15 September 2015

Interview: Peter Scholes and Claire Scholes


This Sunday, the Auckland Chamber Orchestra performs Peter Maxwell Davies’s seminal music-theatre work, Miss Donnithorne’s Maggot, at the Raye Freedman Arts Centre. Listener blog editor Alex Taylor caught up with husband and wife duo conductor and music director Peter Scholes, and Miss Donnithorne herself, mezzo-soprano Claire Scholes, to talk about violin violence, vocal extremes, expletives and establishmentarianism.  

Alex Taylor: Perhaps let's start by talking about the major work on the programme - Miss Donnithorne's Maggot by Peter Maxwell Davies - how did you come across this work and what made you want to put it on in concert?

Peter Scholes: I saw a performance of Eight Songs for a Mad King in my youth - it was quite a formative experience for me. This is of course a companion to that piece. Claire introduced me to Miss Donnithorne, and it was all go from there.

It's also totally made for Claire's voice and performance style.

Claire Scholes: I first heard about it back at university through Robert Wiremu, who introduced me to a massive range of exciting modern repertoire that he thought would be up my alley. He played me the Mary Thomas recording (with PMD conducting) and I was hooked - I showed it to the voice teacher (Glenese Blake back then) and she opened it up directly to a page of expletives and expressed her opinion that it was a no-go. (It would have been too hard for me back then anyway!)

Peter: It fits the ACO [Auckland Chamber Orchestra] programming style very well. We have done numerous operas over the last fifteen years and it's great to do a more 'recent' (ok not quite an opera!) vocal work. ACO did Poulenc's La Voix Humaine a few years ago - there are some similarities here.

Alex: What sets this work apart from Eight Songs for a Mad King do you think?

Peter: Well ... the violin stays in one piece.

Alex: !

Peter: Both represent madness: one monarchical, one domestic.

Claire: It's a bit more bel canto vocally; and although it still stretches the singer physically (multiphonics etc) it doesn't cover the same Roy Hart spectrum.

Peter: It's got some gorgeous tunes in it.

Alex: Miss Donnithorne was written in 1974 - do you think it still has contemporary relevance as a piece of theatre? How do you bring it into the twenty-first century?

Peter: There was a tabloid item about a groom not turning up to wedding just recently: the bride was going through grief but seemed to come out of it intact. Not so with Miss D of course.
Mental health is talked about now and supported much more than back then. It wasn't that long ago that women were put into asylums for the flimsiest reasons. So the key theme is mental health and this work delves into it in a very real way.

Claire: There are aspects of it that at first glance seem a bit dated to me, which the performers and production have to consider and work around - for example, the chauvinistic notion of madness in women being caused by sexual repression; and madness being played for laughs. There are some stage directions in the score that I think are best taken with a pinch of salt as they would come across as cheap gags. I feel sympathy and empathy for the real life Miss D., and feel that it would be only too easy for any of us to slip into her way of being - so I guess we've tried to find a middle ground where we're true to the guts of the score without playing it for laughs. (In his composer's note PMD says emphatically that Miss D. is not intended to be funny.)

Peter: It's also pure music in that it is about the voice - and the expression that comes from extreme techniques. The range is almost four octaves! [Eb below middle C to a super-high B natural five ledger lines above the stave]

Alex: Claire - how do you prepare for a role like this which is so extreme, vocally and theatrically?
Peter: You should ask the neighbours!
Claire: It's been an extremely slow careful process! I got the score last November, and the first step was the donkey-work of note-learning, and gradually getting the notes comfortably into the voice. It was a good six months before I could truly start playing around with the character of Miss Donnithorne without being glued to the score. Once the score was memorised I had sessions with choreographer/director Marianne Schultz where we fine-tuned Miss Donnithorne's movements. I've also been working with my singing teacher Patricia Wright on technical aspects from early on in the process. I've been in touch with Jane Manning in the UK (who I believe is the only other person to have performed Miss Donnithorne in NZ, back in the 70s with Fires of London) and she was extremely helpful in clearing up some of the more mysterious aspects of the score!

