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Messiaensmusesprogramme.Pdf Welcome to our annual keyboard festival. This year we celebrate one of the most inspirational musical figures of the 20th century, French composer Olivier Messiaen. The centrepiece of the festival is an all-day gala of music reflecting time, place and the musical world of birds. Performed by students from the Royal College of Music’s internationally acclaimed Keyboard Faculty, the day will feature Messiaen’s Catalogue d’oiseaux alongside other keyboard music. Other events include several concerts and a masterclass with one of the foremost interpreters of Messian’s music, pianist Michel Béroff. I very much look forward to seeing you at the following events. You can also watch Oiseaux exotiques streamed live on Sunday 8 March at www.rcm.ac.uk/live. Professor Vanessa Latarche Head of Keyboard, RCM, London Messiaen’s Muses Keyboard Festival is supported by John Ward. FRIDAY 6 MARCH Piano Masterclass with Michael Béroff 2.00pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Belle Shenkman International Masterclass Free but tickets required SUNDAY 8 MARCH Oiseaux exotiques 12.00pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Free no tickets required MONDAY 9 MARCH Chants de terre et de ciel 1.05pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Couleurs et mystères 6.00pm | West Parry Room Free but tickets required TUESDAY 10 MARCH Visions de l’Amen 1.05pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Free but tickets required Messiaen’s Muses keyboard festival is supported by John Ward 1 Friday 6 March, 2.00pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Piano Masterclass with Michel Béroff Imma Setiadi piano Messiaen Vingt regards sur l’Enfant-Jésus: no 4 Regard de la Vierge no 8 Regard des hauteurs Selim Mazari piano Messiaen La bouscarle from Catalogue d’oiseaux Muqiao Zhou piano Messiaen Préludes: nos 2, 5 and 8 Michel Béroff The French pianist and conductor Michel Béroff was trained at the Nancy Conservatory, winning the First Prize (1962) and Prize of Excellence (1963). He completed his studies at the Paris Conservatory (CNSM) with Yvonne Loriod, where he immediately stood out as one of the best pianists, winning the First Prize in 1966. In 1967 he made his Paris recital debut and won First Prize at the first Olivier Messiaen International Piano Competition. He has since been considered one of the most outstanding interpreters of Messiaen’s music. Béroff has played under the direction of such conductors as Claudio Abbado, Daniel Barenboim, Leonard Bernstein, Pierre Boulez, Christoph von Dohnányi, Antal Doráti, Charles Dutoit, Christoph Eschenbach, Michael Gielen, Eliahu Inbal, Kurt Masur, Seiji Ozawa, André Previn, Mstislav Rostropovich, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Georg Solti, Michael Tilson Thomas, and many others. As a recitalist and a chamber musician, Béroff has been very active playing with Pierre Amoyal, Martha Argerich, Jean-Philippe Collard, Augustin Dumay, Lynn Harrell and Barbara Hendricks, amongst others. An exclusive EMI artist for over 20 years, Michel Béroff has published more than 50 recordings; among them, the complete works for piano and orchestra of Liszt, Prokofiev and Stravinsky, conducted by Ozawa and Masur. He has also recorded works by Bartók, Brahms, Debussy, Messiaen and Schumann. Belle Shenkman International Masterclass 2 Sunday 8 March, 12.00pm | Amaryllis Fleming Concert Hall Oiseaux exotiques ‘For me the only real music has always existed in the sounds of nature... The harmony of wind in trees, the rhythm of waves on the sea, the timbre of the raindrops, of breaking branches, of stones stuck together, the different cries of animals are the true music as far as I am concerned.’ Olivier Messiaen In his Catalogue d’oiseaux Messiaen not only depicts birdsong but places the many species of birds in the context of their natural habitat, exploring themes such as the time of day, landscape and often a specific geographical setting. Today we will enjoy a feast of nature in music as eight of the works from Catalogue d’oiseaux are performed, each one followed by a group of pieces which share a common theme with the Messiaen piece just heard. At the end of each group we hear one or more bird pieces from a wide range of composers. MORNING 12.00pm In Le loriot (golden oriole) a dawn chorus gathers momentum as a multitude of birds welcome the day. The piece takes us from dawn to the bright sun of midday and we follow it with other, widely contrasting musical depictions of dawn and morning. Messiaen Le loriot from ‘Catalogue d’oiseaux’ Christine Cheng Grieg Morning Mood from ‘Peer Gynt Suite’ Jia Ying Chan & Rachel Tang Debussy De l’aube à midi sur la mer from ‘La mer’ Yaoying Wang & Channarong Jantararat Ravel Alborada del gracioso from ‘Miroirs’ Sisi Chen Elgar (arr Bothwell Thompson) Chanson de matin op 15 no 2 Chi-Hoi Cheung Ravel (arr Vyacheslav Gryaznov) Lever du jour from Lynette Yeo & ‘Daphnis et Chloé Suite no 2’ Bertram Wee Griffes The White Peacock from ‘Roman