Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Event Details

It’s hard not to contemplate the celestial when you hear German ensemble Sjaella sing together, unaccompanied. With logic-defying interconnectedness, every breath, note and musical gesture appears to come from one mind. This is an out-of-the-ordinary chance to experience these wondrous musicians in an intimate space — rather than their usual sold-out halls and cathedrals around the world — performing Henry Purcell, Clement Janequin, Caroline Shaw, arrangements of Norwegian, Irish, Icelandic, German, and Finnish traditional songs, and a work by young Sydney composer Alice Chance, learnt especially for Utzon. In their own words, 'Sjaella is the soul of the women who appear together on stage and have not lost a child-like experience of the world'. PROGRAM Henry Purcell A Bird’s Prelude from The Fairy Queen Clement Janequin Le Rossignol from Le chant des oiseaux arranged Susanne Blanche Caroline Shaw Dolce Cantavi text by Francesca Turini Bufalini Contessa di Stupinigi Alice Chance Cockatoo Circus Henry Purcell Thus the Ever Grateful Spring Here’s the Summer, Sprightly, Gay See My Many Coloured Fields Now Winter Comes Slowly from The Fairy Queen, Act 4, 1962 text after A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare arranged Gregor Meyer Sjaella Hypophysis text Felicitas Erben, with musical input from Shara Nova Traditional Sorbian Hanka arranged Walburga Walde Traditional Irish Our Wedding Day arranged Michael McGlynn, Franziska Eberhardt Traditional Breton Son ar Chistr arranged Michael Eimann Traditional Finnish Kuulin Äänen arranged Laura Jēkabsone

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

Featured artists

• Presented by Sydney Opera House
• Music of Alice Chance