COME AND PLAY WITH THE HALLÉ

Transcription

1 COME AND PLAY WITH THE HALLÉ WIDER OPPORTUNITIES CONCERTS FOR SCHOOLS CONDUCTED BY JAMIE PHILLIPS PRESENTED BY TOM REDMOND SUMMER 2015 THE BRIDGEWATER HALL, MANCHESTER RESOURCE PACK FOR TEACHERS Supported by Hallé Concerts Society 2015

2 COME AND PLAY WITH THE HALLÉ WIDER OPPORTUNITIES CONCERTS FOR SCHOOLS Thursday 2 / Tuesday 7 / Thursday 9 / Friday 10 July 2015 CONDUCTED BY JAMIE PHILLIPS PRESENTED BY TOM REDMOND THX Flower Sound / 20 th Century Fox Fanfare leading into 5 JOHN WILLIAMS Star Wars: Opening Titles *BEETHOVEN Symphony No 5: First movement (no repeat) 5 R. STRAUSS Also sprach Zarathustra 2 AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION STEVE PICKETT Milky Way 4 SIBELIUS Pelléas and Mélisande: At the Castle Gate 2 (The Sky at Night theme tune) AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION HOWARD GOODALL ORCH. STEVE PICKETT Refuge {SONG} 4 DEBUSSY arr. LUCK Clair de Lune 4 AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION *HOLST ARR. STEVE PICKETT Mars 5 AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION MARK & HELEN JOHNSON ORCH. STEVE PICKETT Life is a Wonderful Thing {SONG} 4 JOHN WILLIAMS Star Wars: Duel of the Fates 5 SIBELIUS Symphony No 5: Finale (extract) 5 *BBC Ten Pieces project

3 JAMIE PHILLIPS CONDUCTOR Jamie Phillips at 23, the Hallé s youngest ever Assistant Conductor first attracted international attention as the youngest competitor in the 2011 Besançon International Competition for Young Conductors. His forthcoming engagements include re-invitations to the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande and the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne and debut concerts with the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie, Swedish Chamber Orchestra, Royal Northern Sinfonia, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, NDR Radiophilharmonie Hannover, Salzburg Mozarteum Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra, Netherlands Symphony Orchestra, Manchester Camerata and Ulster Orchestra. He has conducted the Hallé in The Bridgewater Hall in programmes shared with Sir Mark Elder, and in April 2014 conducted a series of concerts including performances of Tchaikovsky s Symphony No.6 and Beethoven s Piano Concerto No.3 with soloist John Lill. Jamie Phillips is Music Director of the Hallé Youth Orchestra with whom he made both his and the orchestra s debut at The Sage Gateshead in July 2013, touring Germany together last summer. He is also heavily involved in many of the Hallé s education programmes and concerts; last season he conducted 14 schools concerts with the orchestra, seen by 20,000 children from across the North West; in March this year he conducted four Hallé for Youth concerts with the orchestra at The Bridgewater Hall, performing to over 8,000 school children. Jamie Phillips is a committed advocate of new music and has recently recorded works by the Hallé s Associate Composer Helen Grime, jointly with Sir Mark Elder and the Hallé, for the NMC label (released September 2014). He is also founder and principal conductor of the Birmingham Festival Orchestra. The Assistant Conductor Scheme is supported by Help Musicians UK, PZ Cussons and Sir Mark and Lady Elder. TOM REDMOND PRESENTER Tom Redmond is a horn player, presenter and animateur based in Manchester. He has been a member of the Hallé since 2003 and has performed throughout Europe, South East Asia, Japan, North and South America with orchestras including the LSO, Philharmonia, CBSO and the Hong Kong Philharmonic. Tom has introduced concerts to over a hundred thousand children and their families across the UK in the Hallé s hugely popular, interactive concerts for schools. He is increasingly in demand as a presenter and has worked alongside conductors including, Andrew Gourlay, Jamie Phillips, James Lowe, Neil Thomson, Peter Stark, Stephen Bell and Timothy Redmond. At the heart of his concerts for young people and families is a desire to bring the most brilliant music to new audiences and share it in a way that engages all age groups. They include mass participation, multimedia, movement and dance, chanting, singing, listening and storytelling. As part of the Britten Centenary celebrations, Tom narrated Britten's Young Persons Guide to the Orchestra at the closing concert of the 2013 Aldeburgh Festival with Sir Mark Elder and the Hallé. He is a broadcaster for BBC Radio 3, presenting Live in Concert from around the UK. He regularly gives pre-concert talks throughout the country. Tom is the horn tutor at the Junior Royal Northern College of Music, and has taught and led workshops in every conceivable environment from prisons, music hubs and state schools, to public schools and broom cupboards. He is involved in the BBC s ground-breaking Ten Pieces project, leading creative workshops with the project's celebrity ambassadors.

