Jack Symonds is Artistic Director of Sydney Chamber Opera, as well as a composer, conductor and pianist. Fascinated by complex musical ideas, he never wants to make work that resembles anything else – whether he’s programming it or writing it himself.
A bemused Jack Symonds clearly wasn’t prepared for my question: “What do you want on your gravestone – composer, performer, conductor or producer?” At 34, the co-founder and Artistic Director of Sydney Chamber Opera hasn’t bothered to think that far ahead. But it’s remarkably rare for anyone to encompass such a breadth of musical activities and manage to maintain both balance and quality.
Jack Symonds. Photo © Zan Wimberley
Last year, for instance, he produced Antarctica, a full-length opera by Mary Finsterer in Australia, then conducted its premiere in Amsterdam at the Holland Festival. With the 14-piece Dutch new music group Asko|Schönberg travelling to Australia in January, Antarctica will open the Sydney Festival. Symonds also presented a staging of the Benjamin Britten/Luke Styles compilation, Awakening Shadow, in Sydney, leading the band from the piano. And he spent time working with the Australian String Quartet, preparing...
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