BY STEPHANIE ESLAKE
When you’re going to launch a concert season to showcase the passion and “burning curiosity” of Australia’s next biggest performers, you’re going to want to do it with flair.
That’s what the Australian National Academy of Music is gearing up for with its 2019 season opener. ANAM musicians emerging and established will deliver fanfare, funk, and fairy-tale. There’ll be Grainger and Glinka. Fitkin and Bloch. And a whole heap of music in between.
We settled in for a chat with Howard Penny, the school’s head of strings, who tells us about the wildly varied program featuring in the 2019 ANAM Season Opening Concert this March – and why you should rock along.
Howard, when we last touched base you told us all about what HIP means today. Have you since had any major HIP epiphanies or performed in any memorable concerts?
2018 was a wonderfully full and varied year, so it’s hard to pick the highlights.
Of my ANAM-based performances, it would have to be our final concert, with my esteemed faculty colleagues and guests, of the chamber version of Mahler’s ninth symphony: an epic work, and a celebration of what makes ANAM the dynamic place it is, especially after a very challenging end to the year. Walking the walk in front of our talented young musicians always adds an extra electricity!
You’ll be opening ANAM’s concert season this March. Talk us through your favourite work on the program for strings, and why you love to tackle it with your fellow musicians.
Bloch’s Concerto Grosso No. 1 has special memories for me: it was a work on my very first program with the Canberra Youth Orchestra on their overseas tour, when I was a very keen but hopelessly inexperienced 13-year-old at the back of the cello section.
It features wonderfully lush string writing, and channels early music models, much in the manner of Grieg’s Holberg Suite. It is very satisfying both to play and to listen to, and will give the great new string cohort a chance to hone important instrumental and ensemble skills for the coming year.
I also hope I’ll get closer to the notes this time around…
It’s a pretty eclectic program as a whole. Did you help design this? What are some of the commonalities that tie together these incredible works?
This program is, in the very best sense, pure Nick Deutsch: allowing each instrumental group to work together and shine individually, in works both familiar and not – but always of top quality; and to come together at the end with the Glinka for a champagne launch into the rest of the year’s program. This is ANAM 2019!
How does your knowledge of HIP come into play when you are performing such varied works from varied eras?
I would say that every piece I play, study, or listen to is informed by every other piece I have played, studied, or listened to. So in that sense, it is all de facto historically informed.
As I mentioned in my previous interview, I am intrigued by the commonalities of the vocabulary of musical expression of all ages, as well as the individual inflections and dialects. And the company of great composers of any time is endlessly fascinating and cross-referential.
Every day brings new questions but also new insights – what more could you ask for?
The upcoming concert will feature fellow faculty members as well as ANAM Musicians. Tell us a little about the rehearsal process and how you’ll be working with the emerging artists in this big event.
Working alongside our hugely talented cohort is one of the great pleasures of being at ANAM. Being unconducted, the Bloch will give everyone a chance to give input and ‘own’ the performance in the manner of chamber music – something we at ANAM aspire to in ensembles of any size. I’m delighted our incoming musicians will experience this from day one.
While faculty will most likely guide the process, the unwritten rule of active and open listening and flexibility will be to the fore: we all want to create something that is so much more than the sum of its parts.
This will mark the beginning of your 12th year with ANAM, having been a member of the Artists of ANAM since 2007. What do you love most about spending your life in an educational environment?
Teaching is learning, and I try to instil in my class a pride in instrumental excellence, as well as a burning curiosity about what makes music work and what music can achieve – things that continue to drive me in my own work.
My views are constantly being challenged in a healthy way, and I am constantly inspired by my interaction with the next generation of musicians – it’s a two-way street!
So at the end of the day, why should audiences head along to support would class musicians-in-training and their educators in this ANAM Opening Concert?
Why wouldn’t you? Look forward to seeing you there!
Head along to the Opening Concert at 7.30pm March 2 in ANAM, South Melbourne Town Hall.
It’ll feature ANAM Faculty, ANAM Musicians, and the ANAM Orchestra; and yes, it’s going to be huge.
We’re teaming up with ANAM throughout 2019 to bring you interviews about music education and industry. Stay tuned for our next story!
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Images supplied. Featured image by Cameron Jamieson.
