Oratorio performance of the Verdi Requiem
On Saturday, 22 November at 7.30pm
in the Tiffin School, Big Hall,
Queen Elizabeth Road
Kingston upon Thames
Surrey
KT2 6RL
Phone: 020 8546 4638
Choir of 350 boys, girls and adults
soloists
Ilona Domnich-Soprano,
Miranda Westcott-Mezzo,
Dominic Natoli-Tenor
Robert Rice-Bass,
Together with the Brandenburg Symphony Orchestra. Accompanied by imaginative
art work.
Monday, 22 September 2008
brief encounter with Rachmaninoff
St. George's Hanover Square
11th November, at 7:30pm
Ilona Domnich, Nigel Foster and Michael White.
The life of Rachmaninoff through his songs, with narrations.
http://www.londonsongfestival.org/concerts.php
11th November, at 7:30pm
Ilona Domnich, Nigel Foster and Michael White.
The life of Rachmaninoff through his songs, with narrations.
http://www.londonsongfestival.org/concerts.php
Schostakovitch 14th symphony
Cambridge University chamber Orcestra (CUCO)
Conductor- Howard Williams
Bass- Mathew Rose
Soprano- Ilona Domnich
Sang in Russian
26th October 2008, 7:30pm
Conductor- Howard Williams
Bass- Mathew Rose
Soprano- Ilona Domnich
Sang in Russian
26th October 2008, 7:30pm
The work has eleven linked movements, each a setting of a poem by Lorca, Apollinaire, Küchelbecker, Maria Rilke. The songs are about death. death from love, death of poor, death of cursed beauty, death by suicide, death in war, death from broken heart, death in suffering, etc.
Shostakovich itself wrote:' Everything that i have written until now over these long yearss has been a preparation for this work, I intended this Symphony to prove a counterweight to the positive presentation of death in music. I want my listeners , as they leave the hall after hearing my symphony, to think that life is truly beautiful'
Most of the setting is in quasi parlando style. There is a string or hestra with 5 types of percussion section: castanets, wooden blocks, tom-toms, whip, bells. vibraphone, xylophone, celesa soprano and bass.
Shostakovich writing very considerate for the voice. The voice is surrounded and carried through the piece by the instruments and is a an equal orchestral member.
Mathew and I were sitting in the middle of the orchestra and I felt that I was washed by sounds, surrounded by harmonies. The moment i stood to sing I suddenly felt scared that I will not be able to carry this emotional and vocal weight, but the moment an opening sounds of Malagena began I new that i will be fine.
When I arrived to rehearsal I discovered that conductor learnt it in one week time and the orchestra only met 4 days before. And yet they sounded great! I also learnt that most of the orchestra are not even music students. They studying to be Matematicians, Lawers, Historians and everything else but musicians. And yet, in their free time they play so amazingly.
It was an amazing experience, to be singing such a traumatic and genius piece, in russian with a great bass-Mathew Rose, wonderful conductor Howard Williams and a very exciting young, energetic Chamber Orchestra of Cambridge University (CUCO)
It is my 3rd time in Cambridge and this time I had few lovely walks on the stone tiny streets, between the old buildings of churches. Listened from outside to the angelic voices of King's College singers, and to a rock version of a religious service. Cambridge is an amazing town, specially in Autumn, when the old severe buildings surrounded by red and yellow leaved trees.
Shostakovich writing very considerate for the voice. The voice is surrounded and carried through the piece by the instruments and is a an equal orchestral member.
Mathew and I were sitting in the middle of the orchestra and I felt that I was washed by sounds, surrounded by harmonies. The moment i stood to sing I suddenly felt scared that I will not be able to carry this emotional and vocal weight, but the moment an opening sounds of Malagena began I new that i will be fine.
When I arrived to rehearsal I discovered that conductor learnt it in one week time and the orchestra only met 4 days before. And yet they sounded great! I also learnt that most of the orchestra are not even music students. They studying to be Matematicians, Lawers, Historians and everything else but musicians. And yet, in their free time they play so amazingly.
