MOZART AND THE MENDELSSOHNS
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Melbourne Town Hall
Thursday July 3 at 7:30 pm
What used to be simply called the Town Hall series has apparently been amplified in its geographical scope but the essentials remain the same. The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is playing under its chief conductor, Jaime Martin, but the program isn't as barnstormingly popular as you'd expect., Yes, the forces wind up this evening's entertainment with Felix Mendelssohn's Italian Symphony in A Major (well, half of it is) of 1833 which can never wear out its welcome from the first frothing wind chords to the emphatic saltarello's last belt. But, we begin with a true rarity, even in these anti-misogynist times: Fanny Mendelssohn's Overture in C, written in 1832 and an intriguing chronological partner for her brother's brilliant symphony. As for the essential concerto, the MSO offers four of its principals - oboe Johannes Grosso, clarinet David Thomas, bassoon Jack Schiller, horn Nicolas Fleury - as soloists in Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante of 1778 . . . or is it really his? A lot of water has passed under the musicological bridge and the absence of an original score is only the start of questions about this quadruple concerto's provenance. Standard tickets run from $45 to $105, concessions are a princely $5 lower, and anyone under 18 gets in for $20, but let these last beware of the $7 transaction fee that costs a third of your admission cost - that's the way to get the young interested.
This program will be repeated in the Frankston Arts Centre on Friday July 4 at 7:30 pm, and at the Ulumbarra Theatre in Bendigo on Saturday July 5 at 7:30 pm.
JESS HITCHCOCK & PENNY QUARTET
Melbourne Recital Centre and Musica Viva Australia
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Monday July 7 at 7:30 pm
I wrote about this event (see March Diary 2025) while still living on the Gold Coast (ah, those halcyon years of heat and humidity) when the program was played at the Queensland Conservatorium on March 4 It seems a long time to be still on the road four months later for Jess Hitchcock and the Penny Quartet but here they are, fleshing out the Melbourne Recital Centre's monthly program and still (co-)sponsored by Musica Viva Australia. I have a feeling that the original program was altered before the March recital, but in its present format, nine composers offer arrangements of Hitchcock songs, including three by the singer herself as May Lyon, Matt Laing and Nicole Murphy have disappeared from the original list. It's to be hoped that the Penny personnel stay the same - violins Amy Brookman and Madeleine Jevons, viola Anthony Chataway, cello Jack Ward - especially for the program's final offering: a string quartet from American writer Caroline Shaw called Plan and Elevation: The Grounds of Dumbarton Oaks, written in 2015. Admission for your regular patron moves between $65 and $125, concessions on a sliding scale that operates between $56 and $110, the Under 40 bracket get in for $49, while First Nations peoples from any country only have to stump up $15. Your transaction fee at this site falls anywhere between $4 and $8.50 (a riveting exercise in fiscal logistics, reminiscent of Trump's mercurial tariff rates) which is hard cheese for the Aboriginal, Torres Strait, Maori etc. patrons.
FOLK REIMAGINED: EAST IN SYMPHONY
Ryan Maxwell Event
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Wednesday July 9 at 7:30 pm
What you're offered here is a transformation exercise: Chinese folk-song into symphonic form. The executants in this enterprise are the Guizhou Chinese Orchestra and a body called The Australia Orchestra. The visiting ensemble was founded in 2003 and is conducted by Long Guohong in its current Sydney and Melbourne appearances. The local group cannot be traced online (well, I can't find it) but is to be conducted by Luke Spicer, who is a well-known presence in Sydney for work with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Opera Australia. And what do you hear? For openers, there's the Guizhou Kam Grand Choir which will probably be singing a cappella. Then comes that well-worn fusion classic, the Yellow River Piano Concerto, followed by a symphonic sequence of scenes from four great classical Chinese novels, and more solid orchestra (which one?) work in a fantasy springing from the gaming activity Black Myth: Wukong which itself has to do with an Eastern monkey hero questing in the West. For soloists, you will hear Jiang Kemei playing a concerto called Deep in the Night on her jinghu (two-stringed violin) and Zhang Qianyang on the suona (double-reed oboe/horn) in one of the most famous pieces for her instrument, A Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix. Admission costs between $35 and $169 with some piddling concession reductions; groups of ten-plus and students pay between $55 and $107. On top of this, factor in that swinging transaction fee of between $4 and $8.50; could that impost factor in Chalmers' tax review, I wonder?
