Australian Chamber Orchestra 2008

ABN AMRO Vital Tour
Melvyn Tan Plays Mozart

Program
HAYDN Symphony No. 47 in G major (The Palindrome)
SMALLEY Strung Out
MOZART Piano Concerto No. 19, K459 in F major
SCHUBERT (arr. Tognetti) String Quartet No. 15 in G major, D887
 
Richard Tognetti - Artistic Director and Lead Violin
Melvyn Tan - Piano
 
Joyful and graceful describe both Mozart's Piano Concerto No.19 and the playing of star pianist Melvyn Tan, whose renown as a concert artist is matched by his fame for recording the BBC's Pride and Prejudice soundtrack.
A jubilant start to the ACO's new season, Haydn's Symphony No.47 is called 'The Palindrome' for its clever third movement - the first half of each section is played in mirror image in the second. Smalley also plays with palindromes.

In a new arrangement, the drama of Schubert's final quartet matches the energetic performance style of the ACO.


Commonwealth Bank Sublime Tour
Katie Noonan and the Australian Chamber Orchestra
Program
Songs by GIBBONS, DOWLAND, BRITTEN, DRAKE, LENNON/MCCARTNEY, and others
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Five Variants of 'Dives and Lazarus'
ELGAR Introduction and Allegro, Op. 47
 
Richard Tognetti - Artistic Director and Lead Violin
Katie Noonan - Voice
 
The divine Katie Noonan performs five centuries of English song, from Dowland to The Beatles. Noonan's lyrical singing captures the magic that exists when music illuminates text, bringing us joy, grief, pleasure and pain. Then, revel in the warmth and sweetness of the ACO strings in two stirring English masterpieces.


Audacious
Program
JUOZAPAITIS Perpetuum Mobile
HAMEENNIEMI Chamber Concerto for Violin and Strings
ICHIYANAGI 'Interspace'
LUTOSLAWSKI Preludes and Fugue for 13 Solo Strings
SIBELIUS Impromptu
 
John Storgårds - Guest Director and Lead Violin
 
New and exciting music from around the world directed by fearless violinist-conductor John Storgårds. 'A big, muscular player, Storgards brought raw, incendiary power to the increasingly virtuosic cadenzas.' - The Guardian

Let Storgårds introduce you to some remarkable music. Student of John Cage and first husband of Yoko Ono, influential Japanese composer Toshi Ichiyanagi's blends east and west, traditional and contemporary music. Lithuania's Juozapaitis uses orchestral colours to great effect in his racy Perpetuum Mobile. The musicians improvise in Finnish composer Hameenniemi's jazz-inspired Concerto.

More familiar to Australian music-lovers are the intriguingly varied sounds of Lutoslawski and Sibelius' mellifluous Impromptu.


The Red Tree
Richard Tognetti - Artistic Director and Lead Violin
Lyn Williams - Gondwana Voices Artistic Director
Gondwana Voices
 
Program
SHOSTAKOVICH (arr. Tognetti) String Quartet No. 15
Featuring projected images from SHAUN TAN'S The Arrival
YEZERSKI/TOGNETTI/WILLIAMS The Red Tree [2008 Barbara Blackman Commission]
Featuring projected images from SHAUN TAN'S The Red Tree
 
Thought-provoking and pungently atmospheric, the works of award-winning Australian author and artist Shaun Tan provide the inspiration for an unforgettable concert program.

Written in the final year of his life, Shostakovich's poignant String Quartet No.15 speaks of facing the unknown without fear. This potent music underpins and sings to the remarkable images of Tan's book, The Arrival. Entirely through images, Tan tells in gripping detail the story of a displaced person and his journey to find a new life.

With several film scores and concert works to his credit, Michael Yezerski is one of the rising stars of Australian composition. This newly commissioned work based on Shaun Tan's The Red Tree brings together the creative talents of Lyn Williams and her astonishing young choristers, Gondwana Voices, with Richard Tognetti and the ACO in an uplifting collaboration involving music and images.


BNP Paribas Intense Tour
Steven Isserlis and the ACO: An Electrifying Partnership
Program
BARGIEL Octet in C minor Op. 15a
RAVEL arr. Tognetti Two Hebrew Melodies
CPE BACH Cello Concerto in A major W. 172
BARTÓK Divertimento for Strings
 
Richard Tognetti - Artistic Director and Lead Violin
Steven Isserlis - Cello
 
CPE Bach’s Cello Concerto displays a harmonic audacity and florid virtuosity that will be thrilling in the hands of ACO regular, the stellar Stephen Isserlis. Renowned for his phenomenal technique and sensitivity, Isserlis is a perfect sparring-partner for the ACO.

Bartók and Ravel shared an interest in the native music of their own and other countries. Bartók’s Divertimento for strings blends neoclassical lightness with robust fiddling in the vein of Hungarian folk music. Ravel’s sensitive adaptation of two sinuous Hebrew melodies is in turn adapted for the ACO strings into arabesque songs without words. And an intriguing footnote in Robert Schumann’s biography. Bargiel, Schumann’s step-brother-in-law, was a fan of Schumann’s style and crafted an homage in his Octet, where Romantic bluster encloses a lovely slow movement.

"Isserlis seemed very much at home with the ACO - playing with a relaxed, supremely confident mastery that enlivened every phrase of a fine work."
The Advertiser


PriceWaterHouseCoopers Vivacious Tour
Vivaldi's Four Seasons
Program
JS BACH from 'The Art of Fugue'
GYÖRGY KURTÁG from 'Signs, Games & Messages'
BERG Lyric Suite - 3 Pieces
VIVALDI The Four Seasons
 
Alina Ibragimova - Guest Director and Lead Violin
 
With Alina Ibragimova directing Vivaldi's Four Seasons, expect an 'astonishing performance of sizzling virtuosity and mind-blowing acrobatics.' - Glasgow Herald

Bach didn't indicate which instruments should perform The Art of Fugue, so in recent years string players have claimed this fascinating work. Kurtág includes an Homage à J.S.B. in Signs, Games and Messages, his extraordinary exploration of the violin's musical language. Berg's Lyric Suite is often called his most beautiful work.


IBM Euphoric Tour
Beethoven 8
Program
PROKOFIEV Classical Symphony, Op. 25 (Symphony No. 1)
BRAHMS Concerto for Violin and Cello, Op. 102, in A minor
BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 8, Op. 39 in F major
 
Richard Tognetti - Artistic Director and Lead Violin
Timo-Veikko Valve - Cello
 
Australian Chamber Orchestra Lead Violinist Richard Tognetti and Principal Cellist Timo-Veikko Valve showcase their precious Guarneri instruments in Brahms' final orchestral work, the exuberant Double Concerto. 'The slow movement is an ardent, ecstatic song, the finale a joyous, folksy celebration' – The Guardian.

In an unmissable display of symphonic brilliance, the concert opens with Prokofiev's amusing modern take on a Haydn-style symphony and comes to a rousing conclusion with Beethoven's Eighth Symphony.

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