Official program for the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 11-19 July 2015 by Chamber Music Australia

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CO NTENTS Official Messages

Past Competitions – Laureates

Competition Diary

Voting Rules and Regulations

Australian New Works Award

Prizes and Engagements Chair of the Jury

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Jury 12 The Winners’ Tour

Piano Trios

String Quartets

The CMA–Monash Musicology Initiative

Schools Link

Program Notes – Piano Trios

Program Notes – String Quartets

Our Donors

Partners 97 Acknowledgements 98

CO N C ERT E TI Q U E T TE

We ask your cooperation:

Every concert at the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition is recorded for ABC Classic FM.

• Mobile phones, alarm watches and paging devices should be turned off inside the South Melbourne Town Hall and Melbourne Recital Centre.

Extraneous noise during the performance disturbs artists, distracts other audience members, and seriously mars broadcasts and other authorised recordings.

• A single, uncovered cough registers approximately 65 decibels. If you need to cough, please use a handkerchief or tissue to reduce the sound.

• Cameras and recording devices are not permitted in the performance venues.

• Due to the live broadcasts, and because this event is a competition, latecomers will not be admitted during performances unless there is a suitable break. Chamber Music Australia has the right to alter scheduled performances and programs as necessary.

O FFI CIAL M E S SAG E S This means that relationships are established for life: Melbourne weaves these young musicians into the fabric of our city and our city into their hearts. Past competitors speak proudly of their association with Melbourne, and many are invited back to tour and perform as part of their prizes. So begins the cyclical process of cultural exchange and respect for which CMA’s competitions are renowned.

The Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition is one of the most prestigious international music competitions. One matter contributing to this reputation is the international audition process – the calibre of the competitors is ensured by the system of auditions where no-one is discriminated against by their distance from Australia. First there is an initial online selection, then we send eminent musicians to major international hubs for the final selections. Another is that CMA subsidises travel costs for the chosen young ensembles – it costs us a lot but it serves to thus deepen the field of applicants. Once here, ensembles are supported by Melbourne’s devoted musicloving families – our volunteer hosts – who provide these young ensembles competitors with an anchor during their stay in Australia.

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We could not keep the Competition going without our great team of volunteers. We are immensely grateful to them. We are very grateful to the Competition jury. The jury’s function is obviously of central importance. This year’s jury is chaired by Maureen Wheeler AO. This year we are delighted to present the inaugural Australian New Works Award as part of the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. During the competition, competitors have to play a work written in the past twenty years. The idea of the New Works competition is to give Australian audiences the opportunity to hear newly composed Australian works several times during the week, thus building their familiarity with the particular works, and the composers’ style more generally. The jury which has selected the winning compositions was chaired by Kim Williams AM, with Paul Grabowsky AO and Mary Finsterer. We are very grateful to the jury for their difficult and devoted work.

As anyone who attends the Competition would realise, it takes a huge amount of effort to put it together: and that comes at a substantial cost. We simply could not survive without financial support from many sources, but in particular from the State of Victoria through Creative Victoria, our Platinum Partner Spotless Group, our Principal Partner Monash University, and all the donors whose generosity we value enormously. And I want to add special thanks this year to the Premier Daniel Andrews, and the Minister for the Arts Martin Foley for their personal help in getting us to where we are now. As always, events like this place immense demands on the team at Chamber Music Australia. I am particularly grateful to our General Manager, Benjamin Woodroffe, to all the staff at CMA and to the members of the Board and committees: they do an enormous amount of dedicated work which is all the more effective because it is not seen. Julian Burnside AO QC Chair // Chamber Music Australia

Welcome to the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition and a feast of fine music performed by the best young chamber musicians from around the world.

Regional audiences also get to experience the competition with the Prize-Winners’ Regional Tour which includes concerts in Portland, Hamilton and Mansfield.

The competition is embraced by enthusiastic audiences here in Melbourne, and, through the ABC broadcast of every concert, is heard across Australia and around the world.

The Andrews Labor Government is a proud supporter of Chamber Music Australia and the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. It’s events like this that contribute to Melbourne – and Victoria’s – reputation as Australia’s cultural heartland.

This year, the inaugural Schools Link Program will connect each ensemble with a Victorian school and deliver valuable educational and cultural opportunities for students. Another initiative is the Australian New Works Award which will highlight works by Australian composers for Piano Trio and String Quartet.

