Radiant performance

We expected a rush but NCO finished early enough and we relaxed.  Nice, because the next outing was something particularly special.  Guitarist Harley Coleman was staying with us while rehearsing and touring with Luminescence Chamber Singers.  Now, these are a seriously professional group; what they do is worthy of your time.  They had played Andrew Ford Red Dirt Hymns at CIMF and they were touring it through NSW.  We got to see it at The B in Qbn. Luminescence were 6 singers (3 female voices, 3 male) with instrumental accompaniment from Harley on guitar and Freya Schack-Arnott on cello.  Later, a combined children's choir joined for some hymns.  Andrew Ford had written the music, bass line, chords and melody, from the little I've seen.  Roland Peelman worked with the performers to develop presentation and wonderfully rich harmonies while leaving space for improv from the musos.  Roland also conducted the children's choirs on the day.  Andrew Ford was there highlighting the exceptional work on the hymns done by Luminescence.  Suffice to say it was work of the highest artistic achievement to my ears.  I was stunned by the skills and musicality and glorious arrangements; by Harley's understanded chordal interpretation and one pretty rock-dirty solo and Freya's bass lines and atonal plays on sound; by the solo presentations of some songs, then then ensemble performances of others; by the playful drumming on garden pottery, by the reverent singing of the children's choir.  The work comprises 16 shortish songs with lyrics volunteered by invited poets, so a range of themes, but presumably all around issues of Australian relevance.  I caught some lyrics, not all; the richness of performance mostly took my attention on the day.  So I still have a worthy task to read these poems and hopefully a future opportunity to hear a recording or view a video.  Just a stunning performance and a fascinating project.

Luminescence Chamber Singers performed Andrew Ford Red Dirt Hymns at TheB in Queanbeyan.  Luminescence are AJ America, Rachel Mink and Josephine Brereton (sopranos), Dan Walker (tenor), Lucien Fischer (baritone) and Alasdair Stretch (bass-baritone).  Roland Peelman (MD, arranger) arranged and conducted the children's choir from Luminescence Children’s Choir and Music for Canberra.  Accompanists were Harley Coleman (guitar) and Freya Schack-Arnott (cello) and Sammy Hawker (visual artist) provided the backdrop.

Choral weekend 3

Back to choral gigs to record.  This was excellent.  Luminescence Chamber Singers with Apeiron Baroque with the Luminescence Children's Choir and the Children's Choir holiday program.  So, the best local voices with wonderful local baroque players and up-and-coming singers.  The Children's Choir is for ages 10-17; the holiday program is for ages 7-12.  Now all this offers many possibilities and variations.  Suffice to say, they indulged to the hilt.  There were two sets.  The first set had Apeiron up the steps with the choir singing Monteverdi, and Cavalli and a Folia from Reali by Apeiron.  Apeiron moved off stage for the second set leaving room many kids and all manner of jokey performance.  John Ma introduced segments of a walk in the woods by Biber called Sonata Representativa.  John is ever entertaining to add to his immense baroque chops.  Then to finish, a comic cantata by Fehre featuring a schoolmaster and his Singschule with kids even indulging in dressups.  The concert was called Magnificat and featured Popora Magnificat Amin and the theme was "stories or vignettes of musical mentorship and tutelage" with reference to Basilica San Marco, Monteverdi teaching Cavalli, the Venetian Ospedali and the comic opera.  The singing by the choir was just divine, precise intonation, clear expression, beautifully aware and responsive.  This after the Kings College Choir the night before, so high praise.  Apeiron were a wonderful match as capable and accurate and historically apt and often amusing to boot, thanks to John.  The older kids were well on a similar path, obviously well tutored, and the young ones were entertaining just in their presence, not least in donkey ears and tails.  This was a gig of great quality and energy and  aptness and humour and just a huge pleasure.

Luminescence Chamber Singers, Apeiron Baroque, Luminescence Children's Choir and Children's Choir holiday program appeared at Wesley.

