The concert was on 1 April so our practice in the morning, somewhat stilted and desperate, must have been a trick played on us, because the 3pm concert was an absolute blast. This was NCO's annual get-together in Llewellyn Hall with CCS and a few singers out front and the music was Haydn The Seasons. Now, this is a big work (a CSO member suggested "massive") and the orchestra practiced it for perhaps 8 weeks and only met with two of the singers on the Monday before the Saturday, and the other singer and choir only on the Friday night. The arias and choral pieces were pretty much all there, but the repetitives were mostly removed, I guess to relieve the singers of such a massive task in preparation, and in a nifty and local way, they were replaced by a series of Canberra-related spoken word introductions form no other than Laura Tingle, ABC TV journo but also a member of CCS (I've seen her singing before). I couldn't hear Laura from my location, but the proxy was well received and a very clever local innovation talking of magpies and trips to the coast and possums the like. As for the performance, I'm not the only believer in the "she'll be right on the night" line, and the performance just proved the proposition. It was a blast. The were some moments of indecision or missed lines (Haydn is full of explosive and hugely challenging phrases, not just for the winds and others, but even for the basses) but the performance was thrilling and the exhilaration from choir and orchestra and singers on song was ever present. And there were several fugues (3?), one at truly breakneck speed, all thrilling and structurally complex. I love these things. And the gloriously delicate start to, what, winter? And plenty more of interest. Talk of massive, it was 2 hours playing with the repetitives removed! Massive indeed. But we did it and, as is the way, we partied and chuckled about it all after. Just a blast, again, from our NCO/CCS collaboration.
National Capital Orchestra and Canberra Choral Society gather for their annual performance at Llewellyn Hall to play Haydn The Seasons. Sarahlouise Owens (soprano), Ryan O'Donnell (tenor) and Sitiveni Talei (bass) sang. Laura Tingle (narrator) replaced the repetitives with a Canberra Seasons theme. Louis Sharpe (conductor) conducted and Dan Walker (chorus master) prepared the choir. Our bottom end comprised Juliet Flook, Jennifer Groom and Eric Pozza (basses).
This is CJBlog post no. 2,600
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