I congratulate the ensembles selected for this competition stage, and I’m sure that audiences will enjoy the exceptional talent and virtuosity of the performances. Martin Foley MP Minister for Creative Industries

O F FI C I A L M E S S AG E S // 3

O FFI CIAL M E S SAG E S On behalf of Spotless, we are very proud to be a part of this year’s Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. Our Platinum Partnership with Chamber Music Australia aims to encourage and nurture young and talented musicians, and is a natural extension of the existing youth engagement work we do. Spotless has a proud history of developing and mentoring emerging talent, and we truly value the contribution young people make to the community. We employ over 10,000 people under the age of 25 at Spotless, investing heavily in programs that help our young people be the very best they can be, and we are excited to share this approach with CMA. Embracing the end customer experience for CMA as we do with all of our clients and partners we are also excited to be assisting the event, offering our guidance and support from a hospitality services point of view. These services are being delivered by many of our very own young and talented employees at Spotless. We consider this cultural and artistic program a way of bringing Melbourne to the forefront of classical music and international performance events and are most delighted to promote and develop the musical talents of young chamber musicians with CMA. We look forward to being a part of this exciting performance series and spectacular showcase of chamber music for years to come. Margaret Jackson Spotless Chairman

Melbourne Recital Centre is pleased to partner Chamber Music Australia in presenting the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition.  The Competition is a showcase of the very best of the next generation of chamber ensembles from Australia and around the world. We’re proud that Elisabeth Murdoch Hall at Melbourne Recital Centre is the setting for the climax to this inspiring event, reinforcing the vibrancy of the local chamber music scene for Melbourne audiences, this city’s aspiring musicians and for audiences nationally, thanks to ABC Classic FM. Kathryn Fagg Chair // Melbourne Recital Centre

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PA ST CO M PETITI O N S – L AU R E ATE S 6th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 2011 Monash University Grand Prize Amaryllis Quartett, Germany/ Switzerland Musica Viva Australia Prize Kelemen Kvartett, Hungary String Quartets 1st Prize – Robert Salzer Foundation Prize Amaryllis Quartett, Germany/ Switzerland 2nd Prize – Chamber Music Australia Patrons’ Circle Prize Kelemen Kvartett, Hungary 3rd Prize – Laura Brown Prize Attacca Quartet, USA Peter Druce Audience Prize Kelemen Kvartett, Hungary Piano Trios 1st Prize – Hamer –Tribe Prize Trio Rafale, Switzerland 2nd Prize – Beleura Prize Rhodes Piano Trio, UK 3rd Prize – Monique Phillips Prize Trio Paul Klee, France Peter Druce Audience Prize Trio Paul Klee, France 5th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 2007 Primus Telecom Grand Prize Atos Trio, Germany Musica Viva Australia Prize Atos Trio, Germany String Quartets 1st Prize – Robert Salzer Foundation Prize Badke String Quartet, UK 2nd Prize – WFIMC Prize Navarra Quartet, UK

3rd Prize – Chamber Music Australia Patrons’ Circle Prize Ardeo String Quartet, France Peter Druce Audience Prize Badke String Quartet, UK Piano Trios 1st Prize – Clifford Hocking Prize Atos Trio, Germany 2nd Prize – Beleura Prize Morgenstern Piano Trio, Germany 3rd Prize – Laura Brown Prize Tecchler Trio, Switzerland/ Germany

3rd Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 1999

AMP Investments Audience Prize Vertavo String Quartet, Norway

Daimler–Chrysler Grand Prize Aviv String Quartet, Israel

Piano Trios 1st Prize – VicHealth Prize Trio Jean Paul, Germany

String Quartets 1st Prize – Mercedes-Benz Prize Aviv String Quartet, Israel 2nd Prize – Pratt Foundation Prize Karol Szymanowski Quartet, Poland/Ukraine 3rd Prize – Laura Brown Prize Avalon String Quartet, USA

Peter Druce Audience Prize Atos Trio, Germany

City of Melbourne Audience Prize Karol Szymanowski Quartet, Poland/Ukraine

4th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 2003

David Thomas Foundation Prize Aviv String Quartet, Israel

Primus Telecom Grand Prize Paizo Quartet, Denmark

Piano Trios 1st Prize – Chrysler Prize Kungsbacka Trio, Sweden/UK

Musica Viva Australia Prize Eggner Trio, Austria String Quartets 1st Prize – Costel Vasilescu Prize Paizo Quartet, Denmark 2nd Prize – Helen Macpherson Smith Trust Prize Cremona Quartet, Italy

2nd Prize – Tattersall’s Prize Mediterraneo Piano Trio, France/Israel/Spain 3rd Prize – Kenneth W Tribe Prize Trio Rachmaninov, Russia Qantas Audience Prize Kungsbacka Trio, Sweden/UK

