Sat 21
Feb 2009
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Sat 21
Feb 2009
SUSAN NICKALLS
SOPRANO Claire Debono and guitarist Simon Thacker presented a varied programme
of music from Italy, Spain and Brazil in ¡Canto Vivo!
The first half featured big themes and gorgeous melodies from the operatic stage
but reworked on a smaller and more intimate scale for the 19th century salon.
Bellini's charming cantilenas Vaga luna, che inargenti and Ma rendi
pur contento, originally written for voice and piano, suited Debono's
warm and seductive tones, and her vocal agility was put to the test in Mauro
Giuliani's richly ornamented arrangement of the cavatina Di tanti palpiti
from Rossini's opera Tancredi.
Thacker's solo guitar contributions included Julian Arcas's curious Fantasia
on themes from La Traviata that picked out Verdi's gutsy arias in soft
pinging harmonics along with virtuosic pieces by Mertz – Gondoliera and
Tarantella – which demonstrated Thacker's formidable technique.
The touching mutterings of a jilted peasant girl to her mule in the Sicilian
lament Amuri Amuri, complete with appropriate vocal effects, led nicely
into the 20th century repertoire in the second half. There was something quite
psychedelic about Cesar Guerra-Peixe's 1960s Mae d'agua, with its
free-range vocals anchored to a more formal structure that hinted at the 12-tone
technique influencing his output.
To end the evening, Roberto Gerhard's Cantares, inspired by Spanish folk
tunes, captured the musical vibrancy of the language, which Debono clearly
relished in these touching and often racy pieces.
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