Table of contents for July 2018 in Limelight

HERE’S TO EQUALITY IN MUSIC... We recently received some research from UK classical label Drama Musica’s DONNE project, analysing Women in Music. They had crunched the numbers on the mainstage 2018-2019 programs of 15 of the world’s leading orchestras, including the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. Of the 1445 concerts worldwide, only 76 included works by a female composer. There were 3524 musical works featured, a mere 82 of which were written by women. Damning statistics. The inequality of women composers in Australian classical music is something of a theme in the current issue. This month, Monash University in Melbourne is staging The Gender Diversity in Music Making Conference. One of the convenors, Joel Crotty, looks at the history of the event in our Backstage column. Meanwhile, Rosalind Appleby explores the changes…

HATS OFF TO RICHARD GILL I commend Richard Gill on his ongoing contribution to music in Australia. Readers of Limelight and music educators widely are indebted to him for his ongoing leadership in music education and the encouragement of young performers. His articles show a deep and continuing involvement with performance. By way of his leadership in this area, a bright musical future is possible for many young people. Thank you to Limelight and Richard Gill. Beryl Jones, Kew, VIC CAMPING WITH GUY As a country kid, city music camps [referred to in Guy Noble’s Limelight Soapbox in April] helped me grow up, play better, and meet people who were just like me! Billeting with families was scary at first but I have made lifelong friends. They were joyous times.…

Composer and double bassist Daniel Dean has seen the world premiere of his work recorded and broadcast by Sydney classical music radio station Fine Music. Titled Quadrivial Concertino for Oboe and String Orchestra, Dean’s work secured him the Fine Music 102.5 Willoughby Symphony Orchestra Young Composer Award. With a cash prize of $5000, the award meant that Dean’s Concertino was performed as part of the Willoughby Symphony Orchestra’s season at The Concourse in Chatswood. “I’m absolutely thrilled to have won!” Dean told Limelight. “I’m quite new to composition, and for my whole life I’ve always felt like I’ve been playing catch-up to my more talented friends as a musician, so to win this prize is a really huge deal for me personally. I’m very happy that I have something real…

Cantaloube Anna Moffo: Songs of the Auvergne American SO/ Leopold Stokowski SONY G010003424134X I listened to this album endlessly when I was a student at the Australian National University. I’m a huge fan of Anna Moffo’s rich creamy voice, and these gorgeous songs showcase her talent so perfectly. Antônio Carlos Jobim Stone Flower CTI RECORDS 6002 I can’t remember how I came across this album of jazz and bossa nova, mostly written by Jobim, a Brazilian singer/songwriter. It came out in 1970, well before I was born, but I love its slow and sultry feel which is just perfect on a lazy Sunday. Leonard Bernstein West Side Story, Original Motion Picture Soundtrack COLUMBIA 2070 In Bernstein’s centenary year, I’ve been lucky to perform so much of his music. West Side…

WANDA WIŁKOMIRSKA 1929 – 2018 The formidable Polish violinist Wanda Wiłkomirska has died at the age of 89. Born in Warsaw on January 11, 1929, it was her father Alfred who first taught her the violin. She later pursued the instrument more seriously at the Lodz Academy of Music and the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, winning a number of awards in her time at both. Wiłkomirska became the Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra’s principal soloist in 1955, a position that she held for 22 years. She made her American debut with the Orchestra in ‘61, which kicked off her international career. In 1969, Wiłkomirska gave 37 performances in Australia, which she later migrated to. She was the first violinist to perform a solo recital at the Sydney Opera…

“Playing outdoor concerts in 35-degree heat in regulation dress is a health hazard” Ever found your mind wandering during a concert, checking out the sartorial standards of the musicians? Ever wondered why orchestral musicians are still dressing so formally, so conventionally in hot, constricting, formal concert blacks? This is the 21st century after all when the buzzword around orchestral and classical concerts is accessibility! As a result, we’ve become increasingly used to seeing concerts jazzed up with lighting and projections presumably to sate our perceived insatiable appetite for visual stimulation and our ever-shortening attention spans. Oh, and to attract younger audiences – who listen with their eyes! Speaking of audiences, you’ve probably noticed many of us are dressing more casually and bring beverages into the concert hall (good grief, my…

