common elements are Schumann’s Violin Sonata No. 1 in A minor, Messiaen’s early Theme et variations, Debussy’s late (final) G minor Violin Sonata, and an Australian novelty in May Lyons’ Forces of Nature, commissioned for this tour (as is Musica Viva’s wont). The point of difference is that half of the recitals will hear Enescu’s folklore-infused Violin Sonata No. 3 in A minor; the other half (including Brisbane) have to settle for that welcome war-horse, Franck’s A Major (eventually) Violin Sonata. Well, these artists may not meet again after this set of recitals, but at least they’ll always have Australia. Tickets move between $15 and $109; I don’t think there are any extra charges.

HANDEL’S MESSIAH

Oriana Choir

Brisbane City Hall

Sunday November 26 at 3 pm

Thank God: for a moment I thought the barbarians had taken over and our annual Christmas dose of Handel’s oratorio wasn’t going to be spooned out. But here it is, presented by a near-20-years-old Sunshine Coast organization. Oriana has again gained the services of Andrew Wailes, long-time director of Melbourne’s Royal Philharmonic Choir and a consistent presence in a remarkable number of other choral bodies; in my experience, he has directed several outstanding performances of choral+orchestral music. He also has the outstanding quality among musicians of not measuring out his friendship in proportion to favourable reviews. His soloists are soprano Elisabeth Wallace Gaedtke, contralto Anne Fulton, tenor Tobias Merz, and bass Jason Barry-Smith – locals all, these days. But the bulk of the work falls to the chorus which, from its websites, sounds ultra-enthusiastic. The Sinfonia of St. Andrew’s will provide the instrumental support and this performance will follow an out-pf-town reading on the preceding night in Buderim. You can hear the Brisbane performance for between $15 and $55, with that usual added surcharge of $1,25 that seems to be peculiar to Brisbane Town (city) Hall presentations.

ZEPHYR: VOICE WITH WINDS

Brisbane Chamber Choir

St. John’s Anglican Cathedral

Sunday November 26 at 3 pm

This body is singing on its home turf in St. John’s where it is chamber choir in residence, but it also has strong affiliations with the University of Queensland School of Music with which it is affiliated. Its conductor is (and has always been) Graeme Morton, who is an eminence at both the cathedral and university. Alongside the singers we’ll hear a double wind quintet from the UQ School of Music, cellist Patrick Murphy, soprano saxophone Diana Tolmie, and organist Andrej Kouznetsov who is Morton’s assistant at the cathedral. As to what is on the program, details are scanty. Front and centre will be Stravinsky’s Mass for Mixed Chorus and Double Wind Quintet, the latter comprising two oboes, cor anglais, two bassoons, two trumpets and three trombones. All well and good; I’ve not heard this score in live performance and would appreciate the opportunity. But it lasts – at best – 20 minutes. Now we’re promised other music that puts voices and winds together but no details are available. Still, if you put your trust in these performers, you’ll give them the benefit of a fairly solid doubt. And, who knows? Perhaps the other works might explain the event’s title. Admission falls between $20 and $50 with a 50 cent booking fee per seat – which is cheap but irrational.

A QUEER ROMANCE

Michael Honeyman and Sally Whitwell

Opera Queensland Studio, 149 Grey St. South Bank

Friday October 6 at 7 pm

As for picking lyrical products for this song recital, I don’t think baritone Honeyman and his accompanist will have much success – that’s if the adjective ‘queer’ relates to sexuality and isn’t just used as a general term for off-centre or outre. You could go for the Michelangelo Sonnets of Britten – no: they’re written for tenor. What about Poulenc’s songs for Bernac? Fine, but you look for sub-texts in vain across the work of this repressed writer. You might have better luck with Ravel’s L’indifferent or Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis although both are heard more often/successfully from female singers. But an actual romance along LGBTQI lines expressed in unambiguous music is pretty hard to come across; lots of hints and possibilities, very little that’s explicit . . . or maybe I haven’t heard of it yet. As for Honeyman, my experience has been limited to his Opera Australia appearances, best exemplified in a towering King Roger that threw the rest of that particular Melbourne season (2017?) into the shade. Whitwell I know nothing about, but she’s a Sydney musician and that city’s musical life hasn’t impinged on my consciousness for over 60 years. The recital is sponsored by Opera Queensland. Tickets range between $77 and $85; I don’t think there’s any credit-card gouging.