Alex: It's quite a mammoth commitment.

Peter: It's one of those pieces which make you grow as a performer. It extends the voice outside of its comfort zone and in doing so opens up a larger-than-life expressive power.

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Alex: Peter, you mentioned the operatic or music-theatre works that ACO has done recently like La Voix Humaine - why do you think we see relatively little of these sorts of expressionistic music-theatre works in New Zealand? Berg's Wozzeck, for example, or other contemporary operas?

Peter: Got my eye on Wozzeck! Just need a bigger band - that's all.

Alex: I guess I mean the music establishment in general - we see a lot of Verdi and Puccini, but do you think there's resistance to putting on more adventurous works or is it purely practical?

Peter: Mainstream opera repertoire is the way to get audiences. Even when we did a production of La Clemenza di Tito, it was a difficult sell, whereas our Lucia di Lammermoor sold out. We are getting Nixon in China though!

Claire: I think [John Adams’s] Death of Klinghoffer sold quite well.

Alex: And Nixon in China is adventurous?

Peter: In the context of a menu of just Puccini, Verdi and Mozart, I think it is breaking out.

Alex: Perhaps. A bit cheeky of me I know - but if audiences see Adams as being at the cutting edge, what hope is there for the truly adventurous?

Peter: Opera companies will always follow the masses, and Adams has achieved that support in his way. It's up to smaller groups to drive more adventurous projects. Opera need not have massive production budgets so with the right team more can and should be done. Of course funding is also driven by audience numbers - I think more so than when I was starting out.

Alex: You've certainly got a long history of striking and adventurous programming with ACO - what do you see as the orchestra's role or place in the music scene?

Peter: Red Peak flag.

Alex: As in...? well-designed, colourful, popular...?

Peter: It has good stories - it tells good stories - it is a flag. I enjoy working old and new music - we balance familiar with the unfamiliar. Personally I live for the new stuff – e.g. Graffiti (Unsuk Chin), Rautavaara, Anna Clyne, Alex Taylor. It is important that new music from other countries gets played here. I take risks with that because sometimes a piece is so new that it hasn't been "tested" for popularity. But that does not bother me… Lei Liang was a highlight. And Michel van der Aa. I am fond of John Adams too.

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Alex: Perhaps we could talk a little bit about the rest of the programme - how does it fit together? How might a listener experience it as a whole?

Peter: The concert starts very small and intimate - just a duo [Lilburn’s Sonatina for clarinet and piano] - then the quartet [Rodriquez’s Innocents in Love] - then Miss Donnithorne. So it is a progression. The chamber music first half - I see its intimacy as a good introduction to the second half. The Rodriguez has an opera link too. So the sound world develops by the addition of instruments and more complex musical material.

Alex: The Rodriguez is new to me - how would you describe it?

Peter: Post-romantic. Fragile and expressive.

Alex: Perhaps it's a sign of the vibrancy of the Auckland music community, but you're competing with a number of other events on Sunday - how do you go about drawing an audience?

Peter: Tooooo many clashes. It's a disaster really. I think we were all setting our dates ages ago and then this happens. We need to talk more. Anyway, to answer your question, we just hope there are enough people to go around. I don't mind a small audience - I remember concerts in London with tiny audiences - amazing musicians. But if people like this sort of thing happening, it would be great that they came. See you there!

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Auckland Chamber Orchestra, Raye Freedman Arts Centre, Sunday 20 September 5pm. Tickets $39/$29/$19 available from iTicket


13 September 2015

Interview: SOUNZ Contemporary Award 2015



The SOUNZ Contemporary Award is New Zealand's premier composition prize, the classical equivalent of the Silver Scrolls. Each year three finalists are chosen from a pool of entries. The winner will be announced at the Silver Scrolls awards night on Thursday 17 September at Vector Arena in Auckland. This year the SOUNZ Contemporary finalists are Ross Harris (for his Piano Quintet), Chris Watson (sing songs self) and Reuben Jelleyman (Expanse). Listener blog editor Alex Taylor caught up with the three finalists ahead of the awards ceremony.

