PETA STEWART
It’s not often that the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra has a trumpeter in a symphony season, so the opening concert on 4 April, 2024, is being eagerly anticipated. This is when the Autumn Symphonies at The City Hall season is opened by the Canadian trumpeter, Paul Merkelo. Adam Szmidt is on the podium a Mozart Divertimento and Symphony No, 35 and the Classical Symphony by Prokofiev.
Merkelo will perform Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, arranged for trumpet and not piano by Timofei Dokshizer, who invited him to study with him in Russia. Merkelo couldn’t, and to his regret has not subsequently had the chance to meet him.
Dokshizer did, however, give him many recordings, including his own CD of the Gershwin piece, a work that Merkelo says is the perfect combination of jazz and classical music.
“I can invoke highest performance practices of classical while also letting go into a more jazz influenced style,” he says.
Lure of the orchestra
Principal trumpet of Orchestre Symphonique de Montreal for nearly 30 years, Merkelo fell in love with the trumpet when he was 12. Having already studied the piano and drums, he attended a concert with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and was hooked. He knew, at the age of 13, that he would become a professional trumpeter.
There was always music in his home growing up, for his mother played the piano. At 13 he began studying with Ray Sasaki who taught at the University of Illinois in classical and jazz. Working with him and eventually joining the Chicago Youth Orchestra propelled him to want to play in an orchestra. After only three years at the Eastman School of Music he won his first professional job as the principal trumpet of the Symphony of New Orleans. In 1995 he was appointed principal trumpet of the Orchestre Symphonique de Montreal (OSM) where he remains to this day.
Merkelo has also served as a guest principal trumpet with the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. What’s more, he was appointed the Canadian musical ambassador to China for the inauguration of the Montreal Park in Shanghai in 2001
Influences, recordings
Merkelo says he was influenced musically by Maurice Andre (who performed with the former CTPO when it performed in the Canary Islands and Cape Town), as well as Wynton Marsalis whose new concerto he premiered in August 2023. Adolph Herseth of the Chicago Symphony was another influence as was Gustav Mahler.
He made his New York debut in 1998 with Michael Tilson Thomas and the New World Symphony Orchestra and Michael Tilson Thomas, and has since collaborated with conductors such as Bernstein, Dutoit, Maazel, Solti, Mehta, and Gergiev.
Merkelo has six solo recordings, It was French Trumpet Concertos with OSM and Kent Nagano that was nominated by the Juno Awards (Canada’s most prestigious showcase) as the Best Classical Album of the Year – Soloist with Large Ensemble in 2016.
Merkelo teaches in Santa Barbara, California, for two months each North American summer, at the Music Academy of the West, a cutting-edge online education platform eligible for diploma accreditation.
He is on the Canadian board for the Youth Orchestra of America and is a founder of a scholarship in his name which helps young, gifted brass players with financial aid and career guidance. The CPO is delighted that apart for his master class at UCT he will also give one for CPYO and CPYWE trumpeters.
Pushing limits
But top of his list of things to do is to get more trumpet concertos written that combine elements of jazz, world music and classical. He will shortly give the Canadian premiere of the Gabriela Ortiz concerto and a new work by acclaimed film composer Jeff Beal for two trumpets with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. From Mozart to Miles links the history of flamenco music to the classical era and Mozart’s style of composition while paying homage to the famous Miles Davis album, Sketches of Spain and this will be launched shortly with eight orchestras worldwide. All these works push the limits of virtuosity between classical, jazz, and world music.
When he is not improvising, discovering new styles of music, he is studying scores, teaching or performing, he participates in tennis the martial arts and yoga. He won’t have time to do much of that here – he will be surfing and visiting the Kruger National Park and, naturally, the winelands!
PS: For those who remember, in 2014 Sergei Nakariakov performed Aratunian and during Covid David Thompson performed Haydn to a small audience.
Who: Trumpeter Paul Merkelo
What: Opening concert Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra’s Autumn Symphonies
Where: Cape Town City Hall
When: Thursday, April 4, 2024, 7.30pm
Paul Merkelo tickets: Artscape Dial-A-Seat 021 421 7695 / Webtickets Book at Quicket for the dress rehearsal at 11am
WS