PASTORALE
Melbourne Chamber Orchestra
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall
Thursday July 10 at 7:30 pm
Since I've been away, Sophie Rowell has taken over the artistic directorship of the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra as well as having recently been posted to the role of associate professor of violin and chamber music at the University of Melbourne. She's been busy over the years, what with the Tankstream/Australian String Quartet and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra co-concertmaster position for eight years. Tonight, she takes her charges through two string masterworks at either end of the program: first, Barber's Adagio for Strings of 1936 - a favourite when Americans want to be serious or funereal - and Tchaikovsky's lush Serenade for Strings, written in 1880. Both of these are more than familiar, so it's as well that the central works offer some variation. Aura Go will be soloist in Doreen Carwithen's Concerto for piano and strings which the British composer wrote in 1948 and which is probably here enjoying its Australian premiere. The work's three movements appear to be worked out in solid neo-classical style with definite tonalities obtaining across its half-hour length; there's even a good old-fashioned cadenza in the Moderato e deciso conclusion. And the program takes its title from a Peter Sculthorpe excerpt, the central segment of his String Quartet No. 4 written in 1949, then upgraded to string orchestra standing in 2013. It has an even more checkered history in Sculthorpe's own recollections. but it might well be his last 'composition', as the MCO publicity has it. Still, as it's only about 4 minutes long, who wants to argue? Adult tickets range from $72 tp $124 with some reasonable concession reductions and a flat charge of $30 for students and children. The booking fee on the seat I selected was $7, which - to put it mildly - is excessive for the work involved.
This program will be repeated on Sunday July 13 at 2:30 pm.
YINYA DANA: LIGHTING THE PATH
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Hamer Hall,, Arts Centre Melbourne
Friday July 11 at 7:30 pm
In honouring the 50th anniversary of NAIDOC Week, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is paying an exceptional honour to Deborah Cheetham Fraillon whose compositions are the focus of this event. I've not encountered any of her music but I suppose that's because her recent grounds of operation have been in Melbourne, particularly with the MSO who appointed her to a five-year tenure of their First Nations Creative Chair in 2021; I did experience her work as a soprano with Short Black Opera but that was some time ago. Details about what is actually being performed tonight are hard to find. but the range operates between her 2018 Eumeralla: a war requiem for peace (two movements of which were recorded by the ABC in 2020) and last year's Earth. A pair of conductors share the honours: Aaron Wyatt and Nicolette Fraillon. as for soloists, Cheethem Fraillon will be singing, as will vocalists Jess Hitchcock and Lillie Walker. That sine qua non of Aboriginal serious music events, William Barton, brings his didgeridoo to the mix of colours and the MSO Chorus is joined by members of the Dhungala Children's Choir, an offshoot of Cheetham Fraillon's opera company. Standard tickets range from $68 to $113; concession prices are $5 cheaper which should bring on a chorus of that old favourite, Thanks for Nothing. Mob Tix are available for $25, but how do you prove your standing? Just be prepared to hand over the $7 transaction fee, whether you're a member of the First Nations or a Johnny Come Lately like me.
BENAUD TRIO 20TH ANNIVERSARY CONCERT
Melbourne Recital Centre
Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Centre
Saturday July 12 at 3 pm
Yes, it's a celebration of a kind, if a short one as it's only an hour long: no interval, quick in, quick out. The members of the Benaud Trio - brothers Lachlan Bramble (violin) and Ewen Bramble (cello), Amir Farid (piano) - still maintain a relationship; although the brothers are both associate principals with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra and Farid is based in New York. They're playing two works: Dvorak's Dumky of 1891, which they have played here before in the heyday of their Benaud-Melbourne years; and Jakub Jankowski's Piano Trio No. 2. The latter is an Adelaide composer with a modest body of work to his name. The Benauds seem to have premiered this particular trio in 2018, a few months after the debut of Jankowski's Piano Trio No. 1 from the Seraphim Trio. Now the piece is back for another airing. It would be handy if more information was available about the piece, but background is sadly lacking. Entry is a flat $50, concession $40, and you have to negotiate the Recital Centre's odd 'Transaction Fee' charge that runs from $4 to $8.50 according to some criterion that escapes me.
This program will be repeated at 6 pm.
FIESTA! DVORAK'S CELLO CONCERTO & CHINDAMO
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
Thursday July 17 at 7:30 pm
This was originally labelled 'Journey to the Americas' but has since been recast more sensibly so that it covers the entire night's work. Yes, there is some emphatically relevant-to-the-Americas music on the program in Peruvian composer Jimmy Lopez's Fiesta! Four Pop Dances for Orchestra, written in 2007 and the writer's most popular work, here promoted by tonight's conductor (and fellow-Peruvian), Miguel Harth-Bedoya who commissioned it. Joe Chindamo's Americas connection might emerge in his Concerto for Orchestra of 2021, composed for the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra; most of us would associate him with the field of jazz, and so easily American. And then we come to the large-framed Cello Concerto by Dvorak, completed in 1895 and written while the composer was living in New York during his last unhappy months directing the National Conservatory of Music. Here is a rich score loaded with melody and a splendid vehicle for its soloist, who on this occasion is German musician Raphaela Gromes; I believe she has made tours of North and Central America. Standard tickets range from $51 to $139; concession card holders might as well pay full price because their deduction is only $5. If you're under 18, you are charged $20, which makes the compulsory transaction fee of $7 sting all the more sharply.
