Interview with Angela Giblin – musician and teacher

Interview conducted Nov 2013 at ANU Emeritus Faculty
Interview and production – Peter Stewart
Engineer - Nik Fominas

Interview Synopsis:

Angela Ann Giblin was born in Sydney in 1948, to parents Barbara and Hugh (solicitor). Her brother David, born 18 months later, would go on to become a businessman. Angela began her schooling at Loquat Valley School, Bayview, near Pittwater, Sydney, then moved to Ascham School. Kenneth Robins was her music master at Ascham, and his choir, and score-reading classes, were inspirational for Angela. At age 14, Angela’s family moved to Bowral, where nearby at Mittagong Angela studied at Frensham School. There she studied piano with Ian Cooper, and clarinet with Ann Thompson; she also studied with Norma (Bobbie) Williams, teacher and accompanist. Angela was introduced by them to what would later become her instrument – her singing voice. She remained in touch with these mentors and teachers over many years.

In 1971 Angela completed a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree at Sydney University, and in 1972 she was introduced to performance, as Messagera in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo, in a production by the Sydney University Musical Society, conducted by Peter Seymour. Receiving warm praise from Roger Covell, the doyen of Sydney music critics, a career in music became a firm possibility. In 1973 Angela enrolled for a Diploma of Opera at the NSW Conservatorium of Music, and in 1974 auditioned for and was invited to join the Opera Studio of the Australian Opera, as the company's first Trainee Principal. Putting her diploma studies on hold, Angela was soon promoted to Principal, singing a number of solo roles with the company, and working with conductors and directors such as Richard Bonynge, Edward Downes, John Cox, and John Copley. She also performed with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Willem van Otterloo.

In 1976 Angela moved to Austria, to begin a Diploma of Opera at the Vienna Academy, receiving support by way of a grant from the Arts Council of Australia, then a scholarship from the Austrian Government. She completed the requirements for the seven-year diploma course in three years, with excellent results, but her studies were again interrupted, this time by her first professional European engagement, in Klagenfurt, Austria, singing Sonetka, in Shostakovich’s opera Katerina Ismailova. Much to her own disappointment and her voice teacher's chagrin, she was unable to complete the final unit in her diploma studies.

In 1979, Angela accepted a contract at the Braunschweig State Theatre in Germany, and in the following years in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, sang most of the roles for lyric mezzo-soprano, including Oktavian in Der Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss; Dorabella in Cosi fan tutte, Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro, Idamante in Idomeneo, all by Mozart; Suzuki in Madama Butterfly by Puccini; Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus by Johann Strauss; Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Angelina in La cenerentola, Zaida in Il turco in Italia, all by Rossini. All up, Angela has sung about 50 operatic roles during her career.

In Europe Angela worked with conductors Bruno Weil, Eduard Melkus, and Heribert Esser; with stage directors John Dew and Heinz-Lukas Kindermann; and sang with Gundula Janowitz, Judith Beckmann, Günther von Kannen, Waldemar Kmentt, and Hermann Becht.

She was also active in recital and oratorio, and as a voice teacher.

Singers must perform in a range of languages, and Angela soon became fluent in German and competent in Italian and French, singing in total in nine languages. During her final year in Europe, she studied Mandarin Chinese at Heidelberg University, in a course conducted in German!

A highlight for her in these years was a commendation in the yearbook of the respected German opera magazine, Opernwelt, for her portrayal of Idamante in Mozart's Idomeneo.

In 1987 Angela returned to Australia, where she sang with the Victoria State Opera in Melbourne, with ACT Opera, and with other Australian companies, in productions by Barrie Kosky, Ken Russell, Lindy Hume, and Ian Judge, and with conductors Richard Divall, Andrew Greene, Roderick Brydon, Max McBride, and Roland Peelman.

Following the demise of ACT Opera, Angela became an activist in support of the proposed National Capital Opera in Canberra. Along her busy if sometimes winding trail, she took a Graduate Diploma of Education (Music) from the Canberra College of Advanced Education (the University of Canberra, as it now is), providing her with special insight into pedagogy in music.

In Canberra, Angela sang oratorio and concert performances with the Canberra Choral Society and other ACT organisations, working with conductors Nicolette Fraillon and Graham Abbott. She frequently performed at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra School of Music, and other notable ACT venues. In 1993, with the eminent pianist Geoffrey Tozer, she was honoured with a Music Award from the Canberra Critics’ Circle.

