Well May certainly was the month to visit the QPAC Concert Hall. It seems every weekend the QSO was doing something great. And Vivaldi’s Four Seasons has been rescheduled for this Friday 3 June! So make sure you grab tickets fast..
For the first time in 2020, the QSO had its first Music on Sundays concert. What a rousing one it was – mirroring Brisbane’s determination not to have a flood defeat us perhaps? The Heroes and Revolutionaries programme was a stirring combination of classic pieces and some not so well-known ones. Host, Guy Noble, had amusing and insightful anecdotes – memorably Berlioz’s mad inspiration for Symphonie Fantastique, and the reason for the complexity of Cecile Chaminade’s Concertino for Flute & Orchestra. Alison Mitchell’s playing of Chaminade’s Concertino was all that it should have been – masterful, dexterous, yet light and uplifting. We loved it and her.
Speaking of female composers; two other women were included in the program: Joan Tower’s Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman No. 1, and Miriam Hyde’s Heroic Elegy. Australian Hyde’s Elegy is a moving piece that combines light uplifting moments with deep brassier ones. We need to hear more of her compositions, well I do at least.
The audience is always enlivened by rousing pieces and certainly we were there for Elmer Bernstein’s Symphonic Suite from the Magnificent Seven and Rossini’s Overture to William Tell. Guest conductor Jonathan Stockhammer was a delight to watch – that man has the most expressive shoulders. And he was back (couldn’t help the pun) the following week for Mozart’s Requiem. Don’t forget to join QSO for the next Sunday morning concert Fantasy and Folklore on 24 July at 11:30; the conductor will be the QSO’s new Chief Conductor Umberto Clerici.
QPAC Concert Hall
