6. Successes and failures (1982-90)
6.4 CAPAB Orchestra – Difficulties
After the CAPAB Orchestra’s success in the early 1980s a less gratifying period followed.
Since an amalgamated orchestra did not seem a possibility in the immediate future
Bloomberg encouraged a higher degree of co-operation between the CTSO and the
CAPAB Orchestra (Executive Committee Minutes, 30 July 1986). He suggested certain
improvements such as sharing visiting conductors in order to split costs. Furthermore, he
indicated that there was discontent amongst CTSO staff as CAPAB had increased their
fees paid to extra players by 10% without prior consultation with the CTSO. In CAPAB’s
defence, Deputy Chief Director, Guy Carter, argued that CAPAB sessions were longer,
justifying the higher fees and Korsten pointed out that the CTSO was just as guilty, as
they had increased their salaries without informing CAPAB. Both orchestras were,
however, in agreement that these matters had to be resolved to promote good relations
(Board of Directors Minutes, 8 August 1986).
They did eventually co-operate to some extent: in June 1987 the orchestras agreed to
nationally blacklist all overseas players who did not honour their contracts and returned to
their home countries without notice. They also re-affirmed that players under contract
would not be offered positions with other orchestras, although the CTSO apparently
continued to breach this agreement. Graham Coote, who replaced Music Manager
had yet again successfully offered some of CAPAB’s top players positions, attracting
them with more favourable conditions such as higher salaries and fewer sessions. This
brought the total number of players who joined the CTSO after originally being brought to
South Africa by CAPAB, to double figures (Annual Report, 1985/6; Executive Committee
Minutes, 28 March 1990).
In order to improve the CAPAB orchestra and entice outstanding musicians to join the
orchestra, the Music Department appointed their first principal guest conductor in 1987.
According to CAPAB management the appointment of respected conductors greatly
influenced the success of player recruitment. The Italian conductor Ricardo Capasso was
appointed in this new role and was engaged to conduct the orchestra for a few months
per year whilst working abroad for the remainder (Board of Directors Minutes, 14
February 1986; Annual Report, 1986/7). It does not seem as if this appointment had the
desired effect: in September 1988 the management reported that they had been unable
to recruit any string players in South Africa. To at least allow for the contracting of extra
players from the ranks of the CTSO with the aim of strengthening the CAPAB Orchestra’s
depleted string section, CAPAB decided to avoid any orchestral performances on a
Thursday evening to rule out clashes with the CTSO’s regular symphony concerts
(Executive Committee Minutes, 21 September 1988).
It was likely that CAPAB’s efforts to introduce more popular music into the annual music
programme in the latter half of the 1980s hampered recruitment efforts. A request from
Korsten led to the establishment of a series of light music concerts with Afrikaans singers
and CAPAB launched their first light music festival in February 1987. Three different
programmes on seven nights featured popular artists such as Coenie de Villiers, Annelie
van Rooyen, Lucas Maree, Taliep Peterson, the Gerry Bosman Big Band, Norman Furber
Dancers and the CAPAB Orchestra conducted by Capasso (Executive Committee
Minutes, 28 May 1986). CAPAB also hosted jazz concerts in June, which featured Judy
Report, 1986-7). Another first for the Nico Malan Theatre was the appearance of the
popular Afrikaans crooner, Bles Bridges, with the CAPAB Orchestra in June 1988. He
attracted a full house of predominantly first-time visitors and the popularity of his
performances ensured return visits in February 1989, when he again performed to
capacity audiences (Grütter, 1988: 345; Executive Committee Minutes, 22 February
1989).46 Following the success and profitability of these ventures, “symphonic pop” concerts under the direction of Gerry Bosman became a regular fixture and provided a
platform for even more singers of popular Afrikaans music such as Manual Escorsio,
Juanita Claassen and Rina Hugo(Executive Committee Minutes, 27 July 1988). In spite
of criticism by the public in the daily newspapers, accusing CAPAB of “cultural
assassination” (kultuurmoord), these concerts continued to be hosted every few months
(Le Roux, 1988). Not only were these concerts very popular with the public, they were
also highly successful in terms of box office revenue, regularly generating a profit due to
capacity attendance figures (Executive Committee Minutes, 27 September 1989;
Executive Committee Minutes, 22 February 1989).
