FESTIVAL MUSIC
OPERA PREVIEW Ariadne Auf Naxos
As if opera wasn’t complicated enough, Scottish Opera's Festival appearance features the company in Richard Strauss' Ariadne Auf Naxos, but not in the version they'll be
Anne Evans: big tunes, big fun.
including as part of their forthcoming season. Strauss’ first intention was for the piece to be given after Moliere's Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, for which he had written incidental music. But the requirement of an opera company and a theatre company on the same evening was too much, even in 1912, so he wrote another version for opera company only.
In the style of budget-conscious seasons, Scottish Opera does this latter version in the Spring, while showing the stuff that festivals should be made of, the original version, during the International Festival.
Appearing in both versions is the stunning Wagnerian soprano Anne Evans. 'I think it is quite complicated,’ she says with masterful understatement. 'Rehearsals will be chaos for a few days. We’re not used to working with actors and likewise they’re not used to working with singers. But it integrates well and it really is a Festival piece.’
For audiences, the visual beauty of the production should at least match the rich and luscious Strauss scoring. ’It will be fun and a good evening's entertainment,’ says Evans, adding, ’and for those who like big tunes, they will get big tunes. There's something for everyone.’ (Carol Main)
I Ariadne Auf Naxos (International Festival) Scottish Opera, Festival Theatre, 473 2000, 20, 22, 24 Aug, 7.15pm, £5—£50.
MEGASTORE
IS PLEASED TO WELCOME
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FOLK PREVIEW Brian McNeill
The New Tradition is the overall title for a series of Scottish music concerts at the Tron Ceilidh House. Focusing on song, contemporary interpretations of the Scots folk tradition and original songwriting, established artists like Rod Paterson share the bill with younger singers, like James Malcolm, and groups Chantan and Bachue Cafe.
Ex-Battlefield Band multi- instrumentalist and admired songwriter Brian McNeill is pleased to be involved. Composer of the powerfully bleak hymn to Scotland, ’No Gods And Precious Few Heroes', McNeill says, ‘The song end of things has become more and more important to me. I am writing more now and really enjoying it. So the four Tron nights will have some fiddle tunes or whatever, but they’re going to be more about song and the power of song.’
Seven years after leaving the ’Batties', McNeill remains a tireless traveller and performer, currently finding time to finish a novel, complete the follow-up to his multi-media show Back 0’ The North Wind (Ba/tic to Byzantium — The Scots In Europe), tour the States with accompanist Tony MacManus, produce an album of Scottish guitar music and head off to Hong Kong. He’ll write a few songs on the plane. (Norman Chalmers)
I Brian McNei/l (Fringe) The New
Tradition, Tron Ceilidh House (Venue 9) 220 7550, 75—78 Aug, 7.30pm, £5 (£4).
FOLK PREVIEW Mad Pudding
Produced by top Nashville music executive Bil Vorn, Dick (Bela Fleck, Alison Krauss and, recently, Bob Dylan), Mad Pudding's second album 'Rattle on the Stovepipe’ has just been released here. The Vancouver outfit forge an eyebrow-raising, energetic, sometimes wacky vocal and instrumental sound out of bass, drums and guitar, with fiddle and squeeze box interweaving on top. ’As a group we don’t really have a conscious direction,’ says lead vocalist Andy Hillhouse. 'But we try not to suppress what we’ve grown up with, the music that we come from, and the style evolves from that. Amy (Stephen, vocals and accordion) and I are from an acoustic/folk song background and tend to write songs in that idiom, while Cam (Wilson, great fiddler) is from the Ottawa Valley style. His dad’s a fiddler, and mum plays piano. It's a mix of French, Canadian, Irish and Scottish. Very "hoppy", as they say here. Not so modal as the pure celtic, it’s a very happy music.’ I Mad Pudding (Fringe) Famous Grouse House (Venue 34) 220 5606, 79 Aug, midnight, £7 (£5).
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