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David Griffiths  

3 Franks

Duration: 55' 00" Year: 2005
three short operas based on Franks Sargeson Stories

John Drummond  

A Beleaguered City

 Year: 2002
an opera in six scenes to a libretto by Jeremy Commons

David Downes  

A Green Piece

 Year: 1989
dance score for tape

Gary Daverne  

A Man With a Mission

Duration: 1h 20' 00" Year: 1991, r. 2011
an opera in two acts based on life of Missionary John Hobbs

  • Programme Note

    Synopsis

    It is a historic story of a young man who travels from England via Australia, in the early 1820s, to become an ordained minister and set up a Wesleyan Mission in the Hokianga, in Northland, New Zealand.

    The story portrays the relationships, frustrations, conflicts and troubled times with the early settlers, the native Maori people and their Chiefs, especially Chief Te Aara, Tamati Waka Nene and Patuone.

    There is his special love for his devoted wife Jane, their learning, teaching and preaching, their unjustified exile to Tonga, then his reinstatement two years later to the Weslyan Mission in the Hokianga, culminating in the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi at Horeke, in the Hokianga.

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David Farquhar  

A Short Suite from "Ring Round the Moon"

Duration: 15' 00" Year: 1975
for full orchestra

  • Instrumentation
    2222; 4230; timp, perc; strs.
  • Programme Note

    This music was originally commissioned by Richard Campion for the New Zealand Players’ production of Ring Round the Moon by Jean Ahhouil, translated by Christopher Fry. In the second act there is a ball taking place offstage and demanding a large number of dances which are specified in the text.

    The music was first recorded on acetate discs by a ad hoc orchestra led by Alex Lindsay; these small recordings were then played through speakers for the production, sounding very loud to the cast but filtering out more gently to the audience. At the end of the long national tour, the cast knew the music very well and suggested to me that I should do something with it.

    The result, some years later, 1957, was a suite of nine dances first performed by the Alex Lindsay Orchestra. This rapidly became my most performed piece and was commercially recorded by the Alex Lindsay Orchestra in the 1960s, a recording still available today from Kiwi Pacific Reords.

    Ashley Heenen, through the NZ APRA Committee, commissioned an arrangement for full orchestra for the NZ Youth Orchestra to take on a tour of Europe and China in 1975. This version was shortened to six dances by leaving out the first three numbers. The music has also been used for a ballet, The Wintergarden, choreographed by Arthur Turnbull for the Royal New Zealand Ballet Company – this version included a tenth dance not in the 1957 Suite. Since 1975 two further version have been commissioned: Waltz Suite (1989), for string orchestra (five dances) for the Nova Strings, and an arrangement of the original Dance Suite (1992) for violin and piano (nine dances) for Isador Saslav.

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David Farquhar  

A Unicorn For Christmas

Duration: 2h 00' 00" Year: 1962
an opera in three acts

Lachlan McKenzie  

Alice in Wonderland - a ballet suite

Duration: 21' 00" Year: 2003
a ballet suite for orchestra

Matthew Davidson  

Aliens disguised as Elvis...

 Year: 1990
theatre piece for seven performers

  • Programme Note

    The full title of this work is Aliens disguised as Elvis kidnapped my grandmother’s appendix in a previous life after having been sucked through a black hole singularity on a Sunday afternoon picnic in the park with Aunt Jemima Puddleduck while discussing the simultaneity of states of sub-atomic particles, K. 666.31. The work is also known as The Enigma of Arrival, the purpose of this piece is to portray the epic struggle of Life and Death on a microcosmic and macrocosmic scale.

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Jack Body  

Alley

Duration: 1h 30' 00" Year: 1997
an opera in two acts based on the life of Rewi Alley