Poor old Beethoven. He had it all: chronic stomach upsets, headaches, almost permanent diarrhoea, and then there was the deafness. No wonder he suffered frequent mood swings, and some have seen even those as another symptom of an incipient malaise. His autopsy yielded a torrent of nasties: “Beethoven’s liver, shrunk to half the size of a healthy one, was leathery and covered with nodules; the spleen was black and tough and twice its normal size; the pancreas too was unusually large and hard; and each of the pale kidneys contained numerous calcified stones.” Yuk… Over the centuries since he died – his protracted agonies are yet another litany of woes – there have been many who have theorised on the causes of his ailments and ultimate end. Indeed, for many…

BORN AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND STUDIED AUCKLAND & MELBOURNE UNIS, ANAM, GRIFFITH LIKES HIKING, TABBY CATS, JAPANESE LANGUAGE DISLIKES WRITING A THESIS ON A MACBOOK ON ITS LAST LEGS! What first attracted you to the flute? At seven years old I loved the way the flute sounded like birds singing! Who are your flute heroes? The flute players I admire most are musicians before they are flute players. The flute is simply a vessel for their musicality, and one gets the sense they could create music on any instrument. I’ve just been at a fabulous five-day course in Adelaide with world-renowned orchestral player Michael Cox and have returned so inspired. His passion and vision for his music-making leads him to make courageous musical decisions that are not limited by what we…

Slava Grigoryan Bach Cello Suites Volume I ABC CLASSICS 4814553 His first solo album for 15 years, it featured three Suites performed on the baritone guitar. Capturing the timeless quality of Bach’s music, Grigoryan performed with a rich, mellow tone and great lyricism. He followed it up the next year with Volume II. Grigoryan Brothers Songs Without Words ABC CLASSICS 4815101 Citing their love of great melodies and interesting harmonic progressions, the brothers got personal with this album playing their favorite songs by the likes of Bach, Fauré, Elgar and Tchaikovsky, arranged for them by their father Edward. Band of Brothers ABC CLASSICS 4764316 The Grigoryan Brothers joined forces with the Tawadros Brothers – oud player Joseph and percussionist James – to play repertoire ranging from classical and traditional to…

What comes across most profoundly when speaking to Australian composer Ross Edwards is the aura of quiet thoughtfulness he exudes. “I suppose I’m trying to find a ritual that works for me,” he says as we sit in his cosy studio, nestled at the back of the garden at his house in Balmain (the studio is an extension on an outdoor toilet, he tells me), with a keyboard, a computer, notes and fragments of scores pinned up on the walls, and leaves pressing against the windows. “I’m very interested in spiritual things, not in any conventional way – frankly the thought of going to churches just doesn’t appeal to me – but the world of the spirit is around us all the time.” The soft-spoken composer, whose upcoming 75th birthday…

Gaelic Symphony, Piano Concerto Alan Feinberg p , Nashville SO/Kenneth Schermerhorn NAXOS 8.559139 Beach’s two major orchestral works, in good performances, on one disc. Piano Quintet et al The Ambache CHANDOS CHAN9752 Commited performances of three representative chamber works. Songs Katherine Kelton ms , Catherine Bringerud p NAXOS 8.559191 A varied selection from Amy Beach’s prolific output of songs. Variations on Balkan Themes et al Kirsten Johnson p GUILD GMCD 7329 Amy Beach’s major keyboard work, on the second of four discs of her complete piano music.…

“Andrew Manze’s immaculate attention to balance reveals inner details often obscured” Vaughan Williams Symphonies Nos 5 and 6 Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra/Andrew Manze ONYX 9029572422 Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote nine symphonies, the first relatively late in life (he was 38 when A Sea Symphony set sail in 1910) and the last at the age of 85. Those in between form a canon that reveals a composer’s maturing musical voice while charting half a century of British music-making. Many would also say they chart half a century of turbulent world history, and perhaps none more so than the equally powerful Fifth and Sixth. The Fifth – quintessential Vaughan Williams – was written in 1943 amid the hurly-burly of WWII. It contains, however, “the most benedictory and consoling music of our time,”…

“Dante is a must for anyone interested in the byways of 19th-century opera” Godard Dante Edgaras Montvidas t, Véronique Gens s, Munich Radio Orchestra/ Ulf Schirmer EDICIONES SINGULARES ES1029 (2CD & BOOK) Musically speaking we live in an age of new discoveries thanks to the mining of so many archives. What British pioneer Opera Rara has been doing for forgotten gems of the bel canto, Palazzetto Bru Zane has been doing for music of the French Romantics, and in particular the lavish spectacles of the heyday of Grand Opéra. The Parisian composer and violin virtuoso Benjamin Godard was born in 1849, tragically dying of tuberculosis at the age of 45. Prolific in his day, he composed three symphonies, around 100 songs, a wealth of chamber music, plus eight…

