Composer Jonathan Dove Photo credit: Marshall Light Studio Ask English composer Jonathan Dove to describe one of his most memorable career moments and he’ll probably choose the time a samba band, representing Oliver Cromwell’s avenging army, “burst through the main doors of Peterborough Cathedral, battling with the organ, sweeping up the 600 performers and as many audience, and leading them out across the market square and into a huge shopping mall, where young angels came singing down the escalators.” It was 1995, and the work was his opera In Search of Angels, the third and largest communit ..read more

Conductor Gemma New with the NZSO and percussion soloist Jacob Nissly “…in empathetic command of the orchestra.” Image credit: NZSO/Jono Tucker I almost called this review “in praise of Gemma New”. Of course, the concert NZSO presented as “Mahler 5” was as much about the compositions as the performances, but New’s brilliant, intelligent and nuanced conducting added a huge amount to everyone’s enjoyment. Dynamic on the podium, sometimes dancing with the music, she seemed utterly in tune with all three compositions and in empathetic command of the orchestra. Mahler’s 70-minute Fifth Symphony wa ..read more

The Brodsky Quartet and William Barton, didgeridoo Photo supplied by Chamber Music New Zealand When William Barton plays the didgeridoo, it becomes a living voice, singing the history of his land in the unique language of the instrument, the ancient history of Kalkadungu country. At the recent Chamber Music NZ concert ‘Barton and Brodsky’, when Barton joined the UK musicians of the Brodsky Quartet, the voice of the didgeridoo was heard first from off-stage, a signal of its presence, and perhaps what those of us from Aotearoa understand as a karanga, a call to open the occasion. It opened a sp ..read more

Composer John Psathas (right) with the NZSO and solo musicians from the ‘Beyond Words’ concerts: (from left), vocalist Abdelilah Rharrabti, saz player Liam Oliver, vocalist and daf player Esmail Fathi, oud player Kyriakos Tapakis and vocalist OUM Photo credit: NZSO/Jono Tucker Music is a wonderful vehicle for expressing emotions and communicating across barriers of culture and language. Music is not a “universal language”, as the old cliché claims, but it can bring us together and promote understanding. It can give voice to grief and hope and unite us in longing for peace. Over two years ago ..read more

Violinist Johnny Gandelsman …dancing through Bach’s Cello Suites with graceful weightlessness Photo credit: SMB Creative J S Bach’s Six Suites for Solo Cello have the quality of legend for many reasons. They contain some of the most wonderful music ever written. Their discovery by a 13-year-old Pablo Casals in a back-street Barcelona second-hand shop was so intriguing it inspired music journalist and sleuth Eric Siblin to write a whole book about it. Their subsequent renaissance, 140 years after Bach’s death, has meant they’re among the most performed and recorded music in the canon. And then ..read more

Cellist Suzanne Szambelan and saxophonist Hayden Chisholm: classical music with improvisations I recently enjoyed an unusual small-scale concert in Paekakariki in the charming wooden St Peter's Church Hall. The programme was called "Kodály Reframed", its centrepiece a work I didn't know, Zoltán Kodály's Sonata for Unaccompanied Cello, Op. 8, premiered in 1918. The performers were remarkable Polish cellist Susanne Szambelan and New Zealander Hayden Chisholm, the latter based in Europe and touring the world as saxophonist, jazz musician/improviser and multi-instrumentalist. In "reframing" Kodál ..read more

The beautiful, tragic song My Sister's Country has the breath-taking impact of a gut-punch. Composer Claire Cowan uses beguilingly simple chords to set Rhian Gallagher’s moving poetry, describing the result as “hymn or ritual; a place of comfort to cradle the weight of the small but heavy words." The song is one of 21 on a new album, 21 x 21: Beneath the Trees, by 21 women composers of Aotearoa, setting words by our female poets. The listening experience is intense. Cultural worlds, stories, grief and love - these short songs carry enormous emotional freight. Soprano Jenny Wollerman …conceiv ..read more

The beautiful, tragic song My Sister's Country has the breath-taking impact of a gut-punch. Composer Claire Cowan uses beguilingly simple chords to set Rhian Gallagher’s moving poetry, describing the result as “hymn or ritual; a place of comfort to cradle the weight of the small but heavy words." The song is one of 21 on a new album, 21 x 21: Beneath the Trees, by 21 women composers of Aotearoa, setting words by our female poets. The listening experience is intense. Cultural worlds, stories, grief and love - these short songs carry enormous emotional freight. Soprano Jenny Wollerman …conceiv ..read more

The Takács Quartet and the New Zealand String Quartet: a sense of community From left: Harumi Rhodes (viola), Monique Lapins (violin), Helene Pohl (violin), Edward Dusinberre (violin), András Fejér (cello), Rolf Gjelsten (cello), Richard O’Neill (viola), Gillian Ansell (viola). Photo credit: Sophie Kelly For the first ten days of February, Nelson was abuzz with the joy and delight of chamber music lovers. Back to its full length after five years, the Adam Chamber Music Festival welcomed perhaps the most star-studded international and national line-up of musicians in its three-decade history a ..read more

In the world of classical music, many outstanding practitioners specialize in an instrument, a musical period or style. The versatile Sergey Malov is determined to be an exception. “I prefer,” he tells me from his home in wintry Berlin, “to breathe a musical air that is rich in all possible styles and as much of the beauty that music is offering as possible.” When he joins a starry line-up of visiting international artists at the Adam Chamber Music Festival in Nelson, New Zealand - the Takács String Quartet, Hungarian pianists Dénes Várjon and Izabella Simon, Canadian clarinetist James Campbe ..read more