Kamloops Symphony Society
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
John McDonald, ICD.D | President
Steve Powrie | Vice President
Tyler Klymchuk | Treasurer
Kait Methot | Secretary
Kathy Collier
Lisa Fuller
Christy Gauley
Lucille Gnanasihamany
Gabriele Klein
Rod Michell
Sydney Takahashi
Simon Walter
HONOURARY LIFE MEMBERS
Bonnie Jetsen
Art Hooper
Proud Member of Orchestras Canada, the national association for Canadian orchestras
ADMINISTRATION
Executive Director
Daniel Mills
Music Director
Dina Gilbert
Office Administrator
Sue Adams
Operations Coordinator
Sam Bregoliss
Marketing Coordinator
Ryan Noakes
Librarian
Sally Arai
Orchestra Personnel Manager
Olivia Martin
Production Assistant
Adrien Fillion
Chorus Master
Tomas Bijok
Collaborative Pianist
Daniela O’Fee
Chorus Administrator
Marnie Smith
Music Director Emeritus
Bruce Dunn
MUSIC DIRECTOR
Music Director Dina Gilbert is a Canadian conductor passionate about educating audiences of all ages and broadening their appreciation of orchestral music through innovative collaborations. This commitment, as well as Dina Gilbert’s extensive repertoire—often highlighting Canadian and women composers—have shaped her career and the orchestras she has worked with over the years. Regularly invited to conduct in Canada and overseas, Dina Gilbert attracts critical acclaim for her energy, precision and versatility.
In addition to conducting the Kamloops Symphony, highlights of the 2022-2023 season include debuts with the Orchestre national des Pays de la Loire and a tour with the Orchestre national de Metz in France and return invitations with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal and the Orchestre symphonique de Québec. As the Principal Conductor of the Orchestre des Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal, she will perform Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring and Prokofiev’s Cinderella.
Over the years, Dina has been invited by leading Canadian orchestras including the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, the Orchestre Métropolitain, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the Hamilton Philharmonic and the Orchestre symphonique de Québec. She also conducted performances in Oregon and North-Carolina, in Colombia, Spain, France, and in Niigata and Tokyo.
Her innate curiosity towards nonclassical musical genres and her willingness to democratize classical music have brought her to conduct the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and the Orchestre national de Lyon in several Hip Hop Symphonic
programs featuring renowned Hip hop artists I AM, MC Solaar, Youssoupha and Bigflo & Oli. Dina is also renowned for her expertise in conducting multidisciplinary projects such as cineconcerts performances (The Red Violin, The Artist, E.T. the Extraterrestrial) as well as Video Game soundtracks (The Montreal Video Game Symphony, Outlast, The Amazing Spiderman 2).
As the Music Director of the Orchestre symphonique de l’Estuaire (20172022), Dina expanded the symphonic repertoire and has reached thousands of children with her interactive and participative Conducting 101 workshops As the founder and artistic director of the Ensemble Arkea, a Montreal-based chamber orchestra, she premiered over thirty works from emerging Canadian composers. From 2013 to 2016, Dina Gilbert was the assistant conductor of the Orchestre symphonique de Montreal and Maestro Kent Nagano, also assisting guest conductors including Zubin Mehta, Sir Roger Norrington and Lawrence Foster.
Dina Gilbert earned her doctorate from the Université de Montréal and she polished her skills in masterclasses with Kenneth Kiesler, Pinchas Zukerman, Neeme Järvi and the musicians from the Kritische Orchester in Berlin. Awarded the Opus Prize of “Découverte de l’année” in 2017, Dina Gilbert was also named as one of the “50 personnalités créant l’extraordinaire au Québec” in 2018 by the Urbania Magazine. She has also received support from the Canada Arts Council, the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and from the PèreLindsay Foundation.