It was an amazing experience, to be singing such a traumatic and genius piece, in russian with a great bass-Mathew Rose, wonderful conductor Howard Williams and a very exciting young, energetic Chamber Orchestra of Cambridge University (CUCO)
It is my 3rd time in Cambridge and this time I had few lovely walks on the stone tiny streets, between the old buildings of churches. Listened from outside to the angelic voices of King's College singers, and to a rock version of a religious service. Cambridge is an amazing town, specially in Autumn, when the old severe buildings surrounded by red and yellow leaved trees.
Brief encounter with Rachmaninoff
Dress rehearsal
8th October 2008
Chacombe music festival, Sophie's barn, Banbury, Oxfordshire
http://www.chacombemusic.co.uk/themusicfestival.html
Ilona Domnich-Soprano
Nigel Foster-Piano
Michael White-Narrator
The more I sing Rachmaninoff songs and read about his life, i realize what a powerful muse was Russian nature for him. Once he left Russia he lost her (the muse) and could not find an inspiration again for composing songs. It is so many times that I hear that the most magnificent masterpieces were created when the artist was either deeply depressed, lonely, betrayed by a beloved or far away from it's muse. But this is not the case with Rachmaninoff. He needed to hear the sound of the wind among the tree leaves, to see the silvery river running by and to smell the forest in order to transform it to music. He needed the soothing, caring wings of generous Mother nature of Russia.
Every song is a perfect miniature that shows a picture of a landscape or a portrait of a person.
For me it is like with a first note the screen lightens up and you immediately know what is going on, see a place or a person. Then the music ends and the lights dim. You are left shaken, distraught, peaceful, filled with gentleness or full of tears. It is always that you think of a memory or somebody you knew or loved.
This is why it is so easy to tell a story of Rachmaninoff life. His songs are his life. Some of them were written before the actual events happened, but it is as if Rachmaninoff knew what will be.
Here in Banbury was the perfect place for the songs to unfold. In a small village near Oxford, in a converted barn were 30 people sitting really close to us, it felt so intimate and right. I had a feeling that the darkness that was surrounding us from the windows was making the whole event even more beautiful, breaking the imaginary walls and in a fast forward speed connecting English landscapes with Russian, English people with Russian, English emotions with Russian.
8th October 2008
Chacombe music festival, Sophie's barn, Banbury, Oxfordshire
http://www.chacombemusic.co.uk/themusicfestival.html
Ilona Domnich-Soprano
Nigel Foster-Piano
Michael White-Narrator
The more I sing Rachmaninoff songs and read about his life, i realize what a powerful muse was Russian nature for him. Once he left Russia he lost her (the muse) and could not find an inspiration again for composing songs. It is so many times that I hear that the most magnificent masterpieces were created when the artist was either deeply depressed, lonely, betrayed by a beloved or far away from it's muse. But this is not the case with Rachmaninoff. He needed to hear the sound of the wind among the tree leaves, to see the silvery river running by and to smell the forest in order to transform it to music. He needed the soothing, caring wings of generous Mother nature of Russia.
Every song is a perfect miniature that shows a picture of a landscape or a portrait of a person.
For me it is like with a first note the screen lightens up and you immediately know what is going on, see a place or a person. Then the music ends and the lights dim. You are left shaken, distraught, peaceful, filled with gentleness or full of tears. It is always that you think of a memory or somebody you knew or loved.
This is why it is so easy to tell a story of Rachmaninoff life. His songs are his life. Some of them were written before the actual events happened, but it is as if Rachmaninoff knew what will be.
Here in Banbury was the perfect place for the songs to unfold. In a small village near Oxford, in a converted barn were 30 people sitting really close to us, it felt so intimate and right. I had a feeling that the darkness that was surrounding us from the windows was making the whole event even more beautiful, breaking the imaginary walls and in a fast forward speed connecting English landscapes with Russian, English people with Russian, English emotions with Russian.
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