The Equator inspires a new symphonic suite

Press Release
March 2007

The Equator inspires a new symphonic suite

A stunning multi-artform event, combining images from the world’s beautiful and remote places and the music of one of New Zealand’s most highly regarded television score composers, performed by southern New Zealand’s top orchestra will be a highlight of the inaugural Dunedin Heritage Festival.

The Southern Sinfonia’s Brooker United Travel Southern Pride Concert on 24 March, will be a concert of two halves.

The first half features Soprano Anna Leese following her show-stopping performance début at Covent Garden in 2006. Anna’s performance as Musetta in La Boheme earned her high praise from the notoriously critical London reviewers who claimed “Leese is one potential star in the making”.

Since then her career has been meteoric She has secured a recording contract with EMI, and further engagements with the prestigious Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, Canadian Opera, a recital at Wigmore Hall, and a performance at the America’s Cup in Valencia. Dunedin audiences will be able to judge for themselves as Anna will be singing Musetta’s most well-known aria in the concert.

Anna will also sing other popular arias and she will be joined on stage by the 100 voice City of Dunedin Choir which perform popular operatic choruses. The programme also includes excerpts from From the Southern Marches which was such a hit in Otago’s 1998 celebrations. The conductor for this spectacular concert is the acclaimed Peter Adams and MC will be Dougal Stevenson.

The concert’s second half contains just one work: Equator – Circle of Life, a new symphonic suite by Emmy™ award nominated composer Trevor Coleman. The work is an adaptation of Coleman’s original score for NHNZ’s spectacular wildlife series Equator.

Equator – Circle of Life will be the first natural history documentary score to be performed by a live orchestra in New Zealand and Managing Director of NHNZ Michael Stedman describes the concert as a “coming of age” for the company.

“Equator is the finest work NHNZ has ever produced. The series has been screened in every territory in the world and has been much celebrated by the international television industry. To have images from the series, and Trevor’s breath-taking music showcased in this wonderful event is an honour and a thrill for us. For so long the talent and creativity nurtured in Dunedin has delighted the world; now it’s time to bring some of that talent home."

The accompanying images from the Equator series will give local audiences their first opportunity to experience the exhilaration of the High Definition (HD) format on a large scale.

Providing an incredible level of visual clarity, HD is rapidly becoming the international television standard. A Panasonic HD projector is being imported especially for the event and Panasonic’s Head of Engineering from Japan will be a special guest at the concert.

Equator – Circle of Life continues Southern Sinfonia/NHNZ innovative collaborations in the genre of Southern Journeys, Sinfonia Antartica, and Timeless Land, and will be held in the Dunedin Town Hall under the baton of Peter Adams and with MC Dougal Stevenson, on Saturday March 24 at 8.00pm.

ENDS

Press Release
March 2007

Appendix I

Natural History New Zealand

NHNZ is one of the world’s leading producers of factual programming embracing the genres of
nature, health, science, adventure and people. With over 70 programmes currently in production,
NHNZ crews work in locations around the world to produce a diversity of films for international
broadcasters including Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, Voom Media, BSkyB, National
Geographic Channel, HGTV, France 5, NHK in Japan and ZDF and Kabel One in Germany. Based in
Dunedin, New Zealand, the company is wholly owned by Fox Television Studios.

Trevor Coleman

Dunedin born Trevor Coleman began composing music at an early age. His first original composition was broadcast when he was just 15, and he went on to play an active role in the local jazz and rock scene, before gaining his Bachelor of Music degree from Otago University in 1979.

In 1981 Trevor received a further Diploma in Film Scor ing from Boston’s Berkley College of Music before returning to New Zealand, where he began work composing scores for television, including numerous Wild South documentaries for the then Natural History Unit of Television New Zealand.

In 1985 Trevor moved to Europe, basing himself in Munich, Germany, from where his work as a composer, musical director, producer and performer took him all over the continent, from Dublin to Istanbul, engaged in diverse fields such as Jazz and world music, music comedy, through to dancetheatre and television.

He moved back to New Zealand in 2000, and very quickly re-established his connections with Natural History New Zealand and has composed over 60 film scores for this internationally acclaimed production company. Trevor has written for a wide variety of television genres and styles. These include Animal Face Off a groundbreaking 12-part series for Discovery, Buggin With Ruud, the celebrated 13-part series NHNZ-produced series for Animal Planet and Equator the award-winning six part series made by NHNZ and NHK. In 2006 Trevor’s work on both Buggin’ With Ruud and Equator was nominated for Emmy awards, the most recognised television award in the world.

Alison Balance

Alison Ballance is an award-winning producer and director. She holds a Masters degree in zoology and has worked with Natural History New Zealand since 1990.

Alison has made a number of films focusing on New Zealand wildlife, including To Save the Kakapo, about the conservation programme to save the endangered kakapo, Return of the Demon Grasshopper, which featured New Zealand's giant, nocturnal, cricket-like wetas, and Invaders in Paradise, a film about the impact of introduced animals on native plants and animals in New Zealand. Both To Save the Kakapo and Invaders in Paradise won merit awards at the Missoula Wildlife Film Festival.