“Fauré’s Requiem is a stunning blend of form and function, modern yet timeless” In 1887 Britain was awash in bunting just as it was for the recent royal wedding, as Queen Victoria celebrated her Golden Jubilee, marking the 50th year of her reign. She would rule for another 13 years, and died as the longest-reigning British monarch in history – a record broken by her great-great-granddaughter Elizabeth II in September 2015. Another famous and long-serving Briton made his debut in 1887, with the publication of Arthur Conan Doyle’s detective novel A Study in Scarlet introducing the world to Sherlock Holmes. Holmes would go on to appear in four novels and 56 short stories by Conan Doyle. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, Holmes is “the most-portrayed movie character”,…

Coppelia: The Regional Tour This classic tale of magic and mischief, with its irresistible melodies and 'living dolls', is not to be missed. The Australian Ballet, National tour, July 18 – August 24 The Beginning of Nature Explores the forces that nature asserts over humankind despite how we see ourselves as separate from it. Australian Dance Theatre, National tour, until August 18 The Sleeping Beauty David McAllister’s spectacular production unfolds like a rose, drawing you into a world of wonder. The Australian Ballet, Adelaide, July 6 – 12…

PREVIEW In 1998, Dean Bryant went to see a production of Oscar Wilde’s An Ideal Husband at Sydney’s Lyric Theatre – the first theatre show staged at the newly opened venue. “It was an English production that had been recast with predominately Australians. I just went along, I wasn’t even out of WAAPA yet, and I wanted to see what this new theatre was like,” he recalls. Expecting an old-fashioned play, he found himself gripped by the exciting story. Bryant is now Associate Director at Melbourne Theatre Company with a raft of high-profile credits to his name, among them Born Yesterday, Skylight and Vivid White for MTC, and Sweet Charity, Little Shop of Horrors and Assassins for the Hayes Theatre Co. He is also the Worldwide Associate Director of Priscilla,…

LAYLA AND MAJNUN DANCE The dance-opera Layla and Majnun, created by American choreographer Mark Morris and cellist Yo-Yo Ma’s Silkroad Ensemble, is one of the highlights of this year’s Melbourne Festival in October. The production, which will be the largest version ever seen in the West, is based on an opera by the early 20th-century Azerbaijani composer Uzeyir Hajibeyli. Inspired by stories that date back to the fifth century, it is a classic tale of thwarted young love. The work is performed by musicians from the Silkroad Ensemble together with 16 dancers from the Mark Morris Dance Group. SHAKESPEARE POPS IN SYD THEATRE The beloved Pop-Up Globe will be popping up at The Entertainment Quarter, Moore Park in Sydney this September, putting on an epic Shakespearean festival that will take…

Ideal Home Opens: July 5 Genre: Comedy Duration: 90 minutes Coogan and Rudd entertain as a pair of unlikely gay dads In this entertaining US comedy, celebrity lifestyle TV show host Erasmus (Steve Coogan) and his director/life partner Paul (Paul Rudd) are a perpetually squabbling couple forced to adjust their hedonistic lifestyle by the abrupt arrival of a pint-sized relative requiring care. Erasmus’s estranged grown son has just been thrown in jail, leaving the self-obsessed celebrity to look after the sullen grandson he didn’t know he had. An adult suddenly being landed with a child to care for (and usually being changed in the process) is a familiar movie scenario from as far back as 1921 and Charlie Chaplin’s silent era film The Kid. In the 1990s it became popular…

MONDAY - FRIDAY 6am Classic Breakfast Start your day with a delicious selection of the best in classical music 10am Classic Mornings Spend your morning with great music, including new releases and classic performances, plus the latest news and stories from the world of music 1pm Lunchtime Concert The best concerts from Australia and around the world 3pm Music in Time and more Music in Time / Legends / Passenger / Duet / Game Show 4pm Classic Drive A journey home through classical sounds, designed to relax, refresh and delight you 8pm Evenings Concerts from Australian and international ensembles plus music to help you wind down 12am Night Music Classical music that’s perfect for all-night listening, presented by some of your favourite ABC Classic FM voices SATURDAY 6am Weekend Breakfast…

