A real home of their own

In just a few days, Manukau's new Genesis Energy Theatre will be launched by the combined forces of Manukau City Symphony Orchestra and 160 choristers.

I was sceptical last Tuesday, touring the site in hard hat and reflective vest, guided around dust-blown concrete passages and a vast terrace of plastic-bagged seats by the orchestra's CEO Richard Jeffrey.

In his hard hat and safety vest like the hundreds of workmen on the site, Jeffrey is quick to put this new $48 million TelstraClear Pacific Events Centre, touted as bringing together art, culture, leisure and business, into a Pacific context.

"It breaks into three parts," Jeffrey explains. "Passage, arrival and gathering. The building symbolises the waka, with the roof structures sympathetic to the sail and aerofoil. That's how everyone came to Manukau, either by waka, sailing ship or aeroplane.

"The arrival is symbolised by the upturned waka, the gathering by the events that take place."

The handsome spaces of the Genesis Energy Theatre have been designed for a community who want to feel comfortable and welcomed. "We didn't want it to be too awe-inspiring," laughs my guide, obviously happy with what he describes as the "refined rawness" of surrounding concrete.

Inside the 700-seat theatre (the opening of the adjoining Sir Woolf Fisher Arena is still a few weeks away) the model is the Samoan fale or meeting house.

Pillars punctuate galleries, lighting trusses recall the fale's rafters while the latticed ceiling is "the net of Maui embracing the people of Aotearoa as one".

Perhaps one day, Jeffrey says, this theatre will have the mystique of Harlem's Apollo Theatre. "People will want to perform in this space, for the ambience and the way in which audiences will interact with the people on stage and vice-versa. This is what theatre is all about."

Here is a space that can handle everything from operatic productions and concerts to theatre, fashion shows, conferences - and the acoustics, handled by acoustics consultants Marshall Day, should be superb.

"There'll be nothing to worry about," says Jeffrey.

Uwe Grodd, who conducts the opening concert on Sunday, has high hopes for the acoustics after just one rehearsal. "It's very clear on the stage, and clean and reverberant in the hall.

"Most importantly," he adds, "this is a concert venue with flexibility, whereas people usually build a venue with the flexibility to handle concerts."

But there is no stopping Grodd from talking about his special group of musicians he founded 12 years ago. The Manukau City Symphony Orchestra started with weekend workshops, and still gets together for what Grodd describes as symphonic journeys. "We just read through material we are not going to perform in concert. The main thing is the desire to make music."

Other factors make the MCSO unique - scholarships for talented young players and Grodd's insistence on "professional leaders so they can train players in the various sections, and then lead them in the concert".

How did the orchestra achieve the coup of pianist Michael Houstoun as soloist in Sunday night's performance of Franck's Symphonic Variations. "No trouble," laughs Grodd, "we just asked him and he said, 'Great'." His voice drops to a whisper. "I think it has something to do with the infectious atmosphere of what we do."

The other soloist, Loata Mahe, who plays three movements from Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole is a player who "started in the last desk of the second violins 11 years ago and is now in her final year of a BMus".

The New Zealand composer has not been forgotten, with a specially commissioned work by Leonie Holmes. "There's no better way to celebrate in New Zealand than doing it with a large choir," is Grodd's explanation. Holmes' The Journey is sung by five community choirs, ranging from the South Auckland Choral Society to the Tongan Combined Youth Choir.

Composer Holmes, whom some will know from her year as an Auckland Philharmonia Resident Composer back in the 90s, wanted her setting of Tessa Stephens' poem to be "celebratory, challenging and enjoyable".

Having spent most of her own youth in Manukau, Holmes had seen the tireless Terry Spragg do so much to foster music in the region and admits she wanted to write something with these forces to catch what she has always done with and for community music. Spragg has been director of the Howick School of Music and enjoys playing viola with the orchestra.

It is not hard to hear the emotion in her voice when she explains that after all these years of meetings, "we finally have a home of our own".

Performance

* What: Manukau City Symphony Orchestra

* Where and when: Genesis Energy Theatre, TelstraClear Pacific Events Centre, Manukau City, Sunday 6.30pm