Movie Magic with the ICO

Bernard Hermann   Psycho Suite 
Luis Bacalov           Il Postino 
Jean Claude Petit    Theme from Jean de Florette
John Williams         Theme from Schindler's List
Johnny Greenwood  Suite from There Will be Blood
Nino Rota                Love Them The Godfather
Ennio Morricone     Theme from Cinema Paradiso
Sherman                   I wanna be like you
Henry Mancini        The Lonely Princess and It Had Better Be Tonight
John Williams          Hedwig's Theme
Michel Legrand       Umbrellas of Cherbourg

Encore Carlos Gardel           Encore Por una Cabeza 

The Irish Chamber were at St John's Church Waterford last night with their Magic of the Movies tour as guests of Symphony Club of Waterford. They were joined by accordionist Dermot Dunne who was reunited with his Far Flung Trio accomplices, Katherine Hunka and Malachy Robinson . This was music to sit back and wallow in  and the ICO played the many dreamy wistful melodies with unabashed enthusiasm. Opening with  music from Psycho, it was remarkable that the  audience reacted with smiles and chuckles to Hermann's bleak jagged score designed to evoke shock and horror.The accordion and pianissimo don't often appear in the same sentence but Dunne drew this most  deliquescent of dynamics  from his instrument in the acoustic of the church space . Versatility was a keynote of the evening and players added variety with a bit of singing and strumming their violins, ukulele style. While you'd have to admire the can-do attitude of the players, the larky element of a Jungle Book number with Malachy Robinson on vocals had a cabaret feel to it and didn't quite suit the spartan, ecclesiastical atmosphere of the venue.

There was a good enough turnout of 200 or so. Conspicuous by their absence was any student element from either second or third level  courses.  A pity because this was repertoire that had universal appeal. Touring to Monkstown and Sligo this weekend.

The Irish Chamber Orchestra return to Waterford in the Autumn when they step into the breach left by the Irish Baroque Orchestra who have pulled out of their scheduled date. We are lucky to have them visit twice this season. I had a chat with CEO Gerry Keenan who tells me that the orchestra had a wonderful reception at their German concerts in Wurzberg and Cologne earlier this season



The next SCOW concert features the Irish Symphonic Wind Orchestra and the Irish Youth Wind Ensemble, Sunday 11th September 2016, with guest conductors Johan De Meij and Ronan O Reilly.

Preview: Summer Orchestral Manoeuvres

Orchestras  are like mobile homes -movable in theory but awkward and unwieldy in practice. There are the logistics- lots of people to transport to say nothing of bulky basses and capricious harps.  But every now and then,  the RTE  National Symphony Orchestra dig themselves out of their comfort zone of  Earlsfort Terrace to delight regional audiences in  major towns outside Dublin. The recent concerts with Elizabeth Cooney and Conor Palliser were season highlights that drew capacity houses to the City Hall, Cork and WIT Sports Hall,Waterford to hear a programme of Romantic classics. The NSO are off to the West next   for their debut at the Galway Arts Festival.   Welcoming this new departure,  John O'Kane, Executive Director, RTÉ Orchestras, Quartet and Choirs said: 'The Galway International Arts Festival is important because it enables people to encounter the arts in a uniquely dynamic and relaxed environment, providing an oasis away from routine and responsibilities. RTÉ are here to play a part in that heady mixture, by creating an opportunity for festival goers to encounter great classical music alongside the other artforms that the festival showcases.’

 Conductor John Wilson , a firm audience favourite leads the NSO in four works from the heart of the orchestral repertoire: the Elgar Cello Concerto with German cellist Leonard Elschenbroich  and Beethoven's 'Emperor' Concerto with Finghin Collins; Rachmaninov's Second Symphony and Nielsen's Symphony No. 4. 'The Inextinguishable'.  Completing the orchestral mix, the world premiere of Kevin O'Connell's homage to Early Music.

