≈ 90 minutes · No intermission
Last updated: November 12, 2021
Repertoire
In the Garden of Endless Sleep for oboe and piano
Inspired by a fictitious place in Gene Wolfe’s science fiction novel The Book of the New Sun, Kevin Lau (b. 1982) was sparked by an image of “a garden that moves through time, flickering between present, past, and future” to create In the Garden of Endless Sleep for oboe and piano (2020). He notes that the piece explores the “idea of viewing the garden—a cultivated slice of natural beauty—through various stages of growth and decay.” He was also interested in capturing the juxtaposition of “simplicity versus impermeability,” as influenced by Wolfe’s elusive prose. In Lau’s words:
I tried to capture this in part by evoking musical memories from older time periods in a somewhat hazy fashion, and in part through texture—in particular, the use of the piano’s sustained pedal to blur certain harmonies together. The structure of the piece is “fuzzy” as well, invoking not so much rondo form as its afterimage. Although there is an earthy, organic aspect to the piece—the melodious but often asymmetric oboe lines, for example, suggesting the contours of vines and roots and the sprawl of overgrown vegetation—the music is otherwise steeped in a dream-like and uneasy vagueness.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Stray Birds for wind quintet
In her recent works, Canadian composer Alison Yun-Fei Jiang (b. 1992) incorporates themes of cultural displacement, contemplating on the clashing and merging of cultural identities manifested in her own musical language. In 2020, she was announced as one of the NAC’s new Carrefour Composers, a program in partnership with the Canada Council. She shares the following description about her first commission as Carrefour composer, a composition for wind quintet, Stray Birds (2021):
Stray Birds is a musical meditation on the poetics of birds; it is a metaphorical narrative and a personal response to the topics of travel, diaspora, and home.
During the pandemic, with travel constrained and everything working remotely, I have spent more time at home in Toronto than I have in years. I have found myself increasingly appreciating and finding joy in simple things, such as birdwatching from my window and during my daily walks around the neighbourhood. Seeing the free-spirited birds around home brings me comfort and happiness; this piece celebrates such simple happiness. There are moments when the music sounds like birds taking off, flapping their wings, singing, and engaging in chatter. As I find an association between birds’ migration and the human immigration experience, this piece is also a metaphorical “flight”, where one travels and migrates from a bird’s-eye view, experiences a journey of diaspora and displacement, and finally lands at home. The journey is personal and transformative; memories from the past become broken, fragmented, and distorted, and one’s identity becomes reincarnated and reborn. In composing, I channelled the dramaturgy, lyricism, and storytelling from the southern Chinese opera that I grew up immersed in. To musically and metaphorically convey a sense of a fragmented past and a transformed identity, I made the piece sometimes collage-like, often childlike and direct, almost theatrical and, at one point, reiterative in a kind of flow state.
This piece also celebrates spring, as I wrote it around the time of the Lunar New Year and had the Chinese renao concept in mind (it literally translates to “hot and spicy” and is a word used to convey a sense of festivity, bustling activity, and liveliness). I hope that, with the help of our fantastic wind quintet, this music can “take flight” like the free-spirited birds. I hope it brings some comfort and joy to the listeners, just as the birds did for me.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Pastorale for wind quintet, Op. 151
While Lau’s work considers nature’s more enigmatic qualities, Amy Beach’s Pastorale evokes the serene and idyllic aspects of nature and being out in nature. By the time Beach (1867–1944) wrote it in June 1941, she was a celebrated American composer and one of the most frequently performed of her generation. She completed it during what would be her final residence at the MacDowell Colony, an artist retreat located in Peterborough, New Hampshire, where she had regularly spent time to compose, close to nature, for the past 20 years.
