Grown in New Zealand

Hutt Valley Orchestra are thrilled to be premiering the viola concerto of the noted Australasian composer Alfred Hill. It has been played before in Australia but has been newly typeset for this performance to follow the composer's original score. The only known playing of this piece in NZ before was in 2009 when a piano took the part of a full orchestra. In their mid-year concert, HVO will give a fully orchestrated version, to allow the audience to hear it as the composer intended.

The concerto is Hill’s best known orchestral work. The soloist is John Roxburgh of Victoria University. With this choice, conductor Brent Stewart has continued his policy of promoting NZ School of Music performance students.

There will be two orchestras performing on Saturday afternoon. Also with HVO will be Gallery Orchestra of mostly young musicians, which operates out of the Gallery Music Centre. The orchestras play pieces by Debussy, Bizet, Corelli through to the modern Chattanooga Choo-choo. The pieces vary in age as do the players, and it would be lovely to think that one of these young players might one day be as famous as Alfred Hill who began his schooling in Thorndon. Visit www.hvo.org.nz for more details of the programme and the two orchestras.

Like pavlova, Phar Lap, John Clark and Russell Crowe, composer Alfred Hill is probably another whom our Aussie cousins have claimed as their own. Hill was born in Melbourne but lived in NZ from age 2 till 40 (1872-1911) and then spent the remaining 50 years of his life composing, teaching and conducting back on the other side of the Tasman. So an ‘Australasian’ composer may be a fairer label. Hill’s most well known composition ‘Waiata Poi’ (1904) is just one of many works which reflected his deep interest in the Maori world.

Event listed by JoToon

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