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Ben's Ramblings

Start of the new Season RPhO and Conservatory

Last week I started again with the first week of our new concert season with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. 
After a break of 7 weeks I was happy to start again. Like every September for the last 15 years we start with the yearly "Gergiev festival" organised by the Rotterdam Philharmonic.
 
The first concert was a popular outdoor concert with mainly Russian Opera repertoire performed at the "Veerhaven" in Rotterdam, one of the only places in Rotterdam that hasn't been bombed in the second world war!



I really enjoyed the music we played from Tschaikovsky's Famous opera "Jevgeni Onegin". What great music this is. Two great Aria's; Lenski's and Gremin's sang by two very talented singers from the Kirov Opera. Together with the "Waltz" and the "Polonaise". This part of the program was really was very beautiful.



The "Vikings" aria from Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's opera "Sadko", with its interesting low brass chorales, was wonderful to play.
Gergiev is a real specialist for this style of music.

We played much more and ended with the "The Great Gate of Kiev" from Modest Mussorgsky which made my lips feel quite sore after my 7 weeks of not playing.



The next day we played the official opening of the festival, this year in the Rotterdam "Luxor Theater". 
I had to play Debussy Finale from a Symfony in b and Sjtsjedrin Vijfde piano-concert. Interesting parts for the low brass. Not too much but at least interesting to play.



Today I started teaching again at the Rotterdam Conservatory "Codarts".



This year the class will look as follows:

Astri Kariline Ellann (Norway) - second year Rotterdam   
Jesse van der Ham (Netherlands) – second year Rotterdam
Pablo Ruiz Henao (Colombia) – third year Rotterdam
Konstantin Koev (Bulgaria) – fourth year Rotterdam

New students for coming year:

Reinaldo Donoso Pizarro (Chile) – first year Rotterdam
Ricardo Afonso (Portugal) - first year Rotterdam
Nick Sholl (England/Germany) - first year contract Rotterdam
Kevin Absillis (Belgium) - first year contract Rotterdam

As you can see I have 8 students with 8 different nationalities. Unique and very interesting for me to work with. It really is a very diverse and talented group of students. I will post updates about their development frequently!

Published Aug 31 2009, 10:57 PM
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Comments

 

Javi Colomer said:

good luck Ben !!!

September 1, 2009 1:58 PM

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