November 5 (Parihaka Invasion Day)
A small audience greeted the exceptionally talented performance by the winners of the highest awards Australia and New Zealand have on offer. Their lap of victory programme is replete with exceptionally demanding works which all left the audience spellbound in admiration.
Jenny Jin is winner of the Michael Hill International Violin Competition 2023. Her solo performance of Ysaÿe’s wide ranging lyric yet angular Sonata No 5, aptly described as an apex achievement in the violin repertoire, showcased her winning technical and interpretative command. Gillian Whitehead’s set piece for the 2023 competition, Bright Silence, showcased Jin’s accomplishment in twenty-first century soundscape. The work traces the mountainous profiles and fierce light of Central Otago and is highly successful in portraying the region’s foreboding beauty.
Pianist Jeonghwan Kim is winner of the 2023 Sydney International Piano Competition. His performance of Bartók’s Dada-esque Three Burlesques was engrossing. His quixotic interpretation of the three movements ‘Quarrel’,’A little Tipsy’ and ‘Motto Vivo’ showcased his rhythmic intelligence, muscular strength and overall stamina. Kim’s opening passages of Chopin’s Andante spianato were immediately enchanting for their unaccented rolling baseline and for their deliciously delayed melodic phrasing.
Duets included Tartini’s Devil’s Trill, which opened the programme. Held up as the product of a Faustian pact, its opening movement is beguiling and as the work progresses it becomes jaw-droppingly demanding for both virtuosi, Jin and Kim. Wienawski’s well known Polonaise was performed delightfully with easy charm and drama.
Saint Saen’s Violin Sonata in D minor completed the programme. Its third movement ‘Allegretto moderato’ demanded a light quick touch alternating with sonorous passages of significant grandeur. Its final movement ‘Allegro Molto’ with its several compounding climaxes extracted every last ounce of stamina and interpretative excellence from virtuosi Jin and Kim.
The enraptured audience won an encore of Kreisler’s Schön Rozmarin.
Marian Poole