A Luta Continua

for baritone, girls choir and orchestra [2005]

by Peter Wesley-Smith (text) and Martin Wesley-Smith (music)

xanana

first performance:
April 2 2005 at the Ten Days on the Island festival, Federation Concert Hall, Hobart, Tasmania (see here for info)
the performers:
Andrew Collis, baritone; Pip Monk, soprano; the Ogilvie High School Concert Choir (Joan Wright, musical director; Elizabeth Rockliff, accompanist; and Helen Todd, vocal coach); and the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra conducted by Richard Mills
see below for performers' bios, photos etc [Collis, Mills, Monk, Ogilvie Choir, Rockliff, Todd, Wright]
for recent news about East Timor, click here
for a report on and review of the first performance, click here

authors' notes
The illegal Indonesian occupation of East Timor 1975-99 resulted in the deaths of over one third of the population. To us the fundamental issue was the denial, with the support of the Australian and other governments, of the people's UN-mandated right to self-determination. That right was finally granted in 1999, and though it was followed by acts of vengeance by departing Indonesian troops and their puppet militia, East Timor eventually became free. But the struggle of its people continues: for daily survival, for physical and psychological good health, and for justice and reconciliation.
Martin has composed over a dozen multimedia pieces about the plight of the people of East Timor, the first being Kdadalak (for the children of Timor) (photography by Penny Tweedie) in 1978. In 1994, we wrote Quito, which The Song Company has performed widely in Europe, Asia, and Australia. In 2002 we both travelled around East Timor and were struck by the beauty of its landscape and people. But we also saw the destruction and the poverty and the immense challenges. The East Timorese government favours good relations with Indonesia over punishment for war crimes and crimes against the peace, and Indonesian trials of persons accused of human rights abuses in Timor have proved a sad farce. The massive resources in the Timor Sea have been largely commandeered by Australia, which refuses to allow conflicting claims to be dealt with by international tribunals in accordance with international law. The East Timorese people remain the victims of the aspirations of more powerful neighbours.
In A Luta Continua we pay tribute to the charismatic Xanana Gusmão - poet, painter, resistance leader and President - by setting to music one of his poems and excerpts from one of his speeches; to the traditional songs of East Timor, by including excerpts as well as two whole songs; and to the so-called Balibo Five, murdered at Balibo in East Timor in 1975 as they tried to alert the world to Indonesian military incursions. We dedicate the piece to the memory of author and activist Michele Turner - grand-daughter of an Australian commando who served in East Timor during World War II - who interviewed hundreds of Timorese refugees and recorded some of their harrowing stories for her 1992 book Telling. The East Timor support movement in Australia suffered a severe blow in 1995 when she committed suicide in Hobart.
Activist Shirley Shackleton tells of going to Balibo in 1989 to plant a tree in memory of the Balibo Five (which included her husband Greg) and Roger East (an Australian journalist murdered by Indonesian troops during the full-scale invasion of December 7 1975). The Indonesian soldiers there at first refused her permission, but she insisted so vehemently that eventually they told her to plant the tree there and then. "No," she said. "You've argued for so long that it's now getting dark. Too much has happened in Timor in the dark - I'll come back in the morning." The soldiers reluctantly agreed but told her that no Timorese would be allowed to attend the ceremony. As she was lowering the tree into the ground next morning, she suddenly heard a Catholic mass being sung. It transpired that the locals had gathered in the bush to watch; as soon as they saw the tree being planted they innocently started "choir practice" for next Sunday's service. This was the inspiration for the Kyrie in our piece.
Many thanks to many people, especially Harry Bennetts, Sister Susan Connolly, Ros Dunlop, members of the Kangaroo Valley-Remexio Partnership, Antonio de Padua, Shirley Shackleton and Rob Wesley-Smith. Our grateful thanks, too, to the performers this evening: it takes great courage to commission and agree to perform a new work! Special thanks to Richard Mills, who initiated the project. Finally, our thanks to the people of East Timor, who have taught us a lot about courage, determination, forgiveness and hope. Xanana says that "the people of Timor attach more value to freedom, justice and peace than to development." Their struggle has brought them, at last, political independence, freedom and peace. May it now bring them justice, inner peace, prosperity and happiness.

