Last Friday afternoon, concertgoers in the Federation Concert Hall came together to celebrate the career of Tasmania’s cello star Sue-Ellen Paulsen. She gave her official farewell performance by way of a Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra matinee, in which she performed three short works in a beautifully curated program. The event was titled Swansong; a charming pun that united the sentiment of the occasion with one of the most beloved pieces of the performance.

Sue-Ellen Paulsen. Photo supplied

Paulsen has enjoyed an illustrious career as principal cello with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra since 1986. A burgeoning artist who first won the 1980 ABC Concerto Competition and a scholarship to study music in Vienna, she pursued her orchestral and solo career in Australia. But she has also formed valuable relationships with generations of musicians as she teaches cello at the University of Tasmania Conservatorium of Music – and has influenced contemporary composers who have written passages for her instrument knowing she’d be playing, a fact TSO violist William Newbery announced when he took to the stage to introduce the concert. He shared that he’d first seen Paulsen perform an impressive Shostakovich Cello Concerto No 1, and...