Her film The Arid Heart, part of the Wild Asia series for NHK and Discovery, was filmed in Mongolia, Nepal and India. Ice Worlds- Life at the Edge compares and contrasts the animals of the Arctic and the Antarctic, and My Favorite Monkey, for National Geographic, is about macaque monkeys.

Her film Built for the Kill: Chase, showcased predators and prey for National Geographic. Tigers: Fighting Back focused on three scientists working to save tigers in Russia, India and Thailand, also for National Geographic.

Alison wrote and directed three episodes of the Animal Face Off series for Discovery Channel: Great white shark vs Saltwater crocodile, Hippo vs Bull shark and Lion vs Nile crocodile.

She was supervising producer for the 6-part HD series Equator, and produced, wrote and directed the Pacific and Andes episodes, Power of an Ocean and Paradox of the Andes. Power of the Ocean won a Gold Medal in the nature/wildlife category of the New York Film Festival in 2006. She is currently producing shows for Animal Planet’s Growing Up series.

Alison is also a natural history writer, and her first book, “Hoki, the story of a kakapo”, was a finalist in the 1998 New Zealand Children's Book Awards. She has written two series of children’s books - Habitats of the World and Animal Lifestyles - using photographs from the NHNZ collection. She collaborated with colleague Rod Morris on a photographic book called “Island Magic – Wildlife of the South Seas”. (titled “South Sea Islands” in the United States), and her travel journal “Dancing with Cranes – on location with a wildlife film-maker” was published in 2005. She is currently writing the biography of leading conservationist Don Merton.

Appendix 2

Anna Leese, Lyric Soprano.

Full name: Anna May Leese
Date of Birth: 07/03/1981
Current teacher: Enid Hartle

Performances and awards:
Musetta in Puccini's la Boheme, Canadian Opera, 2009
Wigmore Hall recital with Graham Johnson, June 2008
Musetta in Puccini’s La Boheme, ROH, Covent Garden, 2008
Echo in Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos, ROH, Covent Garden, 2008
First Lady in Mozarts’ Die Zauberflote, ROH, Covent Garden, 2008
Countess in Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro with Classical Opera Company, May- July 2007
Performance at the America’s Cup in Valencia, May 2008
Concert tour of New Zealand, February/March 2007- see details under 'bio'
EMI debut recording with Graham Johnson, February 2007
Michaela in the Royal Opera Houses's Carmen, January 2007
Musetta in the Royal Opera Houses' La Boheme, November 2006
Cover Arminda in the Royal Opera House's la Finta Giardiniera, August 2006
Proms Mozart Concert with SCO and Norrington, July 2006
Fiordiligi in Classical Opera Company's Cosi fan Tutte, June/July 2006
Tamiri in Classical Opera Company's Il re Pastore, June 2006
Soloist in Handel's The Messiah, Albert Hall, May 2006
Tamiri in Lindbury Theatre's Il re Pastore, April 2006
Soloist in Dame Kiri te Kanawa Foundation concert in New Zealand, with The New Zealand
Symphony Orchestra (broadcast on television) Feb 2006
Handel's The Messiah performances throughout New Zealand, Christmas 2005
Rosalinde in BBIOS Die Fledermaus (R. Strauss) Nov 2005
Juliet in British Youth Opera's Romeo and Juliette (Gounod) Summer 2005
Fiordiligi in BBIOS Cosi Fan Tutte (Mozart) June 2005
Winner 2005 Richard Tauber Prize in Wigmore Hall, June 2005
Mozart Mass in C minor, Royal Festival Hall, March 2005
Soloist for the Queens' Commomwealth day service in Westminster Abbey, March 2005
Recital in Purcell Room, March 2005
Mozart Arias with the Auckland Philharmonic Orchestra, March 2005
Lunchtime recital at St James, Piccadilly Feb and March 2005
Recording of Elgar's The Apostles in Canterbury Cathedral with London Philharmonia, Jan 2005
Female Chorus in Britten's The Rape of Lucretia with BBIOS, November 2004
Ilia in Mozart's Idomeneo with the Auckland Philharmonic orchestra, July 2004
Mathilde in Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites, June 2004
Lunchtime recital at St Martins-in-the-fields, July 2004
Best overseas competitor in the 2004 Royal Overseas League Competition, March 2004
Vocal section winner of the 2004 Royal Overseas League Competition, February 2004
Donna Anna in Don Giovanni excerpts with Andrew Parrot and the London Mozart Players in
Fairfield Hall, February 2004
Soloist for Handel's Messiah in Marlow UK, Dunedin NZ and Napier NZ, Nov-Dec 2003
Accepted on the RCM Josephine Baker Trust program 2003
Recipient of a Constant and Kitt Lambert Award, RCM 2003
Benefit concert tour of New Zealand, three solo recitals, July/August 2003
Soloist with the Auckland Philharmonic Orchestra for 2003 Puccini concert
Winner of the 2003 McDonalds Aria Scholarship, SydneyRecipient of a Donny trust scholarship
Scholarship trip to Italy to perform and learn basic Italian
Soloist for the Dunedin Proms, 2003
Soprano Soloist for St John's Passion, Dunedin Sinfonia, 2003
Winner of a Patricia Pratt Memorial Scholarship
Soloist for Stadium Spectacular 2003 (televised)
Soloist for Sky City Symphony in Auckland, 2003 (300,000 audience)
Recipient of the 2003/4 Henry Cooper Memorial Award
Performed in Dame Kiri te Kanawa's backing chorus at Craggy Range opening, 2003
Winner of the 2002 Lockwood Aria Competition
Graduated from Otago University with MusB Hons (first class) November 2002
Winner of the 2002 Mobil Song Quest
Recipient of a Creative New Zealand Scholarship 2002
Soprano in Handel's Messiah, Ashburton, 2001
Soprano in Mendlessohn's Elijah, City of Dunedin Choir 2001
Winner of the Dame Sister Mary Leo Scholarship 2001
Winner of the Otago Daily Times Aria 2001
Winner of the Christchurch Competitions Society Aria 2001
Winner of the Nelson Mail Aria 2001

