Amal Choucri Catta welcomes innovation in a traditional concert New Year Concert, 31 December 2005 and 1 January 2006: Cairo Symphony Orchestra, cond. Steven Lloyd, soloist Soprano Nicola-Jane Kemp. Cairo Opera House, 8pm. There were flowers and bright lights and Christmas trees everywhere at Cairo Opera House. Sleighs and dolls and Yuletide presents had been scattered around the halls and Opera entrance since 24 December, as Christmas carols were sung and Christmas concerts enchanted hundreds of listeners. And then came Vienna night with Strauss waltzes. There were seven of them, reviving memories of Kahlenberg and Kobenzl, Schoenbrunn and Schwarzenberg, but mainly of Dommeyer. The audience was also given polkas and marches and music by Lehar, Puccini and Mozart, performed by Cairo Symphony Orchestra under the remarkable baton of Steven Lloyd, probably the youngest and certainly the most captivating principal conductor and music director of Cairo's symphonists. He is all charm, smiles and modesty, yet behind the mirth and the schmalz lay a formidable display of ardour, of sparkling harmony, character and immaculate balance. Steven Lloyd is a powerful performer, capable of holding his orchestra in supremely flexible hands: he loves his work and his instrumentalists and they are visibly enthralled by his conduct and musical virtuosity. Steven Lloyd studied conducting at Birmingham Conservatoire, graduating in 1966 with distinction. He served as principal and guest conductor of different orchestras before being appointed resident conductor of the Royal Oman Symphony Orchestra, and has guest conducted Cairo Symphony on several occasions. He is also a winner of the Birmingham Conservatoire Principal's prize, the Michael Been conducting award, the Salveson Baton and the Silver Medal from the worshipful Company of Musicians. In 2004 he was made an honorary member of Birmingham Conservatoire. He captured the attention of Cairo's audience on Christmas Eve while performing Haydn's Nelson Mass with singers Taheya Shams El-Din, Hanan El-Guindi, Tamer Tewfik, Reda El-Wakil and the A Cappella Choir in the first part of a programme that was subsequently dedicated to film music, with the six movements of John Williams's Star Wars Suite perfectly performed. For the New Year he surprised the ears and delighted the spirit along with the extraordinary British soprano Nicola Jane Kemp. This lady has it all -- beauty, presence, voice, elegance -- and gave the most fabulous performance. She made her concert debut at the Barbican singing incidental music from Beethoven's Egmont. Specialising in the coloratura repertoire, Kemp made her operatic debut at Sadler's Wells in London, singing Edwige in Robinson Crusoe for the British Youth Opera, followed by Pretty Polly in Punch and Judy, Queen of the Night in Zauberfloete and Lakme. On New Year's Eve in Cairo she opened with Fruehlinsstimmen, a lovely waltz, opus 410, by Johann Strauss junior. Her voice was reminiscent of budding white blossoms in the Prater Allee, where in the good old days lovers would secretly tryst while flowers were blooming and nightingales chirped their odes to Spring. A change of mood came with Vilja, O Vilja, Du Waldmaegdelein -- from Act II of Franz Lehar's three-act operetta The Merry Widow -- which recounts a traditional folktale of a maid of the woods and a huntsman's unrequited love for her. Nicola-Jane Kemp has a way of touching the hearts of her listeners, giving them something deep and intimate. She breathes life into the world of sound and poetry, infusing it with a haunting spirit of melancholy . Her Vilja was sung to perfection. In the second part of the concert she surprised the audience with the celebrated Queen of the Night aria from Act II of Mozart's Die Zauberfloete -- Der Hoelle Rache Kocht in meinem Herzen in which the queen swears revenge upon Sarastro the high priest of Isis and Osiris. The aria is famous for the top Fs it requires of the coloratura soprano: with Aria of the bells from the second act of Delibes's Lakme' the Queen of the Night aria is among the most difficult and demanding in the soprano repertoire. Nicola -Jane Kemp's interpretation was thrilling, her coloratura breathtaking. Towards the end she returned to operetta singing with Mein Herr Marquis, ein Mann wie Sie, Adele's laughing song in Act II of Johann Strauss junior's operetta Die Fledermaus. In this aria Adele, disguised in one of her mistress's gowns, flirts with her employer at Orlofsky's party while he flirts outrageously with his own wife, having mistaken her for an Hingarian Countess. Kemp was exceptionally enthralling and the audience loved her. Dedicated to works by the Strausses, the New Year concert has turned into one of the most popular of the Cairo Symphony's concerts. The Pizzicato Polka, Tales from the Vienna Woods, the Blue Danube and the Radetzky March are always played. This time Lloyd managed to add to Strauss the Intermezzo between Acts II and III from Puccini's four-act Manon Lescaut as well as the virtuoso aria from to The Magic Flute in commemoration of the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth. The dynamic young conductor is visibly trying to innovate, which is certainly welcome. He has already captured the interest and attracted the sympathy and appreciation of his audience. As confetti was showered upon him and his orchestra, and the chimes announcing the New Year swept over the stage, the crowd gave him a standing ovation.
