One of Limelight’s recent 30 under 30s excels in ASO debut with Orff and Rach.

Festival Theatre, Adelaide

May 16, 2014

In this month’s Limelight magazine, conductor Nicholas Carter has been listed amongst the “new classical superstars” quickly travelling from assistant conductor of the Sydney Symphony to resident conductor at the Hamburg State Opera with Simone Young before taking on positions with both the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra and the formidable Deutsche Oper, Berlin. After conducting the Adelaide band in the recent State Opera production of La Traviata, it was time to make his debut with the orchestra in his capacity as Associate Guest Conductor with Carl Orff’s monumental scenic cantata Carmina Burana. And from the oh so familiar opening chorus O Fortuna!, it was apparent that here was something special.

How many conductors would choose to give their debut with a combined body of over two hundred and fifty choristers and musicians? Yet excel is exactly what Carter did, with an almost viscerally exciting account of this highly percussive and often monophonic work. Mind you, Carter has a long personal history with it having sung in many performances of the work both as a boy treble and adult chorister.

Three choirs were...