SOUNZ Concerts

Ngā konohete

A playlist of New Zealand works that expand the realm of possibility for sonic shape and colour.

Guest curator: Chris Gendall

Gareth Farr's exciting and virtuosic 'Marimba concerto' opens this programme, followed by Josiah Carr's slowly unfolding 'redwood', which is inspired by the redwood pines at the Whakarewarewa forest in Rotorua. We finish with Jeremy Mayall's short 'The Effect of Bundled Sticks on Sound', which transforms the sound of the bassoon with live electronics.

Waerenga-ā-Hika names the East Coast pā that government troops besieged in 1865. 

The defenders were adherents of the new Pai Mārire religion, which opposed British sovereignty and resisted colonial forces throughout the 1860s. 

This tour de force arrangement by Robert Wiremu of Tuirina Wehi’s classic waiata brings together different vocal styles in both te reo Māori and English, mirroring the syncretic nature of the new religion. 

Lilburn’s setting of Denis Glover’s Sings Harry tells the story of an idiosyncratic New Zealander, a man of many voices and outlooks, from grumpy to gracious; to me the penultimate song, Flowers of the Sea, is one of Lilburn’s finest achievements. 

Craigie Hill is a poignant collaborative work by poet-violinist Keir GoGwilt and composer Celeste Oram, reimagining the Scottish folk love song in GoGwilt’s inimitable Starling form. 

Reuben Jelleyman’s Variations and Ross Harris’s In Memory Judith Clark provide short nostalgic pianistic interludes, and the programme ends with Dudley Benson’s epic a capella ‘Kiwi’, combining Dudley’s quirky alt-pop sensibilities with Hirini Melbourne’s original composition, the Anglican choral tradition, and evocations of birdsong.

Guest Curator: Alex Taylor

Lyell Cresswell’s absurdist Das Lied von dem Fisch is a setting of short poems about fishy topics, including one about a constipated goldfish! 

Janet Jennings sets three poems by D.H. Lawrence in A Bird, a Fruit and a Beast, while Gareth Farr’s Ornithological Anecdotes is a song cycle about New Zealand Native Birds with four specially written texts by Bill Manhire.

Jenny McLeod’s vibrant and youthful Little Symphony, written while the composer was still a student, is a response to Stravinsky’s Symphony in C. It is paired with Douglas Lilburn’s Symphony no. 2 probably New Zealand’s most well known and loved example of symphonic writing.

My selection stretches the notion of performance. Each work enacts a sonic or narrative concept, with a sense of heightened ritual, an economy of means, a containment of riches. 

The works vary in impact, from the visceral imitations of Celeste Oram’s funky Xerox Rock, and David Downes’ compellingly mysterious Generation, to the cool surgical precision of John Coulter’s Mouth Piece, and Miriama Young’s ethereal Inner. Repetition, in various forms, is a significant presence.

Guest curator: Eve de Castro-Robinson

This programme opens with John Rimmer’s short and fiery ‘Vulcan’ inspired by Auckland’s volcanic landscape. 

Commissioned by the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra for the reopening of the Christchurch Town Hall, Chris Cree Brown’s dramatic ‘Phoenix’ follows. 

We end with Lyell Cresswell’s ‘Of Smoke and Bickering Flame’, a virtuosic, intense depiction of conflict between heaven and hell.

In Turanga-nui Gillian Whitehead considers the landfall of Cook in 1769, and of Māori centuries earlier, the feeling of finally standing on dry land after a long journey, and the danger of the inevitable collision of the two cultures. Ben Hoadley’s Turakirae was inspired by the rugged, open landscape of the Turakirae promontory, where the Rimutaka ranges begin. We finish the programme with Chris Adams’s Otira Gorge, an elemental depiction of the eponymous gorge in Arthur’s Pass, as pained by Petrus Van Der Velden.

In this programme, we journey to the depths of the sea. 

The first two works, Puhake ki te Rangi (Spouting to the Skies) by Gillian Whitehead, and Tohorah by Tristan Carter, are celebrations of whales and their song. 

The final work, Ross Harris’s The Abiding Tides, is a dramatic and sombre setting of poems by Vincent O’Sullivan about ships sinking at sea.

Natalie Hunt’s evocative Only to the Highest Mountain introduces this programme, followed by Gao Ping’s The Mountain which is inspired by the culture and folk stories of Sichuan, the composer’s birthplace. We finish with Gareth Farr’s Roar of a Thousand Tigers, a celebration of 100 years since the birth of SIr Edmund Hillary. The title is Sherpa Tenzing Norgay’s description of the icy winds that buffet the uppermost slopes of Mount Everest.

These four works feature dances and dance forms. Leonie Holmes’s ‘Dance of the Wintersmith’ is inspired by Terry Pratchett’s book of the same name in which a young witch unwittingly disrupts the natural balance of the seasons by joining a supernatural Morris Dance. 

Helen Bowater’s ‘Gigue – a pataphor’ is a wild response to the Gigue in Bach’s Partita no. 3, while Gao Ping’s LefTango’ is an improvisatory exploration of the tango for the left hand alone. 

We end with Claire Cowan’s ‘Subtle Dances’ three short moods for piano trio, each featuring one of the three instruments of the group.

Ross Harris's luminous 'There may Be Light' begins this programme of works inspired by ideas of light and light phenomena. Glen Downie's 'Light Speckled Droplet' is a musical realisation of light refracted and reflected in water droplets, while Salina Fisher's Murmuring Light' is inspired by an art installation by Studio Drift, made up of swarms of luminous glass tubes. The programme ends with Karlo Margetić's 'Lightbox', a set of wild, overlapping variations, inspired by overlapping images on a photographer's lightbox.