2022 Adam Summer Celebration Programme
Grand Opening Concert
Welcome! Our Celebration opens with the clear and congenial tones of ‘Papa Haydn’, the revered father of the string quartet medium, then moves further east to Hungary and Bartók's impassioned first sonata for violin and piano. Written at the request of young violin virtuosa Jelly d’Aranyi with whom he was in love, it was premiered with Bartók himself at the piano. The concert finishes with the dramatic colours and rich harmonies of Bohemian Dvořák's second piano quartet, never before heard at our festival.
Joseph Haydn - Quartet in D Major, Opus 20, No. 4
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)
Béla Bartók - Sonata no.1 SZ.75
Monique Lapins (violin)
Jian Liu (piano)
Interval
Antonín Dvořák - Quartet in E Flat, Opus 87
NZTrio – Amalia Hall (violin), Ashley Brown (cello), Somi Kim (piano)
Gillian Ansell (viola)
Thursday 3 February 7.30pm
Tickets: $65 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
Sponsored by Nelson Pine Industries
Velvet Revolution
Soviet-Australian composer Elena Kats-Chernin's exhilarating horn trio reflects the dramatic political events around the fall of the Berlin Wall (she was living in Berlin in 1989) and the peaceful end to Communist rule in the city of Prague. We stay in Eastern Europe for the tour de force that is Shostakovich's second quartet. Written in just 19 days in 1944, it features a huge range of emotions and atmospheres - from sensuous to sardonic, eerie to beguiling, and from Klezmer-inspired moments to rhapsodic recitative.
Elena Kats-Chernin - Velvet Revolution
Arna Morton (violin), Alex Morton (horn), Somi Kim (piano)
Dmitri Shostakovich - Quartet No. 2 in A Major, Opus 68
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)
Friday 4 February 2 pm
Tickets $45 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
Sponsored by Chris Finlayson
Meet the Artists - Arna & Alex Morton and Helen Webby
Stay in the hall after the concert to meet the members of The Morton Trio Arna and Alex Morton and fellow Christchurch resident, harpist Helen Webby. Hear stories about their lives and music-making - including their online extra-musical presence! Audiences will remember Arna Morton as the charismatic first violinist of the 2017 Troubadour Quartet.
Friday 4 February 3pm
Free Entry
NCMA - Auditorium
Romance
We open with two movements from J.S. Bach's mighty The Art of the Fugue. Bach's music was a great inspiration to so many subsequent composers, including Brahms, who based the first and last movements of his E Minor cello sonata on the themes from Bach's Contrapuncti nos. 4 and 13. You'll then re-hear these melodies in the inimitable sound of this beloved sonata, written soon after his arrival in Vienna. In this concert we introduce you to our wonderful soprano, Michaela Cadwgan, with two songs, and conclude the programme with Schnittke's masterful Piano Quintet, reflecting on the death of his mother, through stages of grief to acceptance and hope.
Johann Sebastian Bach - Contrapunctus #4 from The Art of the Fugue
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)
Johann Sebastian Bach - Contrapunctus #13 from The Art of the Fugue
Jian Liu (piano)
Johannes Brahms - Cello Sonata No. 1 in E Minor, Opus 38
Rolf Gjelsten (cello), Jian Liu (piano)
Sergei Rachmaninoff - In the Silence of the Secret Night, Opus 4, No. 3
Sergei Rachmaninoff - Oh, never sing to me again, Opus 4, No. 4
Michaela Cadwgan (soprano), Somi Kim (piano)
Interval
Alfred Schnittke - Quintet (1976)
Diedre Irons (piano)
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)
Friday 4 February 7.30 pm
Tickets $65 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
Sponsored by Dorothy & Alastair Kerr
Jian Liu Master Class
Come and listen while Jian Liu, Head of Piano Studies at the New Zealand School of Music, teaches and inspires young pianists, as he helps them to look behind the notes and lift the music off the page.
Saturday 5 February 10 am
Free Entry
NCMA - Recital Theatre
Flights of Fantasy
A set of songs by Brahms, Strauss and Schubert are the centrepiece of this concert, flanked by music with vocal inspiration: on one side by Hindemith's Opus 11 No. 4 Viola Sonata, one of his most lyrical works; and on the other by the elegiac and highly expressive Arnold Bax Harp Quintet, reflecting his love of all things Irish, and written in the waning days of WW1. To send you humming into the summer afternoon, Massenet's beloved Meditation for violin and harp will be just the ticket.