The RTE Concert Orchestra, although with tidier numbers, tends not to stray too far. The current season sees them keeping the fires burning at the National Concert Hall with an Autumn excursion to the BGET at the  Grand Canal Dock for a concert based on Fantasia,  Disney’s classic introduction to  favourite orchestral repertoire . 

In contrast, the Limerick based Irish Chamber Orchestra demonstrates extreme wanderlust.  The logistics are easier of course with a band size of around 20.  But even so, you have to admire the alacrity with which the ICO cranks up the tour bus and ventures beyond the salubrious base at the World Academy of Music at University of Limerick

There is a pleasing symmetry to their next trip when the ICO takes a robust four by four on the road to 8 venues around Ireland where they will perform The Four Seasons Twice!  The ever-popular Vivaldi violin concertos are a sturdy vintage vehicle for the vigorous virtuosity of leader Katherine Hunka and her feisty string fellows. They have performed them often but in quite different versions.  Finnish virtuoso,  Pekko Kuusisto’s  raspy rustic version was miles apart from Hunka’s own more lush treatment which had the added novelty of accompanying stanzas spoken aloud  by the players.  The  programme combines Vivaldi with the more modern treatment of Astor Piazzolla’s Four Seasons of Buenos Aires., a series of single tango movements with several references to Vivaldi’s famous work.  The diverse venues range from arts centre dotted around the midlands,  a seaside in County Clare, churches in leafy Dublin suburbia and rural Rathkeale. In Waterford they are presented by the Symphony Club of Waterford at St John's Church Waterford. Note the earlier start time of 7.30pm

These musical ambassadors take the ‘world’ brief seriously and have toured with great success across Europe, Australia, South Korea, China, Singapore and the U.S   Future plans include a first collaboration with Irish Youth Opera in a touring production of Handel’s Agrippina in September.

Increase in traffic of national professional ensembles is a welcome trend that  promises  top quality programming to enhance arts scenes and festivals around the country. Watch out for these ensembles coming soon to  a venue near you.

I plan to catch the tour on Thursday night in Waterford when they are again guests of Symphony Club of Waterford.

Here is a reminder of their last visit to Waterford 

The Irish Chamber Orchestra is touring countrywide (9-19 July) visiting 8-venues with The Four Seasons Twice!

Navan (9 July), Mullingar (10 July), Birr (11 July), Roscommon (15 July), Kilkee, Co. Clare (16 July), Waterford (17 July), Monkstown, Dublin (18 July) and Rathkeale, Co. Limerick (19 July).

RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra perform as part of Galway International Arts Festival

 6pm on Friday 17 July in Bailey Allen Hall, NUI Galway

RTE Concert Orchestra play Disney’s Fantasia Live in Concert Saturday 17 October 2015, 3.30pm/ 7.30pm.
Bord Gáis Energy Theatre, Dublin 

Irish Chamber Orchestra at NCH : István Várdai

ICO in chamber music mode at the NCH


Shostakovich: 2Two pieces for octet
Schumann Cello Concerto  arr Vygen and Kahl
Nimbus for String Orchestra  Sam Perkin
Chamber Symphony for Strings op110a

The Irish Chamber Orchestra's current outing is titled World Premiere placing  Sam Perkin's commissioned piece, Nimbus for String Orchestra at the centre of their programme, bookended by works by Shostakovich.  The atmospheric, one movement work mixed a shifting palette  of string effects.  Drones set against shimmery,  tremolo violins , chuggy bass riffs, ghostly harmonics and stocky pizzicato ebbed and flowed in this freestyle piece inspired by an 'aura of radiance'. I originally thought it might have been inspired by cumulonimbus clouds and I could just imagine the music played to accompany shifting cloud patterns.

