Opera Australia performs at Vivid Live for the first time with a concert featuring music by Adams, Dessner and Greenwood.

The Australian Romantic & Classical Orchestra is attracting Australian musicians home, says clarinettist Nicole van Bruggen.

Rare musicians of the finest calibre in a thoughtful and provocative QSO concert.

Miriam Margolyes and the ASO are a dream team, their respect and love for orchestral music is infectious.

A live rendition of Glass's iconic hyper-score still thrills decades on.

Richard Strauss’s Elektra premiered in 1909, representing the cutting edge of modernist expressionism. Two years later, Der Rosenkavalier proved an even bigger triumph. Also to a libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, this opera was crammed with tuneful waltzes in imitation of the ‘other Strauss’. Musically it seemed like a backward step, but Strauss had never aimed to be progressive. A true man of the theatre, he simply treated Hofmannsthal’s subject matter as the drama demanded. Hearing both works today, it is clear they have much in common: soaring soprano lines, restless chromatic harmonies and extremely lush orchestration.   Strauss prepared two “Waltz Sequences” from Der Rosenkavalier for concert use. A longer suite was arranged by the conductor Artur Rodzinski. It was reworked later by Josef Krips, who restored the concluding music of the opera in place of Rodzinski’s inflated ending. (The Rodzinski version is performed here, but I prefer the Krips.) The suite from Elektra is new: “conceptualised” by Manfred Honeck and realised by Tomáš Ille. In both cases I miss the vocal component, especially in the Presentation of the Rose and the great final trio of Rosenkavalier. In the melodramatic Elektra, all of Strauss’s orchestral wizardry… Continue reading Get…

CPE Bach performances that blow everything else away.

Australian composer Alfred Hill clearly liked to borrow music from himself, as his Piano Concerto in A features here on this Hyperion release alongside its source material – his Piano Sonata in A. Johannes Fritzsch leads Piers Lane and the Adelaide Symphony through this glowing, romantic score.   The concerto is being recorded 75 years after its Australian premiere. Lane’s performance is touching; patient with his melody, he seems to treasure each note with understanding and tenderness. The third movement Nocturne – (Homage to Chopin) – is filled with yearning, swells in the strings given added presence by gentle timpani. The album is well mixed, enabling us to hear and feel the communication between each part. Its finale is tasteful and radiant. Between the two Hill works sits George Boyle’s Piano Concerto in D Minor – perhaps the earliest work composed in this form in Australia. Coincidentally, its premiere was conducted by Hill in 1913. The work is theatrical and classy, taking us back to an era long past. After its hearty conclusion, Hill’s Piano Sonata then brings things down a notch. With all other instruments gone, it seems… Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe…

The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra's chief will also head Austria's Stadttheater Klagenfurt and Kärntner Sinfonieorchester.

Filling the void left by Hobart Baroque, Julia Fredersdorff's new period ensemble will launch at Ten Days on the Island.

Musically mind-blowing – a highly talented, intelligent collaborative period music ensemble.

A beautifully presented programme radiating professionalism and polish.