19 Oct 2015

This content is tagged as Music .

NEWS

Aroha Quartet   RNZ Concert   SOUNDZ Recordings and concert

The new collaborative project, established this year, between SOUNZ Centre for New Zealand Music, the Aroha String Quartet and Radio New Zealand Concert (RNZ Concert), in association with the Composers Association of New Zealand (CANZ) and Chamber Music New Zealand (CMNZ) takes place this month.

Aroha String Quartet will rehearse and workshop the selected pieces over the next week, prior to the recording sessions, which take place in Wellington over the weekend of 24-25 October. The sessions will be filmed by SOUNZ and recorded by RNZ Concert, producing 70 minutes of string quartets, which will be broadcast and made available for free online streaming through partner websites.

Aroha Quartet Cellist Robert Ibell said: "It has been a great experience coming to know these seven diverse works. What an exciting range of styles, moods, colours and textures they contain! There's something for everyone in this programme. We're so looking forward to working with the composers as we record their pieces and to presenting them to a wider audience at the free public concert."

The weekend of recording sessions is followed by a public performance of the varied and stimulating works on 26 October 2015, 4pm at St Andrew's on the Terrace, Wellington.

Earlier this year, the following works by seven NZ composers were selected for recording by a panel made up of representatives of partner organisations:

  • Helen Bowater: this desperate edge of now
  • Ross Carey: Toccatina (Elegy)
  • Blas Gonzalez: SPASMS
  • Anthony Ritchie: Whakatipua
  • Jeroen Speak: Auxetos
  • Kirsten Strom: Purity
  • Alex Taylor: refrain 

Diana Marsh, Executive Director of SOUNZ says, “We are delighted to be able to partner with an ensemble like Aroha Quartet and RNZ Concert to create recordings of a range of chamber music to add to our collection. SOUNZ sees this as a pilot project for opportunities with other ensemble configurations in future years.”