We had another fun concert — the music was hard, but the result was rewarding. We had a great turnout on Saturday.
Now we’ve got to start practicing for the next show. Here’s what we’ll be playing:
Dvorak, The Wild Dove tone poem Op. 110 — I hadn’t heard this one before. It looks mostly ok for the cellos, but definitely has some fast bits.
Chaminade, Concertino for flute and orchestra — This looks particularly challenging for the first flute.
Brahms, Symphony no. 4 — I have played this one with Divertimento before. I remember having to take many shortcuts last time; we’ll see if I can do any better this time around. 🙂
It’s less than two weeks until the next Divertimento Orchestra concert. The program this time is incredible; it’s literally some of the hardest music we’ve ever played. Definitely worth seeing.
The Divertimento Orchestra in cooperation with the Embassy of the Czech Republic, is proud to present a program of Czech music, this Thursday and Friday (April 20 & 21, 2018) starting at 8PM. The concert venue is:
Woodroffe United Church,
207 Woodroffe Ave.
The program is going to be great:
Smetana — The Moldau
This piece, originally titled “Vltava”, is a beautiful tone painting that charts the course of the Vltava river. It has a very busy and difficult cello part.
Dvořák — Slavonic Dances, Op. 46
These dances are wonderful, exuberant splashes of music. They contain numerous parts that are extremely difficult to play.
Dvořák — Symphony No. 9 “from the New World”
I love this symphony. The oboe part at the start of the second movement is definitely on my “goosebumps” list.
Tickets prices are…
Adults: $20
Students/Seniors: $10
Children 13 and under: FREE
Please come listen to some wonderful music, including my minor contributions from the back of the cello section.
It’s that time again! I’m very pleased to say that I will be playing in the Spring Concert of the Divertimento Orchestra, April 28th and 29th, 2017. We’re playing three pieces:
Halifax Harbour by Elizabeth Raum
As part of the Canada 150 celebration, we will be playing this fun piece (with a great cello part 😉 ) by Canadian composer Elizabeth Raum. Shhhh! Rumour has it that depending on the night, you might see her in the audience.
Tres Danzas Españolas by Enrique Granados
Enrique Granados was born the 27th of July 1867, 150 years ago. The three pieces that we’ll be playing are orchestral arrangements (by J. Lamote de Grignon) of three of the “12 Danzas Españolas” a piano work published in 1890. There’s a strong Spanish feel and some great solo playing (not by me <g>).
Symphony No. 3 in Eb, Op. 97 “Rhenish” by Robert Schumann
This Schumann Symphony is big, deep music, with complexities that you probably don’t hear on the first listen through. It really wasn’t until I’d played the cello part in context that I felt like I understood it. Very cool!
All and all, it should be an excellent show. And given my recent health issues, I’m particularly glad that I’ll be able to participate. By all means, come and give us a listen.
Here’s the poster for the show. Feel free to print this out and post it wherever people might see it. We love playing for a full house!
(This is an old post from March 29, 2016, recovered via the Wayback Machine…)
Please join me and the other members of the Divertimento Orchestra for a wonderful Spring concert:
Donizetti! – Overture to Don Pasquale
An exciting, rip-roaring overture with some brutally fast playing.
Beethoven — Symphony No. 6 in F, Op. 68 “Pastorale”
This is a deeply moving, powerful Symphony that paints beautiful images, from a shepherd tending a flock, to a ferocious thunderstorm. The more I play this piece, the more I discover in it.
Grieg — Symphonic Dances, Op. 64
Originally written for piano duet, and then orchestra, this is a cycle of four pieces founded on Norwegian folk dance melodies.
The concert dates are:
April 22 & 23, 2016 at 8 p.m.
L’Eglise St. Thomas d’Aquin
1244 Kilborn Avenue
Ottawa
Tickets prices are:
$20 for adults
$10 for Students and Seniors
$5 for kids under 13
Free for kids under 6
This is yet another of those posts that starts out by apologizing for not keeping up with the blog. Believe me, I’m more frustrated than you are that it’s been so long since I last posted.
The thing is, my life has been busy, to the point where I haven’t even been finding the time to keep up with 140 character tweets, let alone full blog posts.
Anyway, here are some highlights…
New role at work
In addition to being the Eclipse Project PMC lead, I have now taken on a significant architectural role working on the “IBM DevOps Services powered by JazzHub”. This is a new property that provides project hosting, including online development (based on Orion), tracking and planning support, etc., which is intended to be the premiere environment for building applications that are part of the “IBM BlueMix” platform-as-a-service. What’s even cooler about this is that it can be used for free. Definitely check it out.
Just finished a Divertimento concert
*sigh*. Yes, it would have made more sense to talk about it ahead of time. Oh well. This was the orchestra’s 30th anniversary concert, and it was an awesome program:
J. Strauss — Die Fledermaus Overture
Mozart — Violin Concerto No. 5, K.218
Brahms — Symphony No. 4 Op. 98
The concert was sponsored by the Austrian Embassy including bringing in the soloist for the Mozart, one Daniel Auner, who is a truly excellent up-and-coming violinist. Even though we only had a single rehearsal with him, I felt like he helped us achieve a recognizably stronger understanding of the music.
I bought a car
A Fiat Abarth. I haven’t actually received it yet — It’s still being built — but I expect it will show up some time in the next couple of weeks. For now, here’s a shot of basically what it will look like:
It’s very small, but I verified that it will hold my cello case with the back seats folded down, so we’re good. Zero to 100 KPH in 6.9 seconds. I’m excited :-).
Just letting you know that the Divertimento 2013 Fall Concert is in just over a week:
November 8 & 9, 2013, 8pm
L’Église St. Thomas d’Aquin
1244 Kilborn Avenue
Ottawa
This is the orchestra that I play cello for, and I certainly hope to see you there. The pieces we are playing this time are:
Cardy — Kissing the Joy as it Flies
Wolf-Ferrari — Suite Concertino, Op. 16
Tchaikovsky — Symphony No. 4 Op. 26
The Cardy is a nice modern little piece built around the cycle of fifths. The Wolf-Ferrari is a bassoon concerto, with Ben Glossop as the soloist; it’s also reduced orchestra, which means I’m not playing in it, but that is fine with me given that the Tchaikovsky is definitely taking all of my energy — seriously, there are parts in it that that my cello teacher claims she would have difficulty playing.
Anyway, as usual, I can get tickets for $2 off the price at the door, but unfortunately if you want me to get you some I need to know by Thursday (i.e. tomorrow). [Apologies for leaving it so late]. The price at the door is:
Adults — $20
Seniors/Students — $10
Children under 13 — $5
Children under 6 — free
If you’ve got a printer handy, and you’d like to help us by putting up a poster, here is a PDF…
