Wellington Subscription Concerts

New Zealand Listener, Volume 34, Issue 871, 13 April 1956, Page 9

Wellington Subscription Concerts

HIS year is an important landmark in New Zealand music. It will be the tenth anniversary... of the National Orchestra’s foundation. Later in the year, in October, there is to be a concert in Wellington, at which the occasion will be celebrated appropriately. The plans for this are still in

the making, but before that, concertgoers are to be offered what the NZBS considers to be the finest season of programmes and artists it has yet presented. During the concert year, the . Subscription ticket system will operate as _ before,

giving suoscribers ~~ eight concerts for the price of six. There are to be several special concerts as well, the first of which will be the allBeethoven night, with the pianist Richard Farrell as soloist, which we mentioned in last week’s issue.

Richard Farrell, of course, is only the first of the artists whom the NZBS has engaged to appear with the National Orchestra during the concert season. Following Farrell, the celebrated Polish pianist Witold Malcuzynski is to be the soloist in a performance of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3. Mal-° cuzynski’s appearance with the Orchestra has been arranged by agreement with R. J. Kerridge, who has brought him to New Zealand for a series of solo recitals. The Rachmaninoff Concerto No. 3 has been heard before here in performances by Richard Farrell and Aleksandr Helmann, but, as this was some time ago and the Concerto is not as well known as the ubiquitous No, 2, another performance should be _ welcomed, especially when the interpreter is as eminent as this one. Malcuzynski’s first public appearance was at Carnegie Hall in 1942, and he has since rapidly made his way to the front rank of contemporary pianists. Today, as a man in his forties, he has reached full artistic maturity. Towards the end of June, the English piahist Lance Dossor is to be the soloist in a performance of Mozart's B Flat Concerto, K.450. Making his debut in England in 1937, Lance Dossor | has since been very highly regarded in England and Australia. From Mozart to the astringencies of Bartok (but Bartok in the more approachable mood of the Third Piano Concerto) brings us to July and the visit of Paul BaduraSkoda. This young man, not yet out of his twenties, has had a dazzling rise to | fame. Listeners will probably | be familiar with his recordings and_he has played extensively in Europe, England, and, four years ago, in Australia. After the pianists comes Harold Beck, a New Zealander who has had a. most successful career overseas as- a ‘cellist, and will be for a short time during the year on a visit to his homeland. Harold Beck left New Zealand in 1937 for Ausetralia, and went on to England in 1948. Until last year he was principal ‘cellist of the Halle Orchestra, and is now principal ‘cellist of the London Symphony Orchestra. He will be heard in Wellington on August 11, as soloist in

the Dvorak ’Cello Con-: certo. To round Sh the season the NZBS is to present in September Madame Victoria de los Angeles, widely regarded as the finest woman singer of today. She is equally at home singing opera, lieder, folk song and sacred music. Though her choice of programme has not yet been settled, it is hoped that she will sing Mozart’s "Exsultate Jubilate" and some Spanish music for soprano and orchestra. Though programmes for only the first four Subscription Concerts in the Wellington — series have as yet been made available, it is noticeable that they diverge from the familiar quite a lot. The staple classics are not very widely represented, although Mozart has two mentions in the "Prague" Symphony, and _ the Piano Concerto, with Lance Dossor as soloist. The emphasis. in the

Subscription Concerts (as distinct\ from Special Concerts, like the all-Beethoven evening) has been on the. more unfamiliar works of the great composers. There is Ravel’s Concerto for Left Hand; Balakirev’s Symphonic Poem Russia, and Tchaikovski’s "Little Russian" Symphony. The Third Subscription Concert on June 27, is devoted -to works which, with the exception of Mozart’s Piano Concerto, are relatively modern. There is Sir Arthur Bliss’s Music for Strings; _ William Alwyn’s-

Second Symphony; the Nocturne tor Horn and Strings by Matyas Seiber, with Peter Glen as soloist, and Richard Strauss’s Symphonic Poem Don Juan. Not, of course, included in the Subscription Concert series, but interesting to know about just the same, are pro= posals to,extend the Youth Concerts which were begun as an experiment last year. Wellington is to have two concerts, on Juné 12 and October 24, and they are to be presented in other centres as well.