Issue No.75
FRIENDS’ NEWSLETTER
May 2018
10 YEARS OF MUSIC IN THE ROUND
CONTENTS PAGE ONE 10 years of MitR
PAGE TWO Focus on Ensemble 360 PAGE THREE Meet the musician PAGE FOUR Ellen Sargen PAGE FIVE MitC update PAGE SIX Man with a Movie Camera PAGE SEVEN Our impact PAGE EIGHT Dates for your diary
After 10 years working with Music in the Round, Executive Director Deborah Chadbourn is moving to a new role this summer. Here, she looks back at her musical highlights. Looking back at ten years of music ‘in the-round’ is a daunting task. I can’t do justice to all the repertoire that Ensemble 360 and guest artists have played with such passion and insight, but here are a few concert highlights...
2008: Huw Watkins’ Broken
Consort and Kurtág’s string quartet Op.1, performed by the Elias, intrigued me. Britten’s string quartet no.3, played by the Belcea, moved me to tears, whilst Peter Hill and Ben Frith playing Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring for piano four-hands was breathtaking. Giddy Goat, by Paul Rissmann, wonderfully narrated by Polly, had us all singing Rock Rounders - the first of many office sing-alongs to pieces by our Children’s Composer in Residence.
2009: Shostakovich Piano
Quintet, performed by Tim and the Elias, was compelling, and contrasted that same autumn with the joyous Martinů Nonet, which shows off Ensemble 360’s combined talents so well.
2010: Back into the Crucible
for the Festival, celebrating what Peter called the ‘Classical Revolutionaries’, ending with his dramatic entrance after Schubert’s Octet to a packed, rapturous audience. In December, the Prazak Quartet arriving from Prague through record-breaking snow to perform Haydn’s Emperor Quartet for 24 people - all treated to a glass of wine by Paul Allen. One intrepid Friend memorably skied to the tram to cultural borders and have such get to the concert! fun in doing so. Gemma’s Terezin Day was We marked World a sobering reminder, as timely today as ever, that while humans War I with The Dark Hour, may forget their humanity, music Associate Composer Charlie Piper’s poignant new piece. The helps us cling to it. following evening, Penelope Wilton and Tom Durham read I was struck by Sally heart-rending extracts from Helen Beamish’s piece, St Andrew’s and Edward Thomas’ writing. Bones, as were many in the audience hearing her work for Peter’s memorial the first time. concerts in November were wonderful celebrations of his Gleeful participation immeasurable legacy; who could in Shahid Khan’s inspiring forget Martin’s performance of Songbook allowed audiences The Lark Ascending? (plus Ben and Gemma) to cross
2011:
2014:
2012:
2015:
2013:
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10 YEARS OF MUSIC IN THE ROUND CONTINUED... 2016: The Skempton piece, Rime of the
Ancient Mariner, performed by Roddy Williams and Ensemble 360, brought Coleridge’s epic poem eerily to life for me. Seeing Roddy and Chris Glynn perform Jeremy Sams’ English translation of Die Winterreise in Doncaster marked a milestone in our audience development there.
2017: Laurène’s Man with a Movie Camera soundtrack perfectly complemented Vertov’s extraordinary film.
MEET THE MUSICIAN
2018: Ensemble 360’s performance of Ravel’s
quartet in F and, with Catrin Finch, of his Introduction and Allegro left me astounded as to why some people dislike French music! Music in the Round has fundamentally enriched my knowledge and understanding of music and fed my curiosity, but listening to music is such a subjective experience. I wonder what you would highlight from the last ten years if asked…
Angus Smith catches up with mezzo soprano Katarina Karnéus ahead of her lunchtime recital this May. What is your earliest memory of singing? Sitting in the back seat of our car in the early 70’s with my two older sisters singing away whilst heading to our country house which was two hours away from Stockholm in Sweden, and then watching Birgit Nilsson singing on television, and trying to imitate her.
FOCUS ON ENSEMBLE 360 For the second installment of this feature Matthew Hunt checks in with us from Germany! Greetings to you all from the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, where my orchestra (the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen) has a residency. We have been extremely busy the last six weeks with Brahms and Schubert - this week saw us play Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem in the Cathedral in Bremen, 150 years after the work was premiered in the same church with Brahms himself conducting. Last week we recorded all 4 of Brahms’ symphonies for DVD at the Théâtre ChampsÉlysée, which was followed by a concert in Aix-en-Provence where we were stranded by the French striking. Tonight we pick up again with Schubert, having started a cycle of his symphonies earlier in the month at the Musikverein in Vienna. Tonight in Hamburg is number 4, the Tragic, and tomorrow the Great C major, paired with sets of orchestrated songs with the wonderful Mathias Goerne. Working with him is a huge treat - what a voice, with such colours, drama and intensity. Looking forward, May is looming, and one of the treats for me will be working with the baritone Roddy Williams. We have kind of known each other for rather a long time, having coincided at the Guildhall School together in London, back last millennium...
