SCUNA history » IVs and Minifests hosted by SCUNA to 1988 » 1977 IV » Publicity
The 28th Intervarsity Choral Festival will be held in Canberra early in September.
Each year university choristers meet in a different capital city to rehearse for a gala public concert.
A choir of 150 will perform the Monteverdi 'Vespers of 1610' in the auditorium of the School of Music at 8.15pm on Saturday, September 3.
The choir and orchestra will be conducted by Brian Hingerty. Soloists will be Margaret Sim, Lois Bogg, William Bamford, Barry Skelton, Geoffrey Brennan and Bryan Dowling.
The festival will also include a free 'Prom Concert' at 3pm on Sunday, August 28, in University House. This concert will feature specially convened small groups conducted by some of Australia's leading choral conductors including Charles Colman, Nicholas Routley, Bevan Leviston, Judith Clingan, Faye Dumont, Bryan Dowling and Brian Hingerty.
Other features of the festival will include lunch-time performances at various shopping centres in Canberra as well as a special performance for students of the ACT secondary colleges.
Some of the more light-hearted occasions will be the 'President's Pyjamas', an obstacle race with a difference at Commonwealth Park on Monday, August 29, at 10.30am. A demonstration 'In Favour of Harmony' will be held at Parliament House about 1.15pm on Friday, September 2, following a march from Civic.
Further information can be obtained from Laurel Burns, 621513, during business hours till September 2.
- LIFE STYLE. (1977, August 24). The Canberra Times (ACT : 1926 - 1995), p. 30.
Retrieved June 21, 2013, from Trove: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110861441
THE 28th Intervarsity Choral Festival, for which the ANU Choral Society is acting as host, commenced this week and will continue through next week culminating in a performance of Monteverdi's 'Vespers of 1610' in the Auditorium of the School of Music on Saturday, September 3, 1977.
This large-scale public presentation is being jointly sponsored by the Stuyvesant Trust and The Canberra Times.
Early publicity for this event, with a tongue-in-the-cheek allusion to a well-known TV presentation, amusingly labelled it "Monteverdi's Flying Vespers".
Actually that is not an inappropriate label, for this remarkable work of three and a half centuries ago is certainly something of a "high flyer" in the history of music. In this setting of psalms Monteverdi introduced the opera orchestra into an ecclesiastical work for the first time - the writing, both for voices and instruments is directly related to his opera 'L'Orfeo' which had made its first appearance only three years earlier and which is also a milestone in the history of music.
The 'Vespers' were written specially for, and dedicated to Pope Paul V, Monteverdi thereby hoping to obtain a position in Rome. But this did not eventuate at that time and he was forced to remain in Mantua. Happily the music was not lost, as happened to much of Monteverdi's remarkable output, and remains today as one of the most forceful and absorbing examples of the new direction which the opening of the 17th century brought to European music. It has been aptly said that the 'Vespers' embody much of the power and vitality of the Counter-Reformation.
Professional soloists and orchestra, together with the Festival Choir of 200 voices, will be involved in this forthcoming Canberra performance. The conductor will be Brian Hingerty, conductor of the ANU Choral Society.
AS CANBERRA grows and more performance venues become available we must expect that there will be an occasional clash of dates. It is particularly unfortunate that this happens on the night of the performance of the Monteverdi 'Vespers' when the Chinese violinist Lim Kek Tjiang is programmed to give a recital in University House Hall in association with the pianist Rachel Valler.
No doubt contractural arrangements made such a clash unavoidable, but it is regrettable because each performance is rather a unique occasion. We are not likely to have the chance to hear the 'Vespers' again soon, while Lim Kek Tjiang is apparently a very fine instrumentalist, and Chinese violinists are not frequent visitors on the Australian concert scene.
- THE WORLD OF MUSIC Choral festival to culminate in Monteverdi's 'Vespers'.
(1977, August 26). The Canberra Times (ACT : 1926 - 1995), p. 25.
Retrieved June 21, 2013, from Trove: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110861633
Fifty singers from the Intervarsity Choral Festival, being held in Canberra this week, will give an open-air concert at the plaza level of the Boulevard shopping centre at 12.30 today. The concert will feature modern "pop" choral music.
- "Concert." The Canberra Times (ACT : 1926 - 1995) 1 Sep 1977: 3. Web.
Accessed 21 Jun 2013 on Trove: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110862753.
Singers taking part in the 28th Intervarsity Choral Festival give a lunchtime recital at the Boulevard yesterday. The highlight of the festival will be tomorrow night's performance of Monteverdi's 'Vespers of 1610' by the Combined Festival Choir conducted by Brian Hingerty. Tickets are available from the School of Music and Bouchiers, Kingston. The festival is being sponsored by The Canberra Times and the Peter Stuyvesant Trust.
- INTERVARSITY CHORAL FESTIVAL. (1977, September 2). The Canberra Times (ACT : 1926 - 1995), p. 3.
Retrieved June 21, 2013, from Trove: http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110863028
28th Intervarsity Choral Festival Canberra
Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610
with the combined festival choir, orchestra and soloists,
Canberra School of Music
Tickets $5.30 & $2.30 (conc.) available from box office, Canberra School of Music
a Canberra Times community project
8.15pm TONIGHT
presented by the Canberra Times
and the Peter Stuyvesant Trust
[Description of the graphic: reproduction of part of an early score of the Vespers, with neum-like notes. One note is written large at bottom right. In the background are angel wings. This was the pattern used on the handbill, posters, programme cover and record cover.]
- I am grateful to Brian Hingerty for this newspaper clipping, now in the safekeeping of the ANU Archives.