To every concert, there is a season

The concert season is winding down for the summer after a busy and varied year. By HEATH LEES.

It's funny how a concert-year can match a concert format - the waiting, the informal warm-ups, the programme centrepieces, then, at the end, all the really spectacular items come out.

There is enthusiastic applause, a sense of great satisfaction and the little rituals of winding down and going home.

This year was like that. Following the usual silent January in honour of beaches, baches and barbies, came the "Sounds of ... "concerts that waft on to our shores every February. The Sounds of Scotland (24 bagpipers and an electric violin) gave way to the Sounds of Ireland (three tenors, but not the ones you're thinking of), and even the Sounds of Australia (10 tenors, and funny with it).

March ushered in the year's major programmes and pride of place, as always, goes to the Auckland Philharmonia, now offering the biggest orchestral series under its Royal SunAlliance banner.

For some reason the orchestra took longer than usual to warm up, which was a pity since the programmes at the start of the year seemed particularly varied and vibrant.

But all systems were go by mid-year, and a spectacular Mahler Third Symphony, with Helen Medlyn in dazzling form, made a nonsense of the "regional" label this orchestra grew up with but has now outgrown. The days of central funding for such an innovative and impressive orchestra must surely be close.

Aucklanders are lucky, though, in having other first-rate orchestras to enjoy and the NZSO visits were flamboyant affairs this year. Pianist Alexander Melnikov started them off in March with a stunning Rachmaninov Three, and yet more Mahler alongside.

Mid-year, they had an all-Beethoven, two-day "festival" that seemed to surprise its organisers by being sold out.

In my book, treat of the year was cellist Lynn Harrell, who arrived with the NZSO on their final visit in November, and played the Dvorak concerto magnificently.

Then, 24 hours later, he revealed what a magnificent Cinderella-like piece Shostakovich's Second Cello Concerto really is.

Seeing him back on the stage in the second half, playing rank-and-file cello in Brahms' Second Symphony, was touching evidence of a superb musician with an unbounded love of music.

There was a curious lull in the middle of the year - school holidays, everyone murmurs knowingly - but maybe it was also because the International Festival of Chamber Music had decided to move to September this year and, in the process, to drop its "chamber" tag for the big time.

Of course, when they chose September 16 for the festival start-date, they had no idea of the nightmare of September 11, or the disrupted air-travel for their visiting artists.

The miracle was that the festival went ahead largely as planned and with some fabulous concerts, crowned by the cello and piano duo of Maria Kliegel and Nina Tichman. In addition, the involvement of the Auckland Philharmonia - always there when good music is to be at its best - added stature.

It's a pity Aucklanders didn't support the opening concert, which must have lost money despite Uwe Grodd's excellent direction of it from front and back.

Will this continue or is the lack of public funds and support likely to kill off another excellent and unique kind of festival in Auckland, just as it begins to make a name for itself?

Speaking of festivals, The Launching which took place in March on the specially made lake of Aotea Square, was fun, thoughtful and promising.

We had two excellent operas this year and, praise be, Aucklanders came out in droves to enjoy them.

New Zealand singer Conal Coad should be knighted for his role as Falstaff, the benighted knight, and NBR NZ Opera should be congratulated for making the relatively little-done Manon come to such abundant life.

The fact that 85 per cent of the named performers were New Zealanders must make the heart swell with pride.

Unfortunately, Auckland (though not Wellington) is to be limited to only two operas again next year.

A number of concerts made the home-grown Auckland Chamber Orchestra reach a new standard, but the year's real chamber music events came from CMNZ and the Jerusalem Quartet, followed at the year's-end by the Ysaye quartet from France (with their ami, Pascal Roge, giving a memorable solo concert of French music a few days earlier to a packed North Shore audience).

And now, as usual, it's wind-up time with Handel's Messiah (tonight and tomorrow at the Town Hall), and then the silence of summer, but some marvellous concerts and events to remember, and to set us up for the musical round-dance that 2002 will bring.