Adelaide Art Orchestra Online

2006 AFC Christmas Proms - The Advertiser Wednesday 20th December, 2006 HURRAH FOR FESTIVE SPIRIT Elizabeth Silsbury - The Advertiser - 20 December 2006 Georgeously Christmassy stage - tinsel everywhere, tree-shaped lights marching aloft, Santa-hatted musicians, lady soloists in very, very bright red - carols galore in scintillating arrangements plus a few well-chosen short orchestral pieces such as Russian Dance because we are all Russian about at Christmas - terrible puns but even the rude bits were funny; at last.... Read More

Contemporary Music Festival - The Australian Monday 25th September, 2006 MINIMALIST APPROACH HITS THE MARK Graham Strahle - The Australian - 25 September 2006 Other capital cities have successfully run them for years, but this is the first time Adelaide has mounted a dedicated new music festival. The initiative of conductor Timothy Sexton, it comprised three concerts, mainly performed by his own privately run Adelaide Art Orchestra and choir, the Adelaide Vocal Project. The boldness of this venture was to be applauded, even if the foundations of what Sexton plans to make an annual event were a little sketchily put in place. As always, the success of such events rests on what kind of artistic shape organisers are able to create, given the multiplicity of forms and styles that now belong under the umbrella of contemporary music. Read More

Israel in Egypt - The Advertiser Monday 6th February, 2006 CHOIR RAISES ROOF TO PRAISE HEAVEN Handel's Israel in Egypt is not all spellbinding music, but it does point the way towards later greater things, with many masterful choruses that bear more than a passing resemblance to the Messiah et al. Most of these are concentrated in its second half, and it's pretty clear old Georg Frederick makes a better fist of straightforward heavenly praise, after the Israelites get out of Pharaoh's clutches, than the grisly operatic narrative about plagues of frogs, blotches and blains, that occupies most of the first half's depiction of their Egyptian sojourn. And there was no doubt about the enthusiasm and raised standards of the 300-strong (sic) Intervarsity Choir as it responded to Handel's more inspired writing in the second half following its rather ho-hum rendition of the first half's pestilential problems. It was as if they had morphed into a different group after interval. Read More

African Sanctus - The Advertiser Tuesday 31st January, 2006 ENERGY BRIMS OVER David Fanshawe's rumbustious amd popular hit from 1972, African Sanctus, proved a perfect choice for the youthfully exuberant 300-plus Intervarsity Choir. Two weeks of intensive rehearsal produced not only this enthusiastic and energetic performance but will also hopefully bear fruit in an equally creditable Israel in Egypt at the Festival Theatre on Friday. Fanshawe's choral writing, although tricky to fit rhythmically with the many tape-recorded examples woven into the score, is ruggedly constructed with broad brush-strokes and can take the occasional piece of rough handling from inexperienced voices without losing its integrity. It simple imagery relies on massed effects and rhythmic ostinati to drive home messages that still resonate today, although with different inflections from the 1970's. Read More

Reflections on Glass - Opera Opera Tuesday 1st November, 2005 AUDIENCE LEFT BUZZING AT GLASS SPEED AND ACCURACY Philip Glass, along with Wagner, is among music's greatest polarisers. Here in South Australia, we have ample opportunity to make up our own minds - to love, to hate, or even both at once. Conductor Timothy Sexton is a passionate and persuasive advocate of the world's best known minimalist. With choreographer Leigh Warren and designer Mary Moore, he staged Akhnaten, seen first in the Opera Studio in 2002 and subsequently in Melbourne and picking up a swag of awards in both cities. Read More

Reflections on Glass - The Adelaide Review Thursday 13th October, 2005 REFLECTIONS ON GLASS Adelaide Art Orchestra and Adelaide Vocal Project In a foretaste of what's to come in 2007, Timothy Sexton's Adelaide Art Orchestra and Adelaide Vocal Project presented in concert version three scenes from Philip Glass's opera Satyagraha. Chronologically the second in Glass's trilogy, it will in fact be the third of his operas they have performed: Akhnaten in 2002 and Einstein on the beach (Parts 3 & 4) last year, both in choreographed productions with Leigh Warren and Dancers. Satyagraha is compelling stuff: a warmer and more varied score, it erupts in rich, ecstatic strength - and did so magnificently here. Sexton led the combined vocal and instrumental forces with characteristic zeal and an easy, flowing rhythmic sense that made Glass's minimalist patterns sound less jittery and more cohesive than they can. Read More

Reflections on Glass - The Advertiser Tuesday 13th September, 2005 DARING DOZEN FREE THE REINS Love him or loathe him, no-one can deny that American composer Philip Glass has had a huge influence on contemporary classical music. Thanks to Timothy Sexton's grand passion for the most widely known exponent of minimalism - basically very fast repetition of melodic and rhythmic patterns with gradual internal changes - Adelaide has had several opportunities to make up its own mind. Music's answer to the alienating discords of serialism, or the laziest compositional technique ever devised? Whatever, unquestionable is that for sheer effort and concentration the 12 singers of the Adelaide Vocal Project who kept the jury deliberating on Sunday night rank with Joan Sutherland trilling out a Donizetti extravaganza. Singing the numbers 1-6, or doh-re-mi, both with variations, over and over and over, sounds easy. Read More