Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra's principal bassist Gordon Hill leads a small ensemble in Stravinsky's L'histoire du soldat (The Soldier's Tale). Photo/Adrian Mallloch.
Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra's principal bassist Gordon Hill leads a small ensemble in Stravinsky's L'histoire du soldat (The Soldier's Tale). Photo/Adrian Mallloch.
Were it not for dental disfigurement, Gordon Hill might have been a trumpeter.
As a kid growing up in New Mexico he was given the option of learning trumpet or double bass.
"I said trumpet, definitely," Hill recalls. "I showed up to the first lesson and the teacher saw my braces. It's been bass ever since."
Dentistry long since sorted, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra's principal bassist leads a small ensemble of his colleagues in Stravinsky's L'histoire du soldat (The Soldier's Tale) as part of the APO's In Your Neighbourhood series. The story of a World War I soldier, his enchanted violin and a bargains with the devil, L'histoire is one of the composer's true masterpieces.
"It's great music to play," says Hill. "The orchestration is so good. Being a bass player I love rhythm, and Stravinsky's all about rhythm."
Hill has performed the work several times in the United States and the APO played the suite a few years ago. However, the version presented this month, featuring a narrator, is rarely staged here. The narrator is Kevin Keys, well-known in theatre circles.
Keys has excellent teeth, which might explain why, before becoming an actor, he was a trombonist, studying performance at the New Zealand School of Music. He says his gangly limbs helped, too.
"I started on cornet and when I was about 9 they said, 'You've got long arms, do you want to play this?'"
Keys, who has performed with Blackbird Ensemble and his own Latin group, Soul Samba Circus, plays infrequently these days. However, his musical training is helpful when working with orchestras, as he does regularly, and not just for the ability to read a score.
"It's a big advantage," he says. "Being familiar with the [musical] environment is really helpful because you understand the culture, the unwritten rules and expectations that exist in the orchestral world."
Stravinsky's work features trombone but Keys feels no urge to take APO principal trombonist Doug Cross' place.
"Orchestral music is such a discipline and I'm far from being on my game as an orchestral trombonist," he says. "I get great pleasure now from hacking away and playing with a crass tone."
Actor Kevin Keys says a musical background is useful when working with the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra.
Keys has recently completed a five-month run performing Shakespeare with the Pop-up Globe. The proximity of the Globe's groundlings, forcing actors to come eyeball to eyeball with the crowd, was good practice for The Soldier's Tale, which is performed in intimate venues in St Heliers and Takapuna.
"There's more a sense of all being in a space telling a story together," he says. "It's like being around a campfire."
The intimacy of a small stage is beneficial for the musicians, too. The Soldier's Tale calls for just seven players and the APO group will perform without a conductor.
"Playing in small groups hones listening skills," says Hill. "When we play together in the APO, the trumpet may be a long way away but here it's right next to you. That facilitates communication and when you take that back to the orchestra it makes a huge difference for everyone's ensemble playing."
When it comes to interpreting the soldier's motivation for making his Faustian pact, trading his violin — and more — for financial gain, Hill and Keys don't necessarily sing from the same sheet.
"For me, the soldier is a flawed character and a symbol of human weakness," Hill says. "He is full of hubris and ego and human frailties. In a way, the devil almost comes across as the more moral character because he's honest about what he's doing."
While Hill has sympathy for the devil, Keys is more forgiving of the soldier who has suffered the horrors of war.
"I think you need to empathise with him," he says. "It's easy in this situation to see the soldier as a numpty who does the obvious thing. But for me it's about trying to find the person faced with a temptation that's genuinely alluring, rather than just an idiot who does stupid things."
For Keys, The Soldier's Tale makes a tidy bookend to the World War I centenary celebrations, which began with a role in Auckland Theatre Company's 2014 production of Once on Chunuk Bair, Maurice Shadbolt's anti-war play about Gallipoli.
"The last moment of Chunuk Bair was my character broken and full of rage as the only survivor in his vicinity. I've often wondered what his future held. It's interesting to pick up with a soldier returning from war in L'histoire — what the war has done to him and what he's prepared now to trade."
Which, of course, is everything.
Lowdown What: Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra plays Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale Where and when: St Peter's Church, Takapuna, June 11; St Heliers Church and Community Centre, June 12