BEANIE’S MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS Naxos dominates the market when it comes to classical music apps for children. Limelight recently reviewed its highly popular My First Classical Music App, geared towards children aged four and above, providing an entertaining overview of the genre and its biggest rock stars. This time we’re turning our attention to Beanie’s Musical Instruments, an ideal introduction to musical instruments for toddlers and their families. Children are sure to fall in love with their guide, Beanie, a teddy bear who plays 24 instruments on a stage and has the answers to any questions likely to arise. The sound quality of the played instruments is of a high standard, while the judicious balance of text and image is always compelling. A simple but attractive design avoids kiddy schmaltz –…

“She bought a box set with all the rockstars: Beethoven, Brahms, Bach, and Chopin” My father is a violinist. As a child growing up in Baghdad, he was really obsessed with these Jewish musicians who played in teahouses where poets and prostitutes hung out. It was just unheard of for a boy from a strictly Islamic family to enjoy this music and want to play the violin. Luckily, he eventually won a scholarship to study in Budapest, which is where he met my mum. Although he was familiar with the Western greats, it was really my mother whose deep love for classical music introduced me to that world. I was about five when she bought a huge box set of records off the TV with all the big rock stars…

GREATEST HITS Leonard Cohen, Columbia 88697581772 Leonard Cohen’s Greatest Hits is so full of joy and sorrow and introspection and wonder at life. It’s a break up and falling in love album all at once. He was one of those poets that just spoke to your heart. I was hesitant to pick this because I think Leonard Cohen is one of those masters that everybody picks, but it’s just full of my favourite songs – Famous Blue Raincoat, Suzanne, Sisters of Mercy. He’s a giant of artistic and intellectual talent. God rest him.…

MAIRI NICOLSON GUEST COLUMN PAGE 18 Mairi’s career with the ABC and BBC has taken her from the Sydney Opera House and Hamer Hall to New York’s Avery Fisher Hall and the Royal Albert Hall in London. Radio, ‘live’ music, travel and media coaching with young singers and instrumentalists are her passions. ROSALIND APPLEBY WOMEN COMPOSERS PAGE 42 Rosalind is a Perth-based journalist, author and writer for the Australian Book Review and Opera magazine (London). Her book Women of Note completes the missing jigsaw pieces in Australian music history. In 2012, she founded the blog Noted covering the Perth arts scene. BREANDÁIN O’SHEA RAVENNA PAGE 64 An Australian arts journalist and musician in Berlin, Breandáin produces arts programs for Deutsche Welle. His Inspired Minds series features 500 in-depth interviews. He…

TIME FOR AN AUSTRALIAN TOP 100 PLEASE, ABC CLASSIC FM “Dance”, the theme of the latest ABC Classic FM Top 100, was exciting, highly interactive, and undoubtedly attracted a new audience. However, Charles Moses, Bernard Heinze and other ABC pioneers would be aggrieved to see the failure to showcase Australian music. Australian performers are revered here because of their overseas success, but not our composers. We heard a US music big bash one weekend recently, and our cultural ties ensure that British music is never far away. As a nation, exposure and pride in our music has not reached those levels, but we’re getting closer. Kats-Chernin, Westlake, Koehne, Vine and many other highly attractive composers are often in our ears, and many less familiar names are turning our listening heads,…

What makes the sound of Stradivarius violins so special? Musicians and collectors have long prized Italian violin maker Antonio Stradivari’s instruments. According to a team of researchers in Taiwan, however, while “the construction methods of Amati and Stradivari have been carefully examined, the underlying acoustic qualities which contribute to their popularity are little understood.” The team’s study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, has shed some light on this mystery, based on baroque violinist Geminiani’s claim that the ideal violin sound should “rival the most perfect human voice”. The research team, consisting of Hwan-Ching Tai, Yen-Ping Shen, Jer-Horng Lin, and Dai-Ting Chung has published the findings of a study comparing 15 antique Italian violins with eight male and eight female singers. The researchers observed, by examining factors…

A new report on the current state of gender equality in dance has been released, with a particular focus on the dearth of women in artistic and leadership roles despite the industry being dominated by women. Turning Pointe: Gender Equality in Australian Dance scrutinises companies in the Major Performing Arts sector as well as their multi-year funded counterparts. With research conducted over the past 12 months in conjunction with an advisory committee of industry experts including Lucy Guerin, Amy Hollingsworth, Stephanie Lake, and Carin Mistry, the report identifies the ways in which women are underrepresented in artistic and leadership roles. “For a long time people have been talking about gender equality in dance both in Australia and internationally, but we didn’t have the data to understand the full picture,” report…