Dina Gilbert
Orchestra
FIRST VIOLIN
Cvetozar Vutev concertmaster *
Elyse Jacobson assistant concertmaster *
Susan Aylard
Jiten Beairsto
Carol Hur
Samantha Kung
Molly MacKinnon
I-Hsin Wu
SECOND VIOLIN
Boris Ulanowicz*
Francisco Barradas
Annette Dominik
Fang Chen Han
Narumi Higuchi
Haley Leach
VIOLA
Ashley Kroecher*
Parmela Attariwala
Tony Kastelic
Caroline Olsen
CELLO
Martin Kratky*
Doug Gorkoff
Yu Yu Liu
Olivia Walsh
BASS
Yefeng Yin++
Lukas Peladeau
FLUTE
Heather Beaty*
OBOE
Marea Chernoff*
Lauris Davis
*Principal +Acting Principal ++Substitute Principal
Chair Sponsors
CLARINET
Sally Arai*
Krystal Morrison
BASSOON
Olivia Martin*
Karmen Doucette
HORN
Heather Walker++
Dennis Colpitts
TRUMPET
Mark D’Angelo*
Jeremy Vint
TIMPANI
Caroline Bucher*
PERCUSSION
Caroline Bucher
Geoff & Judith Benson | concertmaster
Rod Michell | assistant concertmaster
Gabriele Klein | principal second violin
June McClure | principal viola
Anonymous | principal cello
Eleanor Nicoll | principal flute
John & Joyce Henderson | principal clarinet
Kelvin Barlow | principal bassoon
Hugh & Marilyn Fallis | principal trumpet
MOZART’S DARK SIDE
PROGRAMME
Dina Gilbert, Conductor
Jennifer Tung, Guest Conductor*
Maxim Bernard, Piano
Kelly-Marie Murphy In The Time of Our Disbelieving
—conducted by Jennifer Tung
Jean Sibelius
Pelléas and Mélisande
I. At the Castle Gate
II. Mélisande
III. At the Seashore
IV. A Spring in the Park
V. The Three Blind Sisters
VI. Pastorale
VII. Mélisande and the Spinning Wheel
VIII. Entr’acte
IX. The Death of Mélisande
INTERMISSION
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466
I. Allegro
II. Romanze
III. Rondo, Allegro assai
*Participation made possible by Kamloops Symphony’s partnership with Tapestry Opera in the Women in Musical Leadership Program
PERFORMANCE SPONSOR
Maxim Bernard
After completing his studies at the Québec Conservatory of Music with pianist Suzanne Beaubien, his driving passion led him to one of his idols, pianist André Laplante at the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, where he received his Artist Diploma. In 2004, he met the legendary pianist, and soon mentor, Menahem Pressler. During his studies under the guidance of Mehanem Pressler at the University of Indiana, where he earned both his Master’s and Doctoral degrees in Piano Performance, Maxim developed a unique style, and music has become for him a spiritual experience. His sensitivity, his personal touch, and the spontaneity he brings to his interpretations make him an exceptional pianist.
After winning several competitions, in 2006 his career was launched after he won the prestigious “International Stepping Stone” of the Canadian Music Competition. Since then Maxim has been playing in Canada, Cologne, Paris, Bruxelles, Vienna, where he gives solo performances or is a guest soloist with orchestra. To name a few, he has been playing with the Orchestre Métropolitain, the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, the Orchestre Philharmonique du Nouveau Monde, the Peterborough Symphony Orchestra, the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra and Les Violons du Roy. In 2019, he made his debut at Wigmore Hall in London with a Chopin recital! During the same year, he was guest soloist with the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra and the Sinfonia Rotterdam, orchestra with which he made a concert tour of the cities of Rotterdam (De Doelen), The Hague and Amsterdam (Concertgebouw).
Maxim is passionate about the great pianists of the past. He wished to celebrate the career of Vladimir Horowitz by recreating the program that the pianist played in Moscow in 1986. Maxim has meanwhile also recorded this repertoire for his solo album “Hommage à Horowitz”, released on February 11, 2022.
Classica magazine, represented by critic Alain Lompech, gives him 5 stars! He mentions that he “succeeds in evoking the spirit and the style of Horowitz’ performance whilst also remaining himself.” Jean-Charles Hoffelé wrote: “This disc can be listened to over and over again; indeed, the relevance of his choices, the subtlety of his phrasing and the fascinating mirror he holds up to the Moscow recital make it impossible to put back on the shelf.”
