The final concert of the KZN Philharmonic
Orchestra’s Winter Symphony Season Series will take place on June 28 in the
Playhouse Opera and celebrates the 100th anniversary of the birth of Nelson
Mandela.
The impressive programme will feature
conductors Cathrine Winnes and Msizi Brian Mnyandu with soloists soprano Nozuko
Teto; soprano Siphokazi Maphumulo; alto Ntokozo Mhlongo; tenor Khulekani
Khumalo, and bass Andile Dlamini.
The choirs involved at the Clermont
Community Choir, Durban Symphonic Choir and Thokozani Choral Society.
The programme includes Beethoven’s Fidelio
Overture in E Major, Op. 72; Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 4 in A Major, Op. 90,
“Italian”; Handel’s Coronation Anthem No. 1, Zadok the Priest and Author
of Peace from Saul as well as Bokwe’s
(arr. cock): Plea for Africa; Mnomiya’s
Madiba and Sibisi’s Credo (Ngiyakholwa) from the Zulu Mass
in B-Flat Major. Other works are Mozart’s (Süssmayr) Lacrimosa from Requiem
and Haydn: The Heavens are Telling The
Glory of God from The Creation
Unlike Mozart, whose extraordinarily fecund
operatic productivity saw the creation of more than 20 operas, of which the
last eight are unparalleled masterpieces, Beethoven laboured mightily to achieve
a comparable feat with just one opera, Fidelio
(originally titled Leonore, or The Triumph of Marital Love). The great
work’s torturous gestation saw its initial première in its three-act format in
1804, before rewrites set in. By the time the work came to life in its final
two-act incarnation in 1814, Beethoven had produced no less than three
distinctive Leonore Overtures (each
taking on its own concert-stage identity). The fourth and final version, the
familiar Fidelio Overture, is the
curtain-raiser of the fourth Winter Season programme.
Mendelssohn’s “Italian” Symphony has its
origins in the tour of Europe which occupied him from 1829 to 1831. It was
finished in Berlin on March 13, 1833, in response to an invitation for a
symphony from the London Philharmonic Society. The symphony’s success, and
Mendelssohn’s popularity, influenced the course of British music for the rest
of the century. Mendelssohn, however, planned to write alternative versions of
the second, third and fourth movements. He never published the symphony, and it
appeared in print only in 1851; thus it is numbered as his “Symphony No. 4”,
even though it was in fact the third he composed.
The evening’s programme concludes with a
potpourri of vocal classics showcasing a quartet of soloists and some of
Durban’s finest choirs. Two great Handel items – the imposing Coronation
Anthem, Zadok the Priest, and Merab’s
haunting aria, Author of Peace, from
the oratorio Saul – combine with the
deeply moving Lacrimosa from Mozart’s
Requiem and Haydn’s exhilarating The Heavens Are Telling the Glory of God from The Creation – to offset three visceral contemporary items by South
African composers. An uplifting end to the season.
The concert takes place at 19h30 on June 28,
2018, in the Playhouse Opera. Booking is through Computicket (0861 915 8000).
Prior to all the KZNPO World Symphony
Season concerts, Friends of Music hold pre-concert lectures in the Playhouse
Alhambra Room at 18h15. These enlightening talks are designed to enrich the
experience of the concertgoer.
To link direct to the KZN Philharmonic’s
website, click on the advert at the top of this page or visit kznphil.org.za
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