4 PROGRAMME NOTES THX Flower Sound / 20th Century Fox Fanfare leading into JOHN WILLIAMS Star Wars: Opening Titles The iconic 20 th Century Fox Fanfare was composed in 1933 by the head of Fox s music department, the great Alfred Newman. By the 1970s the fanfare had all but fallen out of use; however, director George Lucas loved Newman s logo so much that he insisted it be used for his Star Wars movies. Star Wars composer John Williams agreed, and when he came to write the opening title music deliberately did so in the same key, conceiving the music as an extension of Newman s fanfare. May the Force be with you! *BEETHOVEN Symphony No 5: First movement No piece of classical music has so thoroughly entered the popular consciousness as Beethoven s Fifth Symphony. Over two hundred years after the work s premiere (1808), its first movement s so-called fate motif with its distinctive short-short-short-long rhythm is as instantly recognisable as any Beatles song. During World War Two the BBC used the motif as the call sign for the European Service, mainly because its rhythm represents the letter V for Victory in Morse code (its German origins were also ironically relevant). Electric Light Orchestra adopted it as an introduction to their cover version of Chuck Berry s Roll Over Beethoven, and it has even found its way into disco music (Walter Murphy s A Fifth of Beethoven ), techno and heavy metal. The piece features in novels such as Anthony Burgess s Clockwork Orange, films such as Disney s Fantasia, in the television and radio versions of The Hitchhiker s Guide to the Galaxy and in an episode of The Simpsons containing the classic Clancy Wiggum judgment of the work: Hey, we heard the Duh-duhduh-dum bit already, the rest is just filler! R. STRAUSS Also sprach Zarathustra Also Sprach Zarathustra is an ambitious musical distillation of Friedrich Nietzsche s book of the same name. In the book Nietzsche outlined the figure of the mighty superman, a figure that was to feature prominently in German philosophical thought (for good or otherwise) for over half a century. Strauss s musical take on Nietzsche is most recognisable for its opening address to the sun, an inspiring section of music that Stanley Kubrick later used in his utopian science fiction movie 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968). In this ceremonially slow introduction, over sustained, subterranean bass notes, trumpet fanfares introduce a motif used by Kubrick to represent the unbridled audacity of the modern, space-travelling superman. One of the most famous crescendos in all music ensues. STEVE PICKETT Milky Way (Audience participation) I ve composed Milky Way especially for this season s series of Come and Play with the Hallé concerts as the warm-up piece to the main item, Mars. My thinking in putting this piece together was that with our space theme for the concert, I wanted to use some of the other space music that wasn t being featured in the rest of the programme. Milky Way is, therefore, more an arrangement than a composition but it does contain famous tunes from Close Encounters of the Third Kind the Close Encounters motif is played by the Hallé and answered by the children and other tunes from Star Trek to The Planets. Hopefully, all will give the children a warp drive experience made all the more better by a special voice-over written by our presenter, Tom Redmond.

5 SIBELIUS Pelléas and Mélisande: At the Castle Gate (The Sky at Night theme tune) In 1905 the great Finnish composer Sibelius composed the music for a production of Maurice Maeterlinck s play Pelléas and Mélisande. He subsequently formed a suite from the score, the first movement of which, At the Castle Gate, has become synonymous with the BBC s long-running astronomical magazine programme The Sky at Night, for which it has been the theme tune since the programme began in Majestic, sonorous and evocative of grandeur, the piece was a truly inspired choice. HOWARD GOODALL orch. STEVE PICKETT Refuge (Audience participation) Howard Goodall is an award-winning composer of choral music, stage musicals, film and TV scores, and is well-known as a TV and radio broadcaster. He is also a passionate advocate of choral singing for young people and it s highly appropriate that his song Refuge is one of our audience participation pieces. This reflective song helps us to think about what it feels like to be on the outside of a group. DEBUSSY arr. LUCK Clair de Lune In Clair de Lune, the third movement of his Suite Bergamasque for piano, Debussy established what we now recognise as the distinctive Debussy sound. Here the composer s simple lyricism and enchantingly floating textures depict the most evocative of moonlit scenes. Arthur Luck s deft orchestration adds to the nocturnal magic. *HOLST arr. STEVE PICKETT Mars: The Bringer of War (Audience participation) Gustav Holst was fascinated by astrology and extremely well-read in the subject. This found musical expression in his most famous work The Planets, a seven-movement orchestral suite inspired by the astronomical significance of each planet of the solar system. The work dates from the years immediately preceding the First World War and, in Mars: The Bringer of War, Holst seems to foresee the horrors to come. With its relentlessly repeated, five-beats-to-a-bar rhythm, snarling melodic lines and ominous swells of sound, this music uncompromisingly prophesies the brutality and sheer scale of mechanised modern warfare. MARK & HELEN JOHNSON orch. STEVE PICKETT Life is a Wonderful Thing (Audience participation) Your final opportunity today to perform with the world-renowned Hallé. Life is a Wonderful Thing, by husband and wife team Mark and Helen Johnson, is a funky number that s sure to lift the spirits. So clear your throat, fill your lungs and sing your hearts out!

