Festival Plans At Auckland

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31358, 2 May 1967, Page 12

Festival Plans At Auckland

Two years of planning reach a climax this week with the opening of the 19th Auckland Festival—three weeks of music, drama, ballet, opera, exhibitions and films. With strength provided by internationally known or established New Zealand performers in all its sections, the festival promises to be one of the most balanced and interesting for some years. The only points of imbalance in a widely varied programme appear to be the absence of indigenous drama and the poor representation given to New Zealand music. In the music section the only New Zealand work given prominence is the Cambridge Suite, by Jenny McLeod, which will be played by the N.Z.B.C. Symphony Orchestra. In contrast, New Zealanders are well represented in the visual arts where there are exhibitions by Rudi Gopas and Don Peebles of Christchurch,

David Barker, Max McLellan and Michael Illingworth. CONCERTS There will be a busy period of concerts and recitals. Heading the attractions this year are the great Italian tenor Giuseppe di Stefano and the American pianist Gary Graffman. Accompanied by the noted pianist Ivor Newton, di Stefano will give two concerts of arias and Italian and French songs and Graffman two solo recitals with a concerto appearance with the N.Z.B.C. Symphony Orchestra. The Deller Consort, a group of English singers led by the counter-tenor Alfred Deller, will perform the famous Monteverdi Vespers with the Alex Lindsay Orchestra and the Orpheus Choir from Wellington, and there will be two appearances by the Christchurch Liedertafei, a male choir conducted by Keith Newson. There will be two major choral symphonic concerts.

The Christchurch Harmonic ■ Society, after its Australian : tour, travels to Auckland for 1 a performance of the Vaughan i Williams “Sea Symphony,” : with the N.Z.B.C. Symphony Orchestra, and the Auckland ; Choral Society joins the orchestra a few days later for the Carl Orff choral work “Carmina Burana.” This year’s opera is the gay : Donizetti masterpiece “L’Elisir d’Amore,” performed by the 1 New Zealand Opera Company. FRENCH PLANS The major dramatic event .

will be performances of plays in French by Le Treteau de Paris, a touring company sponsored by the French Government. Plays to be given by local groups include “Dylan,” a the life of the tempestuous Welsh poet Dylan Thomas (Grafton Theatre) and “Eh?” the Henry Livings farce (Titirangi Drama Group). A season of plays by the Central Theatre is limited to members of the theatre and Festival Society. The ballerina Belinda Wright and her husband Jelko Yuresha head the cast of the New Zealand Ballet for a full season of ballet in which there will be three separate programmes. Three exhibitions at the Auckland City Art Gallery—paintings from the National Gallery, Victoria, the Sisler Duchamp collection, and originals by the cartoonist David Low—head a list of several exhibitions in galleries throughout the city.