ICO 2023 season – Sundays @ 1pm

Sunday 23rd April 1.00pm @ Brisbane Botanic Gardens, Mount Coot-tha

Conductor – Greta Hunter

Welcome to our second ICO Sundays @ 1pm concert for 2023 featuring musical pieces that will take you back to the Elizabethan era with Purcell’s majestic masque, The Fairy Queen; Warlock’s Capriol Suite; and finally a taste of our next concert with a a valse from Sullivan’s The Merchant of Venice.

Program

Warlock – Capriol Suite.

Medley of music for mandolin and harpsichord

Purcell – excerpts from The Fairy Queen Z629.

Sullivan – The Merchant of Venice – No. 5 a la valse.

Greta Hunter – Conductor

Greta Hunter is a flutist, music educator, conductor, and musical director of three community ensembles in Brisbane. Greta holds a Bachelor of Music with first class honours majoring in Classical Flute Performance from the University of Queensland.  She held the 2018 position of principal flute with the Queensland Youth Symphony (QYS) after previously performing as the orchestra’s principal piccolo.  Greta has toured regularly with the QYO Chamber Orchestra and in 2017 performed with the QYS on its major international tour to China and Germany.  She is the flute specialist tutor at the Westside Christian College, Brisbane. Greta is an experienced conductor with a passion for community music.  In 2019 she attended the Melbourne Youth Orchestra’s conductor development program, and the advanced conducting program at the Australian Choral Conductors Education and Training (ACCET) Summer School.  Greta has also attended the Australian Conducting Academy in Tasmania and the Zlin International Conducting Masterclass in the Czech Republic, and was invited to guest conduct the QYS in its 2018 Strings Sensations concert. Greta is the musical director and conductor of the Indooroopilly Chamber Orchestra, Songshine Choir and Queensland Korean Junior Strings.

Program Notes

Peter Warlock (1894-1930)

Capriol Suite (arr. N. P. Thomas for chamber orchestra)

The Capriol Suite is a set of dances in the renaissance style. It was based on tunes in a manual of Renaissance dances by the French priest Jehan Tabourot (1515 -1595). The treatment of the source material is very free and the work can be regarded as an original composition rather than an arrangement. It is made up from of six contrasting movements – Basse Danse, Pavane, Tordion, Bransles, Pieds en l’air, and Mattachins – each in a different dance form.

The composer, Peter Warlock was the pen name of Philip Arnold Heseltine, born into a wealthy London family in 1894. He was educated at Eton College and Oxford University where he read for a degree in classics. On graduating he resisted family pressure to work in the stock exchange choosing rather to frequent an artistic circle of friends that included the novelist D H Lawrence.

From an early age he was fascinated by the work of Fredrick Delius whom he met in 1911. The two became close friends, and Delius supported and mentored him throughout his short life. Warlock never settled into a conventional career. He had some short lived appointments, one as a music critic for the Daily Mail. He did however engage in serious musical scholarship, editing, transcribing and arranging early music manuscripts, and writing a major study of the music of Delius.

His first major compositions, mainly songs, began to appear in 1917, at which time he had moved to Dublin to avoid possible conscription. It was at this time that he adopted the pseudonym Warlock, possibly in parody of his interest in the occult. In 1922 he completed his first widely acknowledged masterpiece the song cycle named the Curlew. His period of creativity continued only for a few years culminating in the composition of his most famous work – the Capriol Suite – in 1925. The original piano duet version of the work was a great success and was quickly followed by the version for string orchestra (1926) and a version for full orchestra (1928).

Program notes: Portobello Orchestra http://www.theportobelloorchestra.co.uk/ProgrammeNotes/WarlockCapriol.php

Medley of traditional folk music from Western Europe.

Performed by Cassandra D’Arcy (Mandolin) and Gary Hunt (keyboard)

The Helston Furry Dance is traditionally performed on 8th May as a celebration of the passing of winter and the arrival of
spring since at least 1790. This traditional Cornish dance is one of Britain’s oldest customs and is still practised today.

Methley Park is a country dance from West Yorkshire and is named after the former imposing country estate of the same name.

Morris dancing is a form of English folk dance based on rhythmic stepping and the execution of choreographed figures
by a group of dancers and dates back to the 15th Century. Dancers usually wear bell pads on their shins and wield
implements such as sticks, swords and handkerchiefs that are clapped together in time with the dance.

The Sarabande evolved from a Spanish dance with Arab influences. It is traditionally danced by a lively double line of couples with castanets and dates back to the early 16 th Century. The sarabande musical style was also extensively used throughout much of classical music period, especially the baroque era.

A minuet was a social dance of French origin for two people, usually in 3/4 time.

