“My name is Anita,” a young girl says to her audience. “I’m going to play two pieces.”
“My name is Anita,” a young girl says to her audience. “I’m going to play two pieces.”
Her mother has adjusted the piano stool so that Anita is at the right height for the keyboard. Her feet dangle well above the floor.
Anita is small but she’s big on confidence and skill. She plays her two very different pieces from memory and with aplomb.
On Wednesday and Thursday 2 and 3 October 52 pianists of all ages and abilities came together at the Kingswood Music School to play to each other and whoever happened to drop in.
The 2013 Piano Marathon was organised by Annali Smith.
Two hundred and nine pieces of piano music were played during the course of almost eight hours.
Beethoven’s Tempest sonata sounded alongside Catherine Linklater’s own compositions.
There were soloists and duettists. Dr Mareli Stolp gave a master class for anyone who volunteered.
What a week of music! And I heard only half of what went on.
After the Thursday piano concert I could have heard a saxophone recital (Paul Richard) and then a concert at St Andrew’s College.
The Piano Marathon was only the middle of it.
On Sunday afternoon the East Cape Philharmonic annual Youth Orchestral Course gave their concluding concert in Port Elizabeth’s Feathermarket Hall.
The audience almost filled that huge place.
The Wind Band went first. Conducted by John Rojas from Cape Town, there were 15 players from Grahamstown.
The Orchestra, led by Tessa Campbell and conducted by Gerben Grooten, took the second half. The Orchestra included five players from Grahamstown.
Both band and orchestra played music by the South African composer, Grant McLachlan. The audience was charmed to its feet by the wonderful playing and the enthusiastic atmosphere.
Monday for me was Dance Day, the first day of Arts Week at St Andrew’s College and the DSG: an hour-long performance of dance in the old Drill Hall, choreographed by the extraordinary Leverne Botha.
The compères were slick, funny and clever; the dancing was cool and committed and the music wasn’t too loud.
The Amaphiko Township Dance Company was there, too, dancing with brilliance and flair.
Tuesday: David Juritz was in town.
David is a fiddle player from London. In 2007, the year he turned 50, he went round the world, paying his way by busking.
Thereafter he founded Musequality, an organisation which aims to support music projects for orphans and under-privileged children in developing countries.
Each year, all over the world – including Pepper Grove Mall – buskers get together to perform in aid of community projects. David Juritz visited Kingswood because he was interested in the work of the community engagement programme.
He played for the college and visited community projects in town.
Wednesday: Mareli Stolp played piano music by George Crumb, Karen Tanaka, Leoš Janaček and Frederic Rzewski.
This virtuoso concert would be a significant event in any city’s musical programme.
The final piece, De Profundis by Rzewski – a theatre piece ‘for a speaking pianist’ using texts from Oscar Wilde’s discourse on his imprisonment and humiliation – was a tour de force.
I walked home slowly, full of emotion and thoughtful.
The talented and the makers of beauty are living abundantly amongst us. Thank you for what you bring into our lives.
