One of the great stabilising factors of life is consistency in something you love.
As a tenor, being in the MSO Chorus brings the joys of a second family with great camaraderie between us all, the fulfilment felt in singing (to our heart’s content) and the buzz you get from performing well. If you could bottle the euphoria you feel, you have a great drug to savour for years to come.
These are our concerts for 2012,
performed with the orchestra...
For a promo, here are stills taken while we rehearsed, set to our performance of Brahms' Schicksalslied,
sung in November 2008
March
Westlake Missa Solis – Requiem for Eli
MSO 2012 Program – Tognetti Plays Mendelssohn
with Nigel Westlake conductor
The Program is
Beethoven Coriolan Overture, Op62
Meldelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor – Richard Tognetti violin WestlakeMissa Solis – Requiem for Eli – Blakely McLean Davies treble
Nigel Westlake, Australia’s brilliant composer of film music (including award-winning scores for Babe and Miss Potter, and the Imax spectaculars Antarctica and Solarmax) introduces his new masterpiece, a work of exultant, universal power born out of profound tragedy.
Friday 2 @ 7.30pm Melbourne Town Hall, Swanson Street
May
Walton Belshazzar's Feast
MSO 2012 Program – Belshazzar's Feast with Bramwell Tovey conductor
The Program is
Britten Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra, Op34 Lambert The Rio Grande Walton Belshazzar's Feast
In the 20th century, Britain overthrew its unfair reputation as a “land without music.” Three of the great composers who played key roles in this musical renaissance are featured here. Britten’s popular reworking of the music of Purcell, and Sir William Walton’s dramatic choral masterpiece, based on a great biblical story, frame a rare gem by Constant Lambert (son of Australian painter George Lambert), which fuses Latin American and jazz influences with a distinctively English temperament.
Friday 25 and Saturday 26 @ 8pm Melbourne Town Hall, Swanson Street
June
Holst The Planets with theWomen of the MSO Chorus
MSO 2012 Program – The Planets: A Journey in Music and Film with Alexander Shelley conductor and the Women of the MSO Chorus
The Program is
Mozart Symphony No 41 in C major, K.551 'Jupiter' Holst The Planets
Through movies as diverse as Paradise Road and The Right Stuff, the music of The Planets has permeated our culture. Holst’s spectacular astrological journey is one of the most popular of all orchestral works, from the menacing tread of Mars, the Bringer of War to the final movement, Neptune, the Mystic, in which we seem to be adrift in a world of stars and ice.
Friday 1 @ 8pm Costa Hall, Deakin University, Geelong Saturday 2 @ 2pm + Monday 4 @ 6.30pm Melbourne Town Hall, Swanson Street
August – the MSO returns to the refurbished Hamer Hall
Mahler Symphony No 3 in D minor with theWomen of the MSO Chorus
MSO 2012 Program – A Spectacular Return: Act 1 - Mahler's Third with Markus Stenz conductor Fiona Sargeant viola the Women of the MSO Chorus
and the National Boys' Choir of Australia
The Program is
Dean Brett Intimate Decisions Ades Polaris Mahler Symphony No 3 in D minor
n the first concert in the refurbished Hamer Hall by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, former Chief Conductor Markus Stenz renews his happy association with the MSO in a program of sonic splendour. The adventure begins with music from two of the most exciting and celebrated of contemporary composers, and culminates in Gustav Mahler’s majestic Third Symphony, his great hymn to love and its redemptive power, engulfing the listener with ecstatic sonorities. Please note this concert will have two intervals.
Thursday 9 + Friday 10 @ 8pm Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
Grainger 5 Songs
MSO 2012 Program – Grieg Concerto with Sir Andrew Davis conductor Piers Lane piano
The Program is Grainger Marching Song of Democracy Grieg Piano Concerto in A minor, Op16 Grainger Brigg Fair Delius Brigg Fair GraingerDanny Deever GraingerThe Bride's Tragedy GraingerTribute to Stephen Foster
Sir Andrew Davis leads a celebration of the music of Australia’s – and Melbourne’s – greatest composer, the fascinating and brilliant Percy Grainger. An orchestrator of dazzling virtuosity, Grainger invested the music of British and American folk traditions with original realisations, and his music exults in an Australian ideal of democratic openness. As a pianist, Grainger’s performances of the concerto by his mentor and friend Edvard Grieg were famed for their sympathy and insight, and this concert celebrates Grainger’s triumph with a performance by superb Australian pianist Piers Lane.
Thursday 30, Friday 31 and Saturday, 1 September @ 8pm Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
September – Seethe last performance of theGrainger 5 Songs, above
October
Shore Lord of the Rings - The Fellowship of the Ring
MSO 2012 Program – Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring MSOC and the National Boys' Choir of Australia
See the film, and hear Howard Shore's award-winning score performed live on stage by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Chorus.
Friday 5 @ 7pm Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
November
Duruflé Requiem MSO 2012 Program – Duruflé Requiem with Tadaaki Otaka conductor Garrick Ohlsson piano Deborah Humble mezzo-soprano José Carbó baritone
The Program is
Brahms Piano Concerto No.1 in D minor, Op.15 DurufléRequiem
The Requiem by French composer Maurice Duruflé is a work of delicate and moving beauty, and this performance features two of the most eloquent of Australia’s fine singers, to help draw you into the work’s lush, meditative world.
Thursday 15 + Saturday 17 @ 8pm Melbourne Town Hall, Swanson Street Friday 16 @ 8pm Robert Blackwood Hall, Monash University, Clayton
December
Handel Messiah
MSO 2012 Program – All-Star Messia with Bernard Labadie conductor Karina Gauvin soprano Robin Blaze counter-tenor Ian Bostridge tenor Teddy Tahu Rhodes baritone
The Program is HandelMessiah
Handel’s Messiah is packed with great tunes and inspiring moments – that’s why it’s been loved by audiences for centuries. For this presentation, the MSO assembles a cast of international all-stars, with a stylish and sophisticated conductor, Bernard Labadie. Whether your love for this work is long-standing, or you’re coming to it for the first time, this performance will be a revelation of Messiah’s many musical splendours.
Friday 14 @ 8pm Robert Blackwood Hall, Monash University, Clayton Saturday 15 @ 7pm + Sunday 16 @ 5pm Melbourne Town Hall, Swanson Street
Recently the MSO and Concordis Chamber Choir performed Video Games Unplugged which incorporated the Dragonborntheme from the action role-playing video game The Elder Scrolls V : Skyrim. Some of us tenors and basses added more grunt to the singing. The music you hear here is not us, but from YouTube.
