With the Cattle to screen at 2021 Melbourne International Film Festival

A ruminative film on the interplay between bovine lives and human consumption.

Minimalist in camerawork and composition yet expansive in impact, With the Cattle poignantly brings viewers up close and personal to the tranquillity – and ephemerality – of life for farm cows.

With the Cattle to screen at 2021 Vegan Film Festival opening night

Warwick lights a Spanish Fire in Geelong

via Entertainment Geelong, by Colin Mockett

It’s our orchestra’s policy, and its practice, to present challenging as well as popular works, whilst opening its players to the experience of guest conductors. All three of these occurred with this event, and the outcome was an outstanding concert of pride and rare beauty. The pride was in the quality of Geelong’s still-fledgling symphony orchestra. It’s sometimes difficult to comprehend that this is only the GSO’s third year, for it now plays with the confidence and maturity of an established musical institution. As for the beauty, that came from the choice of programme, which was Spanish themed.

This Spanish Fire began with the smouldering passion of Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga’s Symphony in D Major, which is a difficult, challenging piece of rich, complex musical patterns and textures amid smooth calming passages that was presented by our orchestra with accomplished ease. Then followed the jaunty flickering of Manuel de Falla's equally testing Suite from the Three Cornered Hat, also completed with verve.

Following an interval, the flames intensified when solo guitarist Matt Withers joined in. Matt and the orchestra presented the Basque composer Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez with its well-known second Adagio and equally popular third movement Allegro Gentille. For this reviewer those pieces evoked images not of Spanish plains but of American films, because snippets have been used so many times by Hollywood to evoke the barren western desert atmosphere. So the opportunity to hear the pieces in their full splendour and correct concepts was appreciated.

The long, loud applause drew what was officially an encore piece - though it was listed in the programme, and its composer was in the audience - of James Mountain’s Spanish Romance for Guitar and Orchestra, a lush and sumptuous work of musical romance that was equally well received - before Matt left and the Orchestra took on another popular piece in Enrique Granados’ Intermezzo from Goyescas.

And finally, stoked and enhanced by the addition of extra brass and percussion players, the orchestra finished the evening with a blazing rendition of Emmanuel Chabrier’s best-known work, the catchy and popular España. That was the structure of the evening.

But what made this concert exceptional was not only the high quality of all round performance, but the input of guest conductor Warwick Stendgårds. He’s a slim, middle-aged neatly turned out man who appeared to have energy and vitality to spare. He looked a little like former premier John Brumby - but this was a John Brumby primed on red cordial. Because Warwick Stendgårds conducts with a sort of all-encompassing ‘restrained spectacular’ style, his body swaying with the musical rhythms, his left hand flourishing wide circles while the right wields his baton like a sabre, sometimes stabbing the air, sometimes broadly sweeping but always demanding attention. All this was augmented with little nods, smiles and gestures toward his orchestra - and sometimes, to the audience, too. I’m quite sure that this was a warm learning experience for our orchestra’s younger players, for they responded, literally with gusto.

And for the audience, this night of Spanish Fire made for a blazing success on a cold Geelong night.

More, please.

Source: https://entertainmentgeelong.com/reviews-2018

James Mountain wins 2017 Union House Theatre Conductor Award

Green Room

via The Ether Magazine, by Kimberley Price

The Melbourne Fringe Festival boasts an array of amateur theatre across numerous locations around the city for two-and-a-half weeks. This year, The University of Melbourne’s Music Theatre Association (UMMTA) is showcasing two productions over three nights at the Meat Market in what they are calling ‘The Factory’. The Meat Market is transformed for Fringe Festival into ‘Emerald City’ and showcases a variety of theatre, art, circus acts as well as food and drinks. ‘Green Room’, is an original ‘play with music’, written and composed by James Mountain, directed by Ryan Bentley and produced by Natalie Montalto.

Set in an unspecified timeframe, Green Room is inspired by the events surrounding Pink Floyd’s ejection of Syd Barrett. Green Room’s cast comprises of only three actors, who make up a band that experience a fall from grace at the height of their stardom. The story shows each characters interpretation of the lies, manipulation and reality of the breakup of the band through monologues and scenes.

Sitting down with James, Ryan and Natalie, it is obvious that they all have a huge passion for building amateur theatre, and this passion is certainly evident in Green Room.

‘I started writing the play about six months ago. I’d just come off the back of doing another UMMTA production and I didn’t want to tackle anything political’, says James. ‘I was interested with how people lie to one another and how we play down the reality of situations. We present the best versions of ourselves to others when it’s not necessarily the truth’. Playing on this thought process, and his love of Pink Floyd, the idea of Green Room began, and six months later, he is preparing to see his work projected on the stage.

While this is not Ryan’s first stint at directing, having previously collaborated as a director alongside James as musical director in a previous production, it is his first time working with an original script. ‘I got a call from James explaining the play, and I got very excited. I had a fair bit going on, but I wanted to drop everything for the chance to work on this play. As this script is completely new, I could stage something completely new. The script has developed along with the staging, and in the process, we learnt more about the characters and delved into who they really are’.

As UMMTA’s President, Natalie has taken on more of a managerial role in the creation of the University’s showcase ‘The Factory’, and is acting as a producer for Green Room. ‘Previous years UMMTA committee had won one registration in the Fringe Festival. We had to figure out, how we as a company, who just put on musicals and had never really dabbled dramatically into original work, could really get involved in the Fringe Festival, and promote original work, which barely exists in Australia. We did a call out and had an overwhelming response, and from there we picked two plays, Green Room and Sweet Dreaming and that is how The Factory was formed’. In discussing the attraction of getting involved in the Fringe Festival, Natalie explains that ‘the point of this is not to be the greatest show of all time, the point of it is to just put on theatre. That’s what we’ve done and it’s very exciting’.