“It makes my head hurt. It’s as if the artist statement has become the art itself” My partner Yvonne East was a finalist in the 2018 Archibald Prize with a magnificent portrait of the Chief Justice of the High Court, Susan Kiefel. She had to write an artist’s statement – those little white boards beside the painting where an artist describes the meaning behind the creation. I am pleased to say she opted for clear English expressing the reasons behind her choice of subject and what the purpose of the painting was. It is not always so. Some artist statements really are deliciously awful mini-essays in art jargon, I’m never sure if they are completely taking the piss. Examine this from a work by Jason Martin called Behemoth, displayed at…

What was your gateway into music? I picked up a flute that was sitting around my house when I was in early high school. Basically, I enjoyed the marching band and I taught myself to read and play from the band method book. While I was in high school, I made the decision to major in music. And what kind of classical music were you listening to then? Zero. I grew up on pop music. The only things that I knew in classical music were the pieces I was learning on the flute. How did composition become an all-consuming passion? As a child, I’d always been interested in things that were creative. It’d always been visual art, but there was something about the power of music I thought was entrancing.…

LIZA LIM Known for her intricately sensuous scores and cross-cultural practice, Liza Lim returned to Australia in 2017 after eight years as Professor of Composition and Director of the Centre for Research in New Music (CeReNeM) for the University of Huddersfield in the UK. She is a Professor of Composition at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music where she heads the Composing Women program. She has been commissioned by some of the world’s pre-eminent orchestras and has collaborated closely with Australia’s ELISION Ensemble. Her fourth opera, Tree of Codes, which premiered in Cologne in 2015, was seen at last month’s Spoleto Festival. CAT HOPE Cat Hope’s music explores the bottom end of the sound spectrum which she considers to be neglected and extremely beautiful. She tours internationally with her ensemble Decibel…

LIVED 1867 – 1944 MOSTLY IN BOSTON, NEW YORK BEST KNOWN FOR GAELIC SYMPHONY, PIANO CONCERTO, VARIATIONS ON BALKAN THEMES SIMILAR TO CHOPIN, MENDELSSOHN, SCHUMANN, BRAHMS, LISZT, WAGNER Amy Beach was recognised in her lifetime as the leading American woman composer of her day. This could have been faint praise at a time when women were widely considered intellectually incapable of creating anything more ambitious than piano salon pieces and songs. But although she wrote her fair share of those, Beach won success and respect with large-scale works such as a Mass, a symphony and a piano concerto. All the same, her career raises the question of whether society’s expectations and prejudices might have held her back from becoming not just a very good composer, but one of the greats.…

This is your third Vaughan Williams Symphony recording. What draws you to his music? As a boy I was attracted by the music’s beauty: the Serenade to Music, the Mass, the Five Mystical Songs. The opening of the Fifth Symphony captivated me, whereas the Sixth scared me off. As I get older, I realise it is Vaughan Williams’ sincerity I cherish. His roots lie deep in the English musical subsoil (old church hymns and folk music) and his music emerged from those roots via his heart and instinct. So now I find I am in sympathy even with his most rugged, stern pieces. It’s always interesting to see links or common themes between works. Do you see common threads in the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies? I would draw a comparison…

“Davis and his BBC forces are adept at bringing out the subtleties of Bliss’ tonal palette” Bliss Emily Birsan s, Ben Johnson t, BBC Symphony Orchestra & Chorus/Sir Andrew Davis CHANDOS CHSA5191 Age and seniority in the musical world were not much help to Sir Arthur Bliss when it came to the premiere of his major work, The Beatitudes. One of a number of commissions for a festival celebrating the opening of the new Coventry cathedral in 1961, this large-scale meditation on the nine beatitudes of Jesus was meant to be performed in the cathedral on the day of its consecration. One of the other commissions, however, was Britten’s War Requiem. This subsequently more famous work by the younger composer proved to be so challenging that Bliss’s performance had to…

