Thank you so much to everybody who attended our first concert of the season – Vivaldi Visits Vienna! We truly appreciate your support. We send particular love out to those who donated money. The reality is that even though our concerts are well-attended, ticket sales alone do not cover the cost and we need that kind of support. Thank you so much!
We were honoured in this particular concert to have with us Nathalie Paulin, Soprano. Nathalie is a very accomplished singer with a busy schedule and we are grateful she found time to accommodate Academy Concert Series. Her voice is so beautiful. As the cellist for this concert it was a real treat to play with her. The role of the cello in a concert like this is to support the singer and make her shine – an easy thing to do when working with such talent!
It was also a thrill and an honour to play with such accomplished musicians as Emily Eng, Violin, and Sara-Anne Churchill, Harpsichord. Both of these lovely ladies have extensive training playing baroque music and the beauty of their playing was evident for all to enjoy. We will have the joy of hearing Emily Eng again in our second concert on January 28, 2012 – Mozart: A Year in Vienna.
We tried something new with this concert in that we had an actor – Vanessa AvRuskin – write an original script (together with yours truly and with contributions from playwright Linda Griffiths), and perform short vignettes between the pieces. The purpose of the vignettes was to illustrate and parallel in a modern way the love story between Fileno and Elvira as recounted in the cantatas we performed. While the script was excellent and the acting superb, we gather from your feedback that in the future any actors will have to wear microphones because it was difficult to hear. Thank you for the feedback. We will correct this for future concerts (although there will be no actor at our next concert; the program is too long to allow for it).
As always we welcome any other feedback you may have. Please email me or simply tell us at our next concert. We look forward to seeing you there!
