Piano At Ten, July 6 - Piano Trios
The trio will perform the following pieces:
Piano Trio in d minor, Op.120 Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924)
Allegro, ma non troppo
Andantino
Allegro vivo
Mozart-Adagio Arvo Pärt (b.1935)
Piano Trio in c minor, Op.1 no.3 Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Allegro con brio
Andante cantabile con Variazioni
Menuetto - Quasi Allegro
Prestissimo
About the performers:
Kyle Little, Violin
Kyle completed his Bachelor of Music in violin performance from the University of Dalhousie (Canada) in 2006. He graduated from the University of Wollongong in 2010 with a Graduate Diploma in Education. Kyle is currently pursuing a Masters Degree in Music Education Research. He has studied violin under a number of well respected violinists, including master classes with Pinchas Zukerman and lessons with violinist Mark Fewer, former concert master of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. Receiving a number of awards for academic and musical achievement, Kyle Little has been awarded the Canadian Millennium Scholarship (2006), Kiwanis Canadian National Grand Prize (2002), the Royal St. George’s Society Prize (2004) and the Bornoff/Garamie String Scholarship. Kyle has been highly involved in music across New South Wales. He was the head string tutor for the Southern Stars 2011 - 2013 season, member of the Vatiliotis String Quartet, former concert master of the Wollongong Community Orchestra, and former member of the Wollongong Symphony Orchestra.
Ilir Merxhushi, cello
Albanian-born cellist, Ilir Merxhushi, graduated with excellence in performance and teaching from the Academy of Fine Arts, State University of Albania in 1987. He was then appointed to the Albanian State Opera Orchestra, later becoming the principal cellist. He worked with the orchestra for more than ten years. At the same time he was professor of cello at the Academy of Fine Arts, Albania, and performed as a soloist and chamber musician in concerts throughout Albania, Germany, Italy, Croatia, Spain, Portugal and Greece. Ilir migrated to Australia in 2001. He played with the Australia Opera and Ballet Orchestra under Simone Young as artistic director from 2002-2004. He maintains an active teaching practice in Wollongong alongside a busy performing schedule. His repertoire embraces the major cello works, including the Bach cello suites, concertos by Dvorak, Schumann, Saint-Saens, Lalo and Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations, as well as the sonatas of Brahms and Beethoven.
David Vance, piano
David Vance holds honours degrees in English literature and music performance, and pursued further musical studies in Italy, Austria and England. He taught at the University of Sydney and the NSW Conservatorium of Music before his appointment in 1982 to the University of Wollongong where he was Associate Professor and Sub Dean in the Faculty of Creative Arts until his retirement in 2012. David has broadcast and recorded chamber music for the Australian Broadcasting Commission, and is active as an accompanist and choral conductor. In recent years he has provided music, as performer, composer and music editor, for several documentary films made by the acclaimed Australian cinematographer/director, Geoff Burton, including The Fall of the House, a film about the conductor Sir Eugene Goossens.
Concert review Date: Saturday, 6th July, 2013 10:00am
Venue: Soldiers’ Memorial Hall, Bundanoon
The Artists: David Vance (Piano), Kyle Little (Violin) and Ilir Merxhushi (‘cello)
The Program:
The program comprised a varied selection of piano trio music from the classical and the romantic eras and a late twentieth century piece by a living composer.
1. Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924) Piano Trio in d minor, Op.120
Allegro, ma non troppo
Andantino
Allegro vivo
2. Mozart arr Arvo Pärt (b.1935)
Adagio
3. Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 - 1827)Piano Trio in c minor, Op.1 no.3
Allegro con brio
Andante cantabile con Variazioni
Menuetto - Quasi Allegro
Prestissimo
There was no encore offered, the concert having run for an hour.
Reviewer: Neil Mitchell
Reviewer’s comments:
The Fauré and the Beethoven trios are well-known and little need be said of them as music other than that they were well-liked by the audience but quite taxing for the performers, particularly the pianist. Of the composition by Mr Arvo Pärt, it is a reinvention of Mozart in the minimalist idiom. Of minimalism, the best that I can say is that it has had a rather long day in terms of the span of musical history and that it has led contemporary composers back towards tonality. The audience received the piece with moderate enthusiasm. For a further, musical view of minimalism, the reader is encouraged to seek out Professor Peter Schikele’s Einstein on the Fritz. Peter Schickele is an exact contemporary of Phillip Glass and Arvo Pärt. In regard to the performances, what a treasure it was to have David Vance in the trio. Not only did he not have a single bar’s rest throughout but he was secure throughout. Mr Merxhushi played beautifully but his ‘cello was not facing the audience, so he was a little faint at the back of the hall. Finally, Kyle Little deserves particular thanks for joining the trio at little notice. There were a few lapses in his intonation during the first movement of the Fauré but these resolved in the second movement. General Comments: Today’s artists must be complimented for their professionalism and determination in delivering this concert to Bundanoon. The original artists (violin and piano duo) were successively unavailable and these artists were substituted by one of the unavailable performers. Having come together very recently as a trio, and having limited rehearsal time, must have been both trying and challenging for these musicians. Today was cold but bright and the audience was of good size (close to ninety people) and warmly appreciative. I am not sure of how well understood it is that the artists who have performed this year in Bundanoon are of such high calibre.