PREVIEW He dined with Claude Monet. He painted with (and painted) Vincent van Gogh. He went to concerts with Auguste Rodin. He explained impressionist colour theory to Matisse. Yet it wasn’t until the middle of the 20th-century that the work of Australian painter John Russell was rediscovered – and even now he’s not a household name in the way that many of his friends and colleagues are. This is something the Art Gallery of New South Wales’ Head Curator of Australian Art Wayne Tunnicliffe is hoping to change with a new exhibition titled John Russell: Australia’s French Impressionist, the first survey of the Russell’s work in 40 years, which will explore his unique place amongst the most influential artists in France. “These were artists who were in and out of…

“Mauceri offers solutions to pitfalls of guest conducting, languages and even diet” MUSIC Maestros and Their Music John Mauceri Knopf, HB, pp272, $44.99 ISBN 9780451494023 From one Maestro to another: some intriguing analyses For over half a century now the American conductor John Mauceri has conducted and recorded many forms of music internationally including opera, musicals, symphonic works, ballets and film soundtracks – winning many awards. He is also an academic of note, serving at Yale amongst other institutions and he spent nearly two decades working directly with that other great Renaissance man of music, Leonard Bernstein. Although he has written for major American papers, Maestros and Their Music is Mauceri’s first book. It is a short and compact tome. At just under 250 pages in length, it is one…

Two thrilling competitions will be broadcast live on ABC Classic FM in July – the ABC Young Performers Awards and the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. First up is MICMC: eight string quartets and eight piano trios will compete in heats before each stream is whittled down to five groups who will go on to the Semi-Finals. The five Semi-Finals concerts will be broadcast Friday July 6 from 9:30am followed by the two Finals concerts from 1pm on Sunday July 8. The Semi-Finals of the ABC Young Performers Awards, in Sydney this year, will be broadcast from 2pm on July 16 and 17. This year’s Semi-Finalists are violinists Anna Da Silva Chen, Riley Skevington, Emily Sun and Victoria Wong, pianists Robbin Reza, Tony Lee and Shuan Hern Lee, cellists Benett…

Liam Scarlett’s new production of Swan Lake for The Royal Ballet, featuring some of his own additional choreography, was much anticipated ahead of its premiere in May. Although not a radical reimagining of one of the canon’s most beloved classics, Scarlett, who is Artist in Residence at The Royal Ballet as well as Queensland Ballet’s Artistic Associate, was praised for the freshness of his direction and attention to detail. His principal dancers won some laurels of their own, with The New York Times praising Marianela Nuñez’s “pure line, melting plasticity and smooth legato quality. Her Odette was lyrical and sorrowful; her Odile steely and sexy.” The Telegraph was similarly positive, describing her Odette as radiant and hailing her “strength, technique and sensitivity.” Critics found Nuñez to be well matched by…

FAR-FLUNG ORCHESTRAS Andrew Mellor looks at ensembles in remote places including the Faroe Islands, Alaska, Patagonia, Lapland, and Turkey to discover how they are thriving. SO MANY GRAPES ON THE VINE Australian composer Carl Vine explains what 19th-century weaving and 21st-century neuroscience have to do with the upcoming premiere of his Eighth Symphony. DAME JOAN HAMMOND TO A TEE We look back on the life of the late, great Australian soprano who gave up careers as a professional golfer and a feisty sports journalist to concentrate on singing. PLUS... · The Harp in the South on stage · Eva-Maria Westbroek in Oz · A look around Germany’s Halle and much more... ON SALE AUG 2 2018 AND MUCH SOONER FOR SUBSCRIBERS! (SEE P62)…

ABC DENIES CLOSURE ABC Classic FM’s new Content Manager Toby Chadd has hosed down rumours about the classical music station’s possible closure after an article in Crikey’s Tips and Rumours section triggered speculation about the station’s future. The rumours come following the Federal Government’s decision to pause indexation of operational funding for the broadcaster in the 2018 Budget. A COOL MIL FOR MRC The Betty Amsden Foundation has given $1 million to Melbourne Recital Centre, the largest bequest that the venue has received in its history. In memory of the late arts philanthropist Betty Amsden and her passion for music education, the considerable sum will help fund a dedicated families and children’s program. It is also hoped that the bequest will encourage the creation of new musical works geared toward…

1. Your new disc Four Worlds features a lot of Rachmaninov. What is it about his music that speaks to you? Rachmaninov’s music is diverse and requires very fine artistic insights to investigate its deepest beauty. I don’t think Rachmaninov’s piano compositions are simply virtuosic show pieces. Musically, his work often displays a kind of ‘tragic beauty’ and inspires the listener’s imagination. When I perform the Serenade in B Flat Minor, for example, I imagine that a dancer on stage tries to display the loneliness and gloominess of the music. 2. Are there any pianists who have particularly inspired your approach to his music? The recordings played by Rachmaninov himself are rarities – even today Rachmaninov’s interpretations are still attractive and advanced. In addition to his…