In substance, Pastorale is in fact a reworking of two earlier versions (the first for flute, cello, and piano, the second for cello and organ) that she had composed during her first residency at the MacDowell Colony in 1921. In this version, which is also her only work for woodwind quintet, motifs from the original theme are distributed between the instruments in counterpoint. It begins very softly in the warm lower registers of the clarinet and oboe, with the characteristic “drone” intoned by the horn and bassoon. A key change signals the middle section, during which the parts increase in volume and expand in pitch range, thus intensifying the mood before returning to the initial tranquility at the conclusion.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Summer Music for wind quintet, Op. 31
American composer Samuel Barber (1910–1981) wrote Summer Music in 1955, to fulfill a commission from the Chamber Music Society of Detroit (it was financed, remarkably for the time, through public donations similar to today’s crowdfunding campaigns). Although the work was premiered in March 1956 by the principal players of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Barber composed it with the New York Wind Quintet in mind. After initially meeting the group’s members in January 1955, he observed them working in rehearsal, during which they explored techniques of producing unique sonorities as an ensemble. When the Quintet read through the finished work for the first time, flutist Samuel Baron expressed delight at what the composer had created for them: “We were completely gassed! What a wonderful new quintet conception. [Barber] has written some of our favourite effects.” After the premiere, Barber decided to shorten the piece, in consultation with the Quintet, to the final version that is performed today.
Summer Music unfolds continuously in one movement, structured as a series of episodes during which main themes are presented and return. It opens with a slow introduction featuring a gentle pulsating theme first introduced by the horn and bassoon, evoking the languor of a hot summer’s day or night. A tender melody of darker character follows, a kind of melancholy serenade played by the oboe. The mood lifts, with the instruments “chattering” on a playful rhythmic motive, after which an even livelier section of shifting rhythmic patterns ensues. The principal themes are then reintroduced in reverse order. Later, a new urgency takes hold, intensifying to a grand climax; it eventually dissolves, returning to the opening mood before the ensemble closes with a virtuosic flourish.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Trio for oboe, bassoon and piano
I. Presto
II. Andante
III. Rondo
Tonight’s concert closes with a witty sparkler by Parisian composer Francis Poulenc (1899–1963): his Trio for oboe, bassoon, and piano. He began work on it in 1924 (following the sensational success of his ballet score Les biches for Sergei Diaghilev and the Ballet russes) and, through a rather painstaking creative process, finally completed it in 1926. The composer himself performed the piano part at the Trio’s premiere at Paris’s Salle des Agriculteurs on May 2, 1926.
Poulenc considered this work to be one of importance for him, and later in his life, expressed that “I’m rather fond of my Trio because it sounds well and its sections balance each other.” Along with textural clarity and formal balance, the Trio displays other signature Poulencian aspects from the early period of his compositional career—clever twists on 18th century European music styles; a tonal harmonic palette though spiked with acerbic dissonances; and expressive melodies for which he had an evident gift. After an introduction of somewhat mock seriousness and grandeur, a vivacious theme begins the first movement proper. This melody bookends a sequence of sections, each presenting a new tune or motive, unfolding like vignettes of an operatic drama in which the oboe and bassoon are the main characters.
The Andante is the emotional heart of the piece, with the oboe and bassoon singing a “sweet and melancholic” (Poulenc’s words) duet. Shifting harmonies in the piano part create a dreamy and poignant atmosphere. A perky theme of unrelenting good cheer launches the concluding Rondo; it alternates with contrasting moments of martial spirit and lyrical tenderness, the latter incorporating lush romantic harmonies and rhapsodic piano writing.
Program notes by Dr. Hannah Chan-Hartley
Artists
Praised by critics for the beauty, clarity, and fluidity of her sound, impeccable phrasing, and consummate musicality, Joanna G’froerer enjoys an exciting career as an orchestral player, chamber musician, soloist, and educator. Principal Flute of the National Arts Centre Orchestra since 1992, she was appointed to that position at the age of 20, one of the youngest musicians ever to be hired by the NAC Orchestra.