This program will be repeated on Saturday October 7 at 2 pm.

NOCTURNE

Orava Quartet

The Edge Auditorium, State Library of Queensland

Saturday October 7 at 7 pm

The city’s favourite ensemble of this shape is offering a delectable 90-minute program in a string quartet-favouring location, with a close acoustic from memory. The players – violins Daniel Kowalik and David Dalseno, viola Thomas Chawner, cello Karol Kowalik – open with Borodin No. 2 which features a slow-movement Notturno familiar to all lovers of the musical Kismet, not forgetting the Scherzo which, with its second theme, gave us Baubles, Bangles and Beads. But it’s a satisfying work in its own right, making me wonder yet again: why don’t we ever hear its predecessor based on a theme from a late Beethoven quartet? Then come the Five Pieces by Erwin Schulhoff of 1923 which show a facility that this composer possessed when pushing beyond Les Six. Finally, the Oravas offer us Sculthorpe’s String Quartet No. 9. Commissioned in 1975 by Musica Viva Australia, it’s a work I’ve not heard for many years. But you could say the same about most of the Australian writer’s output in this form, all of it very approachable. This occasion also marks the launch of the ensemble’s second album, for which no details are available. Tickets range from $25 to $69, organized through Eventbrite who will probably charge you for their services, limited as they are.

THE DINNER PARTY

Ensemble Q

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Sunday October 8 at 3 pm

The Ensemble is celebrating a famous dinner on the night of Strauss’s Salome premiere in Graz. Those present included Schonberg, his students Berg and Webern, his brother-in-law Zemlinsky, his idol Mahler, as well as Strauss himself and Puccini (in town for the spectacle). By some clever programmatic variety, we will hear Schonberg’s Six Little Piano Pieces of 1913, Berg’s Four Pieces for Clarinet and Piano from the same year, and Webern’s Three Little Pieces for Cello and Piano from the following year. Puccini is represented by his string quartet lament Crisantemi, composed way back in 1890 between Edgar and Manon Lescaut. Zemlinsky produced his 4-minute Humoreske for wind quintet in 1939 after escaping the Nazis. A neat confederation comes in Schoenberg’s 1920 arrangement of Mahler’s 1885 Songs of a Wayfarer for flute, clarinet, string quartet plus double bass, piano, harmonium, triangle and glockenspiel. Then, the night’s second half is all-Strauss: the Piano Quartet Op. 13, contemporaneous with Mahler’s song-cycle; and Till Eulenspiegel – einmal anders! in which the Austrian academic Franz Hasenohrl in 1954 reappraised the 1895 tone poem by reducing its content by about half and cut the orchestral forces to a violin-double bass-clarinet-bassoon-horn quintet. Don’t know who’s participating in any of the above except for baritone Shaun Brown who sings Mahler/Schoenberg’s four lieder. It’s at QPAC, so the tickets range from $55 concession to $75 full, with the gross impost of $7.20 as a penalty for giving up your Sunday afternoon.

EUROPEAN MASTERS

Academy of St. Martin in the FieldsAcademy of St Martin in the Fields Academy of St Martin in the Fields with Joshua Bell

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Wednesday October 11 at 7 pm

This famous British ensemble has allied with super-duper American violinist Bell, currently the Academy’s music director, for a tour that involves three nights in Melbourne’s Recital Centre (audience limited to 1,000), three nights in Sydney’s Opera House (God knows how many it holds after the latest re-configuration) and two nights in Brisbane; blessed be the east coast. I’ve heard them once at home and once in Melbourne; no question but that this group is top-notch with a burnished output that has been delighting us for 65+ years. The European writers that they’re presenting begin with Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 1, yclept Classical because it offers a modern-day (1916-17) Haydn flavour. It’s fine as long as it isn’t turned into a rapid-fire onslaught in the outer movements. I believe Bell will be front man for Bach’s A minor Violin Concerto BWV 1041; you see, this night’s work is emphatically popular and such a warhorse should go down a treat. The director will also probably take prime position for Saint-Saens’ Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, in which I can already hear the sparks flying in the concluding Piu allegro. To end, Mendelssohn’s Scottish Symphony – his last in the form (probably because it took him so long to finish) and notable for its absence of breaths between movements and the snappy Scots references in the scherzo and finale. Tickets range from $89 to $199 (no concessions); well, they all need recompense for coming so far, don’t they? While splurging on this, never forget QPAC’s extra impost of $7.20 on any order.