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At what point did it occur to you that singing might become a career? I loved to entertain people even as a young child and fearlessly enjoyed being in the centre of attention. I started having singing lessons in my teens; my mother being English encouraged me to study in England, so I did. My path then seemed to unfold itself and when I won the Cardiff Singer of the World in 1995, I guess I realised that singing was my destiny and I haven’t stopped since. I do still enjoy it very much.
I’m also hugely looking forward to new commissions from Platform 4 (Young Rossini, Sunday 13 May, 3pm), and sharing a stage with Tom McKinney (Late Night Extra: Counterpoint, Saturday 12 May, 9.30pm), where we will be playing minimalist music with prerecorded backing tracks. I’ll be playing a piece by Nico Muhly, it goes without saying, and the wonderful New York Counterpoint of Steve Reich. I’ll be playing that with a prerecorded track of myself playing the other 10 parts, the ultimate in narcissistic chamber music....
Matthew will be appearing with Ensemble 360 in concerts on 11, 12 and 13 May as part of our Sheffield Chamber Music Festival.
Your programme offers a wonderful selection of French song, including Fauré’s well-known Après un rêve and Duparc’s wonderful L’invitation au Voyage. Are there other favourites of yours we should look out for? I went to a French IB school in Stockholm when I grew up and I love the French song repertoire. I think that apart from the songs you mentioned, Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis are exceptionally beautiful and sensual.
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Your career takes you from the grandest opera stages to the most intimate recital venues. What particular demands does this make on how you present the music from a perspective of vocal technique? I trained with one teacher only for 30 years, Ulla Blom in Sweden, and she taught me the ‘bel canto’ technique - “the old school” where you use your whole body as your instrument - how
to breathe properly and support your voice so that you are free in the expression and can take on all different styles of repertoire. She said to me that “the voice should be the mirror of your soul”. Could you tell us something about the work you are doing before and after you come to Sheffield? (You are allowed to be as immodest as you like here!) I was in Vienna at Theater an der Wien in the beginning of the year singing the lead role in Der Besuch der Alten Dame by Gottfried von Einem after Dürrenmatt’s play The Visit. I am currently in Leeds singing Herodias with Opera North in the concert performances of Richard Strauss’s Salome. I then head to the Prague Spring Festival for Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder, and then to Belfast for Mahler’s Rückert Lieder and so on. To be a bit immodest I did sing the title role “Norma” at the Gothenburg Opera last season. How do you relax and switch off from music? I go home and enjoy spending time with my family, cooking together and sitting around the table together, chatting about life in general. I look forward to coming to Sheffield for the French lunchtime recital together with Joseph Middleton.
You can hear Katarina Karnéus and Joseph Middleton perform in the Festival on Tuesday 15 May at 12.45pm.
Considering Creativity is on Saturday 19 May, 11am-1pm at DINA
MEET ELLEN SARGEN, PRIZEWINNING COMPOSER Ellen Sargen is a prize-winning composer and a Music graduate of the University of Sheffield. She introduces herself and her new piece, passau, commissioned by Music in the Round for first performance by Ensemble 360 on the Last Night of this year’s Sheffield Chamber Music Festival. I was born in Sheffield but moved away at a very young age. I was drawn back to the city’s vibrant classical music scene, which I think will keep me here for the foreseeable future. The fantastic network here (from Music in the Round to the University Music Department, Classical Sheffield, and the Music Education Hub) has allowed me to thrive as a composer and musician. Writing a new piece for Ensemble 360 is the highlight of my year. The chance to work alongside such fantastic musicians, and to be a real part of Sheffield’s classical music scene in such an exciting festival, is truly thrilling. The programme of the Finale concert means a lot to me as a composer who likes to explore the extra-musical (whether this be exploring literature, art, or place), and it feels extremely special to have my piece on the last night of the festival. As for the music itself, it’s a trio for Horn, Double Bass and Piano. Its title, passau, refers directly to the German city of the same name, where three different coloured rivers find a meeting point in a large confluence. This piece takes direct inspiration from the city, and finds a meeting place for the voices within the trio,
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likened here to the three rivers. Where each river has its own colour and characteristics, so does each instrument in the trio; passau explores where these instrumental colours and characters might meet in common territory. The piece finds a timbral ‘confluence’ which continues beyond the sum of its parts, forming a new meta-body of instrumental colour. There is extremely intimate material between the trio, where voices might find moments of shared colour or gesture in their dialogue. Communication of these moments became paramount in the score, and the intimate in-theround setting enhances this wonderfully. After this performance I’m on the home straight to finishing my Masters! As part of this I will be writing an orchestral score and vocal trio. I plan to go on to PhD in 2019, and hope to spend the next year continuing to compose in residencies and at leisure. I hope to continue playing new music as a flautist, and would like to set up a wind quintet once the Masters has finished!
