Standing Room Only for Sunday 6 March 2022

12:16  Gareth Farr's new piece debuts in Auckland

The classic requiem form is the springboard for a new work that reflects on how Kiwis have been experiencing loneliness, distance, and uncertainty under lockdown and border restrictions.

Where Will They Bury My Bones? composed by Gareth Farr, is a highlight of  the revamped Auckland Arts Festival programme. 

This 20-minute work has been created by New Zealanders living in three different countries..

And in a sign of the times, the premiere  will take place online, and people are being asked to pay what they can. Lynn Freeman asks composer Gareth Farr how he's responded to a time of great dislocation, here and worldwide.

 

12:45  The art of a cappella singing

For a decade Timothy Wayne-Wright travelled the world performing hundreds of concerts with Britain's Grammy award winning The King's Singers.

Now he and his family have settled in Aotearoa, where Tim is setting up a touring A Cappella Academy, a training course for singers and vocal ensembles.

The first one's scheduled for April in Nelson, but he's being flexible with the timing for obvious reasons at the moment.

Timothy's an experienced singing teacher and will be covering off vocal techniques like chord balancing, blending and vowel matching, as well as performance ones like how to really connect with an audience.

He told Lynn Freeman why he loves this specific musical genre.

  

1:10 At The Movies

This week Simon Morris reviews Cyrano, starring Peter Dinklage, animated documentary Flee, and from Kosovo, the real life-inspired  Hive.

 

1:31  FLARE sees muralists taking it to the streets

One of the few public artforms that can happen at the moment is street art.

Christchurch in particular is making the most of it, launching an entire festival devoted to it.

FLARE, the organisers tell us, has a vision to reclaim Christchurch's global status as a street art capital, with artists from across Aotearoa creating seven large scale murals in Ōtautahi.

One of the artists is local freelance designer, illustrator, artist and muralist Kophie Su'a-Hulsbosch, also known as Meep.

She also runs a sustainable clothing company called Future Apparel.

Kophie took time out from her mural to talk to Lynn Freeman about how the Festival's going.

 

1:46  Our first professional portrait artist, William Beetham

Family members descended from Aotearoa's first professional portrait artist, William Beetham, are bringing together paintings he made of himself, his wife and his ten children for an exhibition called William's Legacy.

Some of the works have never been on public show until now.

The Beetham family had been planning a reunion, but when that became impossible they decided having the paintings all together in the Aratoi Gallery in Masterton would be the next best thing.

William Beetham emigrated to New Zealand with his family in 1855 and made a home for them in the Wairarapa.

Lynn Freeman talks to Jo Beetham who's married to one of William's descendants, and to the exhibition's curator Jo Torr, who explains William's place in our art history.

William's Legacy: Beetham Portraits opens at Aratoi on the 12th of March.

 

2:06 The Laugh Track - singer/performer Jason Henderson

It's hard to overstate how important a good, strong title is when it comes to attracting an audience to a show - particularly when the audience may not be familiar with your work.

With that in mind, we can only applaud the bravery of today's Laugh Track guest.  Singer, actor and cabaret performer Jason Henderson has a new show at the New Zealand Fringe.  It's called Jason Henderson reads the Telephone Book.

Well it certainly got our attention.  Jason Henderson talks about musical comedy, Noel Coward, the New York cabaret scene - and the appeal of a good phone book.

His picks include one Cole Porter show-tune, Dame Edna Everage, Phil Harris and Spencer Day.

 

2:27  Patricia Bell and The Library of Unfinished Business 

 

Whether or not you believe in an afterlife, chances are you've imagined what it might be like.

In Auckland writer Patricia Bell's novel The Library of Unfinished Business, we join recently deceased librarian Maurice in a Heaven where everyone has to wear bright yellow.

He also gets to rub shoulders with perky Heavenly Hosts as well as Biblical characters like Adam and Eve.

Aside from her work writing short stories, poetry and non-fiction, Patricia is a freelance editor, proofreader and musical theatre performer. 

Lynn Freeman asks her about her unique view of a very specific Heaven.   Is it a Good Place?

The Library of Unfinished Business by  Patricia Bell is published by Cloud Ink Press.

 

2:38  The notorious Flora McKenzie inspires a trio of crime novels

 

Auckland's famous madam Flora MacKenzie has now inspired a trilogy of crime novels by writer Jen Shieff.

The first two in the series The Gentleman's Club and The Vanishing Act were both finalists in the Ngaio Marsh Awards.

The Final Call is set in 1979 Auckland.

It's a time and place where boundaries are being pushed in fashion, music and social attitudes.     

And yet male homosexuality and prostitution are still illegal.

Lynn Freeman talks to Jen Shieff about Flora McKenzie's Auckland and why she inspired her to write three books. 
 

 

 

 

2:49  The story of Ashburton becomes an art exhibition

 

It began in 1858 as a humble ferry crossing.  Now the Canterbury town of Ashburton, made rich through agriculture, is in the midst of a large scale revitalisation project, with new buildings springing up around the town.

An exhibition at the Ashburton Art Gallery brings together art, photography and objects that tell the story of this evolving townscape.

Curator James Hope has ferreted through collections of the Gallery, the Museum and the Ashburton District Council in search of treasures for the show, many of them rarely seen.

The town may have lost some of its grandest early buildings, but it's held onto other landmarks, like the Domain and iconic clock tower.

Lynn Freeman asks James for more details of Ashburton's early settler years.

 Urban Ashburton opens at Ashburton Art Gallery today.

 

3:06 Drama at 3 - Talking Back and Chekov's Herring

This week sees two comedies, Talking Back by Matthew O'Sullivan and Chekov's Herring, winner of the New Shorts Playwriting Competition in 2014, written by Nick Swinglehurst. 

Music played in this show

Artist: Crosby Stills Nash and Young
Song: Cost of Freedom
Composer: Stills
Album: So far
Label:  Atlantic
Played at: 12.12

Artist: Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch
Song: Didn't leave nobody but the baby
Composer:  Trad
Album: O Brother where art thou?
Label:  Mercury
Played at: 12.28

Artist: Flying Pickets
Song: I heard it through the grapevine
Composer:  Strong-Whitfield
Album: Lost Boys
Label: 10records
Played at: 12.58

Artist: Pentatonix
Song: Perfume medley
Composer:  Nakata
Album: N/A
Label: N/A
Played at: 1.07

Artist: Edith Piaf
Song: Les trois cloches
Composer: Reisfield-Villard
Album: Hymn to love
Label:  EMI
Played at: 1.42

Artist: Todd Rundgren
Song: Johnny Jingo
Composer: Rundgren
Album: A Cappella Live
Label:  N/A
Played at: 1.58

Artist: Sweet Adelines
Song:  We are family
Composer: Edwards
Album: Celebrate
Label: Private
Played at: 2.05

Artist: The Nylons
Song:  That kind of man
Composer:  Cooper
Album: A quiet revolution
Label: Wyndham Hill
Played at: 2.58

Artist: Swingle Singers
Song:  Brandenburg Concerto
Composer:  Bach
Album: Compact Jazz
Label: Mercury
Played at: 3.05

Artist: The King's Singers
Song:  After the goldrush
Composer:  Young
Album: The King's Singers
Label: EMI
Played at: 3.37

Artist: Jubilation gospel choir
Song:  Prayer Wheel
Composer: Trad
Album: N/A
Label: N/A
Played at: 3.58