CLASSIC GRANDEUR

Academy of St. Martin in the Fields with Joshua Bell

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Thursday October 12 at 7 pm

Following its array of popular favourites from last night, the Academy and its music director go straight for that old-time religion with a program that could have come from the 1930s. We are beginning with Mozart’s Overture to The Marriage of Figaro and it’s almost a certainty that Bell and his forces will spring no surprises with this brief burst of brilliance but will mount a crisp presentation; mind you, what else can you do? Bell steps forward for the Beethoven Violin Concerto which will be punctuated by the soloist’s own cadenzas; fair enough, as the composer didn’t supply any himself and who needs Kreisler’s any more? I can remember Nigel Kennedy playing them with timpani support on one of his visits here – probably taken from Beethoven’s own arrangement of the work for piano and orchestra. In any case, Bell’s cadenzas have been around for a while without causing controversy. And we return to Mozart for the Symphony No. 40 in G minor: the most popular of the set and a challenging task for any group of players faced with its inspired bravery and emotional conviction. Tickets cost the same as at last night’s event – $89 to $199, with the same booking-fee exaction of $7.20. Perhaps it’s worth the expense to see these fine flowers from Britain’s musical garden on display.

HEARTLAND CLASSICS

Queensland Symphony Orchestra

Concert Hall Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Friday October 13 7:30 pm

The orchestra’s one city concert for this month does come from the centre of Europe, beginning with the Hungarian frolic of Kodaly’s Dances of Galanta from 1933, oozing national colour and verbunkos format. It’s a friendly suite with some flattering orchestral work, particularly for clarinet which will give Irit Silver plenty of scope to exercise her skills. An Armenian guest then comes forward: violinist Sergey Khachatryan. This youngish (38) musician will take the solo line for Mendelssohn in E minor, which is about as close to music’s early Romantic heartland as you can get and the acme of the composer’s achievement in the concerto format. After this German effusion, we’ll hear Dvorak’s Symphony No. 7 in D minor from 1885 which certain commentators put at the forefront of the Czech composer’s output, despite the prevalence of the New World on every major orchestra’s annual schedule as the years roll on. I’ve a sneaking affection for this score as I first encountered it at the Melbourne Conservatorium where Noel Nickson conducted it in the early 1960s while I sat at the back of the violins and heard student tentativeness in full cry for the first (but not the last) time. Anyway, the conductor here is Otto Tausk from the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. Tickets full-price fall between $90 and $130, but concessions are available; still, you can’t avoid that swingeing booking fee, no matter where you sit or what price reduction you manage to acquire.

This program will be repeated on Saturday October 14 at 1:30 pm

FLORESCENCE

Australian String Quartet

Ithaca Auditorium, Brisbane City Hall

Thursday October 19 at 7 pm

Here’s a fairly well-travelled group. Not that Brisbane is a constant on its touring schedule these days but, unlike quite a few other string quartets on the national scene, the ASQ doesn’t neglect us entirely. The ensemble – violins Dale Barltrop and Francesca Hiew, viola Christopher Cartlidge, cello Michael Dahlenberg – has survived the Great Interruption and comprises the same personnel format as when I heard the group some years ago. As for what they’re playing in this well-polished, atmospherically cold space, it starts with a Movement for String Quartet, written in 2020 by Justin Williams, associate principal viola with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and a founding member of the Tinalley Quartet (although that ensemble hasn’t been heard of for some time now). This brevity (the composer’s first creative gambit) is followed by Haydn in B minor, first of the six in the Op. 33 set and the only one of them not in a major key (although the composer has his little ambisexual harmonic jest at the start). I assume there’s an interval break (after about 36 minutes’ playing) before we jump back to Purcell’s Fantasia No 6 in F which is a substantial work, considering most of its companions. To end, we have Dvorak No. 14 in A flat, the last of the composer’s output in this form and nowhere nearly as well-known (or performed) as No 12, the American (once called the Nigger, especially in slavery-enriched England). That’s a very original program with nothing familiar about it – and so to be highly commended. Tickets? $33 to $78 with no apparent extra charge: another cause for commendation.

