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Nick Deutsch: rich colour of the oboe

Nick Deutsch
Nick Deutsch
IT may seem to some art lovers to be drawing a long bow, but this weekend the Australian World Orchestra, backed by the Goethe Institut, is bringing in the respected  Hindemith Quintet the Canberra to perform a concert called “Breaking Boundaries: Turner and Experimentalism” at the National Gallery of Australia.

The idea is to have audiences travelling through time with Turner and his contemporaries; from Anton Reicha’s “Wind Quintet op.88,” written the same year as Turner’s “The Field of Waterloo” to the experimentalists Grainger, Ligeti and John Cage. The performance culminates in Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring,” this year celebrating its 100th birthday.

The quintet, named after the late Paul Hindemith, is comprised of Wally Hase (flute), Thorsten Johanns (clarinet), Ole Christian Dahl (bassoon), Saar Berger (horn) and Australian Nick Deutsch, (oboe) Who is the lead oboist of the AWO and it international advisor.

I caught up with Deutsch by phone recently. Born in Israel and raised in Australia, he now lives and works in Germany, dashing back to Australia several times a year to spend family time with his wife and daughter at Christmas and other times of the year, normally performing while he is here. “the life of a musician involves a lot of travel, sitting in train or sitting on a plane,” he says.

This time round he has just presented a masterclass at Sydney Opera House, for instance. But he also performs with Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, is a member of the Budapest Festival and is Professor of Oboe inin Leipzig.

The Australian World Orchestra, he tells me get together every two years and is made up of leading Australian musicians working around the world. It happened two years ago and this October is happening again with Zubin Mehta as conductor.

While his mind is on workshops and concerts in Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane, his immediate concern is the unusual arrangement of Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring” for a wind Orchestra. “Although it was originally written over 100 people, this is masterfully done,” he tells me.

As the name of the quintet would suggest, there are also playing Hindemith’s Kleine Kammermusik — Little Chamber Music.

The exciting thing about being in a wind quintet as opposed to say a string ensemble, he explains, is that there is no leader. “It’s an absolute democracy,” he tells me, “with five players – five of the top players in Europe…we are five personalities with varying ideas, but we have such a high respect each other, everyone has to lead, but everyone has to be a team player.”

You may argue that there is a limited repertoire for wind instruments and he agrees that there is far less than for the singeror  pianist, but he adds, “there is still quite a lot of repertoire, especially in the 20th and 21st-centuries.” There’s certainly enough to keep them busy with new, usually original work. “We rarely play arrangements,” he says.

As well, with wind instruments, artists have “the possibility of colour.”

Deutsch says he is very much enjoying this phase of his career. He loves teaching, but also, “In Germany if you take a professorship, you have to leave the orchestra, it allows you to become a soloist,” he explains. Now that he is Professor of Oboe at the Hochschule für Musik – Felix Mendelsohnn Bartholdy, he gets the opportunity to travel around as a guest soloistin Germany and other countries. It’s a special treat to play at the Salzburg Festival in Austria.

When we’re talking,  there are still 70 tickets left for the Sydney concert which he describes as “a fantastic program.” The AWO concerts will be held in Melbourne on October 2 and 4 and in Sydney on October 3. Bookings and info http://www.australianworldorchestra.com.au/

“Breaking Boundaries: Turner and Experimentalism” at the National Gallery of Australia. , at the James O Fairfax Theatre, NGA, 6.30 pm, Saturday July 20, Bookings to 6240 6504 or www.online.nga.gov.au/eventbookings

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Helen Musa

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