We were delighted to welcome the prestigious international concert pianist Dinara Klintonto to launch the 82nd season of Haywards Heath Music Society. Dinara gave a fabulous recital, the first part featuring works by the great lyrical and dramatic composer for the piano, Robert Schumann. Dinara played with huge sensitivity and insight into the passion and drama of the pieces which formed the Fantasiestucke Op. 12.
The concert began with a gentle, dreamy Romance Op. 11 by Robert's wife Clara,. who was regarded as one of the most distinguished pianists of the Romantic era as well as being a composer.
After the interval Dinara turned to Rachmaninov ( Elegie 0p.3) and then to Ravel's Sonatine pour piano which provided a contrast to the Romantic era pieces. Ravel was a good pianist but he was unable to play the Toccata he wrote to end the work - too challenging. However, Dinara - a truly virtuoso pianist, had no such problem!
And so to Gershwin and the C20 represented in this concert by Earl Wild's transcription of 'The Man I Love' followed by a triumphant dazzling finale - a performance of the spectacular Rhapsody in Blue.
Dinara is a pianist par excellence and we are privileged to have heard her here in Haywards Heath.
October's concert at Haywards Heath Music Society featured something completely new in the world of music - Recorder accompanied by a Synthesiser. This concert featuring the recorder was a first for the Society and we were very fortunate to welcome Piers Adams who is regarded as one of the greatest recorder players of our time, and Lyndy Mayle on synthesiser.
The new programme was entitled Baroque Alchemy and certainly both artists provided plenty of magic in their performances. From the opening notes of the concert we were treated to a breathtaking beauty of sound, incredible finger dexterity and seemingly effortless outpouring of the most glorious music.
Baroque composers such as Handel, Bach, Telemann and Albinoni
were joined by lesser known ones such as Veracini, Montalbano, D'Anglebert and Forqueray - all of them very worth hearing. Richard Strauss, Piazolla, Albeniz and Ian Clarke brought us into the modern era but the concert ended with Goldberg Gala, a set of very imaginative variations on the well known theme by Bach.
The combination of recorders with a C21 synthesiser works beautifully. The magical sounds which Piers conjures from his wide range of recorders meld perfectly with Lyndy's sensitive and imaginative use of the huge number of effects available on the synthesiser. There is a great demand from the large audience for a return visit - we certainly hope to hear Piers and Lyndy again.
In November we welcomed prize winning piano accordionist Ryan Corbett to the Methodist Church where, seated centre stage, he delighted us with a fascinating set of transcriptions for this very individual instrument by composers ranging from JS Bach, Mozart, Tchaikovsky to Albeniz and tango specialist Astor Piazzolla.
He started with Busoni's transcription of a Partita Chaconne by Bach and immediately we were dazzled by Ryan's extraordinary
dexterity across the keyboard that gave a visual magnificence to the accordion matched by a huge volume of sound. By contrast, Ryan moved from thunderous organ style bass notes and harmonic progression in the Bach piece to a sprightly Le Tic-Tok tune by Couperin, dreamy at the start before upping the tempo with rapid fingers skittering along the keys, pulsing like a clock.
These first two pieces demonstrated the huge differences in mood and tone that Ryan brought to his playing and set a high bar for what was to follow – the
glorious Ave Maria by Piazzolla, a slow haunting melody that showed the full swell and range of the instrument, before Ryan launched into the Brahmsiana – Rhapsody for
Accordion by Russian composer Vlacheslav Semionov ( b.1946) with its bold introduction before settling into a harmonious paean to Brahms in its tone and feel.
Mozart's Andante for a Musical Clock opened the second half of the concert followed by another Semionov work, Red Guelder Rose, which moved from stormy to lyrical mood with
soft whispery notes. Then came a real highlight of the recital which the audience loved – Cordoba; Asturias by Albeniz, a fast flamenco piece, mostly heard on the guitar, which Ryan ripped into with dramatic flourishes by shaking the accordion in staccato fashion before slowing down then reigniting the tune with electric pace.
His last two works were a soulful Romance by Tchaikovsky and a Rondo Capriccioso by another Russian Vladislav Zolotaryov. This was a rumbustious, surging finish to a most unusual concert by a virtuoso performer who showed us how the piano accordion was truly a full orchestra in its own right.
At the end Ryan delighted our audience by explaining how his Italian accordion was made with 900
individual reeds and 10,000 different parts! Huge applause and a beautiful encore piece rounded off a magnificent recital.
Haywards Heath Music Society welcomed the Trio Kurtág - Juliette Roos (violin), Yume Fujise (viola) and Eliza Millett (cello) to begin the second part of our 82nd season on February 17th. The Trio Trio Kurtág are part of the prestigious Munster Trust Musical Award scheme.
The venue of the Methodist Church proved the ideal location for what proved to be a feast of chamber music at its very best.
The Trio produces a ravishing, rich sound which ideally suited the programme of Classical, Romantic and Modern pieces.