As Director of the Salzburg Whitsun Festival, mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli focussed this year’s program around Rossini for the 150th anniversary of his death. She also starred as Isabella in a new L’ italiana in Algeri, directed by Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier. Entering on a camel, Bartoli also sang in the bath. With the chorus smoking hookahs in time with the music, and Isabella and Lindora posing as if in the film Titanic, Gramilano described it as “a riotously witty yet respectful” production with Bartoli “magnificent”.…

In 2016, I finished my first professional commission for the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra called The Saqqara Bird. The piece had been well received. A few orchestras in the US picked it up, and I had lived my ‘emerging composer’ dream of coming back to work with the orchestra that had set my imagination on fire from the composer school workshops of my early 20s. Little did I know that just over a year later I would be speaking with the TSO again about a major commission in which I would be incorporating text from Shakespeare in a new work for orchestra and narrator. I’ve always enjoyed modern cinematic adaptations of Shakespeare. Kurosawa’s Ran was a favourite for many years, and not just because of the Takemitsu soundtrack. However, having mostly…

Right now, you’re speaking to me from Sao Pãulo, and soon you’ll be playing all across Australia. Do you thrive on touring? It’s not the touring itself. There’s a very wide range of music I love playing, and so I thrive on the variety. I’ve never been somebody who likes to tour a single program for months. I would find it too boring. [My routine] is getting up early and making myself a coffee – I hope there’s a coffee machine in the room! – and then I sit for an hour reading, thinking and just generally decompressing. I find that incredibly helpful, it clears my head for the day. Then I have breakfast, maybe work out a bit and then practise. I find I can concentrate better if I…

The names of the finalists for this year’s 35th Telstra National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art Awards (NATSIAA) were announced in April. However, we won’t know what their work looks like until the exhibition opens its doors in Darwin on August 10, and the prizes in the seven categories are announced. Luke Scholes, Curator of Aboriginal Art at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory (MAGNT), which runs the Awards, is excited at the calibre of work though. “There is a sense of innovation in so many of this year’s entries, and a feeling that artists are striving to find new ways to communicate their knowledge of, and relationships with, country. This has led to a surge in entries in the Multimedia category and artists are experimenting…

ROMANTIC Beach wrote in the Romantic tradition of composers she had encountered as a performer and listener: Chopin, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Brahms, Liszt, Wagner. She was a staunchly conservative opponent of 20th-century musical modernism and the influence of jazz. But she did admit stylistic traces of Debussy and the young Richard Strauss into some of her later works. PIANO A concert pianist with a virtuoso technique, Beach wrote for her instrument in numerous solo pieces, several chamber works and a concerto. The Concerto is an outstanding example of her command of piano texture, sonority and bravura figuration – not least in its dazzling cadenzas. SONG Beach chose songs as the vehicle for some of her most personal statements, choosing texts with care and setting them with sympathy for their scansion, meaning…

“His playing encompasses all the sparkle and the poetry inherent in Bersa’s music” Bersa Piano Music Volume 1 Goran Filipec p GRAND PIANO GP767 Not much information is available about the Croatian composer Blagoje Bersa. He was born in Dubrovnik in 1873, dying in Zagreb in 1934. Clearly a proficient pianist, he spent most of his life teaching composition at the Zagreb Music Academy but also produced a number of orchestral works, three operas, and a good deal of piano music. His music has not had many recordings, or at least none that are generally available. (If you search ‘Bersa’ at Amazon you just get multiple pages of guns and weaponry.) Considering the quality of the music on this first volume of his piano output, his neglect seems incomprehensible. Bersa…

“Those who think of Karl Böhm’s conducting as measured, even sluggish, will get a ” The D’Oyly Carte Opera Company recorded complete versions of all the Savoy Operas of WS Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan for Decca in the early 1950s (except the last two, and all without dialogue). When I was in my teens, obsessed with G&S thanks to school productions, these mono LPs reappeared on the cheap Ace of Clubs label. The best were The Mikado and HMS Pinafore, notable for the presence of longtime D’Oyly Carte baritone Martyn Green. (Ruddigore was ruddy good too). The only operas not reissued were The Sorcerer and Princess Ida, possibly because the lesser-known Peter Pratt had taken over Green’s patter roles. Thanks to Eloquence, those recordings have returned after a wait of…

