The Red Deer Symphony Orchestra season promises to end in grandiose — but populist — style.
Maurice Ravel’s beloved Bolero is on the program, along with another crowd pleaser, Otterino Respighi’s Pines of Rome, on Saturday, June 6, at the Red Deer College Arts Centre.
The two distinctive and unusual works will be sandwiching single movements from Antonin Dvorak’s Violin Concerto in A Minor and Gordon Jacob’s Concerto for Basoon and Strings.
These bright movements will feature two young soloists who won two Red Deer Kiwanis Music Festivals — violinist Heidi Baumbach (the 2013 winner) and bassoonist Pablo Montes (the 2014 winner).
Venezuelan-born Montes was a principal bassoonist in the New World Symphony and Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra in South America before coming to Alberta to study at the Canadian University College in 2010. Upon graduation, he was accepted in the University of Alberta master’s degree program, and was a scholarship student at both universities.
Baumbach played with the Calgary Youth Orchestra, the Canadian University College Chamber Orchestra, and has been a soloist throughout Canada. The former member of the Mount Royal Academy for Gifted Youth is now completing her bachelor’s degree at Burman University (the former Canadian University College).
As Baumbach was sidelined by injury and couldn’t perform with the RDSO last year, the orchestra’s music director Claude Lapalme invited her back to solo at this concert.
He considers the season-closing Bold Bolero program to be full of accessible, “impressive” music, some of which was created by two of the world’s savviest orchestrators.
Ravel was one of them. His Bolero, written as a “choreographic poem” for a dancer, is a minimalistic composition of two melodies that are each repeated and alternated. Lapalme said the only things Ravel does to pique listener interest is vary the kinds of instruments that are played as the melodies are repeated — and gradually crank up the volume to amplify the tune’s intensity.
“Nothing like that had ever been written before then,” added Lapalme — and the hypnotic effect is unforgettable.
Near the end of the 16-minute Bolero, Ravel does something else that’s simple, yet “incredible” — he raises the key from a constant C major to E major for about three bars. The effect is like a splash of red paint in the middle of a neutral background, said Lapalme, who feels the work concludes almost in apocalyptic fashion.
“The effect is grandiose. It’s one of the great moments in music.”
Respighi was another genius at orchestration, said Lapalme. And his four-movement Pines of Rome work is his most famous work — even more recognized than his Ancient Aires and Dances.
The “difficult” work and was meant to evoke the tall, dark pines visible at four Roman locations: the Villa Borghese, a Roman catacomb, the Janiculum (second tallest hill near Rome), and the Appian Way.
Each location is described in a separate movement. The opening villa segment contains all the joy associated with children at play; the second catacomb movement is very dark, reminiscent of monks chanting; the one describing hilltop pines is like a dream sequence; while the triumphant Appian Way movement conjures images of marching Roman soldiers.
The piece, written in 1924, is something of a throwback to more historic music, but is very Italian in flavour, said Lapalme.
The music director intends to move some horn players towards the audience to give the Respighi piece a surround-sound effect, and anticipates the effect will be “very impressive and exciting.”
Tickets to the 8 p.m. concert are $59.35 ($54.85 seniors/$43.35 students or first four rows) from the Black Knight Ticket Centre.
lmichelin@www.reddeeradvocate.com