Cantilena Festival on Islay 2010
4th – 9th July
Annual Report
As
is the usual case, two days of
preliminary rehearsals took place in Glasgow
before the players arrived on Islay
on
Saturday 3rd July. There were
more rehearsals for the full group in preparation for the evening
concert to be
held in the Columba Centre, Bowmore on Monday.
The way the rehearsals are designed may
be of some interest. As well as the
“pre-Islay” rehearsals in Glasgow,
the rehearsal on Sunday 4th July was for the most difficult
works to
be performed during the festival, but from the Monday onward the
schedule is to
rehearse the next days programme in the morning, and the evening
programme in
the afternoon. That way means that the
players have at least 24 hours to absorb the lessons from the rehearsal
on the
afternoon.
Sunday, 4th
July
After these
rehearsals took place
we all trooped down to the Columba Centre to enjoy the opening concert.
There was
a last minute change to the
advertised programme in that, although a Willshire gave it, it was not
Havilland
but his son James who was the solo pianist. This
meant a change of music: Scarlatti was still there
but also a new
sonata by Rory Boyle, a composer familiar to our audience from the 2009
festival, when we commissioned him to write a piece to celebrate the
Year of
Homecoming Scotland. However, this new
work is a dense, complicated and hard work as the 2009 piece was
lightweight
and accessible. Some members of the
audience found it not to their taste whilst others rejoiced in the
challenge it
presented. After the interval normality
was restored by a fabulous performance of Schubert’s great
sonata, which
received a fantastic reception, resulting in a lovely little encore by
the same
Rory Boyle – much approved of by all.
Monday,
5th July
A full days rehearsal at Islay House by
kind permission of the owner, Captain Tom Friedrich, who is one
of
Cantilena Festival on Islay’s patrons. A
new composer for the Festival was Alessandro Scarlatti to open the
concert
given in the Columba Centre plus the ever-popular Holberg Suite by
Grieg and
the exciting Serenade for Strings by Dag Wiren. These
formed the contribution from the strings in Tutti
mode. The major work was the
“Ghost” Piano Trio by
Beethoven performed by the two artistic directors and the former
artistic
director, Scott Mitchell – soon to return to that position! A good audience gave the musicians much heart
that the week would be a tremendous success as indeed it proved to be.
Tuesday,
6th July
A full days rehearsal
with
particular detail being paid to two of the major string works to come
later in
the week – the incredibly complex Adagio and Fugue by Mozart and
the long buy
exhilarating String Symphony No 9 in C by Mendelssohn.
This is Mendelssohn at this most inventive
and wondrous as you will see from the programme notes.
It is always a
pleasure to
perform in the delightful Lagavulin Distillery Hall - so intimate,
(small), the
violins and violas have to stand up, leaving only the ‘cellos and
double bass
seated. This was an opportunity for the
two lovely post graduate ‘cellists from the Royal Scottish
Academy of
Music and
Drama to take over, allowing me, (Adrian Shepherd), to relax for the
evening. Beautiful renditions of the
Violin Concerti by J S Bach were received with great enthusiasm. (I hadn’t realised the players were so
good!)
Wednesday, 7th July
The usual
rehearsals took place in the
morning but then the day belonged to our piano quartet and string
quintet. The latter was a new venture for
us - an
informal lunchtime concert held at a stunning venue in the far
Northwest of the
island in the Outback
Art Gallery,
Sanaigmore. There was a wonderful
atmosphere with the audience seated in armchairs, sofas and on the
floor. There were many children who were
as good as
gold. The quintet played what is known
in the profession as “music from the Pad”.
This is a folder of pre-rehearsed short pieces arranged
for string
quartet/quintet, which is used for all sorts of occasions from weddings
to
funerals and all stops in between. Repertoire
ranged from Opera, through Mozart, Bach, light
classics - to
the Beatles and Joplin. A merry time was
had by all as each item was introduced – some were not and the
audience was
then invited to guess- they were correct every time!