3rd Prize – Precinct Prize Tankstream Quartet, Australia Herald Sun Audience Prize Tankstream Quartet, Australia

2nd Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 1995

Piano Trios 1st Prize – John T Reid Charitable Trust Prize Eggner Trio, Austria

Mercedes–Benz Grand Prize Trio Jean Paul, Germany

3rd Prize – Laura Brown Prize Tel-Aviv Trio, Israel City of Melbourne Audience Prize Trio Ondine, Denmark/Norway/ Sweden

3rd Prize Jerusalem Piano Trio, Israel City of Melbourne Audience Prize Trio Jean Paul, Germany 1st Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, 1991 The First Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition was open to String Quartets/String Trios, and Piano Quartets/Piano Trios. Musica Viva Grand Prize Joint prize winners: Gould Piano Trio, UK Leningrad String Quartet, USSR

David Thomas Foundation Prize Trio Rachmaninov, Russia

2nd Prize – Julian Burnside Prize Trio Ondine, Denmark/Norway/ Sweden

2nd Prize – Sidney Myer Fund Prize Trio di Parma, Italy

String Quartets 1st Prize – Dame Elisabeth Murdoch Prize Vertavo String Quartet, Norway

String Quartets/String Trios 1st Prize – Dame Elisabeth Murdoch Prize Leningrad String Quartet, USSR 2nd Prize – Lord Mayor’s Prize St Lawrence String Quartet, Canada 3rd Prize – Gas and Fuel Corporation Prize Lark Quartet, USA Piano Trios/Piano Quartets 1st Prize – VicHealth Prize Gould Piano Trio, UK 2nd Prize – University of Melbourne Prize Kandinsky Quartet, France

2nd Prize – Tattersall’s Prize Veronika String Quartet, Russia 3rd Prize Yggdrasil String Quartet, Sweden

PA ST C O M P E T I T I O N S – L AU R E AT E S // 5

CO M PETITI O N D IARY ROUND ONE Venue:

Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) South Melbourne Town Hall, 210 Bank Street, South Melbourne

Details:

Saturday 11 July to Monday 13 July

Repertoire: Any work by Haydn or Mozart alongside other repertoire chosen by the ensemble.

7.30pm

Trio Medici (Russia, France)

HAYDN Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797) BRAHMS Piano Trio No. 1 in B major, Op. 8 (1853–4; revised 1889)

Estivo Trio (Australia)

HAYDN Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797) RAVEL Piano Trio in A minor (1914) SUNDAY 12 JULY 11.00am

Noga Quartet (France, Israel)

SATURDAY 11 JULY 11.00am

Classicus Trio (Russia)

HAYDN Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839)

Trio Adorno (Germany)

HAYDN Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797) RAVEL Piano Trio in A minor (1914)

3.00pm

Altius Quartet (USA)

HAYDN String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793) LIGETI String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–4)

Castalian String Quartet (France, Finland, UK) HAYDN String Quartet No. 50 in B flat major, Op. 64, No. 3 (1790) BARTÓK String Quartet No. 6 (1939)

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MOZART String Quartet No. 19 in C major, K.465 “Dissonance” (1782–85) LIGETI String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–4)

Argus Quartet (USA)

HAYDN String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793) BRITTEN String Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 25 (1941) 3.00pm

Trio Bonnensis (Germany, Australia) HAYDN Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 2 in C minor, Op. 66 (1845)

Linos Piano Trio

(Thailand, UK, Brazil, Germany, France) HAYDN Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797) SCHUMANN Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 110 (1851)

7.30pm

Aris Quartet (Germany)

HAYDN String Quartet No. 61 in D minor, Op. 76, No. 2 (1796–7) MENDELSSOHN String Quartet in E minor, Op. 44, No. 2 (1837)

Verona Quartet

(Singapore, Canada, USA) HAYDN String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793) WEBERN Langsamer Satz (1905) LIGETI String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–4) MONDAY 13 JULY 3.00pm

Patronus Quartet (Australia)

HAYDN String Quartet No. 62 in C major, Op. 76, No. 3 “Emperor” (1796–97) ˇEK String Quartet No. 2 “Intimate JANÁC Letters” (1928)

Giocoso String Quartet

(Germany, Netherlands, Romania) HAYDN String Quartet No. 64 in D major, Op. 76, No.5 (1796) KRENEK String Quartet No. 3, Op. 20 (1923) 7.30pm

Trio Palmer (France)

HAYDN Piano Trio No. 28 in D major, Hob XV:16 (1790) BRAHMS Piano Trio No. 3, Op. 101 (1886)

Allant Trio (South Korea, USA, Canada) HAYDN Piano Trio No. 25 in G major, Hob XV:25 “Gypsy Rondo” (1790) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839)

R O U N D T WO Venue:

Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) South Melbourne Town Hall, 210 Bank Street, South Melbourne

Details:

Tuesday 14 July to Thursday 16 July

Repertoire: Any work composed after 1995 alongside other repertoire chosen by the ensemble.

