Winter Symphony Season

Sunday 31 August

 City Hall 15:00

Conductor: Benjamin Zander
Soloists:   Sabina Mossolow (soprano)
                   Violina Anguelov (mezzo)
                   Sipho Fubesi (tenor)
                   Raphael Vilakazi (baritone)

New Apostolic Church Choir & City of Tygerberg Choir

Programme:

Beethoven: Egmont Overture

(After the Overture, Ben Zander will present, with Choir and Orchestra, a substantial lecture-demo on interpretive issues in the Symphony, which will be performed after the interval)

Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 in D minor

       Benjamin Zander                          

BENJAMIN ZANDER has established an international reputation as one of America’s most innovative conductors, especially with the music of Beethoven and Mahler. He is worldwide known as a leadership speaker and co-authored the international best-seller The Art of Possibility. He has been the conductor of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra since 1979 and is also a popular guest conductor all over the world. He has a unique relationship with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London with whom he is recording a series of Beethoven and Mahler symphonies for the Telarc label. The phenomenal success of these discs is in part due to the eloquent and informative discussion discs which accompany each disc. High Fidelity named his recording of Mahler 6th as the best classical recording of 2002, while his recording of Mahler's 9th was nominated for a Grammy Award.

        Sabina Mossolow            Violina Anguelov                    Sipho Fubesi                   Raphael Vilakazi 

GABRIELA MONTERO  has appeared with orchestras across the world. She recently made her début with the New York Philharmonic conducted by Lorin Maazel.Born in Caracas, Venezuela, Gabriela gave her first public performance at the age of five. When she was eight years old she made her concerto début with the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra conducted by Jose Antonio Abreu and was granted a scholarship from the Venezuelan government to study in the USA. At twelve she won the Baldwin National Competition and AMSA Young Artist International Piano Competition, performing Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No.1 with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra

SABINA MOSSOLOW was born in Windhoek, Namibia, of Russian- German parentage. She holds an honour’s degree in journalism as well as a master’s degree in music from the University of Stellenbosch, where she studied singing under the renowned South African soprano Nellie du Toit. Sabina sang the solo part in a recording of Hendrik Hofmeyr’s Sinfonia Africana with the CPO in 2004. 

SIPHO FUBESI has been singing as a soloist in community choirs in the Eastern Cape since he was a schoolboy. After matric, and a stint with the local Sakhabengoma Choral Society, he joined the Cape Town Opera Training Programme. Sipho has sung in the choruses of Nabucco, Faust and Così fan Tutte and performed the role of Kaspar in Cape Town Opera's Amahl and the Night Visitors. He most recently sang The Duke in Rigoletto at the Joseph Stone Auditorium and Ruggero in La Rondine at the Baxter Theatre Centre. Sipho is a final year student at UCT Opera School and was a finalist in the 2005 and 2006 Schock Foundation prize. 

Multitalented baritone RAPHAEL VILAKAZI is the co-founder and former Deputy CEO of Opera Africa. He graduated from Technikon Natal’s Academy of Music and was the recipient of the 1992 Standard Bank Young Artist Award for Music. In 1996 he was awarded the Vita Award for the most outstanding performance by a male singer in a leading role as Papageno in The Magic Flute by Mozart. His opera repertoire also includes the Lawyer in Gianni Schicchi by Puccini, Figaro in Le Nozze De Figaro by Mozart, Escamillo in Carmen by Bizet,  Silvio in Pagliacci, Prince Yamadori in Puccini’s Madamma Butterfly as well as Schanaurd in Puccini’s La Boheme and Valentine in Opera Africa’s pioneering project of Faust staged at the University of Zululand. He took part in a new version of Beethoven’s Fidelio staged by Broomhill Opera Company in London, England and in 2004 he participated in the International Gala Concert presented in Johannesburg by Pro Musica Opera in conjunction with the Norway Government, showcasing the cream of South African Opera Voices together with Norwegian opera voices. His concert repertoire includes Rossini’s Stabat Mater, Haydn’s Stabat Mater, Mozart’s Requiem and Mass in C Major, Four Serious Songs by Brahms, Mendelsssohn’s Elijah, Faure’s Requiem, as well as the world premier of the Zulu Messiah with the KwaZulu Natal Philharmonic Orchestra in Pietermariztburg, SouthAfrica. In 1995 he performed with the London Philharmonic Orchestra in their tour of South Africa, where he sang the baritone part of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9.

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