Summer concerts on Waitangi weekend

10 January 2014 - NZSO Media Release for immediate release

Summer concerts on Waitangi weekend with New Zealand’s best young orchestral musicians

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In the first week of February the NZSO National Youth Orchestra will perform an exciting new concert programme.

On Waitangi Day the talented young musicians who make up this summer’s NZSO National Youth Orchestra will pay tribute to our nation with a free concert in the capital at The Museum of New Zealand, Te Papa Tongarewa. On 7 February, they will perform the programme again at Napier’s Municipal Theatre. Tickets for this second show are priced at just $10 each.

Coming together from across the country, the orchestra members will attend a residential camp on the Kapiti Coast for the week preceding the concerts. There they will rehearse under the direction of Australian conductor Benjamin Northey, and further their own knowledge and skills through sectionals and tutorials with NZSO players.

The concert will begin with Aoteraroa Overture by Douglas Lilburn. Lilburn wrote this piece early in his career while studying in London and it was first performed there, in 1940. The New Zealand premiere was not until 1960, when it was performed by the National Youth Orchestra of that year. Lilburn went on to be a giant of New Zealand music, and the Aotearoa Overture has found its place as an important part of our country’s repertoire.

Australian composer Matthew Hindson draws on both pop and art music for the second work on this programme,Homage to Metallica. He says:  

‘Homage to Metallica is not just a tribute to this particular band, but rather to the whole genre of heavy metal music, and in particular, to the extreme sense of theatricality, virtuosity, rhythmic energy that is so representative of this style.’

With NZSO ConcertMaster Vesa-Matti Leppänen performing as the rock-star, heavy metal soloist on an amplified, one-eighth-sized violin and a coda marked with the unusual orchestral direction ‘apocalyptic’, this vibrant symphonic work is certain to be spectacular.

The final work performed by the NZSO National Youth Orchestra in this programme is a core of the classical repertoire – Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade. Inspired by The Arabian Nights and his own travels abroad, Rimsky-Korsakov hoped that hearers of his four-movement work would “carry away the impression that it is undoubtedly an oriental narrative of numerous and varied fairy-tale marvels”.  The stunning violin solo will be shared by two of the orchestra’s most accomplished young violinists with Principal Second Violin Annabel Drummond performing as soloist at theWellington concert, and ConcertMaster Arna Morton taking the lead role at the concert in Napier.

The NZSO National Youth Orchestra provides New Zealand’s finest young musicians with the opportunity to work together towards a common goal of artistic excellence. The camp and concerts provide an opportunity for young musicians to further develop their orchestral skills, and benefit from the generous support of the Adam Foundation andCrowne Plaza.

ENDS

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