You can hear the three finalists’ works here:

Ross Harris, Piano Quintet: http://sounz.org.nz/works/show/22290
Chris Watson, sing songs self: http://sounz.org.nz/works/show/21008
Reuben Jelleyman, Expanse: http://sounz.org.nz/works/show/22248


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Alex Taylor: How do you feel about being a finalist? How do you feel about the possibility of being "covered" at the Silver Scrolls on Thursday?

Ross Harris: It's great to be part of the finals and being covered at the Silver Scrolls can be completely hilarious.

Alex: What's your experience of that Ross - who's covered you in the past?

Ross: Hamish McKeich and Nathan Haines did the second symphony in a jazz style.

Alex: That must have been quite something!

Ross: Yeah it was really good actually.

Chris: It's a great honour, of course, to be a finalist. It feels like a form of validation that I didn't know I needed but am, as it turns out, happy to receive! Not sure how to feel about potentially being covered. I guess it would be a bit of a laugh.

Reuben Jelleyman: I thought Jeff Henderson's cover of Michael's piece was great (Michael Norris’s Inner Phases, the 2014 SOUNZ Contemporary Award winner)

Alex: I mean, for a lot of the audience - the cover will be the one and only time they hear your piece!

Chris: Hopefully everyone there on the night realises the looseness of the interpretation of the cover.

Alex: Yes absolutely. I know there's going to be drum n bass at some point…

Chris: And the preliminary video should feature quite a bit of the actual recording.

Reuben: I’m quite surprised, really [to be chosen as a finalist]. I think as a young composer considering their early 'career' you never think to count on such recognition at an early stage. I'm keen on the ceremony style - I think all the musical activities during the evening are quite a bit of fun.

Ross: Don't forget earplugs.

Alex: Very good advice.

Reuben: Ross - this is essential! I never go anywhere without them in fact.

Alex: Any picks for the other categories? The silver scroll is a doozy this year.

Reuben: Unknown Mortal Orchestra is my pick [for the song Multi-Love]

Chris: I'm ashamed to say I've not swotted up on the other categories. My NZ music knowledge is limited… But I will make the effort ahead of the night.

Ross: I haven't thought about that; I'm actually more interested in the 1981 competition [The Lost Silver Scroll, to be awarded to the best song of 1981]

Alex: Yes - that's a doozy too! Counting the Beat has been a fav of mine...
Chris: Like Ross, the 1981 bit has more resonance for me.

Reuben: I'm backing Blam Blam Blam [There is No Depression in New Zealand] for that one, but I really have not much to do with 1981...

Chris: Before your time, Reuben?

Reuben: Yes, a few years.

Reuben: x4

Ross: Yeah that's my choice too.

Alex: Topical.

Ross: All too topical.


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Alex: Listening to your piece Ross, the piano is initially a kind of percussive trigger for events - what's the trigger, the impetus for each of you to actually compose music?

Reuben: Sound Visions.

Chris: I'm not sure. Any rational view would disincline me from even starting a piece. So much effort, such delayed gratification!

Alex: So it's not a rational thing, then?

Chris: I suppose not. It's an inner urge amplified by an almost obligation to make something because I have certain skills... of course, there's great enjoyment along the way too.

Alex: Chris - that's a good way to put it - a lot of people mention the inner urge, the compulsion, and leave out the obligation part. Stravinsky may have been the vessel through which the rite passed, but he still had to write to commission....

Chris: This particular piece happened because I had time and funding to do something big(gish) - the Mozart Fellowship. Also, the remnants of the romantic piano concerto fan in me needed and found an outlet.

Reuben: Regarding earlier: I find sound hallucinations map themselves to opportunities before me. For me I've never really written unless there is the concert opportunity ahead of me, given to me. (rather not 'given' to me but 'offered' through competition). From then on it’s about finding the easiest way to write it down - the 'eigenvector'; in this respect Chris's comment is pertinent: it takes much effort, so must be worth doing.

