Festival 2012

THE EIGHTH BULAWAYO MUSIC FESTIVAL

Wednesday 23 to Sunday 27 May 2012

The Eighth Bulawayo Music Festival will take place from Wednesday 23 May to Sunday 27 May 2012 when the musicians will include Juliette Bausor (flute), Morgan Szymanski (guitar), the Odeion String Quartet, Njabulo Madlala (baritone), Leslie Howard (piano), Coady Green (piano), Leigh Harrold (piano) and Richard Sisson (composer, conductor, pianist!).  Also taking part will be Richard Sisson, composer, pianist and entertainer; Petroc Trelawny, the BBC Radio 3 presenter and Mary Smith, presenter of ‘Operatunity’ and various other TV programmes and former head of the community programme at the English National Opera.

Full details of programmes and booking arrangements will be available early in the New Year.

Juliette Bausor: "Rising star in the arts firmament... radiating composure and command in equal measure...” raves The Times

As usual, the core of the festival will be a series of concerts of classical music which will include piano quintets by Dohnanyi, Schumann and Shostakovich, Mendelssohn’s Octet and C.P.E.Bach’s Flute Concerto in D minor.  There will also be concerts featuring ethnic, pop and folk music as well as jazz in which the visiting musicians will take part.  Late night events will include silent movies with live accompaniment by pianists and instrumentalists, just as they would have been originally seen, and a performance of Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale with musicians, actors and dancer.

There will be a pre-festival dinner on the evening of Tuesday 22 May at the Bulawayo Club which will include an entertainment probably centred on the songs of Noël Coward and, of course, the usual “meet the performer” interviews.

Perhaps the main highlights of the festival will be the large-scale choral works.  Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana will be performed in the composer’s own version for two pianos and percussion  with a choir of 200 made up of both schools and adult singers including a contingent from Harare.  There are also plans to perform Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony in the version for two pianos and voices and the Festival will end with a celebration of wild life!

Saint-Saëns Carnival of the Animals will be followed by a major festival commission, The Song of the Carnivores.  This will celebrate the five large carnivores of Zimbabwe – lion, leopard, cheetah, hyena and wild dog.  The words will be by the winner of a nationwide competition for which the guidelines stated that “the song should reflect the life, the beauty and the endangered nature of each carnivore. It should emphasise that each species is an important part of our heritage…”.  Richard Sisson is writing a 35-40 minute piece that will involve a large children’s choir, soloists and the festival and student musicians.  There are plans to arrange performances throughout the SADC region as well as at the headquarters of the London Zoological Society in Regent’s Park.

Full details of the Festival will be available from January 2012 and will be posted on the website – or write to music@gatorzw.co.uk .