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Home , Andrew Ford (composer), Barry Conyngham, Don Banks, Forbidden Colours, Marshall McGuire, Richard Meale

476 3220 GERARD BROPHY

forbidden colours

TASMANIAN SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA Almost every Australian composer born literature, made Sculthorpe (vernacular) and between the end of the First World War and the Meale (international) obvious first generation end of the baby-boomer generation owes even leaders. The upheavals of 1968, and the social their most modest reputation to a half-truth: that revolution that followed in their wake, helped it was only in the early 1960s that our post- convince their students that their Australian colonial music culture caught up with the world identity should derive from looking both inward and produced its first distinctive national school and outward. But to Brophy in the next Gerard Brophy b. 1953 of composers. In press columns, and in his generation, the first to grow up in a multicultural 1967 book ’s Music: Themes of a New globalising environment, such a self-conscious 1 The Republic of Dreams 8’32 Society, Roger Covell gave culturally literate pursuit of Australianness came to seem not only Genevieve Lang harp, Philip South darabukka Australians their first reliable list of composers creatively irrelevant, but a failure of imagination. worth following, most of them contemporary. For Brophy, what would once have been Mantras [14’36] And what Donald Peart dubbed ‘The Australian described as a ‘cosmopolitan’ outlook comes 2 Mantra I 3’42 Avant-garde’ owed as much to frustrations of naturally to a contemporary Australian artist. 3 Mantra II 3’10 journalists, academics and conductors with the 4 Mantra III 7’44 deadening local cult of ‘musical cobwebs’ as it Born into an ‘ordinary Anglo-Irish family’ in did to the talents of the new movement’s ’s eastern suburbs, Brophy grew up in 5 Maracatú 11’11 anointed leaders, , Richard country Coonamble. Later back in Sydney, he underwent what he described as an 6 Forbidden Colours 9’18 Meale, and . Yet what started out as a blatant case of cultural ‘increasingly musical adolescence’. Only at the 7 Le Réveil de l’ange 20’25 engineering took on a natural momentum of its relatively ripe age of 22 (‘dangerously late’, as Lisa Moore piano own with the arrival in the 1970s of a second put it) did his studies of classical generation, students of the first, including Anne guitar turn serious, though just as important to Total Playing Time 64’02 Boyd, , Martin Wesley-Smith and his musical education were the free tickets he frequently received, as a lowly clerk in the Gore Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra . By the time an exponentially larger third generation burst onto the scene in the Hill TV studios, to ABC orchestral concerts and Kenneth Young conductor 1980s – Gerard Brophy prominent among them – recitals, including revelatory performances by Dobbs Franks conductor 7 Australian composition had become a confident Alicia de Larrocha, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Jorge and steadily growing enterprise, which by now Bolet and Mstislav Rostropovich. After attending had acquired not only a past, but what promised a composition course given by Mauricio Kagel in to be a bright and increasingly diverse future. Europe in 1977, Brophy entered the Sydney Conservatorium where he was one of the few Sixties oppositional identities, vernacular or Australians lucky enough to study composition international, inherited from visual arts and with . But the most decisive

2 3 influence during his student years was Richard will’. Brophy looks back on his time with resembling a focused program on his music. His and soft-core porn continues to be a theme in Toop, whose profound engagement with Donatoni as his apprenticeship, and like a good compositions take their form, as he explains it, Spiked Heels: A Carmen Fantasy (1992) and European modernism mentored Brophy, and apprentice, he buckled under. Learning to meet through ‘a process of evolution of their Sheer Nylon Dances (2000) for violin, cello and fellow students Michael Smetanin and Riccardo his master’s strict expectations taught him ‘that materials, rather than of development’. Likewise, ‘fetishised piano’. By the late 1980s, Brophy had Formosa, through their infatuation with the you can write a piece using any idea; that such extra-musical meaning as he intentionally developed a marked preference for arresting Italian avant-garde, and formed them into a anything can be your basic material; and that it communicates derives from a web of references monosyllabic titles, like CharM, Chrome, Flesh, recognised ‘school’ at what Gordon Kerry has wasn’t the material’s fault if it turned out to be a rather than from a continuous narrative. Titles are Glint, Glove and Head. His worklist into the labelled the ‘pointy end’ of 1980s new music, bad piece, it was more likely your fault, because usually an important key. That of Salammbô 1990s can read a little like an artificially variously described (or derided, by their stylistic you hadn’t invented properly with what you’d (1980) for orchestra may directly recall the blood- extended Jeff Koons adolescent fantasy. Yet the opposites) as ‘Late High Modernists’, been given.’ lust and hedonistic imagery of Flaubert’s novel, music behind such intentionally shocking titles ‘Complexicists’ or – the badge perhaps best but listeners might also remember that it is the as Trash, Trip, Tweak and Twist is typically worth wearing – ‘Maximalists’. But performance, as much as the act of writing, name of the fictional opera in the novel and film thoughtful, brilliantly formed and faceted, from has always been a key to Brophy’s personal Personally, Brophy found his formative Citizen Kane. Similarly, Orfeo (1984) for strings, its shattering hardest edges, to (as Lyn Williams approach to composition, and stylish and influences in Sylvano Bussotti’s highly written after a friend was killed in a freak has written) episodes of ‘spiritual accomplished performers tend to inspire him sexualised multi-media works, Salvatore accident, is not the conventional elegy one might transcendence... ethereal textures which more than do other composers; in the case of Sciarrino’s sensual explorations of extreme expect, but a confronting meditation on the split- operate at the limits of audibility’. two works on this disc, pianist Lisa Moore and second succession of emotions – from furious instrumental virtuosity, and ’s Le Réveil de l’ange (1987) for piano and harpist Marshall McGuire. Contact with his struggle to calm acceptance – of a person facing rigorous crystalline complexity. His 1982 chamber orchestra is the last work of what Brazilian guitar teacher Turibio Santos led to his sudden death, just as Orpheus might have graduation work, tracing its musical lineage from Brophy now considers to be his early period. interest in the Candoblé ritual that inspired Exú, experienced facing violent death at the hands Sciarrino’s Caprices (and before them, A single-movement concerto for Lisa Moore, and Brazil’s traditional music was the inspiration of the Maenads. Paganini’s), was a single-movement violin a well-known advocate of some of the most for Maracatú. Balinese gamelan musicians, concerto of dazzling complexity, bordering at Contemplation of the erotic is the source of an difficult contemporary Australian piano music, its Senegalese drummers and timbila players from times on sensual overload. That rigour/rationality almost Baroque sensual beauty in scores like subject matter is miraculous transformation. The Mozambique have since influenced his were destined to become less important in his Breathless (1983) – Donatoni’s favourite Brophy title ‘Awakening of the Angel’ is borrowed from compositional aesthetic profoundly, his scores music than sensuality/irrationality was already work – for an ensemble of three flutes and another Molinier painting, again a paradoxical by preference keeping as much of the implicit in the work’s title, Exú, named after an piano that recalls the texture of a Monteverdi emanation of the artist’s erotic fishnets-and- performers’ traditional music intact as possible. Orixa of Brazilian Candoblé: the deity of fate, madrigal. (Elsewhere Brophy reused the garters world. Yet the title also intentionally messenger of death, and lord of chaos. Not Except in his relatively few texted works, like Monteverdi title Chiome d’oro.) Senso: dopo recalls the birds and angels of Messiaen, whose surprisingly, perhaps, when Brophy joined the early Flesh (1987), the opera The Temptation skin d’armourdo (1982) is named after a example stands behind the music of the piano’s Donatoni’s composition class in Italy late in of St Antony (on a libretto by Martin Buzacott, blatantly erotic painting by Pierre Molinier, and first entries. Then there is a further reference to 1982, his teacher pilloried Exú in front of all his after Flaubert) or the recent Verlaine Songs the exploration (and even celebration) of the the awakening of a homeless man sleeping classmates as being ‘full of capriciousness and (2006), Brophy seldom imposes anything much-contested yet ill-defined conjunction of art rough in Berlin in Wim Wenders’ 1987 film