Ross: Well the commission by Austrian Peter Diessl was a starting point and then the ensemble of string quartet plus piano i.e. sustained sounds versus percussion was inspiring. The piece evolves out of that sound world… making the contrasting timbres belong. And the desire to make a piece evolve over a reasonable timespan!

Alex: you've talked about that a lot Ross - "a reasonable time span" - the idea of a miniature seems almost anathema to your aesthetic - why do you write long pieces? surely any span of time can be "reasonable" or musically conducive?

Ross: That's a good question. To be honest the challenge of longer pieces has dominated my work recently and I think I would have a lot of trouble with miniatures at the moment.

Chris: The obligation thing...sometimes I feel like I'm more into film or fine art than music and that I'd like to make a contribution in one of those areas. But I've not the skills for that, so I'm kind of stuck in music! - that's no bad thing, but is a source of a degree of frustration.

Alex: Yes, I feel a bit like that with poetry.

Chris: I wouldn't really know, but you seem to me to be a very fine poet, Alex.

Alex: Ha! Thank you, Chris. I guess I feel I don't really have the craft that I feel I do in music. But it's interesting how one sort of falls into being a composer…

Ross: I didn't have anything else to fall into.

Chris: Maybe not, Ross, but your breadth of exploration within music is massively wide.

Alex: Hear, hear!

Reuben: Yes, I agree!

Ross: Struggling on!

Reuben: I've been desiring to write longer form for a while now, but I'm hardly given the opportunity - everything I write for is <5mins, say. I took the opportunity over summer to work on a ~13min orchestral piece, but still I marvel at what many composers can do with 20mins, and hope to work with these proportions myself (ASAP).

Chris: 20 minutes is scary long in my opinion.

Reuben: I've always wondered though what it would be like to sit through > 20mins of your own music... Ross?

Ross: It is a very long time for a single movement. Not all that many western art music pieces go that far -or at least not without a narrative- words etc. At least with a longish piece you might get a chance to relax and actually hear it unfolding.

Alex: Perhaps your mode of listening changes according to how long you think you are going to have to sit there for...

Ross: Definitely. In electroacoustic concerts they often tell you how long the pieces are.

Reuben: The foresight listening that Lutosławski worked so hard to disrupt.

Alex: I find listening in an engaged way really exhausting - so longer pieces are by necessity more meditative for me...

Chris: I'm only really capable of listening in the moment so actually struggle with longer works and only get the most out of them after repeated visits. My short attention span is probably evident in my own music.

Alex: That gives it an appealing mercurial quality I think chris...

Chris: ...often at the expense of convincing architecture.

Alex: Quicksilver doesn't need architecture!

Ross: I agree with Alex about the mercurial quality of your music Chris. What's foresight listening?

Reuben: Just a pseudo-definition of what Alex was talking about, where the audience start predicting how long a section will continue for.

Ross: What's wrong with audiences feeling enough about a piece to start predicting duration? Not consciously of course but in an anticipatory way.

Reuben: I think what Bryn Harrison does with complex aesthetics phasing over long periods unifies both these things.

Chris: Reuben, can you say more about "sound hallucinations"?

Reuben: Chris, it's a case of half-perceiving, half-hearing the sounds, and allowing them to form into events in your mind. I suppose I work a lot with thought improvisations - trying to piece sounds together like in free improvisation.

Ross: I'm with you Reuben on the half perceived, half-heard. That interests me a lot at the moment, but transcendental? Who knows?

Alex: Perhaps the sound hallucination thing ties into this next question - Reuben - your piece strikes me as an intensely spiritual work - it reaches a point of ecstasy or illumination just before the end - what role does a spiritual or transcendental aspect play in your music? (perhaps you have thoughts on this too, Chris and Ross)

Alex: It's like a creation ritual or something...

Reuben: I'm not sure, I certainly find a kind of excited state of mind where whatever it is becomes too exciting to stop thinking about it.