Two main themes are seen in the work of Martin Wesley-Smith: the life, work and ideas of Lewis Carroll and the plight of the people of East Timor. An eclectic composer, his output ranges from children's songs (such as I'm Walking in the City) to large-scale environmental events, encompassing many different idioms. Multimedia is a specialty, particularly pieces for instrument(s) and computer about humanitarian and ethical issues - Weapons of Mass Distortion, for example, which is about official propaganda, doublespeak, spin, lies etc. These are regularly presented in concert by the group Charisma (Ros Dunlop, clarinet, and Julia Ryder, cello) and others. His most-performed works include the choral conservation piece Who Killed Cock Robin? and the chamber pieces White Knight & Beaver and For Marimba & Tape. In 1998 he was awarded an AM for services to Australian music.
see http://www.shoalhaven.net.au/~mwsmith

Peter Wesley-Smith is the author of verses for children (e.g. The Ombley-Gombley, Hocus Pocus) and lyrics and libretti for works with music by Martin (Boojum!, Quito). He resigned from a Chair in Constitutional Law at the University of Hong Kong in 1999 and has since lived in Kangaroo Valley, New South Wales. He currently lectures in international law at the University of Macau each October and still occasionally prepares papers on constitutional law topics. Recent commissioned texts for Martin's music include Thank Evans (Australian Boys Choral Institute, 2001), Black Ribbon (Canberra Choral Society, 2001), True (Canberra Gay and Lesbian Qwire, 2002), and Doublethink (The Song Company, 2005).
see http://www.shoalhaven.net.au/~peterws

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andrew collis Andrew Collis

"Andrew Collis was in impressively resonant voice, bringing a sense of occasion to everything he sang."
Neville Cohn, "The West Australian" November 2003
[Beethoven's 9th Symphony, West Australian Symphony Orchestra]

