Latest news with #HanoverHall
Otago Daily Times
14-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Otago Daily Times
Jazz club's tribute to Quincy Jones
Jazz singer Maya Satake. Photo: supplied Dunedin Jazz Club will pay tribute to the life of Quincy Jones with a concert this weekend showcasing the arrangements he wrote for Ella Fitzgerald and Count Basie. The "When Ella Met Quincy" concert will be held this Saturday, May 17, from 7.30pm at Hanover Hall. Filling the shoes of the "First Lady of Jazz" will be young jazz singer Maya Satake, a graduate of the Dunedin Jazz Foundation for secondary school students, and lead vocalist with the Dunedin Youth Jazz Orchestra. Satake is enjoying success as a performer, including winning the Otago regional finals of Rockquest in 2023 with her band Burberry Scarves, and as lead vocalist with All Blues jazz band that won the "best big band" award at the 2024 Dunedin Youth Jazz Festival. Satake's performance of Fitzgerald's Blue Skies at an end-of-year school concert convinced Dunedin Youth Jazz Band director Bill Martin to give her the lead vocalist role for Saturday's concert, a statement said. The Dunedin Youth Jazz Orchestra is driven by the rhythm section of Amelia Ross (drums), Matthew Tait (piano) and Guthrie Wakelin (bass), with solos from DYJO players Louis Robertson, Ethan Burton, Benji Pickering and Callan Power. — APL
Otago Daily Times
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Otago Daily Times
Poetry, opera combine in musical monodrama
Mezzo soprano Dr Tessa Romano in her role as ringmaster in last year's opera production The Trapeze Artists. Photo: Charmian Smith A musical "monodrama" created by Dunedin composer Prof Anthony Ritchie, in collaboration with author Fiona Farrell, will be performed next week for NZ Music Month. Entitled You! Who?, the song cycle will be given its premiere performance by senior lecturer in voice Dr Tessa Romano (mezzo soprano) and Prof Terence Dennis (piano), next Wednesday from 1pm at Hanover Hall. The concert is part of the ongoing University of Otago School of Performing Arts lunchtime concert series. Prof Ritchie composed the monodrama earlier this year, while on sabbatical leave from the university, creating musical settings for eight poems by Fiona Farrell, which follow the ups and downs of a married couple's relationship. The poems were written specially for the You! Who? project by Farrell, a long-standing friend of Prof Ritchie, after discussions of possible creative collaborations. "The poems trace the evolution of a human relationship, from first meeting through marriage, babies, separation, reconciliation, and finally death," Prof Ritchie said. "The songs flow from one to another without a break and the work was conceived as a monodrama, with the singer encouraged to act a role — it is like a mini-opera for one singer." Composer Prof Anthony Ritchie. Photo: Josie Garner Prof Ritchie said the monodrama was written with Romano in mind, after he saw her "wonderful" performance as the ringmaster in Opera Otago production The Trapeze Artists, which combined his music with the poetry of Cilla McQueen and Hone Tuwhare, and libretto by Louise Petherbridge, and was performed during the 2024 Dunedin Fringe Festival. "I was really inspired by her performance," he said. Next week's NZ Music Month concert will also feature two other local compositions. University of Otago music honours graduate Cameron Monteath's work Ballade for Cello and Piano (2023) will be performed by Heleen Du Plessis (cello) with Monteath himself on piano. Also to be presented will be The Spindle of Necessity (2005) by current Mozart fellow Simon Eastward, performed by University of Otago music students.