Amidst this influx of popular culture CAPAB celebrated its 25th anniversary in 1988, which was commemorated with a Silver Jubilee Concert staged in the Nico Malan Opera
Theatre on 8 October 1988. For this occasion CAPAB commissioned a celebratory work
with South African influences by local composer Peter Louis van Dijk. He chose to set
three African texts (Love-song of the water carriers, Song of the Springbok Does and
Hunter’s prayer), adapted from the Penguin Book of South African Verse, for the CAPAB
chorus and orchestra. In addition to these “Songs of Celebration”, the programme also
included various well-known excerpts from operas and musicals performed by the
CAPAB Orchestra, Opera Company soloists and CAPAB Chorus, directed by Gerry
Bosman and David Tidboald (Silver Jubilee Programme, 8 October 1988).
46 An acquaintance of Grütter remarked, “you could see most of them had never been in such a place before. During
By September 1989 the orchestra was in a fairly dismal state as the gradual decline of
member numbers, which included the resignation of five members in short succession,
meant that only 44 of the required 64 members remained. Graham Coote, General
Manager of Music and Orchestra, emphasised the serious need for recruitment abroad
as he considered strategies to recruit players locally to be failing, leaving CAPAB with a
severe shortage of string players (Executive Commitee Minutes, 29 November 1989).
CAPAB director George Loopuyt held talks with the orchestra to discuss their
grievances.47 Subsequently, he suggested that conductor and violinist Gerhard Korsten, at that time resident in Vienna, audition suitable candidates in Europe. This was an
attempt to alleviate both the financial burden and the inconvenience of sending a team of
staff members abroad. Loopuyt assured the parties concerned that all means possible
were being used to recruit orchestra members from Poland and East Germany. CAPAB
probably approached the less affluent Eastern European countries because the relative
weakness of the value of the rand made it difficult to attract quality players from Western
Europe, who required competitive salaries by European standards. At the same time the
Board had to take care not to end up in a situation where new recruits would be paid
higher salaries than current members, as this would be in breach of fair labour practise
(Executive Committee Minutes, 25 October 1989).
Beyond these considerations, CAPAB also faced possible further complications with the
visa application process and had to take into account the fact that newly recruited players
from Europe had previously broken their contracts by returning to their home countries
prematurely (Executive Committee Minutes, 31 January 1990). Notwithstanding these
risks, recruitment efforts yielded positive results. By June 1990 CAPAB had managed to
appoint five Polish players, in addition to two more violinists recruited from within South
Africa (Executive Committee Minutes, 27 June 1990).
47
George Loopuyt, who was previously regional director of the Eastern Cape branch, was appointed as Director of CAPAB with effect from 1 April 1989 (Annual Report, 1987/8). He succeeded Gé Korsten, who requested early retirement (Carter, 1989).
Although Capasso’s appointment as guest conductor had not proved very successful in
terms of improving the orchestra’s standard, CAPAB still regarded their choice of
conductors as vital in order to increase the quality of the orchestra’s playing. At the
beginning of 1990 Terence Kern was appointed as Senior Conductor, and Reinhard
Schwarz as Principal Guest Conductor. CAPAB considered an outstanding performance
of Beethoven’s opera Fidelio in February 1990, conducted by Schwarz, as confirmation
that a conductor of his calibre contributed significantly to both the image and the standard
of performance of the orchestra (Executive Committee Minutes, 28 February 1990;
Executive Committee Minutes, 28 August 1990). In this respect the Executive Committee
decided to terminate the contract of conductor Zoltan Jeney in March 1990 as according
to their evaluation, his capabilities were insufficient to have a positive impact on the
morale of the orchestra (Executive Committee Minutes, 28 February 1990). Further
progress was made with the appointment of violinist Jürgen Schwietering, who had first
appeared with the orchestra in the second Youth Concerto Festival in 1972. He was
appointed as leader in December 1990 and CAPAB management considered this to be a
positive step towards future string player recruitment in South Africa (Executive
Committee Minutes, 29 August 1990). These appointments increased the orchestra’s
size to 60 members (Annual Report, 1990/1).