Lifting the game
A top chamber series is a great introduction to at-home concert screenings.
This month, musicians have been gathering on the stage of Wellington’s Michael Fowler Centre. Sadly, audiences have not been taking their seats in the auditorium to hear and applaud them in person. But the Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts has, in pandemic speak, “pivoted to digital”, and the five concerts of a splendidly curated Chamber Music Series have been filmed for digital live stream. They’re online right now and available until early April.
“With live music so special for musicians right now, it was an almost reverent atmosphere recording the “Bach by Candlelight” concert,” says Gillian Ansell, NZ String Quartet violist. She has curated the Chamber Music Series with violinist Helene Pohl.
Pohl plays Bach’s epic solo “Chaconne” in a new arrangement, with four singers adding the chorale tunes the composer concealed in the music. “The chorales reflect why Bach wrote such a piece,” says Pohl. “He returned from a trip to find his wife had died and was already buried. Imagine the shock! He dedicated it to her memory.”
The NZSQ plays a major role in the concerts, alongside top singers and NZ Symphony Orchestra musicians. A “Chamber Music Spectacular” features the largest ensembles, with Mozart’s magnificent Gran Partita for 13 wind instruments paired with a String Octet by Romanian composer George Enescu. In another programme, taonga pūoro musician Horomona Horo joins the NZSQ for two festival commissions composed 20 years apart – Dame Gillian Whitehead’s Hine-pū-te-hue, from 2002, and the world premiere of the magical Manaaki by composers Ariana Tikao and Phil Brownlee.
Lifting New Zealand’s digital game for concerts at home has been a pandemic silver lining for performers, presenters and audiences. Of course, a live experience is ideal, but streaming high-resolution film of our orchestras and ensembles into homes has allowed programmes to be much more widely enjoyed, and this important aspect of concert presentation will undoubtedly continue once regular live concerts resume.
Although audiences are still getting used to buying tickets for at-home concert screenings, the Aotearoa NZ Festival is implementing a “pay what you can” option to ease audiences into this approach. ▮
Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts Chamber Music Series: Voice of the Whale, Bach by Candlelight, 21 x 21, Hine-pū-te-hue and Chamber Music Spectacular. Online until April 3. Programmes and tickets available at festival.nz/events/ online-chamber-music-series/