The Week’s Music...

New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 901, 9 November 1956, Page 18

The Week’s Music...

by

SEBASTIAN

IRTHDAYS are rare enough events, and most of us seek something special to celebrate them. So did the National Orchestra, when it observed its tenth birthday not long ago. The special everit was a commissioned work from our premier composer Douglas Lilburn, who produced for them a Birthday Offering as an overture, which was prtesented at a Youth Concert (YC link) to mark the occasion. It was remarkably well received considering the novelty and complexity of the piece. Mr. Lilburn himself remarked on his fortnal problems, and indeed it must be difficult to create homogeneity in a work which features so many soloists, including a piano atid saxophone as more esoteric participants. In fact, there was a good deal of concetto style in the piece, all of which helped to make it exciting, with tuttis as its climactic points. From the opening horn call "motto theme" through the rest of the introduction, with its highly effective orchestration, the whole grew organically, and its leavening of lighter material made it a festive rather than a serious work, especially as regards the profuse percussion. The playing was vefy good indeed; the evanescent soloists strutted their hour with aplomb and then were heard no more. Considerable rehearsal must have been required to bring the

work up to such a pitch, but certainly any efforts in this direction were worth the trouble to produce such a performance, which I hope will be repeated even though the birthday itself passes. In the same programme Smetana’s Moldau rippled its way sweetly, with some most attfactive woodwind work: and Jocélyn Walker was soloist in Saint-Saens’s G Minor Concerto, This she played with the verve which is its chief requirement, and this was obviously appreciated by the audience. The orchestras have little to do here apart from the rather tricky job of keepitig time, but the two forces worked well without the sense of opposition that is the bane of many concerto pefformances. Quite different in style was the Rachmaninoff second Concerto that I heard from the Atickland Junior Symphony (NZBS), with Russell Channell as a retnarkably competent soloist. The brilliant passages sparkled as they should, even if the soul-searing latiguishings lacked a little in poignancy; and the orchestra itself was really very good. I must admit surprise that such an atn-_ bitiots piece could be adequately tackled by a local orgafiisation: but then, youth will tackle almost anything unabashed, and very often the result is a success beyond our expectations. This one was indeed.