Clarity

Five concerts in the Christmas series and we got to two.  This was a much smaller concert than the first but what was lost in complexity was gained from the familiarity of the performers and the clarity of the performance.  This was just the core 6 singers who make up Luminescence and who presumably, frequently, sing and practice together.  We could hear that heightened awareness between performers.   We could hear each individual voice, given just 6 singers together in great clarity and the space did its bit too, with its gentle presence.  So the sometimes raucous songs of Spain's golden era and Alfonso's cantigas was a dream.  Despite foot stomps and tambourine percussion.  This is music from later C13th and late C16th, sometimes simple melodies, sometimes embellished or harmonised by the group, sometimes boisterous and festive, sometimes sole voices with perhaps a single tonic note accompaniment.  What I loved was the clarity of a small, comfortable, practised group and the clarity and uniqueness of each voice.  Interestingly, choir was ordered with sopranos at each end, low bass and baritone in the centre and mezzo soprano and tenor between.  One performer spoke of two trios, whether the male lower and female higher, or the right baritone-tenor-soprano or left bass-mezzo-soprano, I'm not sure.  Whatever, this was a memorable display and one fully worthy of Tim's complex recording (hint: love to hear it...).  Just a stunner.

Luminescence Chamber Singers were led by Roland Peelman (conductor, percussion).  LCS comprises AJ America (mezzo soprano), Lucien Fischer (baritone), Veronica Milroy and Rachel Mink (sopranos), Alasdair Stretch (bass) and Dan Walker (tenor).

Chrissie

Visiting other worlds will surprise but also fascinate.  This was a Christmas concert and some things were from the world of everyday Christmas concerts and so were just lovely joy, especially the singalong on Hark the herald angels sing and O come all ye faithful.  They are both wonderful songs and well known and a huge joy when you are singing, doubly so when accompanied by the likes of the Luminescence Chamber Singers.  Our lines were not the complex harmonies of their choruses but enjoyable none-the-less.  But there were other worlds at this Christmas Classics concert.  The first tunes were the strangeness of pre-Renaissance music (as early as c.1370) where I noticed just one harmony, a simple 5th, but the melodies were exquisite and the rhythmic phrasings were challenging and the stratospheric high notes were just enthralling.  I was a bit dumbfounded that a Song of the nuns of Chester, after starting with females, had a second chorus with males, the lower tenors and basses, but then this is the modern world.  We got more modern with William Byrd ~1580 then through to contemporary takes on early music (not least one by local David Yardley) and generally on Christmas and arrangements of modern songs in an early, richly luminescent style to fit the choir.  There were actually 2 choirs: Luminescence in 6 or expanded to 9 (presumably written for 3 each of SATB) and the Luminescence Children's Choir in the balcony at the rear of Wesley Church, plus an occasional organist on Wesley's worthy organ.  So this was a period outing but also varied and even fun at times.  The singing, of course, was always impressive and sometimes to die for.  I enjoyed several solo segments, not least one from our guest, Alex, and both the extremes were thrilling at times, Veronica at the high end and Jack at the low end.  The chance to join in the singing and the lovely hymns reminds me of the season and has me longing to attend a few sung masses and other services to partake in the joy of singing in community but I doubt the accompaniment at the local midnight mass will be quite so capable.  So a challenging and satisfyingly arty take on the Christmas concert and much contemplated and enjoyed.

Luminescence Chamber Singers and Luminscence Children's Choir were led by Roland Peelman (conductor) and joined by Samuel Giddy (organ) and Valdas Cameron (percussion).  Our guest is Alexander Gorbatov (tenor).

Vox+

This was a gloriously beautiful concert but that could be expected.  It was called B.A.C.H. with reference to the Bach motif; it was sung by Luminescence Chamber Singers so those glorious voices and harmonies; it included violinist-cum-vocalist Anna Freer as guest while one member was off the US; it included a rendition of Bach Violin Partita no.2 Dmin with its 5 movements ingeniously interspersed with Bach chorales; it started and ended with some lively early music, amusingly for me (given I did a midi take complete with whistles on Hope / The Pots) including the crab canon over palindrome Guillaume de Marchaut Ma fin est mon commencement.  I loved the violin partita and wondered over the accompanied fifth movement and admired the partita played touchingly and searchingly from memory, but what did it for me were the voices.  I consider the voice the most perfect, most complex and satisfying instrument, not surprising given it is of us  rather than an invention however impressive, and Luminescence do it so well.  Not quite perfectly, but bloody close to.  And Anna fitted wonderfully as a sit-in soprano.  Those voices and harmonies were a thing of immense beauty and exploration of harmony and rich vocalisation.  This was a concert to treasure.  Good to see that our local ArtSound recording engineer, Tim, was there experimenting with multiple mic pairings.  He does an excellent job, too.