6 JOHN WILLIAMS Star Wars: Duel of the Fates This highly dramatic piece comes from the Star Wars film, Episode 1: The Phantom Menace, and is heard during the final lightsaber duel between Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Maul. John Williams at his brilliant best! SIBELIUS Symphony No 5: Finale (extract) In April 1915 Sibelius was awestruck by the beautiful sight of 16 swans in flight, an experience he described as one of my greatest. So inspired was the composer that he wrote what he called a Swan Hymn and incorporated it into the finale of his Fifth Symphony. At the end of this excerpt there is a long crescendo and the Swan Hymn rings out in triumph. The music then seems to hold its breath (six loud chords are separated by long pauses) and suddenly the symphony ends. Programme Notes Anthony Bateman 2015

7 EDUCATION The Hallé's Award Winning Education Programme was established in 1989 and has now grown to the point where it generates over 60 projects a year in various parts of the community from schools, special needs centres and prisons to youth clubs and the elderly. The aim of Hallé Education is to firmly establish the Hallé Orchestra as a valuable and highly responsive resource for all members of the community in and around Manchester. We do this principally by placing musicians into the wider community to compose and perform music alongside project participants. The Education Programme complements the Hallé's annual schedule of more than 120 concerts and is central to the Orchestra's artistic strategy. Schools' work remains our main focus where, in partnership with teachers, we aim to enhance the National Curriculum for music. To complete the experience we encourage those involved to share with us the passion and quality of live music in the concert hall. For those unable to attend concerts for whatever reason, we have a programme which develops the many positive benefits of arts work through the creative process of music-making. Since its inception, the quality of Hallé Education has been recognised by several prestigious awards including: a Royal Anniversary Challenge Gold Medal for its Gamelan project; a Sainsbury's Arts Education Award for Powerful Percussion; a PRS Composers in Education Award for Bridging the Gap; and a Regional National Training Award for its training programme for Hallé musicians which was generously sponsored by the Esmée Fairbairn Charitable Trust. Two other factors have been vitally important to our success. They are the support and dedication to the Programme of over half the Orchestra's players and the overwhelmingly positive response from schools and other participants. Although much of Hallé Education's work is based in Greater Manchester, it also serves the wider geographical area covered by the Orchestra's touring programme throughout the north of England. Without doubt, one of the most exciting and successful initiatives developed since Hallé Education's inception is Hallé for Youth. Each year this specially devised series of concerts for schools provides an introduction to live classical music for over 10,000 schoolchildren throughout Greater Manchester and the North West. Another highlight of Hallé Education s programme is the series of Come and Play with the Hallé concerts, which involves the orchestra performing with thousands of primary-aged children who are engaged with the Whole Class Ensemble Teaching Programme, and provides children from within a local authority with an opportunity to take part in a musical performance with a live symphony orchestra. Teachers from the local music services tutor the children attending the concerts, with all the materials designed by Hallé Education. The programme is designed so that the children are involved in an interactive experience throughout the whole concert. Original and arranged material, specially composed by Steve Pickett for the professional players and young people to share, is presented alongside orchestral blockbusters ranging from film scores to famous classics. The children, therefore, experience both the power of a symphony orchestra at first hand, and are then part of it.

