ORCHESTRAL SEASON NEARS END

New Zealand Listener, Volume 17, Issue 425, 15 August 1947, Page 6

ORCHESTRAL SEASON NEARS END

New Lilburn Work for Final Wellington Concert

HE National Orchestra of the NZBS made its first public appearance on March 6 of this year in Wellington. Since then it has given 29 concerts, present ing 15 different symphonies and 80 other different works. And its concerts have been attended by more than 50,000 people. The final concert for this season is to be given in Wellington on Wednesday, August 20, under the guest-conduc-torship of Warwick Braithwaite; thé programme will include Douglas Lilburn’s new composition for full orchestra, Song of the Antipodes. Then the orchestra will go into recess till the opening of the 1948 season in Wellington in March. The players’ contracts, which were for 12 months, will be reviewed in October this year, and then will come their annual leave of a fortnight. Recess Means Work Recess does not mean a holiday; it means the preparation of the coming season’s increased repertoire. Tentative plans for 1948 provide for 18 public concerts within the first two months of the season alone, whereas the 29 performances this year were spread over the whole period from March to August. _ The Listener was told by Andersen Tyrer that it was proposed, during the recess, to build up the repertoire of standard works, with the additicn ° of new compositions now on order as they come to hand from overseas. By making the players familiar with those works, rehearsing from scratch while on- tour would be minimised or evoided, and revision only would be needed. The orchestrg would, therefore, be able to give more concerts than in the first season.

A good deal of music is being bought from England and the United States. At the moment it is arriving in ‘smail quantities and at irregular intervals. Works by \ Benjamin Britten, Weinberger and Moeran have been ordered, and their arrival is now awaited. Completion of the instrumental complement is expected at any time by way of a bass clarinet and a cor anglais to come from France. So far the cor anglais parts have been played by the first oboe, with amendments to the parts to bring them within the oboe’s scope. Home Town Broadcasts Since its formation the membership of the orchestra has changed very little, and its size is the same as when it was launched. After the last concert of this season the groups belonging to centres other than Wellington will go home, to put in at least two hours a dsy preparing the new season's repertoire. And as well as this, they will give regular brvadcasts from their home stations as individual groups, and with the studio orchestras in Auckland, Christchurch and Dunedin. The Wellington Orchestra will give concerts from 2YA. Thus the music lovers of their home towns will benefit by the players’ experience with the full orchestra. In. addition to giving more concerts next season in the centres, it is probable that the orchestra will extend its travelling programme to take in some of the smaller towns. Otago will, of course, see a good deal of the orchestra in 1948 when (as+ reported recent!y in The Listener) it will assist in the cvlebration of the province’s centennial. Lilburn’s New Work "A well-written composition by a New Zealander whose work has been known

to me for some years," is how Warwick Braithwaite describes Douglas Lilburn’s Song of the Antipodes, which is to be given its first public performance next Wednesday by the NZBS National Orchestra. "The orchestration,’ Mr. Braithwaite told The Listener, "is both interesting and extraordinarily clear, and the themes are original but not harsh." Song of the Antipodes was completed last year. Its central idea is a choralelike theme, briefly announced at the opening, later set out in’ full by -the strings, with woodwind episodes, and used again as conclusion. It is from this theme that the title of Song is derived. The word Song should be thought of in its older sense of psalm, or again, as the poet Whitman used it. It implies © praise or thanksgiving, as well as description. "Composers in a new country, having no established tradition to guide them, must seek out their own paths as best they may," Douglas Lilburn told The Listener. "History and environment may help to establish a background. The word Antipodes was chosen here for its richness of association in these things. To the early voyager it meant strangeness and remoteness, uncharted seas and the unknown South land, and even today a New Zealander may share something of these feelings towards parts of his country. When he moves out of the cities he is apt to be confronted by dis- y~ tance and solitude, or the leap suddenly on his horizons, and-h is never far from the sound of great oceans that beat upon his coasts. "These, and similar things, form part of his heritage, and it is thought that this heritage will have its influence on the art that is produced in these islands."