Paul Hindemith - Sonata Opus 11, No. 4
Gillian Ansell (viola), Diedre Irons (piano)
Johannes Brahms - Ständchen, Opus 106
Johannes Brahms - Vergebliches Ständchen
Johannes Brahms - Immer leiser wird mein Schlummer
Richard Strauss - Für fünfzehn Pfennige
Franz Schubert - Auf dem Wasser zu singen
Franz Schubert - Der Musensohn
Michaela Cadwgan (soprano), Somi Kim (piano)
Arnold Bax - Quintet (1919)
Helen Webby (harp)
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)
Jules Massenet - Méditation from “Thaïs”
Helene Pohl (violin), Helen Webby (harp)
Saturday 5 February 2 pm
Tickets $45 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
Sponsored by Annie Henry
Bold Strokes
One of Prokofiev’s most gripping works, his F Minor Violin Sonata, sets the stage for an evening of contrasts. Be soothed by the classic harp sounds of Pierné before a light-hearted take on a famous Mozart piano sonata segues into Mozart himself, taking the mickey out of lesser composers and bumbling performers in his ‘Village Musicians’ serenade. Then let NZTrio take you on a grand ride with Brahms' majestic first trio.
Sergei Prokofiev - Sonata in F Minor, Opus 80
Helene Pohl (violin), Diedre Irons (piano)
Gabriel Pierné Caprice
Helen Webby (harp)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart/Fazil Say - Turca
Helen Webby (harp)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - A Musical Joke (The Village Musicians)
Ed Allen (horn), Alex Morton (horn)
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello)
Interval
Johannes Brahms - Trio No.1 in B Major, Opus 8
NZTrio – Amalia Hall (violin), Ashley Brown (cello), Somi Kim (piano)
Saturday 5 February 7.30 pm
Tickets: $65 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
Sponsored by Rosamund Arthur and Don Mead
Helen Webby Master Class
We are excited to present our first ever harp master class - if you've ever wondered how harpists create that magic on their instrument come along to find out! See master harpist Helen Webby inspire young harpists to bring out the best in themselves and their instrument.
Sunday 6 February 10 am
Free Entry
NCMA - Recital Theatre
Celebrating Aotearoa
As always, we love celebrating the richness of Aotearoa’s marvellously diverse composers in our Waitangi Day concert. From the simplicity of Lilburn's iconic song cycle Sings Harry, to the colourful and atmospheric writing of Salina Fisher and Ken Young, to the rocking rhythms of Mark Smythe's Moto Revivo in a new revision specifically for this concert, there's something for everyone.
Douglas Lilburn - Sings Harry
Michaela Cadwgan (soprano), Somi Kim (piano)
Salina Fisher - Kintsugi
NZTrio – Amalia Hall (violin), Ashley Brown (cello), Somi Kim (piano)
Mark Smythe - Moto Revivo
Helen Webby (harp)
Kenneth Young - Horn Trio
Arna Morton (violin), Alex Morton (horn), Somi Kim (piano)
Sunday 6 February 2 pm
Tickets $45 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
2022 Troubadours in Concert
Come along and hear the 2022 Adam Troubadours as they strut their stuff on the NCMA stage.
String Quartet No. 2 in C Major (1945) - Benjamin Britten
l. Allegro calmo senza rigore
ll. Vivace
lll. Chacony
Grace McKenzie (first violin), KiHei Lee (second violin), Nathan Pinkney (viola), Bethany Angus (cello)
Sunday 6 February 6.15 pm
Free Entry
NCMA - Auditorium
Grand Finale
Our Grand Finale concert features a fabulous range of works, including the luscious Saint-Saëns Fantaisie for Violin and Harp, a world premiere for the NZSQ with Bob Bickerton playing Taonga Puoro, some beloved Italian songs and Aria, and to end, Tchaikovsky’s blockbuster ‘Souvenir de Florence’ string sextet.
Phil Brownlee and Ariana Tikao - Manaaki
Commissioned by the Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts
NZ String Quartet - Helene Pohl (first violin), Monique Lapins (second violin), Gillian Ansell (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello), Bob Bickerton (taonga puoro)
Camille Saint-Saëns - Fantaisie for Violin and Harp, Opus 124
Amalia Hall (violin), Helen Webby (harp)
Giulio Caccini - Amarilli Mia Bella
Francesco Durante - Danza Danza Fanciula
Giocomo Puccini - ‘Donde Lieta Usci’ from La bohème
Gioachino Rossini - Aragonese
Michaela Cadwgan (soprano), Somi Kim (piano)
Interval
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - 'Souvenir de Florence'
Helene Pohl (violin), Amalia Hall (violin) Gillian Ansell (viola), Monique Lapins (viola), Rolf Gjelsten (cello), Ashley Brown (cello)
Sunday 6 February 7.30 pm
Tickets $65 plus booking fee
NCMA - Auditorium
Sponsored by Nelson Pine Industries