A native of Vancouver, Joanna G’froerer comes from a family of professional musicians. She performs regularly as a soloist with the NAC Orchestra, having appeared as soloist in over 30 different programs since joining the orchestra. She has also performed concertos with many of Canada’s other fine ensembles, including the symphony orchestras of Vancouver, Victoria, and Quebec City. Joanna G’froerer is a past first-prize winner of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal Competition.
Among her acclaimed recordings are a CBC disc of Mozart’s Flute Quartets with Pinchas Zukerman, Martin Beaver, and Amanda Forsyth, named Best Canadian Chamber Music Recording of 2002 by Opus Magazine. A recording of Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, with Jens Lindemann, James Ehnes, Jon Kimura Parker, and Charles Hamann, was nominated for a Juno Award in 2021.
Joanna G’froerer has been featured in the chamber music festivals of Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, and Ottawa, Halifax’s Scotia Festival, the Campos do Jordao Festival in Brazil, and the Affinis Festival in Japan. As an educator, she has taught flute at the NAC Summer Music Institute, at Domaine Forget, and the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. She is presently on faculty at the University of Ottawa and at McGill University in Montreal.
Joanna G’froerer is a Wm. S. Haynes Artist, playing a custom 19.5 K gold Haynes flute with lightweight silver mechanism and headjoints in 19.5K and 14K gold.
Heralded for the “exquisite liquid quality” of his solo playing (Gramophone), Charles “Chip” Hamann was appointed to the principal oboe chair of Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra in 1993 at the age of 22. Mr. Hamann has also served as guest principal oboe with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, London’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and Quebec’s Les Violons du Roy.
Mr. Hamann’s solo debut album, the double CD collection Canadian Works for Oboe and Piano with pianist Frédéric Lacroix, was released in 2017 on the Centrediscs label and his playing was lauded for “well-rounded tone, sensitive phrasing and…breathtaking sustained tones” (The Whole Note) and “exquisite musicianship.” (The Double Reed) With the NAC Wind Quintet, his performances of music for wind instruments by Camille Saint-Saëns with pianist Stéphane Lemelin for the Naxos label, including the op. 166 Oboe Sonata, won Gramophone Magazine’s Editor’s Choice award in 2011. Mr. Hamann was also featured in J.S. Bach’s Concerto for violin and oboe BWV 1060 with Pinchas Zukerman on NACO’s 2016 Baroque Treasury album for Analekta that earned him praise as a “superb colleague” (Gramophone) and for “a gorgeous, expressive sound.” (Ludwig van Toronto) Mr. Hamann has commissioned numerous solo works from leading Canadian composers and continues to champion new repertoire. He will record a CD of newly commissioned music for oboe solo and oboe with piano in 2021 with pianist Frédéric Lacroix.
Charles Hamann has appeared as concerto soloist with Les Violons du Roy, the Alberta Baroque Ensemble, Lincoln’s Symphony Orchestra in Nebraska, the Yamagata Symphony Orchestra, and Ottawa’s Thirteen Strings. He has appeared many times with NACO, both in Ottawa and on tour, in major concertos including Mozart, Strauss, and Vaughan-Williams. He has been a featured recitalist at the International Double Reed Society conferences and has presented solo recitals across Canada and the US.
Mr. Hamann is Adjunct Professor of oboe at the University of Ottawa School of Music and was on the faculty of the NAC Summer Music Institute for twenty years. He is a frequent faculty member at the Canada’s National Academy Orchestra, National Youth Orchestra of Canada, and the Orchestre de la francophonie. Mr. Hamann has been a guest clinician throughout Canada and at leading conservatories in the US. Internationally, he has given clinics in Mexico, China and Japan, where he is a frequent guest artist at the Affinis Music Festival and has been a guest faculty member of the Hyogo Performing Arts Centre Orchestra, a prominent orchestral training institution.
Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, USA, Mr. Hamann pursued early study with Brian Ventura and William McMullen and later at the Interlochen Arts Camp and Interlochen Arts Academy with Daniel Stolper. He earned a Bachelor of Music and the prestigious Performer’s Certificate from the Eastman School of Music in 1993, where he was a student of Richard Killmer.