I’m
sure that this venture will be repeated next year.
The
evening concert, the last of our visits to the Columba
Centre produced what many in the audience felt was the highlight of the
Festival. However, they were probably
talking of our pianist, Scott Mitchell who made light of the extremely
difficult “Archduke” Piano Trio of Beethoven, as well as
the heart – rending
Schumann Piano Quartet. However, the
interaction between musicians was intense, as for the first time
in many years,
the piano trio, the basis of the original festival as performed,
and made the performance one
to remember.
Thursday, 8th July
The Old Kiln
Café, with the
delectable Jackie Thomson in charge of affairs, was the only
concert
where the audience surrounds the players. A
technical hitch with the recording meant that we had to
perform the
magnificent Mozart Adagio and Fugue again – nobody objected! There was great hospitality for both players
and audience – a truly memorable evening.
Friday 9th July
The final
rehearsal was completed
in the morning, which allowed all but the Artistic Directors, who were
involved
in a Board Meeting, a free afternoon. Bruichladdich
served enormous glasses of whisky to the
audience as they
came in the door! What a wonderfully
“relaxed” gathering to play for. The
amazing Mendelssohn Octet, (with added Double Bass part), is always the
traditional first half. The second half
of ten pieces, ending with Scottish Reels as well as an extremely
generous
number of raffle prizes made for a long but very successful final night. The whole collected assembly stopped dead at
one point to observe the most spectacular sunset. One
of our patrons remarked that he head been
all over the world but nothing compared with the sunsets on Islay.
I
mentioned the raffle; The Friends of
Cantilena on Islay
organise a raffle and prizes every night, which
raised about £500 in the course of the week.
These lovely people give so much of their time in
distributing posters
and leaflets – one member, Dr Paul Sheldon, actually
produced the
programme for the week – all made possible by the sterling work
done by their
energetic Chairperson - Catherine Wilson. We
owe them a great debt.
For the
record, the professional musicians were:
Violins:
Angus Ramsay; Principal violin,
Scottish Opera Orchestra
Angus Anderson; former
Leader, Scottish Opera Orchestra
Viola:
Stephen Shakeshaft; former
Principal, RSNO, SOO
‘Cello:
Adrian Shepherd; MBE; Former
Principal, RSNO
Double Bass: Paul Marrion; Principal,
BBCSO (London)
Piano:
James Willshire; Head of Junior Academy,
RSAMD
Scott Mitchell; Official
accompanist, RSAMD
The
students were:
Violins:
Daniel Rainey, Lissa Robertson
Viola:
Ian Anderson
‘Cellos:
Barbara Misiewicz, Abigail Hayward
Having obtained
the finance from various private sources, in
particular Sir John Mactaggart and the Schroder Foundation,
the
festival was very grateful to Argyll and Bute’s
contribution, which enabled us to continue with the festival of
children’s
art. In summary, one of the most
successful festivals to date
The
Cantilena Festival on Islay
presents…
The
Children’s Festival of Art 2010 Animation Project
All the films on
the DVD were conceived, designed, produced,
filmed and edited by local children on Islay The week culminated with a
screening of all the films made and each participant was given a copy
of the
DVD to take home. during the 2010 summer festival.
Workshops throughout the
week included
storytelling, drawing, collage, photography, design, animation filming
and
editing.
For the past 5
years, Cantilena Festival on Islay has been running
the Children’s Festival of
Art. This
is a workshop week that has a
different theme each year. Previous work
has included Sea-monsters, which resulted in the making
of a 15
foot long sea creature and Fifty Figures which
used the
hand puppets of Paul Klee as inspiration and the children involved made
their
own puppets during the week. Over the
past couple of years the workshops have been structured to involve some
of the
musicians in the festival and the children’s visual work has been
inspired by
the various instruments and sounds created by the musicians during the
sessions. This year, we ran an animation
project with each child producing their own film, which they took home
at the
end of the festival.
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