Australian bass-baritone Andrew Collis was a member of the Cologne Opera from 1993, beginning in the Opera Studio and then joining the ensemble as a full soloist in 1995, where, among many other roles, he has sung the title part in Le Nozze di Figaro, Schaunard and Colline in La Bohème, Hobson in Peter Grimes, Mr Flint in Billy Budd, Dr Kolenaty in The Makropulos Case, Tchelio in The Love of Three Oranges, Leporello in Don Giovanni, Don Magnifico in Cenerentola, the Marquis in Dialogue of the Carmelites and Dr Falke in Fledermaus.
Outside Cologne, he has performed with the opera companies in Berlin, Frankfurt, Essen, Mannheim, Dortmund, Wiesbaden and Düsseldorf and has sung in concerts in Strasbourg, Stuttgart and Bonn. He has performed often with distinguished conductor James Conlon in the Cologne Philharmonie in various operatic concerts from Wagner to Stravinsky and Ravel and most notably in the award-winning recording of Zemlinsky's Der Zwerg for EMI.
In Australia, Andrew has performed with Opera Australia in the 1999 production of Roméo et Juliette in Melbourne and Sydney and with Opera Queensland in La Bohème, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Giulio Cesare, Carmen and the title role in Don Pasquale. He has also sung for the West Australia Opera's production of Roméo et Juliette and appeared with Victoria State Opera in Otello in 1993. In 1994 he sang Fasolt in Das Rheingold for State Opera of South Australia's Ring production.
Other international experience has included two appearances at the Hong Kong Festival in Tosca and Un Ballo in Maschera and in the Lyric Opera of Singapore's production of The Magic Flute. In 2000 he went to the Canary Islands for the St John Passion; in 2001 he appeared at the Vienna Festival in the Cologne Opera's acclaimed production of Luigi Nono's Intolleranza; and in 1997 he appeared at the Perth Festival as a visiting soloist with the Prague Chamber Orchestra.
In addition to his operatic repertoire, Andrew has an extensive list of concert and oratorio performances to his credit, including Magnificat, Coffee Cantata, and Mass in B minor of Bach, Messiah, Samson and Semele by Händel, Die Schöpfung, Stabat Mater and various Masses of Haydn, Beethoven Missa Solemnis and Mozart Requiem. In 2003 he sang Beethoven's 9th Symphony with both the West Australian and Melbourne Symphony Orchestras.
Apart from the numerous prizes won in Australia, including the Herald-Sun Aria, the German Opera Award and the vocal section of the ABC Young Performers' Awards, Andrew was a prize winner in the 1997 International Wagner Competition held in Bayreuth and Strasbourg. He also attended the Bayreuth Festival as a scholarship holder.
Andrew Collis' 2005 engagements include Sarastro in The Magic Flute and the Bass arias in St. Matthew Passion for Perth Festival, Beethoven 9th Symphony with Adelaide and Melbourne Symphony Orchestras, Colline in La Bohème for San Diego Opera, the title role in The Marriage of Figaro for Opera Queensland and Messiah for Sydney Philharmonia.
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pip monk Pip Monk
Philippa attended Ogilvie High school for four years where she was a member of the Chamber Choir. Between the years 2000 and 2004 she was a member of the National Children's choir Gondwana Voices and participated in the celebrations for the Centenary of Federation in 2001, numerous Australia day ceremonies in Darling Harbour, Choralfest in Queensland, and in 2003 and 2004 travelled to the USA, Mexico and France. She attended Rosny College for two years, where she gained the title role of Kate in Cole Porters' Kiss me Kate and played the role of Joanne in Steven Sondheim's Company. She sang with the Rosny College stage band, and is currently gaining placement as the lead vocalist in the Tasmanian Naval Band. So far in 2005, Philippa has played the role of Fantine in Les Misérables.
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richard mills Richard Mills
Richard Mills (b. 1949) is deservedly one of Australia's most sought after composers and music directors. In recent years he has pursued a diverse career as a composer and a conductor, which has seen him working with a large number of the nation's music organisations.
Mills pursued his advanced musical studies under Edmund Rubbra (composition) and Gilbert Webster (percussion) at the Guildhall School of Music, London, where he won the Saltzman Prize. Throughout his career he has also been recipient of the Maggs Award (1982), the Don Banks Music Fellowship (1995), and in 1999 was awarded an Order of Australia.
Mills made his debut as an opera conductor at Opera Queensland with The Magic Flute. Now, through his work with West Australian Opera, he has a large repertoire of standard works, as well as a reputation for conducting contemporary opera and his own compositions. Victorian State Opera commissioned him to write an opera of Ray Lawler's Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, which premiered in Melbourne in 1996. Opera Australia commissioned his second opera Batavia, which was premiered at the Melbourne Festival in 2001 to great critical acclaim. Batavia consequently received a number of Green Room and Helpmann Awards including Best Opera at both ceremonies and Best New Australian Work.
His own music has found wide acceptance and popularity with musicians and the concert-going public, and his works are regularly performed through out the world. Compositions range from Concerto for Violin and Viola, Flute Concerto commissioned by James Galway, Earth Poem-Sky for Aboriginal dancers, singers, electronic sound and the Darwin Symphony Orchestra, music for the ballet Snugglepot and Cuddlepie premiered by The Australian Ballet, and Fantastic Pantomimes written for the Melbourne Symphony's tour of Japan. Recent commissions for the Sydney Symphony include Tenebrae, Emblems premiered in 2000, and Totemic Journeys to celebrate Australia's Centenary of Federation. Requiem Diptych was commissioned and premiered by the Chicago Chamber Musicians Brass in 2001.
His CD recording Richard Mills Orchestral Works with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra has become a best seller on the ABC Classics label. In 1992 his three volume CD of the film music of Franz Waxman with the same orchestra was awarded a Deutsche Schallplattern Kritiks Preis in 1992.
Richard continues a high level of involvement in the community through such projects as commissions for the 1982 Commonwealth Games, the 2000 Olympic Games, and the Australian Bicentenary re-orchestration of Charles Williams' Majestic Fanfare (the ABC news theme). As an academic he has been Lecturer in Composition and conducting at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music and Visiting Fellow, University of Melbourne School of Music.
Currently, he works as Artistic Director of the West Australian Opera, a post held since 1997, and he has recently taken up the post of Artistic Consultant with Orchestra Victoria. In addition to these jobs, he works as a freelance artist throughout Australian and overseas.
Richard Mills can be contacted by email through his agent.
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Joan Wright