Kimball Sykes joined the National Arts Centre Orchestra as principal clarinet in 1985.
Born in Vancouver, he received a Bachelor of Music Degree from the University of British Columbia where he studied with Ronald deKant. In 1982 Mr. Sykes was a member of the National Youth Orchestra and was awarded the first of two Canada Council grants to study with Robert Marcellus in Chicago. He has participated in the Banff School of Fine Arts Festival, the Scotia Festival, the Orford Festival and the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival.
He has performed and toured with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and was a member of the Vancouver Opera Orchestra. While in Vancouver, he was a founding member of the Vancouver Wind Trio. From 1983 to 1985 he was principal clarinet of the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra.
Mr. Sykes has performed as a soloist with the NAC Orchestra on numerous occasions. In May 2000, he gave the premiere performance of Vagues immobiles, a clarinet concerto by Alain Perron commissioned for him by the NAC, and in November 2002, he performed the Copland Clarinet Concerto, both conducted by Pinchas Zukerman. Other groups he has appeared with as soloist include Thirteen Strings, the Honolulu Symphony and the Auckland Philharmonia.
Mr. Sykes has performed numerous solo and chamber music programs for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. He can be heard on the recent Chamber Players of Canada recording of Schubert’s Octet. He has also recorded the Mozart Clarinet Quintet with Pinchas Zukerman and NAC Orchestra principal musicians Donnie Deacon, Jane Logan and Amanda Forsyth which is included in the NAC Orchestra’s double Mozart CD for CBC Records which was nominated for a Juno Award in 2004.
Kimball Sykes is currently on faculty at the University of Ottawa.
Christopher Millard, one of Canada’s best known woodwind artists, joined the National Arts Centre Orchestra as principal bassoon in 2004 after serving with the Vancouver Symphony and the CBC Radio Orchestra for 28 years. He is also the principal bassoon for the Grand Teton Music Festival and has made five concert tours with Valery Gergiev and the World Orchestra for Peace.
A distinguished teacher, Mr. Millard served on the faculty of Northwestern University until 2014, and continues to give masterclasses at many of the foremost music schools: Curtis Institute, New World Symphony, Manhattan School, Rice University, Indiana University, the National Orchestral Institute as well as in Canada at Domaine Forget. For 20 years, Mr. Millard was the bassoon professor for the National Youth Orchestra where he helped nurture a new generation of Canadian wind players. His students now occupy numerous positions in American and Canadian orchestras. A student of Roland Small and the legendary Sol Schoenbach at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia, Mr. Millard also studied with the great French flutist Marcel Moyse.
A regular guest artist and teacher at the Scotia, Banff, Orford and Ottawa Chamber Music Festivals, Mr. Millard has also appeared in concert and recordings with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Marlboro Festival, Chamber Music Northwest, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, the International Double Reed Society and as a soloist with numerous orchestras. He regularly performs at home and on tour with the National Arts Centre Wind Quintet, a highly acclaimed ensemble that has made a debut recording on the Naxos label.
Mr. Millard has received wide praise for his numerous recordings BIS, Naxos, Arabesque, CBC Records and Summit, including a disc in the prestigious “OrchestraPro” series. His recording of the Hétu Bassoon Concerto won a 2004 Juno Award. He is a recognized authority on the acoustics of reedmaking and a skilled woodwind technician.
Principal Horn with the National Arts Centre Orchestra since 2002, Lawrence Vine has also served as Principal Horn with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra.
A much sought-after chamber musician, Lawrence has performed with Andrew Dawes, Lynn Harrell, Joseph Kalichstein, Anton Kuerti, Malcolm Lowe, Menahem Pressler, Pascal Rogé, David Schifrin, Joseph Silverstein, and Pinchas Zukerman. He regularly performs at home and on tour with the National Arts Centre Wind Quintet, a highly acclaimed ensemble that has recorded for the Naxos label.
