On Sunday, October 13th, at 3 PM The Chamber Music Collective welcome to Shed & Silo Country Restaurant the esteemed musicians Danré Strydom (clarinet), Lizet Smith (clarinet), and Grethe Nöthling (piano), presenting their recital entitled The Meeting.
Danré Strydom has established herself as one of South Africa’s premier solo, chamber, and orchestral musicians through her global concert experience. After playing clarinet/bass clarinet ad hoc for the award-winning Brussels Philharmonic from 2008 to 2013, Danré accepted a position as woodwind lecturer at the University of the Free State’s Odeion School of Music (OSM). She is the Continental Chair of the International Clarinet Association and was selected to be a Buffet Crampon Artist (2015), being the first South African representative.
A multifaceted musician, Lizet Smith has performed throughout Gauteng as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral musician. She is a member of both the Air Flair Quintet and Trio Chalumeau, and has performed chamber music at the Amsterdam Grachten Festival, as well as Apeldoorn’s Paleis Het Loo. Since 2004, Lizet has held positions in the Chamber Orchestra of South Africa, the Johannesburg Philharmonic, amongst others. Presently, she is principal clarinet of the Gauteng Philharmonic Orchestra.
Since making her musical debut at age 7, performing as soloist with the Johannesburg Symphony Orchestra, pianist Grethe Nöthling has won several national music competitions, awards, and bursaries. She has performed as a soloist with the KZN Philharmonic Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra of South Africa, as well as the Free State Symphony Orchestra. Since completing her graduate studies in the USA, she has served as piano lecturer at the Odeion School of Music, UFS, and at the South African College of Music, UCT. Grethe was recently appointed as Head of Keyboard at St John’s College.
“The Meeting”, a title borrowed from the earliest work in this programme – Amilcare Ponchielli’s Il convegno – sets the tone for the recital in its entirety. Not only does this title signify the musical gathering of three friends, but it also focuses the audience’s attention to the great level of intricacy required by the two clarinetists to ensure the success of such a musical partnership.
Both this work and Carl Baermann’s Duo Concertante were composed during the 19th century, during a period where the showpiece was a popular vehicle for composers to enable musicians the room to explore the wide range of their instruments, whether it be with lyrical melodies or playful acrobatics, thereby highlighting both the musicality and virtuosity of the musicians. As is the case with most showpieces of this nature, the piano frequently assumes the role of an orchestra where the moments of introductions and interludes are interspersed with relatively simple accompaniments, allowing the clarinets to shine, as it were.
The two 21st-century works on the programme, Michele Mangani’s Concertpiece and István Kohán’s Konzertstück à la Feidman, were both composed in 2015 and demand a high level of virtuosity from the musicians. Mangani’s accessible musical style, emphasised by beautiful melodies and traditional harmonies, reminds one of the film scores of earlier Italian composers such as Nino Rota and Ennio Morricone. Kohán, however, takes as his inspiration the Klezmer musical style of Ashkenazi Jews and his native Hungarian folk music to compose a work that has a language uniquely its own.
Join them at Shed & Silo Country Restaurant at Norton’s Home Estate, Benoni on Sunday, October 13th, at 3 PM for an afternoon of exquisite beauty in the company of the world’s most beautiful clarinet music.
If you want to enjoy a delectable lunch at Shed and Silo Country Restaurant before the concert, they highly recommend making a reservation.