(Jonas Brolin)
Classy and entertaining programme. (Review by Keith Millar)
The auditorium at St Agnes Anglican Church in Kloof is a
voluminous, bright and airy hall – and it has an acoustic to match. The result
is a venue which is particularly suited to classical music performances.
Providing the music on a sunny spring afternoon last Sunday
was the impressive Durban City Orchestra.Under the baton of their Resident
Conductor, Russell Scott, they belied their amateur tag and displayed their considerable
talents in a performance which was both classy and entertaining.
The orchestra is possibly better known for concerts of
popular and symphonic rock music featuring leading South African artists. But
on this occasion they produced a pleasing programme of classical pieces from
Glinka, Haydn and Shostakovitch.
The Durban City Orchestra, which is made up largely amateur
and student musicians, played with great resolve and not a little skill. It was
a performance which was much appreciated by the disappointingly small audience
in attendance at the St Agnes Auditorium.
The first item on the programme was the Overture to the
opera Ruslan and Lyudmila by Mikhail
Glinka. The opera, in five acts, is based on a poem of the same name by Alexander
Pushkin. The popular and rollicking overture from this work was an ideal start
to the concert.
This was followed by Joseph Haydn’s delightful Concerto for
Trumpet in E Flat. Haydn wrote this concerto 1796 at the age of 64 for his
friend, trumpeter Anton Weidinger. Weidinger, in an effort to improve the
limitations of the natural trumpet of the time, developed an instrument which
incorporated keys similar to those of the woodwind. Haydn’s work exploited the
new technical capabilities of the instrument and proved to be a great success.
It has since become the cornerstone of the solo trumpet repertoire.
Displaying his significant skill at Sunday’s concert was
Swiss born, Jonas Brolin, who is Co-Principal Trumpeter for the KZN
Philharmonic Orchestra. Brolin who is not a demonstrative player showed
admirable accuracy, control and dexterity. His fine performance of this
beautifully melodic work was complimented by the excellent efforts of the
orchestra.
Rounding off the programme was Dmitry Shostakovich’s
Symphony No. 9 in E-Flat Op. 70. Written in 1945 the symphony is an accessible
and compact work in five movements,which in the words of the composer is ‘a
joyful little piece’. It is both satirical and humorous, and ridicules the
pomposity and buffoonery of Stalin’s Communist regime which suspected insurrection
and espionage at every turn.
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