As a soloist, he has appeared with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, and Ottawa’s Thirteen Strings Chamber Orchestra. His festival credits include the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, the Banff Centre for Fine Arts, Cleveland’s Kent/Blossom Music, the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival and Ottawa's Music and Beyond Festival.
An active teacher and clinician, Lawrence is proud to teach the horn studio at the University of Ottawa's School of Music. He previously taught at the University of Manitoba, and has presented masterclasses at the Manhattan School of Music, Baltimore’s Peabody Conservatory, Chicago’s Roosevelt University, Toronto’s Royal Conservatory of Music, Wilfrid Laurier University, and the Universities of Colorado, Toronto, British Columbia, Calgary and Victoria. He also serves on the faculty of the NAC Summer Music Institute.
The Toronto Globe and Mail has praised his “fine, burnished playing”; the Winnipeg Free Press commended his “delicate phrasing, rounded tone, and sense of poise”; the Ottawa Citizen enthused that his “playing was assured, and his clear sound was remarkably subtle”; and the Montreal Gazette described his playing as “radiant”.
Frédéric Lacroix has performed in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia as a soloist, chamber musician and collaborative pianist. He is a frequent collaborator with members of the NAC Orchestra both in chamber music and recitals, having first performed in the Music for a Sunday Afternoon concert series in 2015. This past September, he curated, as fortepianist (and composer), the late-night concerts of the NAC Orchestra’s Beethoven Festival.
Following the University of Ottawa’s purchase of a fortepiano, he has devoted part of his time to the study and performance of music on period keyboard instruments, for which he was recognized as the Westfield Center Performing Scholar for 2008–2009. He has presented numerous concerts in Canada and the United States as harpsichordist and fortepianist.
Intrigued by the seemingly infinite diversity of new music, Lacroix has enjoyed collaborating with composers and performers in the premiere of a number of Canadian and American works. Also active as a composer, his song cycle, Nova Scotia Tartan (2004), is featured on Hail, a disc dedicated to Canadian Art Song.
Frédéric Lacroix teaches piano and composition at the University of Ottawa. He recently completed his doctorate degree in keyboard performance practice with Malcolm Bilson at Cornell University.
“The Carrefour residency is a one-of-a-kind orchestral training ground. As an emerging composer who aspires to write music for the orchestra, I am truly honoured and thrilled to be one of the Carrefour composers in residence. I look forward to my upcoming collaborations with the National Arts Centre Orchestra and its music director Alexander Shelley, and hope to create meaningful works by learning from and exchanging ideas with musicians of this amazing Canadian orchestra as a Canadian artist.”
Chinese-Canadian composer Alison Yun-Fei Jiang (b. 1992) explores the intersections of genres and cultural ideologies by drawing inspirations and influences from an array of sources such as Chinese traditional folk music, film music, popular music, literature, Canadian landscapes, and Buddhism, creating music with epic melodic gestures in a lyrical, dynamic and colourful nature.
She has collaborated with ensembles such as the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, National Youth Orchestra of Canada, Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Esprit Orchestra, JACK Quartet, the Wet Ink Ensemble, Imani Winds, Molinari Quartet, Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra, American String Quartet, Quartetto Apeiron and FearNoMusic. Her music has been broadcast on CBC Radio 2 and performed in venues including Symphony Center (Chicago), Koerner Hall (Toronto), and the DiMenna Center for Classical Music (New York), featured in the Royal Conservatory of Music 21C Festival and the University of Toronto New Music Festival. Awards and recognitions come from ASCAP, the SOCAN Foundation, the Graham Sommer Competition for Young Composers, the American Prize and International Alliance for Women in Music.
Alison is a current Ph.D. candidate and Division of Humanities Fellow at the University of Chicago. She holds degrees in music composition from Manhattan School of Music (B.M.) and New York University (M.M.).
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