Children DELIGHT IN Meteor magic
Mentioned in despatches:
I walked into the Barry Hopkins gallery, that magical museum space dedicated to one of our great promoters and collectors of great art, to catch The Otira Train.
It, in turn, caught my imagination in ways which make us realise that we cannot really live a full, civilised, informed life without great artists. Said Train is in a print from the Cats, Trains, and Whimsey exhibition of prints by New Zealand artist Gary Tricker, better known internationally than in his homeland.
The Otira Train pulls in a quote from Irish author George Moore – ‘‘A man travels the world over in search of what he needs and returns home to find it.’’ – and Tricker reminds us of that truth with one of the most wonderfully accessibly surreal prints, full of heart and revelation.
There are several dozen prints for your exaltation and enjoyment. In the familiar stylistics, there is a constant stream of fresh and witty revelation about you, my dear reader!
Do not miss it. It closes on November 18.
It is, indubitably, a visual grande cru of an experience.
Review
What: Ben Hoadley and Friends
Who: Lunchtime Recital Series
When: Wednesday, October 3
Where: Concert Chamber of the Gallagher Academy of Performing Arts
Works by: Bourdeau, Michi, and Tellemann
Soloist: Ben Hoadley, bassoon
Ben Hoadley is a graduate of Waikato University.
He has master’s degree in composition as well as a faculty of arts and social sciences thesis scholarship, and in his year, won the Lilburn Prize for Composition. Since that time he has composed, performed as one of the world’s premium exponents of the bassoon, researched and recorded newly discovered gems from classical bassoon manuscripts, served time with a variety of orchestras, including the Boston Symphony, run master classes, and been poached by the Aussies to lecture at the Australian Institute of Music. We set him up, supported him and should have been able to make a better offer than Oz to bring him here.
That he is such an international success answers all the queries about the quality of music degrees and other qualifications bestowed by the University of Waikato, and the standards of teaching and guidance which underpin the music arts programmes in this university.
This concert was memorable, then, for whole variety of reasons.
First, it underscored the performance standards and the range and variety of performances which have characterised this year’s Lunchtime Concert Recitals. Second, it illustrated the power of the Dr John Gallagher Concert Chamber to have audiences hear some of the best sounds they will ever encounter.
Third, ongoing numbers demonstrate that the faith our audiences have in the Wednesday offerings is constantly being reinforced.
Fourth, every time we hear concerts like this, with locally based performance musicians of the standard of Lara Hall, current enrolees of the Conservatorium, and former students who return to play, we are reminded that we could be anywhere in the world, from Vienna to New York, and rarely hear better.
This was a vintage year, a grand cru year, and more is to come in 2019. Fifth, this concert was unusual.
Few in the audience considered the bassoon to be a solo instrument. As a close friend of mine whose opinion I trust, said in passing, ‘‘[A]nd I had always thought of the bassoon as something which went ooompah Pah pom te pom in the background.’’ And on Wednesday, she was moved and uplifted by music of extraordinary beauty and breathtaking virtuosity.
The two Bourdeau works Premier Solo and Deuxieme Solo had Hoadley’s bassoon superbly displayed by Katherine Austin’s piano to produce a dancing, laughing, romantic, pairing which was simply beautiful.
When Hoadley was supported in quartet in the Michi works by the strings of Lara Hall and Harris Leung, violin, and Callum Hall, cello, the consequent purity of tone and perfection and balance of pitch was akin to a Chateau d’Yquem premier cru, clean and rich and uniquely sweet.
When he, Hoadley, delivered on stage, alone and palely loitering, he turned to Telemann for comfort, and I ran out of superlatives. There is nothing left to say.
Review
What: The Magician’s Nephew
Who: Stories and More
When: Saturday, October 6
Where: The Meteor Theatre
Authors: Adapted by Glyn Robbins from the novel by CS Lewis
Director: Cecilia Mooney
A fairy stood in the doorway. She was catching rainbow bubbles dancing their own fantasy before she danced off to join the rest of the audience.
It was the perfect beginning for a play which caught the minds of an audience aged anywhere between 3 and IQs of 300.
The author of the novel from which the play is developed, CS Lewis, is one of the last century’s great storytellers, and this adaptation retains all the Lewis magic of character and idea.
A chattering of expectant audience members responded, miraculously, to imperceptible indications that the magic was to begin, a silence of the innocents descended like a cast spell, an impressively efficient stage crew opened the proceedings in darkness with a magic box, a puppet had a conversation with the audience, and an hour and a half of totally absorbing, entertaining, dramatic delight took the whole audience in a great Lewisian journey.
Magic was the key to unlocking the experience. Magic drove the narrative.
Magic arrived in dynamically performed words and actions. Magic entertained through characters as diversely eccentric as Phil Dalziel’s Uncle Andrew, as humanly genuine as the two leads – Eli Oliver’s Digory and and Megan Goldsman’s Polly, as lively and novel as Holly McCallum’s Jackdaw, and as perfect a representation of a selfishly evil villain(ess) as Missy Moroney’s loudly energetic Queen Jadis. The adult audience was utterly entertained.
The child audience was entranced.
Their response to the action on stage was to live it, both in the drama and with the characters. I am still smiling with pleasures of this experience.