As director of the Brisbane Music Festival, pianist and composer Alex Raineri is renowned for a musical vision in which traditional classical works and contemporary musical practices are understood as parts of a vast, borderless continuum. He regularly commissions new works, and his list of collaborative partnerships is eye-wateringly long. On Homegrown, Raineri is joined by soprano Rebecca Cassidy, a fellow Queenslander whose star is on the rise, her regular performances with Opera Queensland and the Queensland Symphony Orchestra attracting praise for her rich tone and vocal dexterity. 

Homegrown features works by an intergenerational group of Australian composers, including Dulcie Holland, Miriam Hyde, Mary Mageau and Peggy Glanville-Hicks, as well as living composers Betty Beath, Linda Kouvaras, Deborah Cheetham Fraillon, Melody Eötvös and Lisa Cheney. Nature, place and motherhood are common lyrical themes, with many compositions comprising musical settings of existing poetic works. 

One of the most arresting is Mary Mageau’s treatment (1992) of Son of Mine (1960) by Oodgeroo Noonuccal, who may be better known to some readers as Kath Walker, renowned Aboriginal poet and activist....