 November Newsletter31 October 2006Don’t miss Symphonic Rock ‘n Screen
On Saturday 4 November, “Symphonic Rock 'n Screen - from Hollywood to hit parade” will showcase the CPO in a lightermood when the orchestra plays hits from Hollywood and rock music. Conductor Iain Sutherland of Rock Legends fame has arranged the music of among others Gershwin, Bernstein, John Williams, ABBA, Queen and Lennon & McCartney, among others, for this upbeat programme.
Iain Sutherland’s concept of combining a symphony orchestra together with a pop group resulted in the hugely successful Rock Legends concerts in 2003.
For this latest concert, he combined the symphony orchestra with a rock band. The first part of the programme is called “Symphonic Hollywood”, consisting of hits from the silver screen and presented in the style of the Hollywood Bowl and Boston Pops concerts. The music featured will include themes from hit movies such as Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Superman and great Hollywood musicals such as My Fair Lady, West Side Story, Me and My Gal and Sweet Charity.
For the second half, the Rock Band joins the orchestra to play Symphonic ABBA, The Queen Suite and a rousing finale based upon Lennon and McCartney's superlative hit Hey Jude.
Lionel Bowman remembered
On hearing the sad news of the recent passing of Lionel Bowman, one of South Africa’s greatest concert pianists, the orchestra’s management decided to dedicate the second concert (17 November) of the Cape Town International Summer Music Festival to his memory. Mr Bowman will be remembered as a leading exponent of the music of Beethoven. Although his career as concert pianist ended in 1982, he remained very influential in music circles as teacher and mentor. His heritage includes the Bowman Beethoven Bursary competition for students at the music departments of the universities of Cape Town and Stellenbosch.
Festival news
The following corporate sponsorships for some of the Festival concerts have been confirmed:
We are most grateful to these sponsors for their invaluable support. The Friends of Orchestral Music are sponsoring the participation of the following soloists in the Cape Town International Summer Music Festival: John Ntsepe, Hanneli Rupert, Beverley Chiat, François du Toit, Albie van Schalkwyk and Wessel van Wyk. We sincerely thank the members of the Friends for their contribution in making the Festival a success. Calendar During October the orchestra was engaged in outreach concerts at schools and in playing for Cape Town City Ballet. Between 4 and 19 October they performed more than 20 concerts at schools all over the metropolitan area. These concerts are an important part of the outreach activities of the orchestra and, as our photograph shows, the CPO’s performances under Alex Fokkens were met by enthusiastic crowds at all the venues.
The school concerts were followed by rehearsals for the season of Cape Town City Ballet’s Giselle from 24 October to 2 November.  “A Music Festival takes us to a next level” – Sergei Burdukov
When you ask Sergei Burdukov, Artistic Executive of the CPO, about the upcoming Cape Town International Summer Music Festival, his message is clear:
“It is taking us to a completely new level, both locally and internationally.”
“The time had come for bigger ideas”, Sergei said. “New ideas such as that of an international music festival mean that a large horizon opens up in terms of worldwide recognition. One example of what this festival already means to us, is that when the Swedish recording company BIS heard that we have been granted the permission to perform the world première of Alfred Schnittke’s Oratorio Nagasaki, they signed up to record this work, as well as his Symphony Number Zero with the CPO and Conductor Owain Arwel Hughes. This is a major event in the international music world.”
Sergei explains further about how the idea of the festival started: “CEO Louis Heyneman and I work as a very close team during the planning of such major events. We decided to capitalise on the fact that international summer music festivals have become very popular internationally and because of our geography, a summer festival in Cape Town provides a break from the winter cold to visitors from the northern hemisphere.
“The CPO always has a concert series towards the end of the year. After discussions with Olga Kern, who was immediately enthusiastic about the concept and who agreed, we decided to turn that series into something bigger with the addition of more concerts and recitals. We also ensured that we engaged top conductors and artists, and chose a programme of works that included major works by popular composers, as well as a rare performance of Mozart’s Concerto for Three Pianos by three of our foremost pianists.
“We added three world premières, a performance of Saint-Saëns, Carnival of the Animals with the popular Evita Bezuidenhout as narrator, a first performance of the Cape Philharmonic Youth Orchestra in front of an international audience and a Festival Pops concert with local pop diva Yvonne Chaka Chaka. We realised we had the recipe for an exciting international music festival. ”
“We decided to start with a festival that would be manageable in terms of size, but also meaningful in terms of the content. Among others this also meant a significant South African participation.”
“An event like this gives our own soloists the opportunity to gain experience in front of international audiences and is also a showcase for works written by local composers. This local participation will help to give the Festival its own special identity from the start,” he said.
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