Ellen Sargen’s new work, passau, is premiered at the Festival’s Finale concert on 19 May at 7.15pm
CONSIDERING CREATIVITY
Dr Stella Mascarenhas-Keyes is leading what will be a fascinating exploration of musical language and conversation, Considering Creativity, on the final day of this year’s Festival. In this session we will find out what happens when you bring musicians together as a group for the first time and invite them to make music! Expert performers include members of Rafiki Jazz, Ensemble 360’s Laurène Durantel, folk musician Hannah James, and composer Ellen Sargen. Sheffield has an exceptionally diverse and inspiring music scene. All the participants make music (in the broadest sense of the term) here. So we are bringing them together to explore what it is to be creative and to see how people with completely different types of training and experience can nevertheless find common ground with each other through music. We can expect the debate to range from where musical inspiration comes from to how diverse instruments can blend together and how where we come from affects what we bring to musical engagement.
Audience voices will be a vital element of the mix, so do be ready to ask questions and provoke conversations. There might even be some participation too!
FURTHER SUCCESS FOR OUR FIRST BRIDGE QUARTET Great news from the Marmen Quartet who were the first musicians to be supported by Music in the Round through the Bridge scheme. We’re sure you’ll join us in wishing them many congratulations for their recent successes as winners of the 2018 Royal Over-Seas League Competition and as semi-finalists in the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition.
EARLY YEARS MUSIC TRAINING DAY Last month at the Crucible we hosted a packed day of workshops, talks, and singing for people who make music with Early Years children - part of our ongoing work to give them support, resources, and inspiration. It was led by Polly Ives and colleagues, and it was so popular that we had to increase the capacity - twice!
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SUPPORT MUSIC IN THE ROUND THE RETURN OF MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA One of the standout performances in last year’s Russia in the Round festival was Laurène Durantel’s improvisation to the silent film Man with a Movie Camera, a landmark achievement in cinematic history directed by Dziga Vertov in 1929. Poignant, funny and mind-expandingly original in its daring imagery, this silent movie has been scored by composers on numerous occasions, and Laurène’s equally beguiling musicianship and stage presence was the perfect complement. Not only using her first instrument double bass, Laurène sang, read extracts of her own poetry and made wildly imaginative use of an out-oftune piano that we found at the back of the cinema in the Sheffield University Auditorium. It was so successful that Music in the Round and Laurène have made the almost unprecedented decision to repeat the performance this year in the 2018 Sheffield Chamber Music Festival, at the Showroom Cinema. Laurène is keeping her cards close to her chest, although she promises that this year it will be quite different to the previous performance. However, we can confirm that a piano is due to be moved into the cinema and, depending on Laurène’s preference, it may or may not be tuned!
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LAST CHANCE TO PREORDER YOUR FESTIVAL PROGRAMME AND SAVE Last year’s trial pre-order scheme helped us to save significantly on the expense of producing a souvenir programme for the May Festival. This year we’re doing the same, but as we continue in our efforts to reduce the costs of this publication, the price has increased.
WOW! OUR IMPACT IN 2017/18 As we start to look back on the 12 months from April 2017 to March 2018, we thought you might like to know that Music in the Round reached over 30,000 people during the course of the year in a programme of activity which included 118 concerts (31 of them for children) and around 100 learning & participation events. We co-produced two Classical Sheffield events over two weekends reaching around 10,000 people. In particular we were thrilled to present the UK premiere of John Luther Adams’ Canticles of the Sky for 38 cellos in Kelham Island Industrial Museum. 72% of our concerts took place in South Yorkshire including 56% in Sheffield. We worked in 12 locations outside our region including two very different London boroughs. With Ensemble 360, we presented our first weekend festival at the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough and our third at Cast in Doncaster, and partnered with The University of Sheffield for La Belle Époque, our weekend of French music and song. March 2018 brought together 120 non-specialist classroom teachers, nursery workers and other practitioners to take part in an Early Years
FRIENDS’ SCHEME REVIEW Over the summer of 2018, we’d love to talk to you about the Friends’ scheme: what you like, what you don’t like, and what you think could be improved. We think that more of our regular supporters who aren’t currently Friends might consider joining up, but we need your help and insights into how we might attract more people. Watch this space, but in the meantime, if you have any thoughts already, please do get in touch.