THE NEW WORLD

Southern Cross Soloists

Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre

Sunday October 22 at 3 pm

The Soloists are going all-American in this all-things-to-all-men compendium which begins with Caroline Shaw’s Entr’acte, last heard here from the Australian Chamber Orchestra on August 7; this time, in its string quartet format. Then we are treated to a bit of ersatz Americana in the Largo from Dvorak’s New World Symphony, Goin’ Home; presumably being sung to words provided by the composer’s American pupil, William Arm Fisher . . . otherwise, why not just stick with the piece’s original title? Then comes Artie Shaw’s Clarinet Concerto of 1940 which makes hay with the composer’s big band sunshine. The ensemble hits the inspirational if imaginary national vein with Three Scenes from Aaron Copland’s Rodeo ballet – which is odd as the usual collation features four of the work’s original five scenes. Konstantin Shamray will play his reading of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue; presumably as a piano solo, but you can’t tell with the Soloists. The final essay is a Piazzolla (well, he lived in the USA for 10 or 11 years): Fuga y misterio which comes from the composer’s opera Maria de Buenos Aires. It’s a frustrated tango, or so it seems to me, despite its formal qualities that sound as natural as the instrumental section to Bernstein’s Cool. In the program’s centre is an as-yet unnamed new work/collaboration between guitarist John Jorgenson (of Elton John band fame) and Chris Williams, the Soloists’ Didgeridoo Soloist in Residence. You’d suppose that the work will feature both composers as executants but – apart from Shamray – other participants on the night remain anonymous. Tickets are from $35 (student) to $85; it’s QPAC-sponsored, so have your extra $7.20 ready.

SONGBIRDS

Ensemble Offspring

Brisbane City Hall

Saturday October 28 at 7:30 pm

Is this group in a state of constant expansion or contraction? Last time I looked, it appeared to be a mixed trio; from its website, you’d think it was a sextet. For this particular program, three sound-sources are nominated: flute, clarinet and percussion. This last is certainly the ensemble’s founder/artistic director Claire Edwardes whose name is well-established among adherents of Australia’s contemporary music activity. The flautist will be Lamorna Nightingale, the clarinets negotiated by Jason Noble; these musicians have participated in Offspring recitals earlier this year. Three composers are singled out for mention on one particular informational platform: Gerard Brophy, Fiona Loader, and Nardi Simpson All three will be represented by some ‘beloved’ works. We know that they’ll be Australian birds – Brophy’s 2019 Beautiful birds, Loader’s Lorikeet Corroboree of 2015, perhaps Simpson’s Of Stars and Birds (which you can see the Offspringers play on YouTube). And then we move away from the avian and more to the environment with two Hollis Taylor/Jon Rose collaborations in N’Dhala Gorge @ Ross River and Bitter Springs Creek 2014, alongside Brenda Gifford‘s Mungala (Clouds), Ella Macens‘ Falling Embers, Alice Humphries‘ The Visitor (Sorry, I can’t stay), and Bridget Bourne‘s Wood Grooves – all written between 2018 and 2022. Tickets aren’t yet on sale.

KINGS AND CASTLES

South East Queensland Symphonic Winds

Old Museum, Bowen Hills

Sunday October 29 at 2:30 pm

A few unusual features about this event, which is the only one in October’s calendar for the Old Museum that appeals. First, it’s a dress-up event: you come attired as a king (or queen) and you could win a prize – an initiative that would spark up many a more grave event at QPAC. Second, the program is remarkably broad – and vague. The 60-piece ensemble (that’s a massive lot of winds) under Adam Pittard is promising a feast of music from around the globe – royalty of all types and times. We will hear musical insurrections (Khovanshchina? Va, pensiero?) and Holy Grail quests (Parsifal? or more likely Indiana Jones?). Geographical locations move between Ancient Persia – we could all do with a dash of Ketelbey, or a few selections from Kismet – and the Kingdom of Siam, which for many of us is forever associated with Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The King and I. The Winds choose their repertoire from light classical, Broadway musicals, movie themes and original compositions; some of my suggestions above might obtain, although perhaps not the Wagner and Mussorgsky operas. Tickets fall between $19 and $24, a dollar extra if you buy at the door. And there’s a 2% credit card fee – a matter of cents, I suppose, but necessary?