4 5 Wings of Desire (subtitled The Awakening of an present, slow tempi were rarely encountered in the Australian Ballet’s 2008 season. This is also Whispers (1984). But in contrast to his Angel ). The opening’s high-pitched wind and bell my music. Furthermore such a deliberate focus the case in Maracatú (2003), an orchestral piece exuberant celebration of the gradually sounds, scurrying strings and glissandos might on instrumental colour, as seen in this piece, written especially for the Tasmanian Symphony accumulating Boléro-like energy that brings belong to Brophy’s early style, but the tremolo was forbidden.’ Orchestra, in which Brophy returns to the Afro- Maracatú to its thrilling conclusion, Brophy also string melody that tentatively emerges, Brazilian world of Exú, and perhaps more believes that one of music’s ‘most immediate sounding at first deceptively like a wordless Once emancipated from modernist shackles, it especially to its companion percussion piece and redeemable features...in these increasingly chorus (as if the listener must strain to hear a was still some years before Brophy came to a Axé (1982), named after the life-force that Exú distracted times’ is its capacity to be a vehicle just sub-audible text), turns out to have presaged second crucial watershed, partly in finding a new dispenses. Unusually among Brophy’s music, ‘for self-reflection and the contemplation of our a radical change in Brophy’s compositional style. way to compose faster music again by, in his however, Maracatú takes its name from a genre, existence’. Mantras (2003) was composed ‘with Immediately after this work, as Andrew Ford own words, discovering ‘the confidence to work a traditional ceremonial and musical dance form this in mind, and invites the listener to enter into observed, ‘the brakes were judderingly applied creatively with the music of other cultures’. The of the Brazilian slave community, ‘a type of another, less frantic time-frame.’ For once there to the teeming activity’ that characterised his breakthrough came in The Republic of Dreams processional originally performed to pay tribute seems to be no other subtext. He explains the music to date. (1996) for solo harp with flute, clarinet, to tribal royalty, fusing African rhythms with a work simply as consisting of three distinct percussion and strings, what he describes as an Portuguese melodic sensibility’. Brophy treats pieces, each a meditation on a ‘carefully chosen The first fruits of this change took the form of ‘Eastern-sounding piece’, less a homage to the his borrowings from this tradition respectfully, and focussed sonority... in which the listener what seemed to be the radical simplification, Western harp (and soloist Marshall McGuire, for and his own use of them with a playful, may just settle and be still, albeit for only a even a move toward minimalism, of Forbidden whom it was written) than indirectly to the oud, Umberto Eco-like irony, not without admitting brief moment.’ Colours for chamber orchestra, composed in the Arabic lute. Since this work, concerto-like the possibility that a listener might choose to September and October 1988. That this work Graeme Skinner pieces have proliferated, especially works for hear further ‘forbidden colours’ in slanting was a personal watershed is quite clearly percussion ensembles and orchestra, including references to similar previous appropriations: indicated in the title. As Brophy pointed out, his Yo yai pakebi, man mai yapobi (1999) (in the piccolo at the opening, to Arthur Benjamin’s choice of title – the name of the 1968 English Senegalese, ‘I am the knife, you are the meat’) Jamaican Rumba; the first orchestral tutti, to translation of Yukio Mishima’s novel Kinjiki – for the Afro-Dutch ensemble Anumadutchi, and 1940s newsreel soundtracks, as well as to the was also an ‘indirect reference to my previous The Book of Clouds (2008) for the Australian scores of Brazil’s most famous composer, compositional preoccupations’. The sumptuary groups Synergy and TaikOz and the Heitor Villa-Lobos, or to the orchestral scores of code of the Japanese imperial court forbade the Symphony Orchestra. other Latin-Americans like Chávez, Revueltas wearing of certain colours by certain ranks and and Ginastera. classes. (Mishima extends the forbidden colours The rhythmic impetus provided by percussion is to homosexuality and other sexual taboos.) also a dominating force in Brophy’s growing list Meanwhile, what he describes as the Brophy implies that, by analogy, as someone to of ballet scores, including Wind Around My ‘mysterious rustlings and murmurings’ of the date identified as a hard-edged modernist, Heart for Regina van Berkel (who has also middle section are filtered recollections of his certain traditional forms of musical expression choreographed Yo yai pakebi, man mai yapobi for own early style, still related if only distantly to had been denied him: ‘In effect, until the the Nederlands Dans Theater), and Semele for the impetus behind works like Cries and

