Music lovers of jazz, opera, catered for during Cambridge Autumn Festival

Jazz and opera lovers will have no problem getting into a musical mood at this year’s Cambridge Autumn Festival. Polish your shoes and wear your best string of pearls as the 16-piece Hamilton Big Band takes people through an evening of hits from today and yesteryear.

The band will deliver on a promise your toes will continue to tap along to the big hits of the 1940s to the 1980s. Who can forget the style, the pinnace of the big band era made famous by Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington and Count Basie? ​Using the energy and love for the big band sound, members have also arranged contemporary music to suit the tone. Expect to hear the Hamilton Big Band arrangements of songs from Norah Jones, James Brown and David Lee Roth.

Accomplished Waipa vocalist Katie Trigg will be joining the band adding a bit of sass to the Cambridge performance.

Started back in the 1960s, original band member Danny Roguski, is joined a mix of long-serving and new members. The band continues playing thanks to the passion musicians have for the Big Band genre.

If the big band sound has wet your taste buds for more nostalgia, then take in a night of opera theatrics from Gilbert and Sullivan.

Cambridge opera lovers can indulge in a showcase of the musical pizzazz and ingenuity of Arthur Sullivan and quirky humour of WS Gilbert. Hand-picked by the assistant director of the NZ Opera School, Ian Campbell, the night features “all the best bits” from the operas of the famous British pair.

Not only will the Cambridge Autumn Festival concert offer a selection of solos and choruses but there will be a complete performance of the operetta Trial By Jury.

Librettist WS Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan wrote their delightful and enduring comic operettas between 1871 and 1896; many of these are still performed around the world.

While commenting on the social and political issues of the time, they entertained the masses with their fast and funny productions featuring song, dance, humour, and catchy melodies.

The details:

Hamilton Big Band: April 11, St Andrew’s Church, Cambridge.
A Gilbert and Sullivan Night: April 12, St Andrew’s Church , Cambridge.
The Cambridge Autumn Festival: April 7-15.
Visit the website cambridgeautumnfestival.co.nz for programme updates.