The Long Forgotten Dream Neil Armfield directs this world premiere play full of humour, touching characters and even a little magic. Sydney Theatre Company, July 23 – August 25 A Taste of Honey Vaudeville meets kitchen sink in one of the great (and half-forgotten) plays of the 20th century, starring Genevieve Lemon. Belvoir, Sydney, July 21 – August 19 The Almighty Sometimes A profound study of a young woman trying to discover where her illness ends and her identity begins. Griffin Theatre, Sydney, July 27 – September 8 Gloria Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ explosive Pulitzer Prize finalist takes a scathing look at office politics, the media and modern America. Melbourne Theatre Company, June 16 – July 21 Melancholia Lars von Trier’s cinematic masterpiece is reimagined for the stage by ground-breaking playwright Declan…

Diane Arbus: American Portraits The photographs of Diane Arbus are powerful allegories of postwar America – once seen, they're rarely forgotten. National tour, until September 30 John Mawurndjul: I am the old and the new A comprehensive survey of one of Australia's leading contemporary artists. Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, until September 23 Outside: Matters of the heart in Indigenous art Deals with the beauty and importance of the land and environment to Aboriginal people. Art Gallery of Western Australia, until 2019…

NON-FICTION Last Night of the Proms: An Official Miscellany BBC Books, HB, 240pp, $27.00 ISBN 9781785943386 The Last Night of the Proms is enjoyed by millions around the world. This first and official miscellany explores the history and traditions that have developed on the last night of the world’s biggest and longest-running classical music festival. NON-FICTION Literary Britten Kate Kennedy, Ed. Boydell Press, HB, 417pp, $197.99 ISBN 9781783272853 Literary Britten: Words and Music in Benjamin Britten’s Vocal Works takes a unique approach to Britten, drawing together well-known Britten experts alongside English, music, modern language and history scholars who bring their own perspective to bear on Britten’s work. NON-FICTION Unlimited Replays William Gibbons Oxford University Press, PB, 208pp, $83.99 ISBN 9780190265267 Delving into the shifting and often contradictory definitions that emerge…

Australian Youth Orchestra: AYO July Season The AYO and conductor Courtney Lewis join forces with the winner of the 2016 SIPCA, Andrey Gugnin, to bring you a dazzlingly fresh performance of Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto. One of Britten’s most ominous works, Sinfonia da Requiem, provides a thrilling opening to the concert, and is balanced impeccably by Rachmaninov’s driving Symphonic Dances. WHEN: July 14 – 16 WHERE: Sydney, Brisbane TICKETS: $25 – $60 BOOK: 1300 668 500 [ ayo.com.au  ] ABC Young Performer Awards: Finals Three gifted musicians battle it out for the coveted title of Young Performer of the Year. Each Finalist will play a concerto accompanied by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Nicholas Milton. Be inspired by their journey, be transported by their performance,…

ABC CLASSIC FM OPERA AUSTRALIA July 7 at 1pm When it comes to Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, few can claim to have made their operatic debut in this most challenging of bel canto roles. Australian soprano Jessica Pratt did just that at the age of 28, a mere babe in the opera world, and has sung it to great acclaim all around the world since. Now the part she’s performed more than any other, Pratt brings her celebrated interpretation to the Sydney Opera House for a grand homecoming, appearing alongside the American tenor Michael Fabiano as her lover Edgardo and Giorgo Caoduro as her brother Enrico. Carlo Montanaro conducts. With a splendid top, dazzling agility and an innate sense of the musical line, Pratt harkens back to the singers of…

1. Which English singer had a role written for her by Walton when he revised his Troilus and Cressida? 2. What musical fact links Richard Nixon, Steve Jobs and Harvey Milk? 3. Which two out of Berlioz, Gounod, Saint-Saëns, Debussy and Ravel never won the Prix de Rome? 4. Which 20th-century composer based a ballet on the music of Pergolesi? 5. The symphonic poems Russia and Tamara were written by which composer? 6. Two Russian operatic ‘heroes’, Herman in Pique Dame and Alexei in The Gambler, engage in games of chance. Which of the two ultimately wins? 7. Which conductor once declared that “Brass bands are all very well in their place – outdoors and several miles away”? 8. Which out of Russian composer Piotr Ilych Tchaikovsky’s six symphonies has…