Symphonic delights

"Koi band master aa raha hai (some band master is coming)” is what one person in the queue told another outside the booking office of the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA). They had lined up (armed with sleeping gear) to spend the night outside the booking office to purchase tickets on behalf of their employers for Bombay born maestro Zubin Mehta’s concerts the day before booking opened. Two concerts with Mehta conducting the Australian World Orchestra (AWO) were held at the Jamshed Bhabha Theatre (JBT) at the NCPA on October 25 and 26, 2015 (see "Zubin to conduct Aussies,” Events and Personalities, Parsiana, September 21, 2015).
The conductor’s Indian tour with the AWO also took him to Madras and New Delhi. "This orchestra comprises the finest classical musicians from home and around the world,” Alexander Briger, AWO’s artistic director and chief conductor mentioned. Modeled on the Japanese Virtuoso Symphony Orchestra, the AWO is the "result of 100 musicians from 50 orchestras,” noted Briger’s foreward in the program.

The globally much fêted Mehta is a recipient of the Padma Vibhushan and Tagore Award for Cultural Harmony from his country of birth and continuing citizenship.
As entry is strictly allowed only between two pieces both concert days began with short overtures to enable latecomers to rush and occupy their seats. On day one, students of the music school set up to commemorate his father, the Mehli Mehta Music Foundation (MMMF), had the opportunity to perform with the AWO under Zubin’s baton with a children’s favorite, Joseph Haydn’s Toy Symphony. On the second day six children of the MMMF Outreach program from low income schools commenced the evening with the national anthems of India and Australia. Mehta announced that they had started studying the violin at the Outreach program only three months prior under the guidance of Mika Nishimura.
The second day’s symphonic delight was Wolfgang Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante with Daniel Dodds on the violin and Tobias Lea on the viola. Based in Switzerland and Austria respectively, the renowned musicians had joined Mehta for the India tour. Despite their stature as soloists, both played along with the AWO members in the lead for the last piece of Franz Schubert’s Symphony No. 9.
The tour also fielded Greta Bradman — a surname known to every cricket buff. The granddaughter of the great Don, Greta, who started her professional career as a concert classical singer only in 2010, set the stage aglitter with her shimmering golden outfit and voice with the range, power and expression of a coloratura soprano. Her joyous aria was tinged with a sense of mischief as she startled the conductor by ending a musical phrase right in his face.
Each day ended with one encore by the orchestra. The familiar, with the not-so-familiar music-going crowd, left the JBT longing for more. Some were gratified that they had tickets for an occasion that comes once in two or three years.