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Archived event

Performance details

Saturday 11 March 2023 at 7.30pm
Arts Centre Melbourne, Hamer Hall

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About this performance

Featuring

Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Elena Schwarz conductor
Clara-Jumi Kang violin

Program

Natalie Williams Fourth Alarm
Martinů Symphony No.1
Brahms Violin Concerto

About this performance

What do a bugle, a bell tower, and a child prodigy violinist have in common? Find out as the MSO explores a series of star-crossed summons and signals under the baton of Swiss-Australian conductor Elena Schwarz – formerly a prestigious Dudamel Fellow at the LA Philharmonic.

  • Australian composer Natalie Williams’ music has been performed by the likes of the MSO, Atlanta Opera, Berkeley Symphony, and Musica Viva. Fourth Alarm (2013) expands a short Australian Army bugle call into a vivid work for orchestra – at once an expressive call to arms and a pressing, rhythmic warning of danger.
  • Destined for a musical life after being born in a Bohemian bell tower, Martinů’s magical First Symphony traverses passages of bombastic character and mysterious quietness building to an explosion of orchestral colour.
  • The enduring success of Brahms’s knockout Violin Concerto was in no small way influenced by a fated musical encounter with violinist Joseph Joachim when Brahms was only fourteen. Years later, they became friends, and this concerto was written especially for Joachim, who had a significant hand in its composition. International powerhouse violinist Clara-Jumi Kang puts her distinctive musical stamp on this astonishing work.

Duration: approx. 2 hours including interval

2023 Li Family Trust 600

East meets West is supported by the Li Family Trust

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