Luminescence performed Bach and more at Drill Hall Gallery.  Anna Freer (violin, soprano) joined choir members AJ America (mezzo soprano), Veronica Milroy (soprano), Dan Walker (tenor), Lucien Fisher (baritone) and Alasdair Stretch (bass).  Tim Lamble recorded for the performers and ArtSound.

3x8

This concert was called Magic Eight because each of the three pieces were by an octet, two instrumental and one choral.  Most people just drooled over the Schubert Octet, well known and long (6 movements, ~1 hour) and interesting to me as I played my first chamber concert on two movements of the piece.  So I like it and they played it with immense capability and hugely satisfying interpretation, but it was just a little unadventurous for me, standard, ordered, of that era as works usually are, but of an era that just seemed a bit tame.  But what to say?  Max McBride was playing bass and he was inspirational, 5 strings, eyes up and around, glorious soft  tone, explosive semiquaver lines.  I was amused to see the cellist smile at Max's parallel lines to his.  I mainly watched Max and the strings, and the strings seemed to lead it all, mainly from first violin.  Quatuor van Kuijk were inspirational in how they communicated although first violin tended to watch less, but I caught a big smile between the violins at one stage and they were very obviously pleased.  That was after the interval.  Just before the interval was Per Nörgard Wie ein Kind (Like a Child) by Luminescence with Roland conducting, and that was odd, using lyrics and noises from Adolf Wölfli and Rainer Maria Rilke for all manner of fascinating musics.  I enjoyed it immensely, following some strange lyrics projected above.  This was very much not your everyday baroque outing; it was obvious why a conductor was required.  Really impressive and great singing and various noise making.  But by fave was the opener, Igor Stravinsky Octet, all jumpy and playful and totally a work for winds.  I delighted in the brass, not least the high, pure trumpet tones and the interpay of flute and clarinet and the bass-y bassoons and was struck by the long breaths demanded of Zoe Pepper.  This was my fave of the night although all was a huge please for whatever reason.  Nobody I spoke to agreed with me: they all preferred the Schubert.  So be it.  Just a bit too comfy a choice for me.  And one final observation.  The Stravinsky reminded me of Fellini and the dates align, so my guess is that Nino Rota (b.1911) was greatly influenced by Stravinsky (Octet 1923).  But that's just a bit of amateur musicological investigation.

Luminescence Chamber Singers, Quatuor Van Kuijk, Sally Walker (flute), Oliver Shermacher (clarinet), Ben Hoadley and Zoey Pepper (bassoons), Fletcher Cox and Joel Walmsley (trumpets), Jackson Bankovic (trombone), Aidan Gabriels (horn), Max McBride (double bass), Paolo Franks (trombone) and Roland Peelman (conductor) variously played Stravinsky, Per Nörgard and Schubert at the Fitters Workshop.

Rustic folk

Of faeries and fools was the title of this concert and I could see the reference clearly in at least 3 pieces.  The sounds were different as the musical combinations were different and to some degree as the styles were different, but the performances were consistently impressive.  The works dated from after Grimm's Fairy tales (1812) and carried on some of the influences.  First up as Schumann with a clarinet trio (Oliver Shermacher, James Wannan nad Roland Peelman on clarinet, viola and piano) just stunningly sharply played all round.  Then piano (Roland again)and two vocals (sopranos Susannah Lawergren and Anna Fraser ) for Dvorak Moravian duets.  Now this reminded me of Schubert songs and that's a strange style to my ears, dated both in musical form and lyrical themes.  The lyrics were translated to English and projected behind.  I could only chuckle at the dated love songs.  But that's that style.  The singing and piano were great though.  Perhaps better without the meanings?  Then an interval and a ridiculously funny Janacek Nursery rhymes in Czech language.  Again lyrics translated and projected and and the absurdity was a delight.  Luminescence played this with James Wannan and Ronan Apcar.  Then to finish, a much larger ensemble playing Katz-Chernin Village idiot, a work in 5/4 variously 3-2 and 2-3 and a collapse of time at the end.  This was a much larger group with a Alma Moodie string quartet and Jacques Emery on bass and others including e-pno and e-guitar and piano accordion and percussion.  So a very different , more modern and humourous take.  A great finish.