Sketches op 7’ Xiyuan Sun Couperin Le gazoüillement from ‘6th Ordre’ Anhad Arora† Rameau Le rappel des oiseaux Edyta Lajdorf 3 †indicates RCM Junior Department musician LANDscapE 12.55pm The startlingly vivid impression of jagged cliffs which opens Le merle bleu (blue rock thrush) provides the inspiration for a collection of pieces suggesting different landscapes. Messiaen Le merle bleu from ‘Catalogue d’oiseaux’ Annabelle Park Ravel La vallée des cloches from ‘Miroirs’ Simon Carrey Liszt Paysage from ‘Etudes d’exécution transcendante’ Grigoris Ioannou Graham Lynch Admiring Yoro Waterfall Yan Lam Lai Debussy Des pas sur la neige from ‘Préludes Book 1’ Tomoka Kan† Gareth Farr The Horizon from ‘Owhiro Bay’ Conor Murphy† Glinka/Balakirev The Lark Andrew Yiangou INTERVAL SpaIN 2.10pm Le traquet stapazin (black-eared wheatear) is set in the Catalan area of southern France, very close to the Spanish border. Both its setting and its depiction of the hot sun inspire a group of pieces which look south and explore the intense flavours of Spanish piano music. Messiaen Le traquet stapazin from ‘Catalogue d’oiseaux’ Phoebe Ng De Falla Danza del molinero from ‘The Three-Cornered Hat’ Armin Coralic Mompou Cançon i danses no 6 David Serrano Albéniz El Puerto from ‘Iberia’ Kenny Salazar Debussy La puerta del vino from ‘Préludes Book 2’ Miguel Mateus Granados The Maiden and the Nightingale from ‘Goyescas’ Theresa Yu 4 CALM NIGHT 2.50pm L’alouette lulu (woodlark) is set during a still night represented by a recurring motif – a calm progression of chords folding into B flat major. Then we hear other composers’ portrayals of a similarly peaceful or benign night time. Messiaen L’alouette lulu from ‘Catalogue d’oiseaux’ Chen Zhang Debussy (arr A Caplet) Les parfums de la nuit from Vera Fonte & ‘Images pour orchestre’ Jose Francisco Quintas Vilar Lyapunov Rêverie du soir Yukina Murase Liszt Harmonies du soir from ‘Etudes Ilya Kondratev d’exécution transcendante’ Thelonius Monk/Oscar Peterson Round Midnight Tolga Atalay Ün Fauré Nocturne no 3 in A flat major op 33 no 3 Irena Radic Ravel Oiseaux tristes from ‘Miroirs’ Aleksandar Djermanovic WATER 3.45pm After a strikingly violent opening, La bouscarle (bush warbler) goes on to contain river motifs and passages of hypnotic beauty which portray reflections in the water. We continue with Debussy’s famous depiction of the same phenomenon and explore how water has long been a gateway to the imagination for piano composers. Messiaen La bouscarle from ‘Catalogue d’oiseaux’ Selim Mazari Debussy Reflets dans l’eau from ‘Images Book 1’ Sarah Park Griffes The Lake at Evening from ‘Three Tone-Pictures’ Loh Shao Wei Liszt Au bord d’une source from Nurry Lee ‘Années de pèlerinage – Première année: Suisse’ Ravel Jeux d’eau Ning Hui See Ravel Ondine from ‘Gaspard de la nuit’ Pavel Markov Grieg Brooklet op 62 no 4 from ‘Lyric Pieces’ Vincent Ling† Schumann Vogel als Prophet from ‘Waldscenen’ Maria Inês Costa 5 PlacE 4.35pm La buse variable (buzzard) is set in a particular location: ‘Le Dauphine, la Matheysine. A big landscape covered by the fields of Petichet, at the end of Lake Laffrey, at the foot of the bald mountain of the Grand Serre.’ We take this as our cue to perform a short but colourful collection of pieces which are also set in specific places around the world. Messiaen La buse variable from Juan Pablo Hinojosa Ferrera ‘Catalogue d’oiseaux’ Liszt Au lac de Wallenstadt from Luka Okrostsvaridze ‘Années de pèlerinage – Première année: Suisse’ Grainger Zanzibar Boat Song Yan Lam Lai, Jane Lau & Nigel Clayton Albéniz Triana from ‘Iberia’ Lara Melda Benjamin Jamaican Rumba Lucy Wang & Daniel Jordan Grieg Little Bird op 43 no 4 from ‘Lyric Pieces’ Berniya Hamie† Couperin from ‘Troisiéme livre de pieces de clavecin, 14th Ordre’: Le rossignol-en-amour (The nightingale in love) & Jane Lau Double du rossignol La linote-éfarouchée (The startled linnet) Sarah Kim Les fauvétes plaintives (The plaintive warblers) Lisa Hilditch 6 THE SEA 5.20pm Le traquet rieur (black wheatear) opens with an explosive theme which represents ‘joy of the blue sea’. Throughout the work it is used in dialogue with the birds of coastal habitat soaring above. The sea has always been a great source of inspiration for composers, as this collection of pieces demonstrates. Messiaen Le traquet rieur from Catalogue d’oiseaux Sohyun Park Debussy (arr A Caplet) Jeux de vagues from ‘La mer’ Muqiao Zhou & Weihao Fu Debussy L’Isle joyeuse Paula Belzunegui Rachmaninov Etude-tableau in C minor op 39 no 1 Sean Jackson Rachmaninov Etude-tableau in A minor op 39 no 2 Ma Regina Montesclaros Scriabin Sonata no 2 op 19 ‘Sonate-fantasie’ Lucy Wang Tchaikovsky Song of the Lark op 39 no 2 Ziying Zhang† Daquin Le CouCou Kheng Hoe Low Marco Scorsolini Carolina Wren (world premiere) Jia Chan THREatENING NIGHT 6.20pm Le courlis cendré (curlew) explores a more threatening and disturbing aspect of night, and a dramatic progression of chords towards the end depicts ‘the night and the fog spreading little by little’.
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