Review: Young opera stars wow audience at Whanganui recital

Tenors Shiddharth Chand, Ridge Ponini and Taylor Wallbank wowed the audience at the New Zealand Opera Studio Artists' Recital. Photo / John Wansbrough

New Zealand Opera Studio Artists’ Recital

Prince Edward Auditorium

Whanganui Collegiate School

Wednesday, January 11, 1pm

Review by Lin Ferguson

It was a delicious, light-hearted afternoon treat.

Five young singers dressed in their best and lit up the auditorium with personality, music and fun.

The audience was enchanted from the start, with accompanist and very droll narrator Bruce Greenfield keeping the audience hanging on every word.

You absolutely can’t lose that much-loved trio Sol3 Mio, brothers Pene and Amitai Pati and cousin Joseph McKay - they are now a firmly established NZ Opera School institution.

And for this concert, three up-and-coming tenors opened the show with a great Sol3 Mio rendition.

Centre-stage was Ridge Ponini, with a warm creamy voice getting the show on the road. Then, coming through separate doors into the auditorium singing the full Sol3 Mio harmonies were Taylor Wallbank and Shiddharth Chand, stepping down the aisles and onto the stage.

The audience loved them. It was a great take-off, and a nod yet again to the famous trio who had first performed at an Opera School concert more than 10 years ago.

As Greenfield said, they were the day’s three tenors, and there were two sopranos to come... hurrah!

Soprano Rhiannon Cooper swept onto the stage - a statuesque presence with a marvellous stillness - and sang one of the three Robert Browning poems set to music by Amy Beach, Ah, Love, But a Day, which was eloquent and beautiful.

Then to the songs from musicals, and soprano Sarah Hubbard, glittering and gorgeous, soared through Tonight from West Side Story.

Chand took the stage again, celebrating the Hollywood musical film era and launching into Mario O’Lanza’s Be My Love. This tall, dark and handsome young singer was perfectly cast.

A heartrending rendition of Bring Him Home from Les Misérables delivered by Ponini was sung with the right mix of warmth and longing.

And humour was injected again, as the three tenors jostled each other aside while vying for soprano Hubbard’s attention in West Side Story’s Maria.

This was a joyous hour.

It was a concert which had the audience leaving wreathed in smiles.