Early Summer Music in West Vancouver
The Parish of St. Stephen’s, West Vancouver, under the encouragement of the rector, the Reverend Kenneth Vinal, initiated the beginning of the summer early on June 8 with the sounds of music in many forms. This involved people of the North Shore gathering to share their talents. The first of three concerts was held at Kiwanis Garden Village for residents and their friends. The program entitled “Singing the Seasons: Spring into Summer” did just that on a warm summer’s afternoon with a varied program ranging from British folk songs to several medleys from musical theatre. Under the baton of director and accompanist, Dr. Annabelle Paetsch, St. Stephen’s Community Singers led off with such well-known favourites as the “Skye Boat Song”, “Loch Lomond”, and a particular favorite of the men’s section, “The Rose of Tralee”. The musical theatre component featured composers, Richard Rogers, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Sir Arthur Sullivan. Flutist, Nancy Riecken and percussionist Hilary Clark added depth to the keyboard/piano accompaniment of Dr. Paetsch.
The following week, the parish hosted the West Vancouver Youth Band’s (WVYB) Symphonic, Concert and Debut Strings. The age range of this group started with elementary students and finished with graduating students, some of whom had been with the Strings for eight years. Several years ago, WVYB’s director, Doug Macaulay initiated this string ensemble to fulfill a perceived need for violinists in the Lower Mainland. The Debut Strings were led by director, Genevieve MacKay who lent a supportive line when the Debut group joined the entire ensemble for the finale. The next age group was the Concert Strings, conducted by director, Nicholas Urquhart. They performed four pieces of varying difficulty ending with a challenging Bach Sinfonia. Building on the level of music just heard, two students performed a Passacaglia by Johan Halvorsen for violin (John Lang) and cello (Alex Co) setting the stage for the “Symphonic Strings”. Twenty two enthusiastic teen-agers joined forces to energetically perform six symphonic selections including Mykola Lysenko’s “Prayer for Ukraine”. (The proceeds from the evening’s concert were destined for local Ukrainian refugees).
Three students from Annabelle Paetsch’s Piano Studio: Grace Ciprick, Christina Xia and Bonnie Li performed keyboard parts with the Symphonic Strings. The finale using every string student was the ever-popular “William Tell Overture”by Rossini conducted by Nicholas Urquhart. A very satisfied audience departed looking forward to the next concert.
The final concert of the season, on the afternoon of June 18, featured two choral ensembles: the 30-voice St. Stephen's Community Singers (directed by Annabelle Paetsch) and the 16 girls of the Cadenza Academy of Music and Arts Ensemble (directed by Mahtab Haghighi). The theme of this delightful multi-generational concert was "Songs from the Stage," and included repertoire by each of the choirs as well as a combined performance piece to close. In addition, Paetsch shared an entrancing piano solo, and Haghighi was spotlighted as soprano soloist alongside her student Kiana Parsa. Flute obligato was by Nancy Riecken with Hilary Clark on percussion. As demonstrated by a full house for this concert as well as the previous two, St Stephen's is becoming even more widely known not only as a source of religious inspiration but also of musical enjoyment and community engagement through music.
IMAGES in the Top Scroll
A variety of photos taken by John Ruddick of the June 17 and 18 concerts