This program will be repeated in Costa Hall, Geelong on Friday July 18 at 7:30 pm and back in Hamer Hall on Saturday July 19 at 2 pm.
AXIS MUNDI
ELISION Ensemble
Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Centre
Friday July 18 at 7 pm
The ELISION Ensemble is almost 40 years old, which puts into perspective a fair few of us who were around in its heady early years. Speaking of the few, some of the original musicians survive, including founder Daryl Buckley who remains one of the most adventurous guitarists I've come across. A fair bit of tonight's program is up-to-date, beginning and ending with 2025 compositions. Melbourne-based academic Charlie Sdraulig's fresh Air opens us up in a septet (possibly) for flute (all three played by Paula Rae), bassoon (Ben Roidl-Ward), saxophone (Joshua Hyde), trumpet (Tristram Williams), trombone (Benjamin Marks), violins (interesting as there's only one such player listed: Harry Ward) and contrabass (Kathryn Schulmeister). Then clarinet Richard Haynes performs John Rodgers' Ciacco solo for bass clarinet of 1999 before we encounter Mexican-born Julio Estrada's yuunohui'ehecatl (2010?) to be played by trumpet, trombone, bassoon and contrabass. After interval comes the program's title work, written for solo bassoon by ELISION evergreen Liza Lim in 2012-13, followed by indigenous composer Brenda Gifford's new score Wanggadhi for saxophone, trumpet, trombone and bass. Then we hear Victor Arul's Barrelled space featuring bass clarinet, saxophone, bassoon, trombone, percussion (Aditya Bhat and/or Peter Neville), and bass. If you haven't had enough, you can wait around for a post-recital performance of Double Labyrinth v2, a new construct by British writer Bryn Harrison that calls for alto and bass flute, clarinet d'amore (Haynes had one made about five years ago), clarinet in A, flugelhorn (Williams, presumably), harp (Marshall McGuire), percussion and violin. Tickets are $55, concession $45, and don't forget that peculiar transaction fee of between $4 and $8.50 that slugs every order you make.
MOZART'S CLARINET
Musica Viva Australia
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre
Tuesday July 22 at 7 pm
A trio of specialists take us through a set of works by Mozart and Beethoven in this latest Musica Viva recital. The entertainment features Nicola Boud on 'historical' clarinets, Sydney Symphony Orchestra cellist Simon Cobcroft, and Erin Helyard playing the fortepiano. I think their combined aim is to give us the experience of listening to this music as it would have sounded when it was written - a delight for musicologists, an aural adjustment or three for the rest of us. We begin with Beethoven's Sonata for Fortepiano and Horn Op. 17 of 1800, arranged for basset horn (with the composer's approval, apparently) by Josef Friedlowsky in about 1802. A touch earlier in his life, the composer wrote his Variations on Ein Madchen oder Weibchen from Mozart's The Magic Flute for cello and piano in 1798; a puzzle as it's catalogued as his Op. 66. All three players are involved in Mozart's Kegelstatt Trio of 1786, even if the original called for a viola, not a cello. Back to Beethoven for the Aria con variazioni (four of them, with a coda) tacked on to the Three Duos for Clarinet and Bassoon WoO 27 and written somewhere between 1790 and 1792; you assume Cobcroft will stand in for the lower voice. Helyard then performs the familiar Sonata in C K. 545, composed for all piano learners' delight in 1788, and the ensemble concludes this exercise with Beethoven's Gassenhauer Trio Op. 11, written in 1797 with clarinet, cello and keyboard as the designated players. Tickets range from $20 to $153, and, on booking, you will encounter the $7 transaction fee: a disappointment we have always with us.
A GHOSTLY AFTERNOON
Selby & Friends
Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Centre Wednesday July 23 at 2 pm
This recital features two young musicians in the latest Selby & Friends recital. Violinist Natalie Chee, Sydney-born and recently nominated as the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra's concertmaster for 2026, and cellist Benett Tsai, fresh from delivering the Saint-Saens Concerto No. 1 with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra, will partner with Kathryn Selby in three piano trios. First comes an arrangement by the Linos Trio from 2001 of Debussy's Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune - one of the more formidable works that ushered in a new musical era as far back as 1894. From the program title, you would have guessed that Beethoven's Op. 70 No. 1 was on track for a hearing, and so it is although perhaps not as spectral as it seemed to listeners in 1809. To end, the group takes on the gripping Shostakovich Piano Trio No. 2, a 1944 work that never fails to absorb its listeners from the keening cello harmonics of the opening to the three last bars of soft E Major chords that offer a close but no consolation. Entry ranges from $63 for a student (and a concession card holder), to $79 for a senior, to $81 an adult. You'll also pay between $4 and $8.50 if you order online or by phone. What if you show up at the box office, cash in hand? Worth a try.
This program will be repeated at 7 pm.
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