The “Sir Roger de Coverley” is a traditional northern English and/or Scottish country dance that dates back to the late 17th Century. The name refers to a fox, and the dance’s steps are reminiscent of a hunted fox going in and out of cover.

Henry Purcell (1659-1695)

The Fairy Queen

With the re-opening of theatres after the Restoration of the monarchy, English theatre developed its own unique style, often called dramatic opera, in which additional scenes with music (masques) augmented spoken plays. Using Shakespeare’s play A Midsummer Night’s Dream as the backdrop, The Fairy Queen by Henry Purcell expounds on love and marriage, with allusions to co-regnants William and Mary, even as it references London’s ever-expanding world-view.

The Fairy Queen, first performed in London in 1692, was a great success. An unknown librettist adapted Shakespeare’s play and provided the new scenarios and texts. Purcell provided music for the additional scenes interpolated into each act of the play.

The drama of The Fairy Queen is in five acts preceded by instrumental music. The “first and second music,” consisting of two pieces each, were played as the audience took their seats. Then the overture, beginning with its trumpet fanfare, would announce the beginning of the drama. Between the acts are instrumental “act tunes” meant to be played during scene changes.

Act IV begins with a three-movement symphony in the Italian style. In the music that follows, Oberon and Titania, king and queen of the fairies, are reconciled after their quarrel, and their reunion is celebrated with a sunrise and the rebirth of the world. All nature is now in order once again, and there follows a masque of the four seasons.

Program notes: Handel & Haydn Society: https://handelandhaydn.org/enhanced-program-notes-the-fairy-queen-love-unbound/

Boston Baroque – Martin Pearlman: https://baroque.boston/purcell-the-fairy-queen

Arthur Sullivan (1842 – 1900)

The Merchant of Venice Suite

Arthur Sullivan was born in London, the son of the bandmaster to the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. By the age of 8 he had already learnt to play all of the instruments in his father’s band and at 14 he won the first Mendelssohn Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music. This scholarship allowed him to study at the Leipzig Conservatoire.

The music to The Merchant of Venice was written for a production of the play at the Prince’s Theatre, Manchester. It concentrates on a single scene, a lavish masque during which Jessica and Lorenzo make their elopement. The following was written by Sullivan’s friend George Grove, editor of the dictionary of music, for a performance given at Crystal Palace in 1871:-

‘When the music begins, the stage is empty and night is approaching. The distant cry of the gondoliers echoing along the canals, and the voices of the masquers as they approach nearer and nearer are all depicted in the music. A lover serenades his mistress, the masquers gradually throng the ground, and the revelry begins. The dances are first a bourrée, the old-fashioned heavy measure; next a grotesque dance for Pierrots and Harlequins; and thirdly a general dance in modern waltz rhythm. Night has settled down on the scene when Jessica makes her escape; after this the fun waxes furious, and midst the glare of torches, the glitter of coloured lanterns, and the shouts and songs of the revellers, the curtain descends.’

The success of the music meant that it was often played without an accompanying production, and a suite consisting of four movements was regularly performed during the composer’s lifetime.

Program Notes: Willo Horsbrugh https://www.bhso.org.uk/work/sullivanthe-merchant-of-venice-suite/.

Program Notes

Peter Warlock (1894-1930)

Capriol Suite (arr. N. P. Thomas for chamber orchestra)

The Capriol Suite is a set of dances in the renaissance style. It was based on tunes in a manual of Renaissance dances by the French priest Jehan Tabourot (1515 -1595). The treatment of the source material is very free and the work can be regarded as an original composition rather than an arrangement. It is made up from of six contrasting movements – Basse Danse, Pavane, Tordion, Bransles, Pieds en l’air, and Mattachins – each in a different dance form.

The composer, Peter Warlock was the pen name of Philip Arnold Heseltine, born into a wealthy London family in 1894. He was educated at Eton College and Oxford University where he read for a degree in classics. On graduating he resisted family pressure to work in the stock exchange choosing rather to frequent an artistic circle of friends that included the novelist D H Lawrence.

From an early age he was fascinated by the work of Fredrick Delius whom he met in 1911. The two became close friends, and Delius supported and mentored him throughout his short life. Warlock never settled into a conventional career. He had some short lived appointments, one as a music critic for the Daily Mail. He did however engage in serious musical scholarship, editing, transcribing and arranging early music manuscripts, and writing a major study of the music of Delius.

His first major compositions, mainly songs, began to appear in 1917, at which time he had moved to Dublin to avoid possible conscription. It was at this time that he adopted the pseudonym Warlock, possibly in parody of his interest in the occult. In 1922 he completed his first widely acknowledged masterpiece the song cycle named the Curlew. His period of creativity continued only for a few years culminating in the composition of his most famous work – the Capriol Suite – in 1925. The original piano duet version of the work was a great success and was quickly followed by the version for string orchestra (1926) and a version for full orchestra (1928).

