APOLLO SINGERS

Dominion, Volume 30, Issue 189, 7 May 1937, Page 12

APOLLO SINGERS

First Concert of Season PLEASING PART-SINGING For its first concert of the season the Apollo Singers attracted a fair audience to the Wellington Town Hall Concert Chamber last evening. -Male part-sing-ing is traditional with all the Nordic peoples, and has been popular with the English for a couple of hundred years at least. In these changing times —and perhaps nothing has changed so much as in the case of popular music-—it is commendable to realise that Wellington has not been without its male voice choirs for nearly half a century, thanks, in the main, to two notable enthusiasts, the late Mr. Robert Parker, whose Liedertafel was an institution iu the old days, and in later years to Mr. H. Temple White, who with his Apollo Singers still keeps the flag flying. Last evening's programme included some good part songs of various periiKls. It was appropriate that the singers should initiate the new season with Gounod’s splendid “Hymn to Apollo,” a part song flambuoyant spirit of which breathes aspiring praise and sturdy adoration to the God of Song. This number was heartily sung. “Calm as the Night” (Bohm), another old favourite, better expressed in solo form, was scarcely so well sung There was a slight drag here and there, but the singers made full compensation in the beautiful part song, “O Men from the Fields,” arranged by Mansfield of Esplin’s expressive Irish melody, which rei resents a Connemara mother crooning over her dying boy. In this number the voices blended beautifully, and the tender feeling embodied in Padriac Colum’s lyrics was given full measure. The encore was well deserved. In lighter vein the choir revelled in the madrigal, “My Bonnie Lass, She Smileth” (Thomas Morley, arranged by Thomas Keighley), and in “Come, Landlord, Fill the Flowing Bowl.” a rousing drinking song by Dr. Markham Lee (soon to visit New Zealand). In contradistinction was the rather high-flown “Rhapsody” of Brahms, composed _ on certain lines from Goethe’s "Winter Journey in the Harz.” It seems that in this number Brahms had forsworn melody (of which he was no mean master), for both in the solo (most admirably sung, too, by Miss Molly Atkinson) and the concerted passage, the music had little appeal. Other part songs were the spirited “Follow the Gleam” (Florence Aylward, arranged by Gains), the ingenious “The Old Woman” (Sir Hugh Roberton), the lovely Mendelssohn number, “On Wings of Song,” “Land of Hope and Glory” (Elgar), and “The Wanderer” (Elgar). “Maureen” (also by Roberton). with solo by Miss Atkinson, made up a most interesting programme from this well-balanced choir.

The Apollo Singers were fortunate in the assisting artists. Miss Molly Atkinson has two qualifications which make her appearances most welcome. She has a ringing, bright-toned, full-breasted mezzo voice, marked freedom in production, and has an intellectual background that lends a certain grace to her singing. Iler interpretation of Bemberg’s “Hindoo Song” was artistic, and that brightness of disposition which is in the singer came out in the encore number, “■When in My Garden Strolling” (Schumann). Miss Atkinson was also delightful in the Rachmaninoff songs, “In the Silent Night” and “Spring Waters,” which are not for everyone. Her encore number was “O That It Were So” (Bridge). The viola is not regarded as a solo instrument. but Mrs. Freda Meier is an exceptional exponent. The Corelli-Allard “Sonata” (with Miss Ortni Reid at the pianoforte), a theme and variations for the most part, was not exactly a ravishing number, but in “An Old Irish Air” (arranged by Tertis), she produced a beautiful tone that captured the audience without uncertainty. There was a velvet softness and mellowness that made a decided appeal. This effect was the same when she played a negro spiritual melody by Dvorak (arranged by Kreisler). the Glazounov “Serenade Espagnole” and a tuneful “Allegretto” by Schubert. Miss Reid was again the aecomnanist. Mrs. R. G. Caigou was the singers’ competent accompanist.