Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Event Details

This concert traces nature as both inspiration and warning. What does pastoral music sound like in today’s society when it doesn’t necessarily share the spiritual tenets of the “Classical” era? What happens when this is all broken and set alight?  

Rodion Shchedrin's Three Shepherds scatters flute, oboe, and clarinet around the hall's perimeter, calling to one another like distant shepherds across open air. Antonio Vivaldi's La Pastorella answers with something more traditional—folk lyricism embedded into e a Baroque frame. 

Ilari Kaila's Jouhet (bow-hair) for string quartet, reaches into Finnish folk memory–rhythms familiar and faintly unsettled, as if remembering something half-lost. 

Then the fire. Fire Dances, an ABC commission from Elena Kats-Chernin, Nat Bartsch, Olivia Davies, and Maria Grenfell, scores a piano trio into miniatures—each one translating into sound the wall of bushfire flame. 

The concert closes with and adaptation of George Enescu's orchestral favourite, the Romanian Rhapsody. The original but especially this version is an exhilarating display of folk-inspired virtuosity and sheer instrumental euphoria.  

Performing alongside the ANAM Musicians in this concert are ANAM Faculty members Howard Cello, Head of Strings and Cello, and Artistic Director Paavali Jumppanen. 

Rodion SHCHEDRIN Three Shepherds
Antonio VIVALDI Concerto in D Major, RV. 95 "La Pastorella"
Ilari KAILA Jouhet

Fire Dances
Elena KATS-CHERNIN In the Ember's Path
Nat BARTSCH Haze for Days
Olivia DAVIES Haze
Maria GRENFELL Wall of Flames

George ENESCU Romanian Rhapsody in A Major, op. 11 no. 1

ANAM Musicians

Further information for this event is available online at the event's website

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• Presented by ANAM Musicians