His qualifications led him to serve on juries of many music competitions throughout Canada. He is currently a piano professor at the Conservatoire de musique de Québec.
GUEST ARTIST
GUEST CONDUCTOR
Jennifer Tung
Chinese-Canadian conductor Jennifer Tung leads a uniquely versatile career as music director and pianist, as Artistic director of Toronto City Opera and Assistant Conductor to the Mississauga Symphony Orchestra. In 2020, Jennifer joined Tapestry Opera as a conductor in the inaugural Women in Musical Leadership program (in partnership with Toronto Symphony Orchestra and Pacific Opera Victoria), where she served as Assistant Conductor for the world premiere of Brian Current’s Gould’s Wall (Tapestry Opera) and a new production of Orfeo ed Euridice (Vancouver Opera).
Jennifer has helmed productions of The Mikado, Sweeney Todd and Peter Brook’s Tragedy of Carmen for the Hawaii Performing Arts Festival, and in 2019, La Traviata for Opera York. She served as Assistant Conductor for the DORA Award winning opera Shanawdithit for Tapestry Opera and Opera on the Avalon.
Jennifer serves on the faculty of Toronto’s Glenn Gould School and holds degrees in vocal performance and collaborative piano from the Eastman School of Music.
PROGRAMME NOTES
Today’s concert reveals that although Mozart may have had his “dark side” he is by no means alone, as an artist, in this. It is the nature of great art to explore the full range of human experience, and great artists bravely confront the dark as well as the light in the pursuit of their craft. Set aside the popular memes of “a dark side” in Star Wars or of the “dark arts” in Harry Potter movies. The music of both Kelly-Marie Murphy and of Jean Sibelius confront much that is “dark” in human nature. The melancholy that colours elements of Mozart’s piano concerto No.20 (melancholy is an infrequent occurrence with him) is perhaps more personal, while the music of Murphy and Sibelius seems to embody a broader “dark side” that is at once personal but also social: an alarming darkness in human nature itself as it searches for meaning in this world.
PROGRAMME NOTES
Based now in Ottawa, Kelly-Marie Murphy is one of Canada’s most productive composers whose works are commissioned and performed by some of the country’s leading artists and ensembles, including the Toronto, Winnipeg, and Vancouver Symphony Orchestras, The Gryphon Trio, James Campbell, Shauna Rolston, the Cecilia and Afiara String Quartets, and Judy Loman. Her reputation is not just North American, however, as her music has been performed around the world by outstanding soloists and ensembles and has been broadcast on radio in over 22 countries. Her music has been interpreted by eminent conductors such as Sir Andrew Davis, David Brophy, the late Bramwell Tovey and Mario Bernardi. It has been heard in renowned concert halls, such as Carnegie Hall in New York,
The Mozarteum in Salzburg, and The National Concert Hall in Dublin.
The quality of Dr. Murphy’s creativity is reflected in the many academic scholarships she has received, and the impact her compositions have had on contemporary music is evident in the regularity with which her work has for many years been acknowledged with prizes, starting early in her career in 1992. As a look at her list of works would quickly reveal, Kelly-Marie Murphy is committed to an art that confronts the nature of contemporary reality, both external and internal, light and dark: “Smoke Darkened Sky” for piano, “Rains of Ash and Embers” for strings, “To Hold Back Chaos” for quintet, ”For Fragile Personalities in Anxious Times” for quartet, as well as “In the Time of Our Disbelieving” that opens today’s concert.
In the TIme of Our Disbelieving (1937)
Kelly-Marie Murphy’s commitment to an art that is relevant to the realities of our own time is reflected in her own account that follows, of the genesis of this work:
In the Time of Our Disbelieving was commissioned by I Musici de Montréal for a concert in April 2020. It was written between December 2019 and March 2020 when there were extraordinary things going on in the world. We are in a time which has been described as “a crisis of disbelief.” There are consequences in refusing to acknowledge reality—whether about ourselves, or about the world around us.
