VSO ends season with concert for Canada’s 150th anniversary
Tovey’s Ancestral Voices offers serious look at relationship with First Nations
The end-of-season concerts of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra are always designed with a festive or celebratory vibe, and this year is no exception: we get a world premiere for Canada’s 150th birthday, a favourite concerto (Korngold’s Violin Concerto, with Baiba Skride), and Mahler’s spectacular First Symphony.
This is the last VSO concert before the official celebration of Canada’s 150 on July 1 — the genesis of the first work on the program: a new set of songs for mezzo soprano and orchestra by maestro Bramwell Tovey called Ancestral Voices, featuring Marion Newman.
The work is anything but flashy patriotic fluff: Tovey offers his thoughts on the most complicated part of our shared Canadian legacy — the fraught relationship between First Nations and subsequent arrivals.
“I was very moved by the reconciliation commission that took place a few years ago,” Tovey explains. “As a fairly new Canadian I didn’t live here when the residential schools existed, but I got interested in the politics, and what a terrible thing they were. I don’t like it when artists bang political drums, but I thought I might be able to create something that reflects, if you like, the shame of it all.”
Tovey didn’t access indigenous musical themes.
“I don’t want to get into the controversy of cultural appropriation, so there’s no replication of First Nations music — which I’m not even qualified to attempt anyway. I’ve decide to stick entirely with non-aboriginal language; everything is actually from my own cultural tradition, if you like.”
“The cycle may yet run to more instalments,” Tovey says. “For now I’ve set four songs: the first by Keats, of all people, which describes Arcady, a pastoral paradise, written just before much of Canada was discovered. Then a selection from a longer poem, The Song of the Last Bison by Charles Mair, a Scot who came to live in Canada — very anti-colonial, with enlightened attitudes to nature and the First Nations people.”
The cycle then takes a turn away from the poetic.
“The third I’ve simply called The Letter, from a letter discovered in the colonial archives dealing specifically with the disastrous policies of the residential schools. The fourth song is taken from texts by prime ministers (Stephen) Harper and (Justin) Trudeau about the legacy of the schools, and from a United Nations text on the rights of aboriginal peoples.”
Tovey may not like to bang political drums, but he is out to make a statement.
“We do tend to sweep the dust of this era under the carpet. Most politicians now are at least aware of the injustices, but recent events tend to put issues on the back burner.
“It is important in North America today that nothing gets swept under the carpet.”
The season finale concludes with a reminder that Tovey is nearing the end of his tenure as VSO music director.
His choice of Mahler’s First Symphony to round out the program is an inspired reminder of what has arguably been the great core of Tovey’s programming over the seasons — his complete cycle of the Mahler symphonies.
This is neither the time nor the place to celebrate that momentous achievement, but it’s certainly one of the great landmarks in the VSO’s (nearly) 100-year history. With such a world of music to consider, I couldn’t resist asking if the ebullient First Symphony is his favourite.
“Whatever Mahler symphony is up next is my favourite,” was the maestro’s speedy comeback.
I don’t like it when artists bang political drums, but I thought I might be able to create something that reflects ... the shame of it all.