Academy Orchestra given platform at JPO concert

Date: 09 March 2011
Article: Madoda Ntuli
Picture:Supplied

The Johannesburg Philharmonic Orchestra’s concerts on 16 and 17 March 2011 will feature a special “curtain-raiser” by the JPO Academy Orchestra. At 8pm on Wednesday and Thursday, just before the start of the JPO’s final symphony concerts for the season at the Linder Auditorium in Parktown, the Academy Orchestra will perform the first movement from Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony. Thereafter, the JPO will continue with its scheduled programme under the baton of principal guest conductor Bernhard Gueller – performing the Prelude, Liebestod and Nachtesang from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, as well as Mahler’s Symphony No.4 in G major, featuring soprano Kelebogile Boikanyo.The JPO Academy is proud to present to the loyal supporters of the JPO the next generation of orchestral musicians who will, in time, become the future members of the JPO.

Many of the young musicians in the Academy Orchestra are part of a four-year accredited training programme offered by the JPO, which arose in response to the lack of a similar programme being offered at South Africa’s tertiary institutions. This initiative is geared towards nurturing and encouraging young musicians to turn professional at the end of their training. For the last three years, the Academy Orchestra has built its membership from the humble beginnings of around 28 players to its current membership of 52 players, of which 35 are scholarship students in the academy. The remaining players hail from various schools as well as Wits University, and the orchestra also features privately-tutored students from around Gauteng.

The scholarship students receive weekly tuition on their chosen instrument from teachers drawn from the JPO, in addition to intensive music theory training. As the four-year course is designed to train orchestral musicians, they are required to attend weekly rehearsals with the Academy Orchestra in addition to their practical and theoretical lessons.

This year, the JPO has also started weekly scale and technical classes for the strings, and a brass ensemble which meets three mornings a week.
The young musicians have been rehearsing for this performance with the JPO since the beginning of February, putting in many hours of intensive sectionals and tutti work.
For more information on the JPO and the JPO Academy, call 011 789 2733, e-mail info@jpo.co.za or visit http://www.jpo.co.za/.

The Legendary Jeremy Taylor Looks Back

Date: 09 March 2011
Article: Madoda Ntuli
Picture : Supplied

JEREMY TAYLOR: “Ag Pleez Daddy” - 50 Years On
The beautiful, intimate little theatre at Foxwood House in Houghton is soon to host a legend; the man that South Africans took to their heart – despite the fact that his biggest hit song was rapidly banned by the government of the day. Or maybe because of it!
We ask the man himself what his new show will be about: “About an hour and a half,” Jeremy replies with the usual elfish twinkle in his eye.

In many ways, it will be a nostalgia trip, affording audiences a live performance of Jeremy’s greatest and most loved hit songs of the 60s and 70s – songs such as “Lift Girl’s Lament”, “Ballad of the Southern Suburbs”, “Transplant Calypso”, and “We’re From the Northern Side of Town”…
And, of course, the crowd-pleasing “Ag Pleez Deddy”. Clearly, there’s no way that the audience will allow the well-loved folk singer to leave the theatre without performing that celebrated ditty...
We will also be hearing the beloved songster’s newer work, and be regaled by anecdotes and stories of his life then and now, in his customary dry and witty style. Like a true folk singer, he will perform his songs ‘unplugged’ on his acoustic guitar.

“Yes, it will be a matter of something old something new,” Jeremy continues. “As usual, my appearances are a personal exploration, and since it is now exactly 50 years since the release of “Ag Pleez, Deddy”, there will inevitably be some reflection on how and why these songs of mine bubbled up to the surface, and what relevance they have, if any, to the South Africa that has emerged from those madcap days of tears and laughter. This may turn out to be more of a ‘Jeremy Taylor at home’ rather than ‘back in town’.”
And how does he feel about returning to South Africa? “I am both excited and nervous!” he laughs. “The years spent living and working there – 20 in all – were so intense. Nowhere else have I experienced such a sense of physicality; such a lust for life. To share that feeling, I wrote songs, and whenever I sing them, the feeling comes back. I guess that means I'll have to keep singing!” he concludes with a roguish grin.

Bookings to be made directly with Foxwood House at 011 486 0935.
But hurry, as there are only four shows!

VENUE: Foxwood House, 13 5th Street, Houghton
DATES: Saturday 26 March at 8pm
Sunday 27 March at 12 noon
Saturday 02 April at 8pm
Sunday 03 April at 12 noon
TICKETS: R150, including welcome cocktail