Concerto for Violin & Chamber Orchestra
which was premiered at St John's Smith Square, London on April 23rd 1999
Soloist: Hannah Dawson
THE WORLD PREMIERE of Michael Omer's Violin Concerto was ecstatically received at London's St John's Smith Square on Friday 23rd April. "You could hear a pin drop..." so rapt was the attention of the audience. Hannah Dawson gave the performance of her life, in what was an inspired reading of this new but accessible work, and the general concensus was that this piece would prove to be a welcome addition to the violin concert repertoire.
"...the most moving emotional journey I have ever experienced through music!"
John Taylor, Emeritus Professor of Mathematics, King's College, LONDON
"...surely the composer must have been delighted by this moving and self-assured performance...Hannah Dawson's interpretation and technical prowess was nothing short of breathtaking.....(the concerto)should gain a place in any violinist's repertoire
Sevenoaks Chronicle (Full Review), May 20 1999
Somewhere between Michael Nyman and Karl Jenkins then, there is someone writing music for a new public eager and hungry for accessible and emotional music. Someone with the 'common touch' who intelligently uses contemporary references, but does not insult this new audience with vacuous pretension or childish doodles...
Hanna Dawson & Michael Omer seen in rehearsal at St John's Smith Square, London (For more rehearsal pix see below)
This new concerto was especially written for up and coming 18 year-old soloist HANNAH DAWSON, about to go the London's Royal College of Music - a bright attractive star in the making.
The composer writes:
"This piece came about as a direct result of hearing Hannah Dawson play at a St John's Smith Square concert last April and was written during summer 1998.
The concerto is in one single movement which falls into five contrasting sections, with a cadenza, and was inspired by lines from Christopher Marlowe (1564 - 93) touching upon man in relation to the cosmos.....
Our souls, whose faculties can comprehend
The wondrous Architecture of the world:
And measure every wand'ring planets course,
Still climbing after knowledge infinite,
And always Moving as the Restless Spheres........
I have a long term obsession with space and this gave rise to an earlier work, "To the Stars - a Requiem for the Space Shuttle Challenger", first performed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, in memory of the crew who perished at launch in January 1986. That accident was a defining moment in manned space exploration and for a while all seemed lost.
This new piece is more optimistic and is essentially about journeys - the inward emotional journey, mirroring the hope that man will continue to look and travel outward to other worlds. The music begins and ends in the same distant and mysterious way - the traveller has passed by...but the journey goes on." © 1999 Michael Omer
MICHAEL OMER graduated from the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, London, where he was awarded the Alexander Grosz Memorial Prize for composition. He also won the Llangollen International Composers' Competition, a SILVER at the New York Film & Television Festival, and now enjoys a wide-ranging career writing a variety of music, for television, film, theatre and concert hall. Credits include the Oscar Nominated movie It's Good to Talk; Casualty; The Prince & the Pauper; Little Lord Fauntleroy; Equinox and Everyman. His music has been heard on London's South Bank (Queen Elizabeth Hall, Royal Festival Hall), and at the Edinburgh International Festival, and his film/tv music continuse to be heard worldwide.
"I was only trying to appeal to a wider public" confessed award-winning composer MICHAEL OMER of his space-inspired concerto, soon to be premiered at London's St John's, Smith Square, London.
He was responding to criticism that modern composers shouldn't write tunes, and worst of all shouldn't try to be 'Jacks of all trades' - something which Michael definitely has had to be to survive in today's commercial world...writing music for last year's Oscar® Nominated movie IT'S GOOD TO TALK with one hand, whilst producing the number five chart hit EVERLASTING LOVE for BBCTV's CASUALTY with the other...and a violin concerto???
Though classically trained, it seems that whenever he produces so called 'classical' music, it's a big shock to everyone.
"It isn't about 'crossover'....I really hate that word, and it doesn't mean anything. It seems to be about people merely tolerating you getting out of your pigeon-hole for a bit...but then they feel much more comfortable if you jump back into it again afterwards - they just can't cope with versatility.
"Nigel Kennedy ('Kennedy') lives next door when he's in London, and I know he has had all this is spades. What IS the problem. Seventeenth century musicians HAD to be able to do everything."
The South Bank's Queen Elizabeth Hall was the venue for his last critically acclaimed piece about the cosmos - TO THE STARS - a Requiem for the Space Shuttle 'Challenger'. This was scored for large ensemble with choir and boy soprano soloist.
"This obsession with space seems it doesn't want to go away" he admitted when recently interviewed on BBC Radio 3's MUSIC MACHINE. This piece is very much about a journey - an emotional one, as well as a physical one. The violin solo takes us firstly above, and then completely off the planet!....quite an experience...I just know Hannah will take the whole audience with her!"
Hannah Dawson is the bright and talented young soloist for whom Michael has specially written this intriguing concerto. An attractive and talented 18 year old who has just gained entry to London's Royal College of Music - but will she cope with the rigours of this emotional journey?:
"Oh heavens yes. I heard her play at a concert last year, and had to write her something.....well the piece was written for her actually. She has a most wonderful internal intensity - it's not on her sleeve like with so many young players, but comes from within - she is absolutely captivating."
Whilst deliberately not in the vein of a Boulez, or even a Thomas Ades (Michael's one time student at the Guildhall School of Music), the piece seems to be both mysterious and accessible at one and the same time. Even the title, MOVING AS THE RESTLESS SPHERES (a quotation from Christopher Marlowe) seems to draw one to a world of almost beguiling uncertainty - and drawn we are.
Michael goes on: "The Space Shuttle piece was very much about looking out from our world. But it was written at a moment when all seemed lost, and worldly' concerns threatened to stop us searching. As the millenium ends, I fear we are returning to the contemplation of our own feet of clay. This is exacerbated by the current creeping financial paralysis which will keep us on this planet like no other thing could - quite an irony." (Serious stuff indeed, and not auspicious for composers chasing commission fees either, I tentatively suggest...ooops)
It seems that this commercial composer is becoming rather serious all at once!
He had also been hoping to develop a theatre work with the late Poet Laureate TED HUGHES:
THE DREAMFIGHTER comprised a series of stories especially commissioned by BBC television, for which Michael scored the music. ("the Hughes chord is the basis of the concerto!") Full of amazing imagery, these 'creation tales' spawned some wonderfully fresh music which Michael had hoped to extend and adapt into a ballet. Sadly this project looks doubtful at the moment - Hughes had given 'in principle' consent to it being developed, and Mark Morris the American choreographer/producer had been initially approached - though Michael now hopes to approach the poet's artist daughter Frieda Hughes "when a respectful time has passed..."
So will the concerto win over audiences, in the way that his film and television scores do? Michael hopes so. "I am bringing in my recording people, and we will have a CD to hawk around. The second performance of anything is the most difficult to get off the ground!"
In fact the earlier work TO THE STARS should get it's second performance at the Barbican in 2000.
So what's next on the horizon for this admittedly versatile composer...? "Oh a feature film, if we get all the finance in place... it should start shooting later in the year. Maybe this time we will win the Oscar®!
© Polly Marshall 1999
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