Unusually this was a 'Back to the past' programme which started in a concentration camp in 1944 with the heartfelt, soulful and elegiac music of Gideon Klein's
String Trio. The intense middle movement was bookended by lighter music all based on Moravian folk music. The work was all the more poignant for being the last thing Klein wrote before his death at Auschwitz.
Back then to 1902 and one of Ernst Dohnanyi's most famous chamber works, the Serenade in C Major, Op.10. The Trio produced a compelling and hugely enjoyable account of this very attractive piece. They played with verve capturing the various moods from a March, a serenade solo from the viola accompanied by pizzicato notes, a bustling fugue, an exquisitely soft and beautiful solemn theme and variations, and ending in an ebullient Rondo with a majestic restatement of the March theme.
The second part of the evening took us back to Vienna in 1797 with a performance of Beethoven's String Trio op.3. This sunny, joyful work is full of contrasting rhythms and textures. It was received with great enthusiasm by the very appreciative audience. The Trio Kurtag are consummate artists playing with faultless technique and great musicianship. We wish them well for the future.
Haywards Heath Music Society is very grateful to the Countess of Munster Musical Trust for sponsoring this concert.
Members and friends of Haywards Heath Music Society were treated to a dazzling display of keyboard virtuosity at St Wilfrid's Church on Saturday March 23rd 2024. Dominic chose to play a programme where most of the composers had learnt with one of the others. "The Composer's Apprentice" included the sparkling Sonata XV1:50 by Haydn followed by a Sonata Fantasia Op.27 no.1 by Beethoven.
Dominic's playing brought out the excitement and drama in these pieces which were composed only five years apart. Beethoven was a pupil (sometimes a very stubborn, difficult one) of Haydn.
The second half began with a most beautiful work by Saint-Saens – the Etude Op. 52 no.6 "Etude en forme de valse". Perhaps not as well known as it should be, this piece
made a terrific impression – "Wow! Fantastic!" I wrote in my notes. This truly virtuoso work was played with great passion and I think all present would have liked
to hear it again.
Gabriel Faure was taught by Saint-Saens while still at school, and the pair remained lifelong friends. The lovely, serene Nocturne Op 36 no.4 made a great contrast to the Saint-Saens and led us to the last work of the evening, "Miroirs" by Maurice Ravel. Ravel was taught by Faure at the Paris Conservatoire. The five movements of Miroirs are very contrasted - Noctuelles, Oiseaux Tristes, Une Barque sur L'Ocean, Alborado del Grazioso and La Vallee des cloches. Dominic's evocative interpretations were truly magical.
Dominic has played for the Society twice before as the founder and pianist of the Mithras Trio. At this recital his mastery of the keyboard and perceptive musicianship shone through every bar! A wonderful piano recital and one which will be long remembered!
Programme: "A Tribute to Dizzy Gillespie".
We were delighted to welcome back to St Wilfred's Church the National Youth Orchestra Ambassadors with their leader Mark Armstrong.
The band treated us to a rousing evening of 1940's Be Bop jazz music based on the compositions of the extraordinary trumpet player and showman John 'Dizzy' Gillespie who was famous for his beret and horn-rimmed spectacles, scat singing, bent horn, pouched cheeks and light-hearted personality.
The sextet comprised Mark on trumpet, Joe Pickering and Sophie Speed, alto and tenor saxes, George Belmont bass, Noah Ojumu drums amd Tom Hughes, piano.
They kicked off their session with Blue n' Boogie, a 1944 jazz standard and foot-stomping number, that set the tempo and mood of things to come, with bright, clear blowing by Mark and snappy vamping on the piano by Tom.
The tunes chosen in the first half ranged from seductive Latin rhythms in Con Alma to all-horns-a-blazing in Hot House, a Be Bop standard echoing Cole Porter's 'What Is This Thing Called Love' and ended with Salt Peanuts, a catchy piece that had the audience calling out the title refrain between solos.
Mark's piercing trumpet cut through the riff phrases of the two saxophones and their interplay was a joy to behold.
In the interval some people said they couldn't tell what was coming next and the difficulty of following 'the tune'; "However, the band's sound was spectacular, and the church acoustics were fabulous," remarked one concertgoer. Certainly the harmonic and rhythmic complexity of this style of jazz music was challenging to the listener so we were grateful when Mark stepped forward to talk us through the history and background of these pieces in a casual and often comic way!
In the second half two pieces stood out - A Night in Tunisia - which like many of Gillespie's tunes featured a short introduction and brief interlude that recurs between solo sections; in this case a twelve bar sequence leading into a four-bar break for the next soloist. Mark called it 'The Perfect Cadence' with a flattened ninth and tonic fifth. When the technical talk finished the band softened the mood and played Tin Tin Deo, a reflective number with a lilting Cuban rhythm and they closed their set with "The Champ" which Gillespie wrote in Paris in the mid 1940s whilst playing alongside Les Double Six, a French vocalese group.
Loud applause and whoops of joy swept over the musicians as they lined up on the stage at the end. What's more we were chuffed at breaking our music society attendance record with an audience of 156 folk that evening. Hurrah! Jazz music will always feature in our concerts in the future with at least one performance each season.