It might have been a cold, wet Friday night in Sydney, but the Paddington Town Hall felt cosy as the chiming of Olivia Bettina Davies’ electro-acoustic Femme slid seamlessly into Sungji Hong’s Black Arrow, Jason Noble’s bass clarinet warbling timbral trills against anxious electronics. The evocative pairing kicked off Ensemble Offspring’s micro-festival Kontiki Racket, in its second iteration following a successful debut in 2016, which spanned two days of new music – as well as food, drink, conversation and more.

Ensemble Offspring Artistic Director Claire Edwardes at Kontiki Racket. Photo © Christopher Hayles

EO’s Artistic Director Claire Edwardes kicked off the first of six world premieres at the festival with a performance of Canadian star composer Nicole Lizée’s Ribbon Windows A, the first movement of what will be a sister piece to Xenakis’ Rebonds. This was a more intimate work than the Xenakis (or indeed the complex audiovisual works by Lizée that have been performed in Sydney in recent years) with a palette drawing on the susurrus of sand paper against drum skins and temple blocks – alongside stamping “shh” exhalations and melodica – which Edwardes paired with...