Green Room is a production aiming purely at entertaining its audiences. The stripped back set, which involves the utilisation of all elements, is divided into three areas, each representing a different kind of green room for the band. By using three moving walls, the setting is constantly evolving, and always controlled by the actors. The juxtaposition between the actors’ monologues and scenes together, showcase the conflict of the truth and what is the reality. Audiences can expect to become sceptical of the three characters, in trying to determine who is actually being honest in their descent from fame.

The three actors; Matt Healy, Dan Czech and Sia Bairaktaris all bring original elements to their characters, something which surprised both Ryan and James. ‘I actually wrote Ella’s song after working with Sia and knowing her range and strengths. So that the song is tailored specifically for her and therefore it’s the best song of the whole show’ explains James.

With Green Room’s opening night fast approaching, the excitement of putting on an original piece is both thrilling and nerve racking for James, Ryan and Natalie. With Australian Theatre still a rare commodity, it’s inspiring to see three university students working together and creating a piece, which has endless possibilities. ‘Having something so original, together we got to produce something pretty awesome’ beams Ryan.

Particularly for James, who little over six months ago, only had an idea and a love for Pink Floyd, the transformation from imagination to a complete show in staggering. ‘It’s all been in my head and it’s crazy to think that these people have done such a fantastic job with nothing else but my imagination. I’ve thrown some pretty crazy stuff out there, and Ryan, the actors and the musicians have gone off and created something, that quite frankly, is better than what I expected’.

The Factory presents ‘Sweet Dreaming’ and ‘The Green Room’ at The Gingerbread House, Emerald City (Meat Market – 5 Blackwood Street, Melbourne).

15th, 16th and 17th of September at 8pm.

Tickets – Adult $25, Concession $20

http://www.melbournefringe.com.au/event/the-factory/

James Mountain emerges from Between Tall Trees

via CutCommon, by Myles Oakey

They’re so tall, you can only sense their grandeur. Only their narrow trunks fit into view; the canopy overhead, and the roots hidden beneath the wild forest floor.

This is Sue Needham’s Forest, the artwork of inspiration for James Mountain’s composition Between Tall Trees – winner of the Matt Wither’s Australian Music Competition for 2016 and Emerging Composer Under 25 Award.

The competition required all entrants to compose a piece for solo classical guitar in response to Needham’s watercolour landscape; James had his interpretation and title before his first notes.

“I thought to myself: ‘Maybe I can write a piece about what you can’t see in the painting. What if the guitar and the painting worked together to give us a picture of the forest?’. So I decided to write the music based on animals that I imagined could be in the forest,” James says.

“A lot of the themes represent not specific animals, but different sizes of animals – in a kind of cute way.”

On November 13, James will have his idea realised when his work Between Tall Trees is performed beside Needham’s Forest in an intimate concert given by Matt Withers at the National Arboretum Canberra.

“As an aspiring composer, the most exciting thing about the whole process and whole competition is that my piece will be performed by someone of Matt’s calibre. It’s an unreal situation that I haven’t fully got my head around.” 

James’ composition will feature along with those of other competition finalists Kirsten Milenko and Mitchell Newton, as well as a new work by Australian composer and Senior Lecturer in Composition at the University of Queensland Dr. Robert Davidson – also a judge on the competition’s panel.

In selecting James’ piece, Davidson commented, “excellent counterpoint, effective and very idiomatic guitar writing, clear conception, strong melody and harmonic direction. Engaging throughout”.

What’s more impressive is that James likely composed much of this work while you and I were sleeping – and while Ross and Rachel were getting back together.

“I’m most productive about 11pm, so I’ll work till 2 or 3am. That’s when most of my best work comes through. I don’t need absolute silence either; recently I’ve been re-watching Friends,” James laughs. 

Although that might not sound like some popular imagination of ‘the composer’, it seems to be working for him.

Having studied classical guitar with John Couch since the second grade, and with every intention of becoming a performer, James tells us about the moment that changed it all for him in his final years of high school.

“Two of my mates are filmmakers, and were entering one of their films in to a competition. Because of the copyright laws, they couldn’t use the music they originally chose for the film. They had about four hours to enter this film before the cut-off; and so I got a phone call asking if I could make the most basic soundtrack for this five-minute film.

“I was under this immense pressure to write, record, and edit. I did it in four hours and sent it back. It was the most terrifying, but also exhilarating experience I’d had in music. And that’s the moment I decided I wanted to be a composer.” 

Now a composition student at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, James has moved from the tiny town of Googong near Canberra to study under Head of Composition Stuart Greenbaum. James is a part of a passionate and collaborative culture at the conservatorium, especially between student performers and composers. It’s a place where James has been able to test out ideas written for various genres and instrumentation, from string quartet to musical theatre, and take every opportunity that comes his way.

“I think Matt Withers’ competition, and others like it, are incredibly important in the evolution and continuation of Australian music, especially for young composers. Because without performers willing to play new music, composers have no way to get their music heard.”

Beneficial for the performers of contemporary music, too. Matt Withers tells us James’ work “has been a joy to learn and I am positive it will be an audience favourite in concert on November 13”.

On selecting the winning composition Matt said: “Mountain’s work was a clear standout because it is written incredibly guitaristically, and the harmonies and melodies are very exciting”.

Matt Withers Australian Music Composition Competition 2016 winners include James Mountain (first place), Kirsten Milenko (second place), Mitchell Newton (third place). The composition was open to all Australian composers to submit a work for solo guitar inspired by artwork Forest by Sue Needham. The winning works will be performed at Music With a View at the National Arboretum, Canberra on Sunday November 13 at 1.30pm. Book online now.