In 1996 Angela was appointed Lecturer in Voice at the Canberra School of Music, where her duties included teaching, maintaining a performance career, and administration. During this period Angela further developed her skills in pedagogy, curriculum design, and management. She worked with the distinguished mezzo-soprano and voice teacher Anthea Moller, who was Head of Voice at the CSM at that time. Angela continued to perform with a range of Canberra organisations, including ABC Radio and the CSM’s public programs. Works by Australian women composers received special emphasis in her programming, in particular those of Peggy Glanville-Hicks, Margaret Sutherland, and Margaret Legge-Wilkinson.

In 1998 Angela was appointed Acting Head of Voice at the CSM, succeeding her mentor Anthea Moller, then in 1999 was promoted to Head of Voice, a key position in a conservatorium of music. During this time she visited Vienna, Paris, London, and other major centres, to observe best practice in international voice teaching and performance.

Earlier, on her return to Australia, she had joined the newly established Australian National Association of Teachers of Singing, a unique organisation in Australia in that it is a professional association for voice teachers, combining collegial interaction and professional development opportunities. She served for many years as a Committee member of that organisation, and as President of the ACT Chapter and as a National Councillor.

Angela’s contributions generally to ANU, and to the music and cultural community in Canberra more widely, are illustrated by a list of her roles and duties during 2003, a typical year for her as a senior teacher, manager, and performer:

Head of Vocal Studies, ANU School of Music

Out of the Ashes, Bushfire Appeal Concert for Canberra New Music Ensemble, National Gallery of Australia

Committee Member for NITA and ANU Board of the Faculties

Executive Producer, Ravel L’enfant et les sortilèges/Mozart Der Schauspieldirektor for George Limb Opera Company (the School’s opera arm)

Staff Representative, Board of Studies, ANU School of Music Recital with John Luxton, A Viennese Sandwich from Trzesniewski

Canberra International Chamber Music Festival, Opening Concert and Surprise Concert

Adjudicator, 14th Australian International Music Festival (Choral Performance), at the AIS Arena

Adjudicator, ACT Lieder Society Festival of Song

Cord Garben Masterclass

Leadership Interaction Discussion Forum

Managing Difficult Discussions Workshop

Arnold Schönberg's Pierrot Lunaire with the Eingana Ensemble, National Gallery of Australia.

Though the integration of the CSM with ANU began with the Dawkins’ education reforms of the late1980s, it took until 2004 for the CSM to be fully absorbed into the ANU, which also marked an unhappy turning point for Angela. Disappointed and frustrated by the incongruities and constraints of economic rationalism and application of productivity metrics within a school of music, Angela decided to resign, and left the ANU gracefully and without fuss.

Then, freed of bureaucratic constraints, Angela took full opportunity to perform and teach music independently. She was unsurprised when in 2013 the ANU Council voted to collapse funding and staffing in the School of Music to levels which Council saw as appropriate to its own conceptions of staffing needs – even if, in Angela’s view, these were unsuited to effective learning and mentoring in music.

Angela has since concluded that schools of music do not belong within universities. A school of music, she believes, should have a high degree of autonomy, independent of other measures of university scholarship, and permitted to manage its own special needs in funding and staffing, in much the same way as do the National Institute of Dramatic Art and the Australian Institute of Sport. In such centres, progress of students through courses of study is not regulated according to standard academic criteria and metrics – assessment (as is the case for NIDA) is based on artistic excellence. While research and scholarship are central to tradition and practice in universities, artistic performance is at the core of music education. And scholarly research cannot be equated to artistic performance.

Angela spends her post-ANU years as a freelance musician and producer, wiser and stronger, balancing her musical life across performance and teaching and mentoring. Despite or perhaps because of the trials she experienced in her nine years at the ANU, she has achieved what she set out to do in her early days in Australia and Europe – a fitting culmination for a life which owed so much to the stimulus of inspirational teachers and wise mentors at Ascham and Frensham, and at the conservatoria in Sydney and Vienna.

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Angela married college teacher Rob Wilton in 1988, soon after she returned to Australia from Europe, with Rob bringing to their marriage his daughter Cassandra and son Rainer. A son, John, was born to Angela and Rob in 1990. Cassandra and Rainer have made professional lives for themselves, while John is currently studying languages at Sydney University, and practicing as a performing musician and administrator.

The ANU Emeritus Faculty now provides a new academic home for Angela, from where she shares her talents with her many friends and supporters, both within the university and beyond in the wider community. She is an activist still, taking responsibility at times for musical events for ANU and for others. From time to time she visits Europe and her old haunts and friends, these days often finding her way as a touring cyclist with husband Rob.