Liam Furey – Disturbance l: Macro I (Wave) for solo viola – Tal Amoore (viola)
Liam Furey – ‘The Birds are Joyous; for it is Morning’ from Preludes for Piano – Liam Furey (piano)
Gillian Bibby – Night Cries in the Mountains – Liam Furey (piano)
Gillian Whitehead – Arapātiki – Liam Furey (piano)
Ross Harris – Klezmer Tunes – New Zealand String Quartet
Janet Jennings – The Auctioneer (Adam Chamber Music Festival commission) – Colin Ainsworth (tenor), New Zealand String Quartet
Emerging composer-in-residence Liam Furey’s Disturbance I: Macro I (Wave) for solo viola opens this Waitangi Day programme devoted to music from Aotearoa New Zealand. Furey then takes the stage as pianist in three works of his choice: his own composition ‘The Birds are Joyous; for it is Morning’, an unpublished gem gifted to him by his former piano teacher, composer Gillian Bibby – Night Cries in the Mountains – and Gillian Whitehead’s Arapātiki.
Ross Harris is known as one of New Zealand’s leading statesmen as a serious composer but is also the accordionist in the Klezmer band, The Kugels. We hear four of his Klezmer tunes especially arranged for the New Zealand String Quartet, before the quartet is joined by tenor Colin Ainsworth for our second festival commission – The Auctioneer by Janet Jennings – which promises theatricality, irony and plenty of irreverence.