8 MUSIC DIRECTOR SIR MARK ELDER CBE Founded in Manchester by the pianist and conductor Sir Charles Hallé in 1858, the Hallé gave its first concert in the city s Free Trade Hall on 30 January of that year. Following the death of Sir Charles Hallé, the orchestra continued to develop under the guidance of such distinguished figures as Hans Richter, Sir Hamilton Harty and Sir John Barbirolli. Sir Mark Elder, who was knighted for services to music in the Queen s Birthday Honours List 2008, became Music Director in During his tenure, the Royal Philharmonic Society has honoured both Sir Mark and the Hallé separately. In January 2011, the South Bank Sky Arts Award was presented to the Hallé and the BBC Philharmonic for their joint performance of Mahler s Eighth Symphony, part of a high-profile anniversary cycle of Mahler s symphonies in partnership with Manchester Camerata and The Bridgewater Hall. The Hallé had previously won the South Bank Show Classical Music Award for collaborations with the BBC Philharmonic and the Royal Northern College of Music, as well as with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. The Hallé performs over 70 concerts a year in The Bridgewater Hall, its Manchester home, as well as making over 40 appearances annually throughout the rest of Britain. The Hallé attracts large and enthusiastic audiences in Manchester and beyond, and its reputation for artistic excellence and versatility has led to many international tours, frequent broadcasts and televised performances. Markus Stenz is the Hallé s second Principal Guest Conductor and marks his third season in post. Colin Matthews is the Hallé s Composer Emeritus and Helen Grime is the Associate Composer. The Hallé has its own CD label, which features in particular the music of English composers especially Elgar and Colin Matthews, as well as Debussy, Wagner and Shostakovich. The latest releases include Vaughan Williams s London Symphony and Oboe Concerto, and English Spring, a collection of brilliant impressionistic English orchestral works. The Hallé s highly acclaimed recordings have been honoured with prestigious awards including five Gramophone Awards in the past three years Elgar s The Dream of Gerontius (2009); Wagner s Götterdämmerung and Elgar s Violin Concerto (2010); and Sir Harrison Birtwistle Night s Black Bird and Elgar s The Kingdom (2011). The Hallé s family of ensembles includes the Hallé Choir, which was founded alongside the orchestra in 1858, and is directed by Frances Cooke, Hallé Choir Director; the Youth Orchestra directed by the Hallé s Assistant Conductor, Andrew Gourlay; the Children s Choir directed by Shirley Court; and the Youth Choir. Last season over a quarter of a million people heard the Hallé, of which more than 45,000 were inspired by the Hallé s pioneering education programme. Generating over 60 projects a year, it exists to create a wider enjoyment and understanding of music throughout the whole community. The Hallé is a society and registered charity. Visit our website at View our new digital content at Follow the Hallé at twitter.com/the_halle Like the Hallé at

9 THE BRIDGEWATER HALL Here are a few facts about The Bridgewater Hall, which you may find useful. The Bridgewater Hall took exactly 3½ years to build, from digging the foundations in March 1993, to the opening concert in September The centre of a lively, noisy city isn t the ideal place to build a new concert hall because orchestras and audiences need perfect silence and microphones are now so sensitive that they can hear things that ordinary people can t, for example: heavy traffic, trams, buses, aeroplanes. The solutions to these problems were: o lift the building off the ground and stand it on a set of huge steel springs so that it floats like a magic carpet o make the building itself very heavy and solid so it cannot move easily o make the doors, windows and carpets very thick o put facilities such as air conditioning, water supply and things that hum and buzz in a separate tower at the back of the building It took a team of 20 architects, an interior designer, a team of acoustic designers with lots of computers and a team of expert engineers to design The Bridgewater Hall. Inside the foyer a sculpture ripples through all four floors. It represents billowing lengths of Manchester cotton and waves of sound, light, water and music. Although it looks as though it could be made of fabric or cardboard, it is actually made of great strips of steel, carefully bent into shape and painted only on the back so that the colours are reflected off the wall behind. Inside the auditorium everything has been designed to make the sound perfect. The most important feature is the ceiling, which is a heavy, ribbed structure of steelwork coated in concrete. It is kept in place by a spider s web of delicate steelwork underneath, which acts like an upside-down suspension bridge the flat concrete is being kept up by the steel wires, rather than hanging down from it. The auditorium can seat 2,400 people, which includes a choir of nearly 300. The Bridgewater Hall organ is the largest mechanical organ to be installed in Britain this century. It has over 5,500 pipes the largest is on the front and is 32 feet long, the smallest is less than 2 inches. The whole organ is the size of a four-storey house with stairs and passageways inside. The organ weighs 22 tons and cost 120,000 to build.

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