6:30pm-9:30pm on Wednesday 19 March
Times shown are in GMT (UTC +0) up to the 26th March. For events on or after 27th March times are in BST (UTC +1).
Churchill College, The Chapel, Storeys Way, CB3 0DS
Maurice Ravel’s Chansons madécasses of 1925 set poetry from 1878 by the French poet Évariste de Parny. Ravel’s setting was controversial at the time due to the anti-colonial central poem Aoua! and they remain controversial today in part due to the erotic exoticism of the outer songs. Coupled with some strident harmonic language, they represent one of Ravel’s boldest but least-known musical statements.
Mezzo Lotte Betts-Dean and the Marsyas Trio, current Artist By-Fellows of Churchill College, will also present two more recent works conceived to partner Ravel’s work: Judith Wier’s Nuit d’Afrique (2015), setting poetry by female African poets; and the premiere of Ewan Campbell’s Traduit de la nuit, setting poetry by the Malagasy poet Jean-Joseph Rabearivelo. The concert will be closed out with works by Australian composer Anne Boyd, and short pieces by Ravel and Debussy.
The event includes a pre-concert talk led by Prof. Charles Forsdick, professor of French and Francophone literature with a specialism in colonial and post-colonial literature, who will help us navigate the complexities of engaging with historic and contemporary music and poetry from Africa and Madagascar. Through conversation with the composers, the pre-concert talk will also explore the process of translation between languages, cultures and artforms.
19th March 2025
The Chapel at Churchill College
18:30 – pre-concert talk
19:30 – concert
Maurice Ravel Chansons madécasses
Judith Weir Nuits d'Afrique Ewan Campbell Traduit de la nuit (new work) Anne Boyd Cycle of Love Maurice Ravel La flute enchantée (Shéhérazade)
Claude Debussy Le Tombeau des naïades from (Chansons de Bilitis)
Prof. Charles Forsdick
Lotte Betts-Dean – mezzo soprano
Helen Vidovich – flute
Olga Stezhko – piano
Val Welbanks – cello
