Superb Song Duo : Flavin & Matthewman at City Hall Waterford

Máire Flavinand Gary Matthewman in the Georgian Large Room City Hall Waterford.

Winning Song Team deliver Love in Spring at City Hall

Schumann Widnung; Die Lotusblume; Du bist wie eine Blume; Fruhlinghshnacht

Wolf Er ist’s; Im Fruhling; An eine Aolsharfe; Zitronenefalter

Strauss Allerseelen; O Susser Mai; Fruhlingsgedrange; Morgen

Chausson; Le temps de Lilas; Les Papillons; Le Callibri

Reynaldo Hahn Le Rossignol des Lilas; Ah Chloris; Printemps

WV Wallace: Sweet Spirit, o hear my prayer, Say my heart can this be love; Orange Flowers

Encore Gershwin  Summertime

There was a great sense of occasion in City Hall as Máire Flavin made her debut in Waterford, the birthplace of her parents. The recital, part of the Waterford-Music series was dedicated to Elizabeth Downey, founder member of the chamber music society celebrating 73 years of activity. Taking her cue from the April date, the soprano built a programme around lieder and chanson dedicated to Love and Spring with a soupçon of American Summer for an encore.

Opening with  Widnung, Schumann’s passionate dedication to his bride Clara, Flavin from the off displayed the vocal fire power and stage artistry that propelled her to the finalist rostrum at the 2011 Cardiff Singer of the World and on to international opera stages. A rich and full bodied voice with her pleasant stage manner and range of dramatic expression made for an intense and  enthralling performance.  From ‘light touch' Schumann she moved to 'angsty Wolf’. In An eine Aolsharfe, the superb pianism of Gary Matthewman in creating an almost orchestral palette of sound was astonishing. A ravishing postlude to Morgen, a wedding present by Richard Strauss to his wife  closed the first half in a mood blissful rapture.

Birds , butterflys and flowers proliferated in the second half chansons by Chausson and Hahn. The most familiar of which was Ah Chloris with resonance in Bach’s air. In a nice touch,  the lilac theme was picked up in the platform display of purple blooms.. Finally by request we heard a set of charming Victorian ballads by local  favourite WV Wallace which suited the drawing room ambience of the splendid chamber. Beautifully dressed in fuschia gown with lace detail and formal tails, the pair looked as though they could have stepped off the set of Downton Abbey where indeed, Matthewman has done some service. 

 This was a thrilling performance from an exciting singer, all the greater for the superb artistry of  Matthewman whose vivid  piano colours and breath-taking timing  created the enchantment around  Flavin's  magical vocal encounters. A night to treasure  from a winning song team! I don’t expect to hear a finer collaboration any time soon.

Among the distinguished guests were members of the Downey family and Jim and Moira Flavin.


Related Posts

Interview Maire Flavin http://cathydesmond.blogspot.ie/2015/04/maire-flavin-to-make-waterford-debut.html

Remembering Elizabeth Downey  http://cathydesmond.blogspot.ie/2015/04/remembering-elizabeth-downey.html

  



Remembering Elizabeth Downey.

Elizabeth Downey

Thursday 16th April is a very special occasion in the Waterford Music calendar. The Downey family mark their unique association with the Waterford Music Chamber series with their support for a recital in memory of one of the founder members. Elizabeth Downey was herself a renowned teacher and performer. More detail on this important figure in the musical life of the city is here in this piece by Charlotte de Cloet Downey composed in 2013 on the occasion of the first Elizabeth Downey memorial recital,

'Singing and voice production were the main teaching subjects, according to her name plate, of renowned Waterford music teacher Elizabeth Downey. Born in London in 1895, she was to be the youngest daughter of the Irish literary publisher and writer, historian and journalist Edmund Downey (1856-1937). In 1906 the family moved back to Ireland, where her father bought The Waterford News and The Evening News, the daily newspapers of which he would be managing director and editor till his death.

Elizabeth, after graduating from the Royal College of Music London as pianist and mezzo-soprano, set up a teaching practice for private pupils in Newtown, Waterford and taught music at the local Ursuline School. Training young singers to compete in annual Feis Ceoil, she achieved a high level of success, with several pupils as prize winner each year. As a teacher in Voice Production she instructed many members of the local clergy in the proper use of their voice in their public ministry.
At many concerts all over the country, she also performed herself as a mezzo soprano, and she was a frequent guest performer on Radio Eireann.
As classical music correspondent she contributed frequently to her father’s newspaper The Waterford News.
Her passion for quality classical music drove her to become one of the four founding members of the Waterford Music Club. In her house in Waterford’s Newtown, in the summer of 1942, the inaugural committee meeting took place, with the other founding members Ida Starkie-O’Reilly, William F Watt and T F H Bayly. Nowadays, 72 years later, the (inter)national chamber music concert society, renamed as Waterford~Music, is still going strong, after having presented over 570 concerts, mainly in the Large Room.
There and in all her other musical activities she always insisted on the highest professional standards, standards which she herself nourished by continuing to take  courses at the RCM in London each summer, the war years excepted.
In 1965, after many years of persuasion, she agreed at an advanced age, to move to Dublin to teach singing at the Royal Irish Academy of Music. She rapidly built up a substantial number of pupils. Unfortunately, she was killed in a road accident in 1967, before her work as a model music teacher had gained the national recognition it merits.'

Waterford Music also remember the late Maurice Downey, half brother of Elizabeth who passed away last November.


More on the guest artists, Máire Flavin and Gary Matthewman in my next post

On Thursday 16th April , supported by the Downey family, Waterford Music will commemorate Elizabeth Downey, this great Waterford music teacher.

Máire Flavin (oprano) and Gary Matthewman (piano) will present a special song and lieder recital with Schumann's ‘Widnung'Lieder’, Strauss, Hahn and Chausson . Specially for this event, songs by William Vincent Wallace are included

Thursday 16th April @8pm, Large Room, City Hall, Waterford


Door tickets: €18/€5 (students). Talk to us about great value season tickets for next year. All tickets include free interval soft drinks. http://www.waterford-music.com