6 7 Lisa Moore Sydney, Canberra and Tasmanian Symphony Kenneth Young took up the position of Principal Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, both to wide Orchestras, the Queensland Philharmonic Tuba with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra critical acclaim. Raised in Canberra, London and Sydney, pianist Orchestra, the Thai National Symphony in 1976; his experience as a conductor with the Lisa Moore completed her graduate studies in Since 1988 Kenneth Young has been a member Orchestra and in the US with the Albany NZSO dates from 1985, culminating in his Paris and the USA. Based in New York City since of the music faculty of the New Zealand School Symphony and the Philharmonia Virtuosi. She appointment as the orchestra’s Conductor in 1985, she has been commissioning and working of Music at Victoria University of Wellington has also appeared as a guest artist with the Residence in 1993. In 2001 he resigned from the with living composers for over 30 years, where he lectures in conducting, orchestration New York City Ballet, Chamber Music Society of NZSO in order to pursue his conducting and collaborating with Ornette Coleman, Gunther and composition. In 2004 he was awarded the Lincoln Center, Orchestra of St Luke’s, American composing career. Schuller, , Elena Kats-Chernin, Composers Orchestra, Steve Reich Ensemble, Lilburn Trust Citation in recognition of Martin Bresnick, Don Byron, Julia Wolfe, Michael So Percussion, Da Capo Chamber Players, Paul He has worked extensively with all the regional Outstanding Services to New Zealand Music. Torke, Steve Reich, Philip , Terry Riley, orchestras throughout New Zealand and with Dresher Ensemble, Susan Marshall Dance Dobbs Franks Gerard Brophy, Peter Sculthorpe, Michael Company, Sequitur, Newband, Essential Music the New Zealand Chamber Orchestra; he also Smetanin, Iannis Xenakis and Meredith Monk, and the Australia Ensemble. regularly conducts seasons with the Royal New Dobbs Franks is equally at home conducting among many others. Zealand Ballet Company. Outside New Zealand, opera, ballet, music theatre or a symphony Lisa Moore was a silver medallist in the Kenneth Young has worked with The Queensland orchestra concert, or in Lisa Moore was the founding pianist for the International American Music Competition at Orchestra, the West Australian, Adelaide and chamber music ensembles. Bang on a Can All-Stars, touring worldwide with Carnegie Hall; she has also received the APRA Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras, Orchestra them for 16 years (1992-2008). She has Sounds Australian Award for Best Performance He first came to Australia in 1960 when he was performed at the Royal Albert Hall, La Scala, and two Australia Council fellowships. Her four Victoria, City of Osaka Sinfonia and the BBC brought here, on the recommendation of Vienna’s Musikverein and the Sydney Opera solo recordings are on the Cantaloupe Music and Scottish Symphony Orchestra. , to conduct the Australian Tall Poppies labels; she also appears on thirty premiere season of West Side Story. After House and made guest appearances at festivals In addition to his work as a performer and a recordings of chamber music. Her album Wild repeatedly leaving Australia for other parts of the around the world including Huddersfield, conductor, Kenneth Young has become one of Russians, with cellist David Pereira, won the ABC world, he eventually decided to call Australia Tanglewood, Aspen, Graz, Heidelberg, Scotia, New Zealand’s leading composers. Numerous award for Best Australian Recording in 1993. home in 1979. Norfolk, Paris d’Automne, Prague Spring, Sonic commissions from Chamber Music New www.lisamoore.org Boom in New York, BAM Next Wave and the Zealand, the Brass Bands Association of New Dobbs Franks has always championed new BBC Proms, as well as the Adelaide and Sydney Kenneth Young Zealand, the International Festival of the Arts, music. He has conducted over 50 first Festivals and the Brisbane Biennale. in 2008, Auckland Philharmonia, Vector Wellington performances of Australian music; he conducted Lisa Moore curated the Canberra International Kenneth Young is one of New Zealand’s leading the premiere season