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Quartet For The End Of Time
2018-10-25

Quartet For The End Of Time

By Olivier Messiaen (1908 – 1992)

25 October 2018

Odeion

19:30

“THE IDEA OF THE END OF TIME AS THE END OF PAST AND FUTURE AND THE BEGINNING OF ETERNITY”

Anmari van der Westhuizen and Samson Diamond (members of the renowned Odeion String Quartet), will join with the award-winning soloists Grethe Nöthling and Danrè Strydom to perform one of the 20th century’s most compelling chamber music works, Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time. These musicians need no introduction to Bloemfontein audiences.

Composed while he was a prisoner of war, Messiaen's Quartet has continually wowed audiences since its creation. The oppressive conditions within which the work was conceived - set against the backdrop of wartime conditions in Nazi Germany - contribute to the work’s inner narrative. In this unsettling time of global political and social uncertainty, we aim to reframe this work from the past in order to contemplate the present. Music woven together with other art forms elicit and explain a range of emotions where words often fail.

A selection of striking WWII photos will be projected behind the musicians - reflecting the theme and history of the composition.

About the composition
Olivier Messiaen (1908 - 92)
Quatour pour le fin du temps (1940 - 41)

Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time was written in perhaps the most incongruous spot any great score has been composed in: an unheated barrack in Stalag VIII-A, a German prisoner-of-war camp, during the second winter of World War 2. Messiaen wrote this mystical quartet for the instruments available in the camp (clarinet, violin, cello, and piano) in a setting that is arguably among the least conducive for creative work.

The quartet is Messiaen's musical depiction of and rumination on Revelation 10:1-7, which the composer included as a heading to the score:

“I saw a mighty angel descending from heaven, clad in mist, having around his head a rainbow. His face was like the sun, his feet like pillars of fire. He placed his right foot on the sea, his left on the earth, and standing thus on the sea and the earth, he lifted his hand toward heaven and swore by Him who liveth forever and ever, saying: "There shall be time no longer, but at the day of the trumpet of the seventh angel the mystery of God shall be consummated."

ADMISSION

  • R120 (adults)
  • *R80 (pensioners)
  • *R70 (UFS staff)
  • *R50 (students, learners and block bookings of 10+)

Tickets available at Computicket or online at http://online.computicket.com/web/

*Please note that tickets for pensioners, students, learners and UFS staff can only be purchased at a Computicket outlet (Shoprite Checkers) or at the doors since a valid card or ID has to be presented to qualify for the above-mentioned discount.

ENQUIRIES
Ninette Pretorius (tel. 051 401 2504)


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Recital by Australian organist, Martin Rein

Thursday, 25 April 2013
Odeion
19:30

Martin Rein began his career with extensive studies in Choral Conducting and Sacred Music at the Berlin School of Music with Prof. Martin Behrmann.  He completed his B.Mus. in 1996.

He then undertook further postgraduate studies at the Music Academy in Detmold and graduated in December 2000 with First Class Honours in Organ Performance, and in June 2001 with an M.Mus. degree, majoring in Choral and Orchestral Conducting.  In his graduation recital in December 2000, he performed amongst other works, the Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue Op. 57 (Inferno) by Max Reger - one of the most challenging compositions within the organ repertoire. 

In Europe he studied organ and piano performance with Prof. Gerhard Weinberger (Munich-Wurzburg) and Dr Ewald Kooimann (Amsterdam) as well as organ improvisation with Prof. Renate Zimmermann (Berlin-Frankfurt-Heidelberg).  He also studied with Dame Gillian Weir in England.  Since then he held several positions at e.g. the Stiftskirche St John's (Germany), at St. Mary's Monastery (Lehnin, Germany) the Alte Kirche (Essen, Germany), conducted the Australian Chamber Singers, was Director of Music at St. John the Evangelist Notting Hill, resident College Organist and Educator at Bearwood College and the Royal Merchant Navy School (Berkshire), and in 2010 Martin accepted the post of Head of Performing Arts and Master of the Choristers at The King's School Sydney (Australia).

As an organist, Martin has performed in Australia, the USA and many European countries in venues such as Westminster Abbey and Westminster Cathedral, both Cathedrals of Berlin (Germany), the Great Hall at Sydney University (Australia), King's College Boston, St Mark's Baltimore, Gloria Dei (Philadelphia) and Carthage College (USA). His recital at Sydney University was broadcasted by 2MBS-FM 'Colours of the King' in July 2005.  Recently he has given concerts in St Martin-in-the-Fields in London, the Cathedral of St John-the-Evangelist in Hong Kong, St. Andrew's Cathedral (Sydney) and the Cathedrals of Auckland and Dunedin (New Zealand).  His special interest in historic organs - many of which he has performed on - is compiled in his book on Baroque organ builders in Germany.

Programme:

  • J.S. Bach - Prelude and Fugue in G, BWV550
  • J.S. Bach - Chorales from the Third Part of the Clavierubung (1739)
  • M. Duruflé - Scherzo, Op. 2
  • M. Reger - Introduction, Passacaglia and Fugue in E minor, Op. 127
  • M. Rein - Improvisation

Admission:

R130 (adults), R90 (pensioners), R50 (students and learners)
Tickets available at Computicket.

Enquiries:

Ninette Pretorius (tel. 051 401 2504)

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