WOW – WOW – WOW !!
The auditorium at the Linder was filled to capacity with an audience eagerly awaiting an afternoon of brilliant music, and my word, did they get it! It’s amazing how performers and audience feed off one another. We, on stage, were super excited to see the full hall and expectant faces, and this made us perform to the very, very best of our ability, that again fed back to the audience which engaged 100 % in the performance. And what a performance it was, everybody was on top form – the choir was in superb voice, the percussionists were working overtime, the pianists equally busy, the vocal soloists were brilliant – William Berger had everyone in stitches with his drunken abbot song! Many seasoned concert goers claimed this was the best Carmina Burana they’d ever heard!
Sue Cock’s pre-concert talks are extremely popular – every last chair taken – but this time Richard led the audience through the work explaining the three distinctly separate sections before they were performed. This was very well received indeed, and Richard’s irrepressible joy in sharing his love of music with others was there for all to see.
Carl Orff is known for his innovative way of teaching children music. He developed the Schulwerk method, which is widely used all over the world, so in tribute to this the concert began with a group of young – some very young indeed – recorder players under the very capable and clearly caring leadership of Nimrod Moloto; they played beautifully – and no, no we’re not talking “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” we were treated to, among others, Bach and Haydn. Everybody was completely mesmerized. Well done to Nimrod and his recorder group.
Our next concert will be a joint venture with the Philharmonia Choir of Cape Town:
Ralf Vaughan Williams
A Sea Symphony
Sunday 15th October 2023 @ 3 pm
Linder Auditorium, Parktown
Soloists: Ondelwa Martins, soprano, Chris Vale, baritone.
The Phoenix Orchestra
Conducted by Richard Cock
Ralph Vaughan Williams was not only a composer of the utmost importance for English music but also one of the great symphonists of the 20th century. Born on 12 October 1872 in the Cotswolds, he was, after his father’s death, brought up in Surrey and educated at Charterhouse School, the Royal College of Music and Trinity College, Cambridge. He was a pupil of Charles Stanford and Hubert Parry, later studying with Max Bruch in Berlin and Maurice Ravel in Paris.
At the turn of the century, he was among the first to collect folk songs and carols from singers. As musical editor of The English Hymnal he composed several hymn tunes that remain popular. A long and deep friendship with Gustav Holst was a constructive relationship which was crucial to the development of both composers. He had a long and productive life; hardly a musical genre was untouched or failed to be enriched by his work, which included nine symphonies, concertos for piano, violin, oboe, and tuba, five operas, chamber, ballet and film music, a large body of songs and song cycles, and various unaccompanied and orchestral choral works.
A Sea Symphony: Vaughan Williams finished this, his first symphony, in 1909. Yet when you hear A Sea Symphony, you’re struck by how the natural world isn’t really part of it. The composer knew the watery sounds from Wagner’s Das Rheingold and depictions such as Smetana’s The Moldau. He knew Debussy’s Impressionistic seascape La Mer, with imagery that would have been hard to resist. But Vaughan Williams took his own path, and despite mentions of ships and waves and the sounds and dangers of life at sea, this choral symphony isn’t about a romanticized notion of the watery part of the world but, rather, about humankind seeking transcendence in a setting which you can’t control. The sea can be seen as a metaphor for life, for our journey through it, and as a cry for unity.
This very beautiful work has not been performed in Johannesburg for many years.
This is your chance – book now to avoid disappointment.
On behalf of the Symphony Choir of Johannesburg
Kate Pape