of ’s Mer de conductors. He has established himself as a Orchestra, Radio New Zealand, the NZSO and Music Festival ‘Sounds Alive’ series, designing Glace and the revival of for . passionate and skilled interpreter of Romantic, Australian orchestras have been performed ten days of new music concerts at The Street 20th-century and contemporary repertoire whilst nationwide and also in the United States, Europe He has been Music Director of the Australian Theatre in the nation’s capital. receiving considerable recognition for his and Australia. Recent premieres include his Ballet, Principal Conductor of the Tasmanian As a concerto soloist Lisa Moore has played performances and recordings of New Zealand Symphony No. 2 with the NZSO and his Saffire Symphony Orchestra, Music Director of the with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the and Australian orchestral music. Concerto for four guitars and orchestra with the West Australian Ballet and Head of Music of the

8 9 Australian Opera Studio. He has also been a In addition to having conducted in 49 of the 50 Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra regular guest conductor with all the Australian states of the USA, he has appeared in New symphony orchestras, Opera Australia, the Zealand, Mexico, Scotland, Ireland, Korea, Established in 1948, the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra is acclaimed as one of the world’s finest Australian Ballet and the state opera and ballet Thailand, Japan, China, Indonesia, Canada, small orchestras. Resident in the purpose-built Federation Concert Hall, Hobart, the TSO presents companies. He continues to appear Israel and Greece. more than 60 diverse concerts across Tasmania and mainland Australia each year. German-born internationally, most recently as guest conductor Sebastian Lang-Lessing has been the orchestra’s Chief Conductor and Artistic Director since 2004. of the Scottish Ballet and conducting a With a full-time complement of 47 musicians, the TSO’s core repertoire is the music of the Classical production of Verdi’s Falstaff in Tokyo. and early Romantic periods. It is, however, a versatile orchestra, equally at home in jazz, popular music and light classics, and recognised internationally as a champion of Australian music. Executive Producers Martin Buzacott, For Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra Robert Patterson Managing Director Nicholas Heyward The TSO presents annual subscription seasons in Hobart and Launceston, and since its inception has Recording Producer Haig Burnell 1, 5, Manager, Artistic Planning Simon Rogers regularly toured regional Tasmania and mainland Australia. The orchestra appears at major Australian Brooke Green 2-4, 6, Peter Taplin 7 Australian Music Program Director arts festivals and in 2005 initiated an annual Sydney Season. International touring has seen the TSO in Recording Engineer Veronika Vincze 1-6, Australian Music Program Director Emeritus North and South America, Greece, Israel, South Korea, China, Japan and Indonesia. Andrew Dixon 7 Editing Haig Burnell and Veronika Vincze 1, 5, Concertmaster Jun Yi Ma The TSO regularly records for radio, CD, film and television. Its recordings on international and Brooke Green and Veronika Vincze 2-4, 6, www.tso.com.au Australian CD labels have garnered critical praise, and the TSO is the only Australian orchestra to have Peter Taplin and Andrew Dixon 7 released a complete set of the Beethoven symphonies, conducted by , and a complete Mastering Veronika Vincze cycle of Schumann symphonies, conducted by Sebastian Lang-Lessing. Editorial and Production Manager Katherine Kemp Publications Editor Natalie Shea Booklet Design Imagecorp Pty Ltd Cover Photo Snow gum trunk, Tasmania © Rob Blakers / Photolibrary.com 2009 Australian Broadcasting Corporation. 2009 Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Distributed Recorded 22-27 October 1989 in the Australian in Australia and New Zealand by Universal Music Group, Sponsor of the TSO Australian Music Program Broadcasting Corporation’s Studio 710, Hobart 7, under exclusive licence. Made in Australia. All rights of the and 13-14 December 2006 2-4, 6 and 28 August owner of copyright reserved. Any copying, renting, lending, diffusion, public performance or broadcast of Powering Australian music into the future 1 5 2007 , in Federation Concert Hall, Hobart. this record without the authority of the copyright owner Forbidden Colours and Le Réveil de l’ange are is prohibited. published by Ricordi. ABC Classics thanks Alexandra Alewood and Melissa Kennedy.

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