Training Day run by Polly Ives and colleagues, aiming to increase their confidence in music-making with children from all backgrounds. We were successful in our application to Arts Council England for a further funding agreement, this one from 2018-22. We raised over £165,000 in grants and donations from trusts, foundations and donors, the majority of which went towards our Learning & Participation programme. Some donations were gratefully received towards our Future Festivals Fund, which now stands at £87,235, just £12,765 off our original target of raising £100,000 by 2021. If you would like to help us reach our target, please do get in touch. We’d like to thank you, our Friends, who regularly donate nearly £15,000 p.a. of this amount, providing essential support for concerts in Sheffield and South Yorkshire. Some of you have let us know that you have left a legacy for us in your will, and we are so grateful for anything you can set aside to help Music in the Round continue to flourish and in turn support the musicians of the future.
For 2018, we’re offering Friends and supporters of Music in the Round the chance to pre-order your Souvenir Programme for £10 (saving £5 on the £15 full price). This year’s 40-page publication features introductions from Angus Smith and Deborah Chadbourn, programme notes by Nigel Simeone, an extended essay on Bach’s Goldberg Variations by Peter Hill, and a full timeline of all the works being played in the 2018 Sheffield Chamber Music Festival. Please place your order by emailing Jenny at marketing@musicintheround.co.uk or calling us on 0114 281 4660 by no later than 10am on Tuesday 8 May.
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ENSEMBLE 360 ON TOUR Barnsley, Emmanuel Methodist Church 4 May, 7.30pm MOZART Violin Sonata in G K.301 BERLIOZ Harold en Italie excerpts (transcribed by LISZT for viola and piano) BARTÓK Duos for violin and viola VAUGHAN WILLIAMS The Lark Ascending (original version for violin and piano) MOZART Duo for violin and viola in B flat K.424
Newcastle-under-Lyme, New Vic Theatre 18 June, 7.30pm SCHUBERT Piano Trio in E flat D.897, Notturno MENDELSSOHN String Quartet in E flat Op.12 FAURÉ Piano Quintet in D minor
01226 327000 www.barnsleycivic.co.uk
Hoylandswaine, St John’s Church 13 July, 7.30pm REBECCA CLARKE Duo for clarinet and viola BEETHOVEN String Trio in G, op.9 no.1 RAVEL Duo for violin and cello MOZART Clarinet Quartet op.79
Leamington, Royal Spa Centre 6 May, 7.30pm Part of the Leamington Music Festival REICHA Wind Quintet in E flat op.88 no.2 JANÁČEK Mládí KABELÁČ Wind Sextet op.8 SCHULHOFF Bassnachtigall SMETANA Polkas MARTINŮ Sextet in E flat H174 01926 334418 www.royalspacentreandtownhall.co.uk Carlisle, Old Fire Station 13 June, 7.30pm SCHUMANN Fantasy Pieces for clarinet and piano Op.73 BRAHMS Horn Trio in E flat Op.40 SCHUBERT Piano Trio in B flat D.898 01228 598596 www.oldfirestation.carlisle.city Doncaster, Cast 16 June, 7.30pm SCHUBERT Piano Trio in E flat D.897, Notturno MENDELSSOHN String Quartet in E flat Op.12 FAURÉ Piano Quintet in D minor 12 - 13 October Classical Greats Festival A weekend of concerts, workshops and events for the whole family 01302 303959 www.castindoncaster.com
4th Floor, Sheffield Central Library, Surrey Street Sheffield S1 1XZ Registered Charity number: 326811 Company number 1880734 VAT number 391 1875 33
01782 717962 www.newvictheatre.org.uk
01226 327000 www.barnsleycivic.co.uk Skipton, Town Hall 23 October, 7.30pm SCHUBERT Octet JӦRG WIDMANN Octet www.skiptonmusic.org.uk 01756 799912 Ensemble 360 and Roderick Williams London, Wigmore Hall 3 November, 7.30pm SUK Piano Quartet in A minor op.1 SKEMPTON Man and Bat DVOŘÁK Piano Quintet in A op.81 Ensemble 360 4 November, 11.30am DVOŘÁK String Quartet op.96, American BRAHMS Horn Trio in E flat Op.40 020 7935 2141 www.wigmore-hall.org.uk On sale to the general public on 29 May 2018