Schubert Overwritten | Rob Hao Friday September 8, 2023, Utzon Room, Sydney Opera House We were treated to a fascinating recital at the Utzon Room with the additional benefit of a great harbour backdrop. Titled “Overwritten”, all the works were written by Franz...
Selby & Friends | Three Stages of Man Sunday September 3, 2023, Turramurra Uniting Church Rachmaninoff had a lot to contend with in his early life. His father was against his musical career and later abandoned the family while two of his beloved sisters died...
Sydney Mozart Society | Frank Celata and Friends! 22 August, 2023, The Concourse, Chatswood What a Program header - Frank Celata and Friends! Frank is well known to Sydney Mozart Society followers as an amiable and brilliant clarinettist and it was no surprise to find...
Sydney Mozart Society | Kathryn Selby and Andrew Haveron May 25, 2023, The Concourse, Chatswood Beethoven’s Kreutzer Sonata is a momentous work - what other work has a book and a sonata by another composer named after it? Just as the Eroica Symphony did, it changed...
Sydney Symphony Orchestra | Elgar's Cello Concerto - Powerful Inspirations Thurs April 20, 2023, Sydney Opera House Wow - I don’t know whose brow was mopped more, the conductor’s, the violinists’, the flautists’ or mine. I had never heard Shostakovich’s tenth...
Sydney Mozart Society| Clemens Leske and Daniel Herscovitch Friday 14 April, The Concourse Chatswood It was brave of the Sydney Mozart Society to put on a programme of music for four piano hands and their bravery was rewarded in spades. Clemens Leske and Daniel...
Orange Chamber Music Festival 2023 March 9 to 12, 2023 | Orange, NSW It was a nostalgic experience driving to the Central West of NSW as I was a regular at the Mudgee Music Festival for 20 years. The two festivals are quite different however with the Orange Chamber...
Australian Haydn Ensemble | CPE Bach: Universe of Harmony December 11, 2022, City Recital Hall, Sydney It’s difficult to believe that in the second half of the eighteenth century, Carl Philip Emanuel Bach was far more famous than his illustrious father. Indeed when...
Sydney Symphony Orchestra | Simone Young Conducts Beethoven November 24, Sydney Opera House To stage a concert performance of such a dramatic opera as Fidelio is a huge undertaking so imagine the task ahead when the title heroine performer had to withdraw the day...
Mendelssohn is one of many composers, in my opinion, who wrote a lot of average material and the occasional brilliant piece. His violin concerto and Hebridean overture are two of the latter and so is the music he composed for Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”...