Joan Wright was born in Tasmania and educated at Ogilvie High School. On graduating from the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music she taught music at Fahan Girls' School in Hobart. In 1970 she travelled extensively overseas, studying at the Orff Institut in Salzburg for a year. During the 1980s Joan established the Young Conservatorium of Music and later held the position of Head of Music at Fahan Girls' School. In 1989 Joan accepted an appointment at Ogilvie High School, firstly as Head of Music and then in her final years at the School, as Head of Performing Arts. Together with her staff, Joan undertook a major development programme which included concert bands, an orchestra, rock groups, guitar and percussion ensembles, and several choirs.
Music Festivals represent one of Joan's areas of major achievement with the introduction of the School's Let's Sing choral event, which, in addition to celebrating Ogilvie's choral achievement, has attracted the presence of international children's choirs.
In December 2004, Joan retired from Ogilvie, although she will maintain strong links with the School as Choral Advisor and Conductor of the Senior Concert Choir and the newly established Alumni Association.
Joan has been a member of the well-known a cappella vocal ensemble, The Jane Franklin Consort, for over 15 years and is currently the Tasmanian State President of Australian National Choral Association (ANCA).

Ogilvie High School Concert Choir

photo taken at ChoralFest in Adelaide in 2004
[click on either of the above photos for a larger version in colour]

Elizabeth Rockliff

Elizabeth Rockliff was born on the North West Coast of Tasmania and studied pianoforte and Music Education at the Tasmanian Conservatorium of Music, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Music Education. She also has a Graduate Diploma in Performance and L.MUS.A. and L.T.C.L. in pianoforte.
As an accompanist and repetiteur, Elizabeth has been involved in musical activities around Hobart, officiating at Eisteddfods and working with various choral organisations including the Tasmanian Conservatorium Chorale for many years and more recently the Lyric Singers. She is now Head of Music at Ogilvie Girls High School and is an accompanist for choral and instrumental work. In addition to her classroom teaching role, she is involved with student support services and is a member of a senior team responsible for pastoral care and counselling of the girls.

Helen Todd (vocal coach)
Helen Todd has been associated with Ogilvie as Vocal Coach for the past eight years. She teaches Contemporary Voice in the Bachelor of Performing Arts in Launceston and at the Conservatorium of Music, Hobart. Helen's private practice work covers a wide range of vocal and choral techniques including jazz, rock, music theatre and classical vocal styles, as well as voice rehabilitation in speech and singing. She also tutors in confidence building, voice enhancement and interview techniques for the Beacon Foundation.
A regular presenter at national choral conferences, Helen specialises in the development and training of choral directors in safe vocal practice for choral singers.
Helen is Principal Vocal Coach for IHOS Music Theatre. She is the founder and Music Director of Song Sounds, Launceston's corporate and major functions entertainment troupe, and the co-founder of Song Sounds for Kids, Launceston's community-based choir for youth. In 2003 Helen was the vocal coach for the University of Tasmania's Australian premiere of Hydrogen Jukebox by Philip Glass, choral trainer for Deckchair Theatre's production of Mavis Goes to Timor for 10 Days on the Island and Co-Music Director for the Playhouse production of La Cage aux Folles.