Chris: Does anyone have amazing ideas right on the cusp of falling asleep? - I've often thought that capturing those thoughts is where the real gold is. It alludes me, however!

Alex: Yes I try to write them down and often coming back to decode them later is completely hopeless…

Reuben: I often lie in bed awaiting sleep and play the piece from the beginning, matching the sounds together and constructing the piece slowly, ordering ideas

Ross: Working at night after waking from sleep seems fruitful for me sometimes.
Reuben:  (Very) early summer mornings are my favourite.

Ross: Bring on summer!

Alex: Do you see Expanse as a spiritual piece, though, Reuben?

Reuben: I don't think so. I see it more as a kind of system or environment of parts. It was necessarily short so I think it happens all too quickly...

Chris: As an atheist, I struggle with the S-word, but I would say that the word that came to mind upon hearing Reuben's piece was 'other-worldly'.

Reuben: I talk about the mysterious nature of the text, and I think I prefer working with volatile semiotics...



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Alex: All of you write music that is - more or less - difficult to play. What is your relationship to virtuosity, and how do performers fit in to that?

Ross: I usually try to make my music playable or at least give the players a sense of satisfaction if they get close to getting it 'right'.

Chris: On a practical level I suppose I've long abandoned any notion that community groups will play my music. I think performative difficulty in my music grows out of the music I most admired as a kid and teenager - Liszt, Albeniz etc. - I see complexist strands of composing as a natural outgrowth of the show-off nature of that kind of romanticism, rather than directly aligned with modernism.

Alex: That's interesting, because you're the opposite of a show-off, Chris.

Chris: ...well, I have an ego too!

Ross: We are all individuals. "I'm not!" (Monty Python)

Reuben: I find the textures or musical content I try to create tends towards virtuosity, simply because my aesthetics demand a higher level of complexity in the perceived sound - often it just means they have to create a lot of sounds (but not randomly) in a short amount of time for it to work.

Chris: That's it exactly, Reuben.

Reuben: I have also been interested in Ferneyhough's approach of creating intensity in the sound through the rigorous process of performing, and I think that this psychological/physiological aspect adds something. He talks of a relationship between the score and the performer 'directed towards performing the piece', rather than performing the piece comfortably, which is less to the point of my interest with my own music.

Chris: Certainly for me, greater awareness of physicality has been a motivation in the last 5 years or so. How a piece will look, what degree of energy (or stasis) will be transmitted from players to audience as an integral part of the musical experience. In the past the music used to be very confined to the score for me, but now the theatrical is of great importance. Yes, difficulty is the obvious way of creating that extra-musical energy.

Ross: Then someone comes along who can play Ferneyhough's music easily and one compositional parameter drops out.

Chris: Who is this freak, Ross?!

Ross: Um?


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Alex: There's a kind of lineage here, three generations of NZ composers, three NZSM composers, Ross you were Chris's teacher, etc - are there musical links too do you think? (For example, I'm thinking of a restless, energetic quality in both Chris's and Ross's musics, and a concern with pushing and pulling musical time)

Chris: Lineage is a funny one. Often underestimated is the degree to which a lineage can also exist when student rebels against teacher! I think there's lineage between Ross and Lilburn, but not in terms of imitation.

Alex: Absolutely!

Chris: I think I abjectly failed (continue to fail) to apply Ross's exhaustive attempts to instil counterpoint and long range teleology in me! - nonetheless, I'll always say he was and is my most important teacher.

Ross: Ah yes - counterpoint.


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Alex: Perhaps last question and thoughts - what would you say - if anything - to a first-time listener of these pieces? What would you hope they might take away from the experience?

Chris: I'm not sure I'd offer any advice. Just bring your ears, as with any piece.

Ross: I'd like it if they found the piece beautiful, intriguing, puzzling, exciting, 'need to hear it again' etc i.e. to have had involvement in the piece.

Reuben: I would say: Listen to the sounds, and then listen to how the sounds change and then know that the sounds were crafted intentionally.

Reuben: I have a lecture on solid state physics! Got to go sorry!