This year’s hopefuls have submitted proposals that look to take classical music in fresh directions.

When Paul Dean pulled me aside in the corridor to quickly tell me that I would be joining the Australian World Orchestra for 2013 as a part of their academy, all I could do was blink and nod (although this is not an uncommon reaction from a viola player). It was a few minutes later that his words actually sank in.  The AWO is an orchestra founded two years ago, formed with the aim to bring the best Australian orchestral players together from around the world. Among them this year you might glimpse an awe-struck girl sitting among the violas – that would be me. Both in 2011 and this year, the AWO has included a few students as a part of the AWO Academy, designed to allow younger musicians the chance to play alongside some of the most successful Australian instrumentalists around. We’re there to listen, to learn, and to discover the depth of talent that we sometimes forget comes from our home, thinking that Australians could never live up to the standard of classical music centres like Europe and America. Since then, a few things have happened – emails have been exchanged, practice parts sent, printed, and scrawled…