Schumann, Dvořák, Janáček and Kats-Chernin were performed at the Fitters Workshop variously by James Wannan (viola), Oliver Shermacher (clarinet), Susannah Lawergren and Anna Fraser (soprano), Roland Peelman and Ronan Apcar (pianos), Theo Carbo (electric guitar), Fletcher Cox (trumpet), Jackson Bankovic (trombone), Aidan Gabriels (horn), Veronica Bailey (percussion), Alister Price (accordion), Jacques Emery (double bass), Luminescence Chamber Choir and Alma Moodie Quartet.

Diversity

Well I dropped my phone and cracked its screen as I waited to enter The Great Divide, a CIMF concert at the Fitters' Workshop, but I came around in the end.  It was an intriguing mix of styles and they shouldn't really work but they did.  First up was Luminescence Chamber Singers directed by Roland Peelman singing mediaeval Spanish cantigas and Portuguese motets.  Six singers, 3 men, 3 women, occasional percussion and foot stamping, religious themes of Mary and women variously as saviours and whores, so clearly unwelcome in today's thought.  I was amused or maybe concerned with women singing this stuff, even as we realise the diverse times and thinking, this being a very earthy and religious age, but the historical denigration of woman's role was pretty obvious.  Strange and confronting to our ears and yet would have been unquestionable in those days, I guess.  Then an interval and a wine and I could forget the phone for a few minutes and I was intrigued by Jason Noble playing Steve Reich New York Counterpoint on clarinet.  I wondered how it would be accepted in this crowd, given he was plugged in, effected, multitracked, whatever.  I asked him later; if I got it right it was 8 clarinets plus two bass clarinets, all multitracked and no effects, just the rich resonances of the space.  I enjoyed that.  Then Orava playing Shostakovich String Quartet Gmaj no.6.  Again I felt some discomfort around me at the quite difficult melodies but I enjoyed it immensely.  Nicely expressed, accurately intoned, earthily bowed and intriguing as a composition ("a masterpiece of Soviet optimism post-Stalin" / CIMF concert program).  So a fascinating and satisfying concert if the lead-up was less pleasing.

The Luminiscence Chamber Singers under Roland Peelman (director), Jason Noble (clarinet) and Orava String Quartet performed at the Fitters' Workshop for the Canberra International Music Festival 2022.  Luminescence comprised AJ America, Veronica Milroy, Dan Walker, Lucien Fischer, Jack Stephens and Roberta Diamond.  Orava comprise Daniel Kowalik and David Dalseno (violins), Thomas Chawner (viola) and Karol Kowalik (cello).

