Manawatū Sinfonia celebrates Palmerston North composers with concert

Manawatū Sinfonia conductor Tim Jones is ready to climb in to the orchestra's celebration of Palmerston North composers. Photo / Judith Lacy

If you think orchestral music was only composed centuries ago in Europe by men with funny hair, think again.

Sunday's Manawatū Sinfonia concert is a celebration of New Zealand composers, three of whom are from Palmerston North.

Conductor Tim Jones says the sinfonia has never had a concert of just New Zealand composers before.

Four of the pieces were written in the past two years - music hot off the press, he says. Two of the pieces will be world premieres.

The concert will open with Eric Biddington's Classical Overture. It will be the New Zealand premiere of the Christchurch composer's work with its "lovely, breezy opening".

Then it's the world premiere of Nick Hunter's Piano Concerto, which Jones describes as daring, edgy and exciting. Hunter is a Palmerston North piano teacher and will be the piano soloist for this work on Sunday.

Jones says Piano Concerto has many contrasts of mood and he appreciates the cleverness of how it is written and the way it makes use of instruments including the extremes of the piano keyboard.

Next is Sai Natarajan's We Yearn to Tell Stories. Natarajan is in the sinfonia's percussion section.

Jones says We Yearn to Tell Stories is a beautiful, measured piece with lovely contrasts between loud and quiet.

"Every person I play this to falls in love with it."

Craig Holdaway's The Undertaking of a Quest will also be a world premiere. A former brass band conductor, he plays the cornet and trumpet and, like Hunter and Natarajan, lives in Palmerston North.

Jones describes the piece as cinematic with the fast sections heroic and exciting and the slow sections lyrical and melodic. The timpani and snare drums drive the piece.

The penultimate piece is the late Douglas Lilburn's Mountain Rescue, written for the 1950 New Zealand film Journey for Three. Mountain Rescue plots the journey of rescuers on a glacier. Jones says there are big, storming moments for the orchestra in this atmospheric piece.

The finale is Elysian Fields by David Hamilton. He is coming from Auckland to listen to the Palmerston North premiere of his work. Elysian Fields was written for the Auckland Youth Orchestra and has a tubular bell solo - think glockenspiel but on its end.

"It's a big, big sounding piece," Jones says. "It's going to literally take the roof off at the end." Think triple forte: very very loud.

About 45 musicians are needed for this concert.

Jones is usually in percussion and is an occasional conductor of the sinfonia. His last stint with the baton was in 2019 for Last Night of the Proms.

Jones, who is an educator for Life Ed Manawatū, started in 1987 with the Manawatū Youth Orchestra. His clarinet audition was not good but then orchestra director John Schwabe put him in the percussion section and the rest was ... music.

The Details
What: A Celebration of Local Composers
When: Sunday, 2.30pm
Where: Speirs Centre
Tickets: $20 /$15 / $5 at the door or on Eventfinda

This is a Public Interest Journalism funded role through NZ On Air