MUSIC WEEK

Press, 5 October 1988, Page 23

MUSIC WEEK

Panting recital

On Friday and Sunday violinist Richard Panting will combine with pianist Christine Cuming to present recitals in the Great Hall of the Arts Centre. Richard Panting graduated from Auckland University, where he was a pupil of Michael Wieck. After joining the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra he received an Italian Government Scholarship which enabled him to study further in Rome and Venice with Remy Principe. Further study in London was followed by work and positions in the London Symphony, New Philharmonia, and Yehudi Menuhin Festival Orchestras. For 3iZ> years Panting was principal violin with the Northern Sinfonia Chamber Orchestra, and for the next seven years played principal positions in Sweden and Norway. On his return to New Zealand he was the acting Assistant Concertmaster in the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. This year Panting has based himself in Christchurch where he is completing a postgraduate degree at the University of Canterbury with Jan Tawroszewicz. The concerts will be the resumption of a longstanding collaboration with Christine Cuming, who is also a graduate of Auckland University, where she studied with Janetta McStay. While her pupil she won many awards, including the Christchurch Civic Music Council’s National Concerto Competition, and fulfilled engagements which included concerto appearances with the National Youth Orchestra. The award of a Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council Scholarship enabled her to continue studies in Vienna, Salzburg and London. Cuming has appeared with all the major New Zealand orchestras and is in demand as both soloist and accompanist. Friday’s lunchtime recital, sponsored by Amuri Corporation, Ltd, will feature music by Mozart, Bach and Wieniawski. It will begin at 1.10 p.m. Sunday’s programme is similar. It begins at 3 p.m. Harmonic choir Schubert is the subject of the Harmonic Choir’s next concert on Saturday in the Christchurch Town Hall at 8 p.m. The choir will be accompanied by the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra and two guest artists, an Auckland singer, David Griffiths, and a Christchurch violinist, Martin Riseley. The choral works include the “Mass in G” which will be sung in Latin. Schubert’s “Magnificat in D” will also be sung. “Symphony No. 5 in B Flat” will be played by the C.S.O. This symphony without trumpets and drums is scored for flute, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns and strings. The work was written when Schubert was only 19. The bass soloist, David Griffiths, has studied overseas and won the Mobil Song Quest in 1983. He will sing a bracket of five lieder songs. Martin Riseley, is a well known performer in Christchurch. Most recently he won a “Young Achiever” award. He will play “Konzerstuck in D.” Choir festival On Sunday, at 2.45 p.m. the Christchurch Community Choirs Festival will be held in the Christchurch Assemblies of God Church, Tuam Street. The seven participating choirs will be the Addington Workshops W.E.A. Male Voice Choir, the Aeolian Choir, the Cantabile Singers, the Canterbury Singers, the Harmoney Singers (new this year), the Risingholme Community Choir and the South Brighton Chorale. The programme will include music by Hugh Robertson, Sir Arthur Sullivan, John Rutter, and Antonin Dvorak. A trombone quartet will play after the individual choirs and to conclude the concert. The massed choirs will sing Hallelujah from “Mount of Olives” by Beethoven and the audience will participate in singing “All hail the power of Jesus’s name” “Guide me, 0 Thou great Jehovah” under the baton of Francis Dennis with Jean Rutherford at the piano. Continuum concert The choir of the Christchurch Cathedral will present a recital in the Cathedral on October 6 at 8 p.m. The choir, which seldom gives recitals outside its liturgical services, will sing in the reordered sanctuary at 8 p.m. The programme will include Schubert’s “Deustche Mess in F” and music by Purcell, Handel, Harwood, Faure, Mathais, Britten and Philips. David Childs, the master of the choristers, will play an organ work by Langlais and will be joined by Mark Hodgkinson in two works for trumpet and organ by Giovanni Viviani and Eric Schmidt. Hodgkinson received his early musical training at the Christchurch School of Instrumental Music. After being appointed principal trumpet of the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra, he spent 1980 to 1984 studying trumpet in Sweden on a Swedish Institute scholarship. In 1986 he was musical director of the Perkel season of "Eugene Onegin” in Auckland and in the same year he acted as assistant conductor for Mercury Opera’s “Tales of Hoffman.” He now lives in Christchurch where his teaching activities include conducting Orchestra 3 and supervising the Brass section at the C.S.I.M. Since May he has been conductor of the Christchurch Orchestral Society. >