Masterclasses:
Antony Rolfe Johnston, Professor Richard Miller, Jane Keller, Judy Bellingham, Marvin Keenzy, Roger Vignoles, Donald Maxwell, Sarah Connolly, Stephen Roberts, Thomas Allen, Sarah Walker, Anne Murray.

Family background:
I grew up in a small town, in a family of five. My mother is a music teacher, though she did not teach me, my sister is a songwriter/performer based in Holland, my brother is a baritone currently studying at Indiana University, and my father is a keen follower of music. Consequently, I started singing at an early age, in the local church choir conducted by my mother. I continued to sing in church choirs until the second year of my undergraduate degree, when I decided to concentrate on solo voice.

Musical Education:
I attended Palmerston North Girls High School, where I joined all the choirs, and eventually conducted my own vocal group for two years and was named music captain. I was very involved in choirs and shows, and was a member of the New Zealand Secondary Schools Choir, and later, the New Zealand Youth Choir. I studied several instruments during school, including piano, violin, bassoon, clarinet, guitar and recorder, before I decided to pursue solo voice in 1998.

I graduated from the University of Otago in November 2003, with a first class honours degree in music (MusB Hons). I recently graduated from the Benjamin Britten International Opera School at the Royal College of Music, London, and won the Queen Elizabeth Rosebowl, which will be presented to me by HRH Prince Charles in 2007.

Appendix 3

The Southern Sinfonia

The Southern Sinfonia is based in Dunedin and is Otago and Southland’s only professional orchestra.

Each year the orchestra presents a five-concert subscription series and tours to Southland and Central Otago. The Southern Sinfonia regularly accompanies productions by performing groups such as the Royal New Zealand Ballet, resident and touring opera companies, the City of Dunedin Choir and other musical and choral companies. It also undertakes several educational programmes for young players.

These include the Sinfonia Academy where they develop their ensemble skills, and the Play with the Orchestra where they have the opportunity to play with the Southern Sinfonia players.

The orchestra is acknowledged as New Zealand’s most innovative orchestra. Recent highlights have included three collaborations with Natural History New Zealand (NHNZ) which have resulted in the production of commercially available videos and DVDs: Southern Journeys (a millennium commission), Sinfonia Antartica and Timeless Land. The orchestra also collaborated with Otago Heritage Books in From the Southern Marches (also released on CD). In 2007 the Southern Sinfonia once again joins with NHNZ in the Dunedin Heritage Festival’s concert which includes a commissioned film score based on NHNZ’s television series Equator - Circle of Life.

The orchestra has established a reputation for its high calibre performances and the international and New Zealand conductors and soloists it attracts. These include Shlomo Mintz, Nikolai Demidenko, Raphael Wallfisch, Julian Lloyd Webber, Dame Cleo Laine, John Dankworth, Nigel Kennedy, Sir Donald McIntyre, Dame Malvina Major, Michael Houstoun, Nicholas Braithwaite, Helen Medlyn, Werner Andreas Albert, Jonathan Lemalu, Deborah Wai Kapohe and the up-and-coming Soprano Anna Leese.

Formed as a small orchestra in 1966, the Southern Sinfonia now draws its players from a pool of approximately 100 part-time professional musicians.

Along with the other three professional city-based orchestras in New Zealand, the Southern Sinfonia is funded by Creative New Zealand.

Appendix 4

City of Dunedin Choir

Musical Director: David Burchell
Accompanist: Roland Storm

The City of Dunedin Choir, as it is now known, is one of New Zealand’s oldest community choirs, having been formed in 1863. As befits a community choir, it attracts people of all ages and from all walks of life, with varying degrees of musical expertise and experience but sharing a passion for music and music-making.

The Choir aims to keep the tradition of choral singing as part of the fabric of life in the Dunedin and Otago musical scene, and has a proud heritage of performing large choral works to the highest standard. It has been instrumental in keeping choral masterworks before the public of Dunedin and Otago and is well known for its consistently professional performances.

Since 2000, the Choir has been very fortunate in having David Burchell as its conductor for performances of the finest classical and contemporary works in the choral repertoire.

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