The New Zealand Herald Premier Series: Light & Shade

Conductor: Giordano Bellincampi
Flute: Melanie Lançon

Respighi: The Birds
Ibert: Flute Concerto
Ravel: Pavane
Respighi: Church Windows

The soul of the flute is captured in Ibert’s effervescent concerto. Now coolly reflective, now jazzy and spicy, the piece is a favourite of flautists everywhere, including the APO’s own Melanie Lançon. Elegiac wistfulness suffuses Ravel’s Pavane.

Bookending the concert are works by Respighi that highlight his flair for imitative writing. The Birds captures the essence of birdsong and behaviour—the pecking hen, the cooing dove. Church Windows, which began life as a series of piano pieces, came out of his exploration of Gregorian chant, but it’s nevertheless bathed in the light filtered through stained glass.