Your essential coast-to-coast guide to the Australian music being played on our concert stages this month.

Your essential coast-to-coast guide to the Australian music being played on our concert stages this month.

The interwoven stories of siblings Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn told in well-chosen words and first-rate, no-fuss musicianship.

Flinders Quartet celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2025. Founding cellist Zoe Knighton has no regrets. Well, maybe just one.

With 18 more composers set to write new works, the ANAM Set will have commissioned 105 pieces by the end of next year.

A world premiere, a Beethoven deep-dive and a theatrical reflection on the Mendelssohns make for a highly-crafted 2024 for the Flinders Quartet.

Nick Cave, Warren Ellis, Bryony Marks, Tim Minchin and 23 first-time composers have been nominated for their contributions to the silver screen.

A mixed program of contemporary works, carried by an exhilarating Australian premiere from New York choreographer Justin Peck.

Cameron Lam started out looking at the sky and pondering the stars, but his thoughts quickly turned to contemplations of death, mourning, bird song, and distant landscapes.

David Hallberg’s first year as Artistic Director of The Australian Ballet has been challenging, to say the least, due to COVID, but he is full of passion and high expectations for 2022.

Sergeant David Griffin was just 27-years old when he wrote The Happiness Box in wartime Singapore. The year was 1942, and the POW wished to create a story for Changi Jail’s child prisoners. Griffin’s fellow inmate Leslie Greener crafted illustrations (which form the cover of this release). Before the final product could be confiscated by the Japanese, the book was buried in an ammunition container for safekeeping, arriving in Australia after the war. It was published in 1947 and now almost seven decades later has been set to music by composer Bryony Marks. Quite a story, right? But despite its heavy history, this is a work that will reach many a child’s heart. It opens with conductor Brett Kelly introducing the instruments and their roles in shaping the characters, and then the Melbourne Symphony begins to tell the story with narration from Stephen Curry. It’s charming and frolicking, and rings with the memories of an Australian countryside Griffin may have yearned for during his captivity and creation of the book. The work is fast-paced and inspires us to visualise Griffin’s story (without ever lingering for too long on any musical idea). Even for an adult listener, it’s… Continue reading Get…