Hungarian cellist, Istvan Vardai joined them for a rendition of Schumann's Cello Concerto in a slimmed down arrangement for strings.  While some cellists can appear to wrestle with their oversized instrument, Vardai's cello seemed almost like a plaything held between his  wide arm span. The performance,  full of grace charm and effortless skill was well received by the NCH audience and we were treated to an encore, Schumann's Abendlied.   (Vardai returns to Ireland for three dates in March with pianist Finghin Collins). You can hear Vardai play the work in the video below)


The Irish Chamber Orchestra are arguably Ireland's most excellent string ensemble. The NCH is  the nation's  premier venue. So what was there not to like. The 18 standing musicians  had loads of room on the NCH platform. In the opening work, two pieces by Shostakovich for octet,  the orchestra was shorn of half it's troupe . Size matters. It felt rather like a glass of fine wine in a pint glass. The main auditorium just  lacked the intimacy that the chamber music programme, pared down to a single timbre needed to enfold the players and give the music it's full potency.

Two more dates in tour

• 20:00, Thursday, February 5, 2015

  University Concert Hall, Limerick
  Find Ticket

• 20:00, Friday, February 6, 2015

  The Model, Sligo
  Find Ticket

Hungarian Cellist with Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Budapest

Festive Music: ICO Joyeux Noel

 

Irish Chamber Orchestra

Katherine Hunka Director

Ailish Tynan Soprano

Rudi de Groote Cello

Cliona Doris Harp 

• Saint-Saëns          Le deluge Op. 45, Prélude
• Vivaldi                  Paris Concerto No. 2 in E minor, RV 133
• 
  
• Mahler                  Adagietto (from Symphony No. 5)
• Britten                  Les Illuminations
• Debussy               Sacred & Profane Dances for Harp and Strings
• Francaix               From Quinze Portraits D’Enfants
•                             In the Luxembourg garden
•                             Madame Charpentier’s Children
•                             At the Piano
•                            The Baby with a Spoon
•                            The Schoolboy
• Martinet             Le Petit Papa Noel
• Wade                  Adeste Fidelis   
• Saint-Saëns       The Swan (from Carnival of the Animals)
• Gruber/Mohr     Silent Night

I enjoyed the Irish Chamber Orchestra's festive French themed programme in the magnificent Gothic stone St Fin Barre's Cathedral .  You can read my review which appeared in Saturday's Irish Examiner here  It was a great pleasure  to hear soprano Ailish Tynan. I last heard her when she was  a guest soloist in Chansons d'Auvergne for a concert with Maynooth University Orchestra of which I was a member around 2001 or so. She was just setting off to begin her studies in London. where she now lives and enjoys a very successful career. The Francaix pieces escaped mention. They wee described by Liz Nolan in her comprehensive programme notes as 'bright, bumptious and gleeful'. Just right. 

Jorg Widmann

It isn't that long since I heard the ICO at their home base at UCH  . I had imagined that the Wunderkind of the programme title applied to the conductor  Jorg Widmann who was all over the programme as conductor , chamber music musician and composer in an impressive display of mulit tasking
. In fact the title applied to the Mendelssohn whose teenage works formed the mainstay of the programme.  You can read that review here 

Cantate Domino: Sacred Music Week at the Crescent, Limerick

'If that's what heaven is going to be like, I want to there' declared one satisfied listener following the opening concert of a week of  concerts at the Sacred Heart Church in the Crescent, Limerick. Stepping inside the recently reopened church,  I wondered at first if I had stepped into a dress rehearsal for the Sound of Music  given the presence  of nuns in old fashioned habits complete with starched wimples . The church was purchased last August by an Italian religious community  dedicated to traditional forms of liturgy who have taken on the task of restoring the former Jesuit church which is back in use after seven years . Further details from the Irish Times here .

Local award winning* chamber choir An Cór  under conductor Cecilia Madden presented a programme of sacred music from Renaissance to Romantic periods. Cecilia Madden and Chloe Heslin offered a Purcell chaconne as a instrumental interlude. There was an leaning towards French repertoire with pieces by Duruflé, Guonod and Fauré included in a programme.