When Australian wildfires raged on and created the worst wildlife disaster in modern history, and were then followed by severe flooding, there were still those for whom climate change was not to be believed. When the news began to come from China about a potentially deadly virus— one that actually cancelled the world premiere of this piece—there are those for whom this was “fake news.” As the US polls were indicating a win for the Democrats in November of 2020 there were those who continued to disbelieve.
Facts are there; belief is an option.
Kelly-Marie Murphy
Kelly-Marie Murphy
John Sibelius (1865–1957)
Pelléas et Mélisande (1905)
Maurice Maeterlinck’s drama Pelléas et Mélisande was first performed in 1893 and within a dozen years had inspired four major musical works: its first English production, in 1898, featured the music of Gabriel Fauré. In 1903, Arnold Schoenberg recounted the story in a substantial symphonic poem that emphasised the passionate and brutal elements of the story’s action. Claude Debussy (who had been at the play’s premiere in Paris) spent several years collaborating closely with Maeterlinck on his operatic version, which had its first performance in 1902. Then Sibelius was commissioned to compose music for the play’s Finnish premiere in 1905. The production ran for eighteen performances, six of which Sibelius himself conducted. The concert suite on today’s programme is Sibelius’ adaptation of that theatrical score.
Pelléas et Mélisande is a symbolic drama that takes place in a mythical medieval world, Allemonde, ruled by King Arkel, and is concerned not so much with the individual characters and their conflicts, but more with the enigma of human life itself, and with the mystical forces that seem to drive the characters whose backgrounds are never fully revealed and whose destinies are never entirely understood. Its “plot” is the familiar love triangle: in brief, Golaud finds Mélisande alone in the woods. She has lost her crown but cares not. He takes her to the castle and marries her. Her love, however, is for Pelléas stepbrother of Golaud, who begins to watch them jealously as their
relationship flourishes. Catching them in a passionate embrace, Golaud kills Pelléas, and shortly after Mélisande dies as she gives birth. The scenes which Sibelius’ music embodies and illuminates—the gates, cellars, and terraces of the castle, the sunset, the gardens at dusk, the seashore—are not just physical locations but are states of mind, the realms of the conscious and unconscious. His musical scenes are like a sequence of tapestries, a series of memories the details of which the music is striving to recall. The small orchestral forces match this intimate intent: one flute (also doubling on the piccolo), one oboe, one English horn, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, timpani, triangle, bass drum, and strings.
The play’s opening scene, 1. At the Castle Gate, is portentous, and so is Sibelius’ music. It is both overture to the whole work and a prelude to the opening scene. Servants work strenuously to clean the castle steps for a celebration. But this is also the Gate of Destiny. The play’s action will now begin. Will it lead to Death? Yes. Or to Birth? Yes— it is in this place that Mélisande will die, giving birth at the play’s end after the death of her lover, Pelléas. Sibelius portrays 2. Mélisande with a plaintive waltz played on the English horn to which the flute and clarinets respond as do the pizzicato strings, capturing at moments the mysterious and evasive quality of her character. 3. At the Seashore is a scene of impressionistic tone painting when Mélisande and Pelléas go at dusk down to the sea. The monotonous
PROGRAMME
NOTES
string sounds convey the steady swell of the waves and the woodwinds the cries of sea birds. The scene of almost sombre darkness is suddenly interrupted with a high fortissimo. Is it a sign of an approaching storm, and if so what kind of “storm”?
