2014 Concert Season

Mass of the Children
Saturday 26 July 7:30pm, Knox Church

DAVID BURCHELL, conductor
CITY CHOIR DUNEDIN
COLUMBA JUNIOR MADRIGAL CHOIR
SOUTHERN SINFONIA ENSEMBLE
Soloists: Cathy Sim, Calla Knudson-Hollebon, Clinton Fung, Peter Wigglesworth, James Burchell

John Rutter: Mass of the Children
Benjamin Britten: Rejoice in the Lamb
David Hamilton: Dance-Song to the Creator
David Hamilton: Three Spirituals
and more

Celebrated 20th century English composers are the main focus of this programme, providing us with magnificent and beautifully constructed works. The Britten has dancing rhythms, is feisty, energetic and is a happy marriage of music and poetry. Mass of the Children is absolutely breathtaking and is Rutter at his best: exciting and engaging with the exquisite blending of children and adult voices.

As a bonus the Columba College senior choir, Cantus Columba, will perform their ‘Big Sing’ numbers.

Haydn: The Creation
Wednesday 3 September 7:00pm, Dunedin Town Hall

Presented by the NZSO in association with ANZ PRIVATE BANK
NICHOLAS MCGEGAN, conductor
MADELEINE PIERARD, soprano
ROBIN TRITSCHLER, tenor
JONATHAN LEMALU, bass-baritone
CITY CHOIR DUNEDIN

Haydn brings forth magnificence from silence as he retells the creation of the world, taking inspiration from the Bible’s The Book of Genesis and Milton’s Paradise Lost. Haydn once confessed, ‘I want to write a work that will give permanent fame to my name in the world’. With The Creation, he has certainly achieved this. Featuring some of the very best voices from New Zealand and abroad, the sensational talents of Madeleine Pierard and Jonathan Lemalu are joined by one of Britain’s leading young tenors, Robin Tritschler. With renowned early music specialist Nicholas McGegan leading the orchestra, this Creation will enchant.

Waves Upon Waves
Saturday 15 November 7:30pm, Auckland Town Hall

Auckland Choral presents Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony with the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and welcomes back City Choir Dunedin for this special occasion. Soloists are the distinguished baritone David Griffiths and Viennese soprano Ursula Langmayr, whose poetic expression enthralled audiences on her last visit.

Reinhard Flatischler, percussion soloist, and composer Johnny Bertl, also from Vienna, together wrote Waves Upon Waves especially for this world premiere. This Suite for Choir, Percussion and Orchestra promises to be a tremendous feast of colour, rhythm and drive.

URSULA LANGMAYR, soprano
DAVID GRIFFITHS, baritone
REINHARD FLATISCHLER, percussion
CITY CHOIR DUNEDIN
AUCKLAND CHORAL
AUCKLAND PHILHARMONIA ORCHESTRA
UWE GRODD, conductor

Gloria! A Baroque Christmas
Friday 19 December 7:30pm, Knox Church

DAVID BURCHELL, conductor
CITY CHOIR DUNEDIN
SOUTHERN SINFONIA
Soloists: Lois Johnston, Cathy Sim, Claire Barton, Ben Madden

Buxtehude: Das neugeborne Kindelein
Schein: Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ
Praetorius: In dulci jubilo
Charpentier: In Nativitatem Domini Nostri Jesu Christi H414
Bach: Cantata 133: Ich freue mich in dir 
Handel:  Messiah chorus ‘For unto us a child is born’
Telemann:   Solo cantata for soprano
Clérambault: Hodie Christus natus est
Vivaldi: Gloria in D major, RV589

The featured work in this Baroque Christmas concert is the familiar and popular Gloria by Vivaldi. The wonderfully sunny nature of the Gloria, with its distinctive melodies and rhythms, and the brilliance and variety of textures displayed in the eleven movements of this work, make it a tremendously appealing example of late Baroque sacred music.

Charpentier’s In Nativitatem Domini Nostri Jesu Christi portrays, with delicacy and passion, the age-old story of the Evangelist calling the shepherds to Bethlehem, there to find Joseph, Mary and the infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.

Bach composed the Christmas cantata Ich freue mich in dir in Leipzig in 1724 for the Third Day of Christmas. The work is suffused with earthy and realistic touches bathed in an otherworldly heavenly glow. It is surprising that the final chorale harmonization has not become famous as a Christmas carol, for it is a wonderful melody, beautifully harmonized.

These three works form the backbone of this celebration of the birth of Christ in our Baroque Christmas concert, and together with other shorter works by Buxtehude, Schein, Praetorius, Handel, Telemann and Clérambault, the music is presented in the spirit of joy that is Christmas!