Tragedies

The concert was called the Art of Rhetoric. It was essentially the words of various politicians put to music by composers Robert Davidson and Gordon Hamilton and performed by RD's band Topology and the combined choirs TAV (The Australian Voices) and our local Luminescence Chamber Choir under GH. The first half was less effecting. There was considerable minimalist four-to-the-floor regularity, repeating lines, occasional jazz improvs or written conversations between instruments (not least all the strings, violin, viola and bass). But the key was the treatment of speech. RD would listen to the patterns, the phrasings, the moving pitch and tempo to write a line to accompany selected lines of speech or sometimes just accompany with a wash of sound or an aural counterpoint. The first half featured this style, with words from David Malouf, Jessie Street, Charles Kingsford-Smith and Menzies and some ever-sad words of Abbott. That was the start of the tragic story recited from Australian politics. I chatted a day later with someone who was there, who had worked in Parliament House, and we could only bemoan our recent inability to deal with issues. It seems worse now, but there in some ways the Singing Politician recounted a history of tragedy with little light. There was one of Tony Abbott with one of his simplistic slogans, "No no no". Note, ever in three; ever a slogan. He understood rhythm if not the ease and costs of destruction versus the difficulty and hope of construction: think car industry, govt agencies that fell in one swoop, Julia Gillard for that matter. There was Menzies, the sainted one: we all know the quote about entering the war because the mother country had, but there was also melocholy in his further words of a price to be paid. Billy Hughes about Gallipoli, the Dark hour, and John Curtin about the war approaching Australia and John Scullin, sworn in only 2 days before the Stock market crash of 1929 that ushered in the Depression and, indirectly, another war. And Fraser with his infamous line about the easy life or otherwise: this was done 4/4 minimalist with polyrhythms. The Dismissal was the biggest work, using multiple voices for a long rendition. I hadn't remembered a younger Keating line, "a completely unprincipled act", but I did remember the chants of "We want Gough". Also here was choral accompaniment with a remelodicised God save the Queen: interesting. I hadn't remembered Bob Hawke, then ACTU head, on the day of the dismissal calming workers with a warning of a "snowball into violence". That was admirable (and prescient as we watch democratic politics crumble under right-instransigence and growing inequality and climate and the rest). Also Noel Pearson in his euology to Whitlam recognising Gough's good work for Aboriginals: "The reward for public life is public progress". Howard just appeared as a cricket tragic seeing politics as a parallel game: "politics and cricket ... playing the game, yeah". There was the profundity and truth-telling of Keating's Redfern speech: "the problem begins with us ... it begins in an act of recognition that it was us that did the dispossession ... we took the children from their mothers". [NB: how could you not despair after Stolen Children, with institutional child abuse and deaths in custody and Manus/Nauru as emotional darts to our civic hearts]. There was a fascinating play with the Rudd Apology speech, where two words were extended to several minutes and sung by the choir and recorded, then, live, played back, faster and faster until we heard those words again: "We apologise". Then Gillard "Not now, not ever". I sat thinking of the young women singing those words and how they would relate to this recent feminist history. Then a summary piece that featured various boorish and barbaric quotes: I'm a fixer; No cuts to education, health; the recession Australia had to have; suppository of all wisdom; PM Trumble; Please explain; People have a right to be bigots; by 1990, no child will be living in poverty; shirtfront; kids overboard. Then a final encore on Trump and "total political correctness". So I listened and mighty was the playing, the composing, the voices, not least Luminescence who got their part together in no time, but more so I found myself despairing of this country and its uninformed self-image: forever now "Great" or "Fair go" in the talk of pollies but the home of climate denial, inequality, misinformation and more, once the light of the world with emancipation and the rest, now this timorous server of wealth and denier of evidence. This is music but more. Excellent for the political tragics amongst us.


Topology, The Australian Voices and Luminescence Chamber Singers performed music by Robert Davidson and Gordon Hamilton, mostly on political themes, at the National Gallery of Australia. Topology comprised John Babbage (soprano, alto sax), Robert Davidson (bass), Bernaud Hoey (viola), Therese Milanovic (piano) and Christa Powell (violin). Gordon Hamilton (conductor) led the combined choirs.