The series continues nightly at 8pm concluding with an organ recital on Monday evening by tonight's accompanist, Abbé Matthew Walter who adds further to the considerable pool of organists in the Limerick area between two cathedrals, Glenstal Abbey and the Redemptorist church to name just a few venues. Organ fans may like to note the next concerts from the Irish Chamber Orchestra are titled Steeplechase and will feature the instrument in various churches. The Limerick concert takes place in St Mary's Cathedral on Thursday 16th May and features organist of St Mary's Cathedral, Peter Barley 

*An Cór were awarded Best Sacred Music Choir and Best Limerick at the 2013 Limerick Choral Festival.

An Cor Chamber Choir

Hungarian Maestro in Limerick:Takacs Nagy with ICO

Symphony No 15 G major K.124  Mozart
Symphony No 44 E minor 'Trauer'  Haydn 
Carmen Suite                    Bizet/Rodion Schedrin             

It has been ages  since I've heard the Irish Chamber Orchestra but free of commitments on Thurday  I joined the reasonably full house at University Concert Hall Limerick for a programme of Classical symphonies and a ballet suite based on melodies from Carmen . And very fine it all was too. While you can be sure that the playing will be first class from the ICO, a particular draw on this occasion was the chance to see and hear the charismatic Hungarian conductor, Gabor Takacs Nagy. After several decades at the helm of his eponymous string quartet, he has changed roles and is tipped  as being one to watch for a plum conducting positions with one pf the major London symphony orchestras. So far he seems happy to practice his art with smaller ensembles outside the capital and is working with premier chamber ensembles, Manchester Camerata and now in a new role as 'Artistic Partner' with the Irish Chamber Orchestra. (The Takacs String Quartet still exists now based in the US with two of the original members in the line up )

As if in an effort to make a connection with the audience from the outset, the tall and slim Hungarian , made his entrance  from front of house and first addressed the audience reprising some of his remarks made at a pre show dinner address.  His voice didn't project  quite enough to carry effectively to the higher levels of the house and that aspect of the performance didn't add value for me seated at the back of the stalls. You can catch a flavour of his style  in the video below. In his expressive conducting gestures he  radiates a sense of energy  and a most genial personality that is very appealing.  In the Mozart and Haydn symphonies, he drew a performance  marked with precision and contrasts from the Irish Chamber Orchestra. I have rarely heard such hushed pianissimos and the reading of the Haydn  brought out the dramatic elements of the work.. Unusually the two oboes were placed in the hot seats  right in front of the conductor and the Haydn was performed without a keyboard continuo part.
The percussion players were the star turn in the fabulous Camen Suite by Russian composer Chedrin .  A group of five players including the experienced Noel Eccles and rising star Alex Petcu fanned out across the stage enclosing the orchestra. adding lashings of sparkle to the rich and sonorous string sound  . I specially liked the marimba duet. Shorn of  the distraction of voices and stage sets, just how resilient and numerous  are those Bizet's melodies  was apparent in this reworking for the composer's ballerina wife who Takacs Nagy informed us had last danced to the work at age 61!  Hope for us all yet.   -And the very best way to finish-, the longest silence  before applause and a deserved standing ovation.

Venue Notes I went along to the pre show dinner  in the  elegant period dining room of Plassey House. The Hungarian maestro gave a  charming  pre dinner address  before departing to prepare for the concert .   He opened with an anecdote about his first trip to Limerick in the 70's as a member of the acclaimed eponymous string quartet .  He spoke animatedly  about his approach to the task of conducting and of course complimented the players of the  ICO.  Opportunities to meet the performers are welcome.  Open rehearsals, pre concert talks and post show signings extend  the concert experience.  Entertainers /artists in the commercial world know the value of meeting and greeting their audience and the show ain't over 'til the post show hand shakes and signing are done. However as in the NCH last week, UCH does not encourage patrons to dally . Why not open the cafe  and/or bar for a period after the show and even engage in a little merchandising. The ICO like any recording artist has CDs to sell  after all .




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http://cathydesmond.blogspot.ie/2011/02/upstairs-downstairs-ico-and-showband.html