The Peninsula Summer Music Festival will return from 2–10 January, 2027, with 14 events celebrating Australian musical talent across the Mornington Peninsula’s churches, gardens, vineyards and picturesque settings.

Festival directors Ben Opie and Melissa Doecke have assembled a program spanning baroque, jazz and chamber music. The program includes a series of one-off collaborations, with a particular focus on Australian women in music.

Opie and Doecke says they’re “thrilled to showcase the extraordinary talent of Australian women in music,” in particular those of violin star (and 2027 Festival Artist) Emily Sun, who will join acclaimed pianist Aura Go for two concerts at Moorooduc Estate (5 January), before taking centre stage at the Festival Gala for Schubert’s Trout Quintet.

Emily Sun. Portrait supplied

Based in London where she currently Violin Professor at the Royal College of Music, Sun has performed at venues including the Royal Albert Hall, Wigmore Hall, Tchaikovsky Great Hall and Seoul Arts Center.

Her debut album, Nocturnes (ABC Classic/Universal), reached No. 1 on the ARIA Classical Charts, while her more recent release, Film Fantasia, has also attracted critical acclaim.

The Peninsula Summer Music Festival opening weekend begins on 2 January at St John’s Anglican Church in Flinders, where baritone Christopher Hillier joins Inventi Ensemble for Songs and Serenades at Sunset.

The following afternoon, 3 January, the outstanding young Melbourne pianist Charlie Wu – who, at 13 won the Grand Prix at Moscow’s Grand Piano Competition – performs with the Nightingale Trio, before Opie and Doecke lead Baroque by Candlelight that evening, joined by international guest oboists Francesco Ciarmatori of Italy and Mélissa Tremblay of Canada.

Andrea Keller. Portrait © Ian Laidlaw

Jazz takes the spotlight on 4 January when the much-loved Twilight Sessions at Montalto brings together three-time ARIA Award-winning pianist Andrea Keller and saxophonist Sandy Evans, with double bassist Helen Svoboda and drummer Kyrie Anderson, for a program featuring original works. Earlier that day, a free family performance by Melbourne Puppet Kerfuffle takes place at Balnarring Civic Reserve.

Sun and Go’s two performances at Moorooduc Estate on 5 January, are followed by a 7 January recital by Charlotte Miles at Port Phillip Estate on 7 January in which the rising star cellist will perform works by Ligeti, Bach and Hans Bottermund, alongside kalkii by Dr Lou Bennett and Paul Stanhope.

One of the festival’s more distinctive offerings returns on 8 January, when Bach and Bathe invites audiences to enjoy the thermal waters of Peninsula Hot Springs while listening to Bach’s Goldberg Variations. The performance features Melbourne Symphony Orchestra principal viola Christopher Moore, violinist Zoë Black and cellist Molly Kadarauch.

The festival’s major orchestral event, the Festival Gala on 9 January at Flinders Civic Hall, will feature the world premiere of a violin concerto by Australian pianist and composer Kym Alexandra Dillon, performed by Emily Sun with the Festival Orchestra under conductor Simon Bruckard.

Natsuko Yoshimoto. Portrait supplied

The orchestra will also perform arrangements of Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune and Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony. Among the participating musicians is Queensland Symphony Orchestra concertmaster Natsuko Yoshimoto.

The festival also continues its engagement with First Nations communities on the peninsula. On 10 January, Indigenous violinist, composer and dance practitioner Eric Avery will perform his original works with Fiasco Quartet at Willum Warrain.

The Peninsula Summer Music Festival runs from January 2–10, 2027, at venues across the Mornington Peninsula.

A preview event on 4 December at Main Ridge Estate will offer an early taste of the festival, with Fiasco Quartet performing Haydn’s F minor quartet and Glazunov’s Third Quartet in an intimate vineyard setting. Tickets are limited to 50.