Program notes: Portobello Orchestra http://www.theportobelloorchestra.co.uk/ProgrammeNotes/WarlockCapriol.php

Medley of traditional folk music from Western Europe.

Performed by Cassandra D’Arcy (Mandolin) and Gary Hunt (keyboard)

The Helston Furry Dance is traditionally performed on 8th May as a celebration of the passing of winter and the arrival of
spring since at least 1790. This traditional Cornish dance is one of Britain’s oldest customs and is still practised today.

Methley Park is a country dance from West Yorkshire and is named after the former imposing country estate of the same
name.

Morris dancing is a form of English folk dance based on rhythmic stepping and the execution of choreographed figures
by a group of dancers and dates back to the 1 th Century. Dancers usually wear bell pads on their shins and wield
implements such as sticks, swords and handkerchiefs that are clapped together in time with the dance.

The Sarabande evolved from a Spanish dance with Arab influences. It is traditionally danced by a lively double line of
couples with castanets and dates back to the early 16 th Century. The sarabande musical style was also extensively used
throughout much of classical music period, especially the baroque era.

A minuet was a social dance of French origin for two people, usually in 3/4 time.

The “Sir Roger de Coverley” is a traditional northern English and/or Scottish country dance that dates back to the late
17th Century. The name refers to a fox, and the dance’s steps are reminiscent of a hunted fox going in and out of cover.

Henry Purcell (1659-1695)

The Fairy Queen

With the re-opening of theatres after the Restoration of the monarchy, English theatre developed its own unique style, often called dramatic opera, in which additional scenes with music (masques) augmented spoken plays. Using Shakespeare’s play A Midsummer Night’s Dream as the backdrop, The Fairy Queen by Henry Purcell expounds on love and marriage, with allusions to co-regnants William and Mary, even as it references London’s ever-expanding world-view.

The Fairy Queen, first performed in London in 1692, was a great success. An unknown librettist adapted Shakespeare’s play and provided the new scenarios and texts. Purcell provided music for the additional scenes interpolated into each act of the play.

The drama of The Fairy Queen is in five acts preceded by instrumental music. The “first and second music,” consisting of two pieces each, were played as the audience took their seats. Then the overture, beginning with its trumpet fanfare, would announce the beginning of the drama. Between the acts are instrumental “act tunes” meant to be played during scene changes.

Act IV begins with a three-movement symphony in the Italian style. In the music that follows, Oberon and Titania, king and queen of the fairies, are reconciled after their quarrel, and their reunion is celebrated with a sunrise and the rebirth of the world. All nature is now in order once again, and there follows a masque of the four seasons.

Program notes: Handel & Haydn Society: https://handelandhaydn.org/enhanced-program-notes-the-fairy-queen-love-unbound/

Boston Baroque – Martin Pearlman: https://baroque.boston/purcell-the-fairy-queen

Arthur Sullivan (1842 – 1900)

The Merchant of Venice Suite

Arthur Sullivan was born in London, the son of the bandmaster to the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. By the age of 8 he had already learnt to play all of the instruments in his father’s band and at 14 he won the first Mendelssohn Scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music. This scholarship allowed him to study at the Leipzig Conservatoire.

The music to The Merchant of Venice was written for a production of the play at the Prince’s Theatre, Manchester. It concentrates on a single scene, a lavish masque during which Jessica and Lorenzo make their elopement. The following was written by Sullivan’s friend George Grove, editor of the dictionary of music, for a performance given at Crystal Palace in 1871:-

‘When the music begins, the stage is empty and night is approaching. The distant cry of the gondoliers echoing along the canals, and the voices of the masquers as they approach nearer and nearer are all depicted in the music. A lover serenades his mistress, the masquers gradually throng the ground, and the revelry begins. The dances are first a bourrée, the old-fashioned heavy measure; next a grotesque dance for Pierrots and Harlequins; and thirdly a general dance in modern waltz rhythm. Night has settled down on the scene when Jessica makes her escape; after this the fun waxes furious, and midst the glare of torches, the glitter of coloured lanterns, and the shouts and songs of the revellers, the curtain descends.’

The success of the music meant that it was often played without an accompanying production, and a suite consisting of four movements was regularly performed during the composer’s lifetime.

Program Notes: Willo Horsbrugh https://www.bhso.org.uk/work/sullivanthe-merchant-of-venice-suite/.

Indooroopilly Chamber Orchestra

Flute

Hayley Bryant

Zoe Ingram

Clarinet

Melissa Dobbie

Colleen Rowe

Bassoon

Jarrah Newman

Kirsten Wilson

Horn

Nicole Blackett

John MacGinley

Piano

Gary Hunt

Mandolin

Cassandra D’Arcy

Timpani and Percussion

Janine Kesting