Potpourri

This was the first concert of the Canberra International Music Festival 2017 and it was a veritable potpourri. No surprise there; it was promoted as the Gala opening : a world of music. obviously touching on a range of performers and styles coming up in the festival. Festivals are not easy things to organise and I was surprised by some of the names: they hadn't been on the brochure, released well before the program. But nothing lost: these were great and fascinating players. First up was Luminescence Chamber Choir with William Barton on didj, a world premiere called Beaver blaze, based on White Australia, the poem by Oodgeroo Noonuccal. The theme of the Festival is Revolution, after all, and this was profound. Then Lisa Moore starting with Bach then through a lithe and flighty Schumann Bird as prophet to end with a modern piece by Rzewski. He was a new name for several I spoke to (me too) but he was also well received by several: my little survey suggested a discerning and adventurous audience. I was particularly taken by Lisa's estimable sense of time: firstly in the firm and resolute Bach then in the delicate, featherweight Bird as prophet. Then my passenger, Alex da Costa and his Strad, played some duos with Roland Peelman. Phenomenal technique, wonderful loud tone. Yes, it's a Strad but you need technique to get that from it. Stunning tone and chops, playing Vitalia, Prokofiev Montagues and Capulets, Tchaikovsky, de Falla. There's a good bit of performance here and prodigious capability and an alluring instrument to boot. Then interval and an Australian premiere from composer Chen Yi, currently at the ANU School of Music, Yangko, played by Alex with Roland and another on Chinese percussion. Interesting to hear Alex doing something outside the mainstream: no surprise that he did it with ease. The Simon Bolivar String Quartet are visitors from Venezuela. They played Shostakovich String quartet no.8 C min op.110 with satisfying intonation and lovely moving instrumental focuses. Again, very well received. And an end with a composition by ex-Canberra now-Brisbane bassist and composer, Robert Davidson, with renowned didgeridoo player, William Barton, Landscape, played by string quartet, guitar, didj and harpsichord. I'm looking forward to hearing more from Robert later in the programs. Then drinks and a celebration of the opening of the festival. As always, CIMF looks fascinating and cleverly themed, let alone its musical capability and profundity.

The CIMF 2017 opening gala concert featured William Barton (didgeridoo), Clive Birch (bass vocal), Luminescence Chamber singers, Alexandre da Costa (violin), Minh Le Hoang (guitar), Lisa Moore (piano), Roland Peelman (piano, harpsichord, percussion) and the Simon Bolivar String Quartet with members Alejandro Carreno and Boris Suarez (violins), Ismel Campos (viola) and Aimon Mata (cello).

Two Salls

Sally Whitwell and Sally Greenaway performed for a special concert at the High Court. As Sally G said at the end, this is new music, composed by the two Sallys and performed with an array of very capable local performers.

First up was Sally Whitwell. She started with a solo piano piece, Reels, that floated then grew into heavy chords and rolling arpeggios then a call and answer between right and left hand, heavily spelt then lighter and quicker and responsive. Then Waltzing alone, pensive, and Road trip, recounting a trip along the coast north of Sydney, both duos of piano and violin. Winter love was Sally's first attempt at writing for string quartet, this time with piano; just gentle and lovely. Wicked Strings performed. Ad astra was performed with spoken and sung voice with cello and piano. It a lament to JS Bach recounting that three of his tunes were included on the sound recording with the Voyager spacecraft ( http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/spacecraft/music.html ). (Sally quoted Carl Sagan: "We could have just had Bach but that would have been showing off"). Then Some world far from ours, responding to a poem by Shelley. Then two with the surprisingly impressive and young Luminescence Chamber Choir, Echo and To your shore.

Second was Sally Greenaway. First up was Stay awhile for piano and choir, here Luminescence in 8 parts (they are 8 singers), on responding to adversity, and Katrimba, written in three for marimba but arranged for piano, cello and violin. Then three musical poems on solo piano and a commission sung by bass baritone Richard Baker to the theme of a poem by Pierre Louys. Summer beckons was a lyrical pastoral piece with Barbara Jane Gilby on violin. Interesting that both Sallys performed a piece referencing seasons: Winter love and Summer beckons. The Feud was written to poetry by Tanya Kiermaier with seven short movements separated by little poems. Then a piece of real emotion, San luiz, telling a story of a difficult time - I found it the most touching - and a final Encore de lirico. Sally G shows her filmic training in her music: moody, emotional, fittingly accompanying other performance.

This concert was labelled as Australian Women Composers and it was that, but more. Both are Canberra bred; both have ABC label CDs, Sally W has several; this was new music, so composed now; not least, the accompaniment was great, from Wicked-Strings!Quartet, Luminescence Chamber Choir and several friends. This was a quality local concert in a lively space and always well attended. And with any luck, you will be able to hear it again: it was professionally recorded by Infidel Studios.