4. A Spring in the Park: Mélisande and her lover Pelléas walk in the park and stop beside a spring. This basically happy, even passionate scene also contains hints of tragic events to come. Mélisande (inadvertently) drops her wedding ring into the spring. Did you hear the triangle sound? In a scene in the castle tower, Mélisande combs her hair and sings a ballad 5. The Three Blind Sisters. The concert suite does not include a voice part, but the melody Sibelius creates for Mélisande (principally on the clarinets), its simplicity and limited range, strengthens the remote medieval atmosphere of the play’s setting and the other-worldly qualities of Mélisande herself. The 6. Pastorale: is fluid and peaceful music suited to the play’s pastoral setting, but must
seem ironic in relation to events that are increasingly threatened by Golaud’s jealousy of Pelléas. In the castle, 7. Mélisande Spins with her distaff and wheel. Behind the spinning motion conveyed by the trill of the violas we hear a sinister and more urgent melody in the strings and clarinets that is prophetic of violence to come. The 8. Entr’acte that follows is a prelude to the tragic concluding events. The sprightly and cheerful mood with which it starts seems ironic as the atmosphere grows increasingly more ominous as the piece progresses. Sibelius concludes his suite with 9. The Death of Mélisande. The music is dignified and elegiac, and grows gradually to an extraordinarily powerful climax that itself descends into reverential quietness once more as Mélisande, her lover murdered by his step-brother, fades gently into death. She leaves her newly born child, whose paternity will forever remain uncertain, to face a sad and enigmatic world.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791)
Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor K. 466 (1785)
Mozart is universally admired among composers of classical music, and part of that admiration stems from the breadth of his accomplishments—from sonatas for individual instruments through a variety of chamber music ensembles, to orchestral works of several kinds especially his symphonies, and then to his magnificent operas. However, his concertos have a special appeal for many people—there is always
something captivating about the encounter between the virtuoso display of a solo instrument and the imposing range of resources of an orchestra. And of the concertos it is those for piano that appeal most widely.
Of the 27 concertos Mozart composed for piano and orchestra only two are in a minor key. This one, No.20 in D minor, generates more passion in listeners than any other, leading some
PROGRAMME NOTES
to afford it mythical status. The key of D minor is one Mozart seems to have reserved for the expression of his most intense feelings. It makes this concerto openly emotional, “dark,” dramatic and full of passion. These were qualities which in the “romanticised” taste of the 19th Century made this concerto, along with his Symphony No.40 in G minor, his opera Don Giovanni and his Requiem the most admired of Mozart’s works, and influenced works of a generation of composers from Beethoven through to Brahms. Its persistent minor tonality, its rumbling discontent and stormy outbursts, its rich orchestration (that included trumpets and kettledrums) and evocative contrasts in texture, all seemed to speak of individuality, personal freedom and even revolution.
First Movement Allegro
If we seek the source of the “dark side” that this concerto expresses we should be careful. It is natural to want to attribute it to “dark events” in Mozart’s life such as the loss of an infant child, or problems with money, or else to increasing personal or artistic maturity. But, such is the nature of genius, these things are difficult to disentangle. About a month after finishing this D minor concerto Mozart completed Piano Concerto No.21 in C major which we have named (since1967) “Elvira Madigan” from its use in the Swedish romantic film. This is a work of a different mood entirely: a delicate, affirmative work. Yet Mozart must have been working on both of them at the same time! Do “dark” experiences explain both?
The concerto begins with the orchestra’s tensely mysterious but insistent probing that quickly turns decisive and forceful, after which the piano enters with a gentle tune that it never shares—and perhaps with good reason—its wide leaping intervals are uniquely suited to the keyboard and would sound awkward on any other instruments. After the emotional turmoil that follows throughout the heart of the movement it is interesting that the movement ends with gentility and restraint—combatants weary after their prolonged exertions, perhaps, or just an anticipation of the change in tone to come.
Second Movement Romanze
What a contrast the slow movement presents with its transparent opening melody on the piano and its key of B-flat major. The new key and the repeated sweetness of the melody may beguile us into peaceful relaxation. A sudden, dramatic outburst introduces a prolonged stormy episode in G minor that eventually becomes more subdued, even pensive, before the opening melody and key re-emerge to shape a contented close.
Third Movement Rondo: allegro assai
The piano decisively re-establishes key of D minor at once but the mood is not quite the same as the opening movement: one critic called it not so much “sinister” but, rather, “turbulent grimness.” The musical form is a rondo which involves the introduction of several principal themes and the development of several episodes, through several different keys, which lead eventually to the concerto’s second piano cadenza and to the closing bars in which Mozart cleverly (generously?) transforms the music’s mood from “grimness” to a spirited congeniality. Light after the dark?
PROGRAMME NOTES
