The seventh Mark Motors Audi Signature concerts of the season – entitled Mahler’s Fourth – will be performed on Wednesday June 1 and Thursday June 2 at

8 p.m. in Southam Hall.  The National Arts Centre Orchestra – under the baton of Music Director Pinchas Zukerman – showcases NAC Orchestra principal clarinet Kimball Sykes, and features guest artists soprano Erin Wall and pianist Jon Kimura Parker.

This concert is made possible in part through the Friends of the NAC Orchestra Kilpatrick Fund.

PRE-CONCERT CHAT by Jean-Jacques Van Vlasselaer – 7 p.m.
June 1 in Le Salon (in English): “Paradise before Hell”
June 2 in the Panorama Room (in French): « Le Paradis avant l’enfer »

NAC Orchestra favourite Jon Kimura Parker shines in one of Mozart’s greatest and most popular piano concerti. Piano Concerto No. 27 in B flat major (composed in 1791) is the composer’s final piano concerto  -- the work of a genius in peak form, composing in a genre in which he excelled. The concerto is truly sublime, enchanting the listener with grace and serenity, and nothing could be more tenderly touching than this concerto’s graceful slow movement. Mozart may have performed the concerto at its premiere in March 1791 (the facts are in dispute), but the occasion did mark Mozart's last appearance in a public concert; he took ill later that same year and died on 5 December 1791, aged 35.

Soprano Erin Wall, NAC Orchestra principal clarinet Kimball Sykes, and pianist Jon Kimura Parker are featured in The Shepherd on the Rock, a famous lied for soprano, clarinet, and piano by Franz Schubert. Composed in 1828 during the final months of his life, it could just as easily be described as a work of chamber music or even an operatic aria. The lied was written for opera soprano Pauline Anna Milder-Hauptmann, a friend of Schubert, who had requested a showpiece that would allow her to express a wide range of feelings. The lied is multi-sectional, with the clarinet and the voice equally challenged. The first section is warm as the lonely shepherd, high on the mountain top, listens to the echoes rising from below. The second section becomes quite dark as the shepherd expresses his all-encompassing grief and loneliness. The third and last section is a sign of hope as the shepherd anticipates the rebirth inherent in the coming of spring.

Gustav Mahler's Symphony # 4 in G major (written in 1899-1901) is the most accessible of his works, presenting all the characteristics of his distinctive vision -- his love of nature, grotesque humour, scintillating orchestration, integration of song and abstract instrumentals, and a constant search for meaning amid the great questions of life. For Mahler, when mankind, full of wonder, asks what it all means, only a child can answer.

Symphony No. 4 is built around the song “Das himmlische Leben”, originally written by Mahler in 1892, which presents a child’s vision of Heaven. It is prefigured in the symphony’s first three movements and sung in its entirety by a solo soprano (Erin Wall) in the fourth movement. In a relaxed, bucolic scene, a child presents a sunny, naive vision of Heaven and describes the overflowing bowls of delicious food which will make up a feast for all the saints. Wild game run through the streets, St. Peter catches willing fish, St. Cecilia plays music, 11,000 virgins dance, and angelic voices join together in jubilation. The scene also has its darker elements as the child knows that the heavenly feast takes place at the expense of animals, including a sacrificial lamb. As summarized by biographer George de la Grange, the Fourth combined deliberate simplicity with a wealth of invention, with formulas borrowed from the past which have been enriched and transformed with inexhaustible imagination.

The NAC Orchestra performs Mahler’s Fourth in Southam Hall of the National Arts Centre on Wednesday June 1 and Thursday June 2 at 8 p.m. Tickets are $20.45, $31.21, $42.51, $53.81, $64.57, $75.33, and $94.17, for adults and $11.38, $16.76, $22.41, $28.06, $33.44, $38.82, and $48.24 for students (upon presentation of a valid student ID card). Tickets are available at the NAC Box Office (in person) and through Ticketmaster (with surcharges) at 1-888-991-2787; Ticketmaster may also be accessed through the NAC’s website www.nac-cna.ca.

Subject to availability, full-time students (aged 13-29) with valid Live Rush™ membership (free registration at www.liverush.ca) may buy up to 2 tickets per performance at the discount price of $12 per ticket. Tickets are available online (www.nac-cna.ca) or at the NAC box office from 10 a.m. on the day before the performance until 6 p.m. on the day of the show or 2 hours before a matinee. Groups of 10 or more save 15% to 20% off regular ticket prices to all NAC Music, Theatre and Dance performances; to reserve your seats, call 613-947-7000, ext. 634 or e-mail grp@nac-cna.ca.

Our latest web offering -- coming soon -- NACmusicbox TIMELINE 200 orchestral works, 80 Canadian compositions, 1 interactive TIMELINE. Explore unlimited music connections and discover Canada's contribution to orchestral history. The interactive TIMELINE includes the addition of 65 Canadian works thanks to financial investment by the Virtual Museum of Canada at the Department of Canadian Heritage. We also acknowledge our partner CBC Radio 2 for providing broadcast-quality recordings of the NAC Orchestra’s archival performances.

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Information:
Gerald Morris
Communications Officer, NAC Music
613-947-7000, ext. 335
email] gmorris@nac-cna.ca