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STOP PRESS:
the struggle continues:
Last Monday, 7 February, the East Timorese newspaper Suara Timor Loro Sa'e reported that at least 53 people had died of starvation in the village of Hatabuiliko since October 2004. "There is absolutely nothing to eat," reported Domingos de Araujo, the sub-district secretary, and "those still alive are looking for wild potatoes in the forest." Reports from the districts continue to filter in: 10,000 people are starving in Cova Lima; 10,000 households are going hungry in Suai; and Los Palos, Baucau, and Manufahi districts are all reporting a food crisis.
from East Timor: a tiny half island of surplus humanity by Ben Moxham in ZNet, Feb 15 2005

REPORT and REVIEWS
The first performance of A Luta Continua was a great success! We were delighted with the quality of the performance and with the audience response. Email responses to the live ABC-FM broadcast included the following (excerpts):

"I think it's fabulous - always completely engaging and alive - all the allusions/folk material so cleverly, seamlessly integrated - love the cuckoo - the deft, imaginative orchestration always lets the text through (well it certainly did over the radio). Gusmao's words beautifully enunciated - excellent soloist. And the optimism of the children and the gospel-style interaction with Gusmao a brilliant idea. Hope you're both really pleased with yourselves - you oughta be! Sounded like an excellent performance too - which you'd expect with Richard conducting."
and
"I LOVED the work! I have recorded and played it several times today. I love the sounds, the emotional intensity, the sound of the children singing, the percussive quality, the contemporary living history aspect - I thought it was wonderful. Well done you - I will never believe you again when you tell me how hard it is to do such a thing. It all sounded as if it was a piece of cake!"

Review by Lee Christofis in The Australian, April 5 2005:
There was no doubting the local importance of the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, threatened with the loss of nine of its 47 players in last month's federal orchestras review, on Saturday night.
The audience erupted into noisy accolades after the premiere of Martin Wesley-Smith's A luta continua (The Struggle Continues) and a performance of Peter Sculthorpe's Requiem (2004). Peter Wesley-Smith, Martin's brother, wrote the libretto of A luta continua, a lament for the many thousands who died in East Timor's struggle for independence, based on future president Xanana Gusmao's defence in the Indonesian courts after his capture in 1992. Sung soberly by bass Andrew Collis and the Ogilvie High School Concert Choir of girls, it incorporated charming Timorese folk songs and dances. Despite its seriousness, it's a lively work that seems to want to go in many directions, as if nothing of its sorrows and dazzling blocks of syncopated sound could settle for long. It was, perhaps, too earnest at this premiere, but the audience welcomed its intentions and emotional scope.
In contrast, Requiem, with the lauded didgeridoo player William Barton and the TSO Chorale under conductor Richard Mills, built its walls and interweaving layers of sound with Latin text and a Maranoa lullaby into an almost hypnotic mediation [sic]. It was a luminous performance.

Review by Peter Donnelly in The Mercury, April 7 2005:
Inspired by spirit of East Timor's struggle
Martin Wesley-Smith's A luta continua is a half-hour work relating East Timor's struggle for independence.
The piece offers declamatory-style music densely orchestrated in a manner reminiscent of American composer Charles Ives, contrasted with more reflective sections utilising East Timorese songs.
The text, by Peter Wesley-Smith, includes excerpts from a speech by President Xanana Gusmao.
The work, which was having its world premiere, conveys a powerful message and was excellently performed, with particularly fine singing by the Ogilvie choir.
Peter Sculthorpe's Requiem formed the other part of the concert.
I was fortunate enough to attend the first performance of Requiem at last year's Adelaide Festival.
Sculthorpe's sometimes deceptively simple style hides real depths of emotion. His music has become increasingly recognised for its unique quality in conveying the vastness and spirit of the Australian landscape.
Sculthorpe has always sought inspiration from the Pacific rim cultures and latterly from indigenous Australian music. His collaboration with William Barton has also led him to incorporate didgeridoo into some of his earlier orchestral works.
The Requiem is a masterwork which blends the various elements of his distinctive style with a return to European roots in the use of the Latin text and plainchant.
This performance was very moving and achieved a better balance between orchestra, choir and didgeridoo than was the case in Adelaide.
A memorable evening, enthusiastically received by the large audience.

Our gratitude and congratulations to all those who worked so hard, and with such skill, to bring this piece to life!

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