The Vancouver Island Symphony presents
Guest Artists: Andrew Clark, French Horn
Isaiah Bell, Tenor
Conductor: Pierre Simard
Saturday, November 16, 7:30 p.m.
Port Theatre, Nanaimo
Tickets: 250-754-8550 www.porttheatre.com
The tale of a city
What Timely Treasures can be found on the streets of London,
city of majesty, history, art, poetry and beauty! In this second classical concert
of their season Passport to Great Entertainment, the Vancouver Island Symphony
whisks the audience away to this majestic city with magnificent music by Joseph
Haydn, Frederick Delius, Benjamin Britten and Ludwig van Beethoven. To help
raise the Port Theatre roof with regal sound on Saturday, November 16, conductor
Pierre Simard and the VI Symphony are joined by Isaiah Bell, tenor, and Andrew
Clark on French horn.
Telling a tale
through music - Simard has created a program that flows with a thread of
storytelling and poetry in music. The concert opens with Haydn’s 1791 salute to
Britain’s oldest musical charity - March
for the Royal Society of Musicians. Move forward 150 years and the thread
continues as Bell and Clark take centre stage for Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings, a song cycle written by
Britten in 1943.
Isaiah Bell –
Simard couldn’t have picked a more fitting tenor for this concert. Bell not
only sings song cycles, he writes them. An active performer of song literature,
Bell is a native of Fort St. John and has had formal training in Victoria,
Montreal, Salzburg and Edmonton. He says,
"What appeals to me
is that a song cycle brings together the world of concert and drama. You are creating
a whole world with your voice. It’s about telling a story, and here
Britten tells the story of the different aspects of night: pastoral
tranquility, covert excitement, dirty dealings, sleep - like looking
at a statue from different angles.”
Andrew Clark – Joining
Bell’s voice is the soaring regal sound
of a French horn played by Clark, a new Islander (from London UK) and principal
French horn with the VI Symphony. Says Clark of the Serenade, “It really is quite
beautiful; in the Prologue and Epilogue, Britten reminds us of what musical
notes nature provides (on a single length of tube) with their less even
intonation.”
Clark knows all about lengths of tube. Besides having had a
very active and successful career as a soloist and with orchestras in the UK,
and now Canada, he manufactures French horns and trumpets.
More on London –
But, on with the show and the tale of London. As Simard raises his baton after
intermission the audience will be led on a stroll through the park with Delius’
peaceful and melodic On Hearing the First
Cuckoo in Spring, and Summer Night on
the River. With Coriolon Overture by
Beethoven, who was a pupil of Haydn, comes the musical story of military-might
versus motherly-tenderness. Then it’s to the very heart of the city as the
orchestra plays Haydn's final symphony - London.
Pre-Concert Talk:
And so the story is told, but to discover more about the
music and composers come to the Pre-Concert Talk.
Tickets: Tickets
are available by calling the Port Theatre Ticket Centre at 250-754-8550.
PASSPORT TO GREAT ENTERTAINMENT - Keeping Music LIVE!
Additional
references:
For Isaiah Bell –
www.isaiahbell.com
For Andrew
Clark - www.naturallyhorns.co.uk 
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