(Maggie Deppe & Sabine Baird)
Sublime music played with elegance and skill. (Review by Keith Millar)
Aaaaah! At last. On Sunday, after a six month Covid hiatus, we were treated to a concert of live classical music. What a pleasure.
Performing their concert entitled Locked In Classics at St Thomas’ Anglican Church in Musgrave Road were Sabine Baird on flute and Maggie Deppe on piano and organ.
It goes without saying that with two such accomplished artists the performance was going to be good. And it was. Sublime music played with elegance and skill.
The venue played its part as well. With its spaciousness and huge vaulted ceilings, it has very acceptable acoustics for classic music performances. And as the cherry on the top, it has one of the best pipe organs in Durban which allowed Maggie Deppe to demonstrate her abilities on this instrument.
The only slight problem with this venue is the boy racers who find Musgrave Road a suitable race track.
The church also provided all the fogging and sanitising etc. which is required to meet the Covid safety protocols.
The programme included a nice selection of music from baroque to film music and a touch of tango.
There were three works by Johan Sebastian Bach. His Suite in B minor, an organ piece Prelude and Fugue in C major and his Sonata BWV 1033.
Christof Gluck’s Minuet and Dance of the Blessed Spirits was followed by Jules Massenet’s sublimely beautiful Meditation from the Opera Thais.
The second organ piece was Voluntary in D. It was composed by Samuel Wesley, the wayward son of Charles Wesley who is responsible many of the most popular hymns sung in the Methodist Church. He wrote in the region of 6,500 altogether.
The artists also performed the Giga from Georg Fredric Handel’s Sonata in F, Gabriel Faure’s Morceau de Concours, as well as two items of film music, Enrico Morricone’s Cinema Paradiso, and John William’s Schindler’s List.
To complete what was a very enjoyable experience we heard Argentinian composer Astor Piazzolla’s Street Tango.
Both Baird and Deppe provided interesting information about the music and the composers between each item. This extra insight was much appreciated by the modest audience that attended the concert. – Keith Millar
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