WEDNESDAY 15 JULY 11.00am Trio Medici (France, Russia) HERSANT Variations sur la “Sonnerie de Sainte-Geneviéve-du-Mont” de Marin Marais (1998) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839)

Estivo Trio (Australia)

KURTÁG Varga Bálint Ligaturája (2007) TCHAIKOVSKY Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 50 (1881–82) 3.00pm

Noga Quartet (France, Israel)

TUESDAY 14 JULY 3.00pm

Classicus Trio (Russia)

SAY Space Jump, Op. 46 (2013) SHOSTAKOVICH Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67 (1944)

Trio Adorno (Germany)

SCHMIDHAMMER Three Pieces for Piano Trio (2014) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 2 in C minor, Op. 66 (1845) 7.30pm

Altius Quartet (USA)

PUTS Dark Vigil (1999) MENDELSSOHN String Quartet in A minor, Op. 13 (1827)

Castalian String Quartet

(France, Finland, UK) ADÈS The Four Quarters (2010) WEBERN Langsamer Satz (1905) RAVEL String Quartet in F major (1903)

KURTÁG 6 Moments musicaux, Op. 44 (2005) SCHUBERT String Quartet in D minor, D.810 “Death and the Maiden” (1824)

Argus Quartet (USA)

GUINIVAN String Quartet No. 1 (2014) MENDELSSOHN String Quartet No. 6 in F minor, Op. 80 (1847) 7.30pm

Trio Bonnensis (Germany, Australia) KURTÁG Varga Bálint Ligaturája (2007) SCHUBERT Piano Trio in E flat major, D.929 (1827)

Linos Piano Trio

(Thailand, UK, Brazil, Germany, France) LINDBERG Piano Trio (2008 arr. 2011–12) BEETHOVEN Piano Trio in B flat major, Op. 97 “Archduke” (1811)

THURSDAY 16 JULY 11.00am Aris Quartet (Germany) BEETHOVEN String Quartet in F minor, Op. 95, No. 11 “Serioso” (1810) ˇ ÁK String Quartet No. 12 in F major, DVOR Op. 96 (1893) WIDMANN String Quartet No. 3 “Hunting Quartet” (2003)

Verona Quartet

(Singapore, Canada, USA) MURPHY Dark Energy (2006–7) BEETHOVEN String Quartet No. 8 in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2 “Razumovsky” (1806) 3.00pm

Trio Palmer (France)

ESCAICH Lettres mêlées (2003) RAVEL Piano Trio in A minor (1914)

Allant Trio (South Korea, USA, Canada) BEETHOVEN Piano Trio in E flat major, Op. 1, No. 1 (1793) MURPHY Give me phoenix wings to fly (1997) 7.30pm

Patronus Quartet (Australia)

STANHOPE Elegies and Dances (2008; revised 2010) BEETHOVEN String Quartet No. 9 in C major, Op. 59, No. 3 “Razumovsky” (1806)

Giocoso String Quartet

(Germany, Netherlands, Romania) PENDERECKI String Quartet No. 3 “Leaves of an Unwritten Diary” (2008) MOZART String Quartet No. 16 in E flat major, K.428 (1783)

COMPETITION DIARY // 7

VOTI N G R U LE S AN D R EG U L ATI O N S FI NAL R O U N D

The 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition (MICMC) is open to Piano Trios and String Quartets from across the globe and is presented by Chamber Music Australia in association with Melbourne Recital Centre.

SATURDAY 18 JULY Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre, corner of Southbank Boulevard and Sturt Street, Southbank

The individual age of competitors must be 35 years or under as at 11 July 2015. The combined age for a Piano Trio must not exceed 90 years. The combined age for a String Quartet must not exceed 120 years.

2pm

• Preliminary Screening Round

Piano Trio Final Round

Three finalists will perform the World Premiere of the Australian New Work for Piano Trio and a work(s) of their choice. 7.00pm

String Quartet Final Round

Three finalists will perform the World Premiere of the Australian New Work for String Quartet and a work(s) of their choice.

WI N N ER S ’ CO N C ERT SUNDAY 19 JULY // 7.30pm Elisabeth Murdoch Hall, Melbourne Recital Centre, corner of Southbank Boulevard and Sturt Street, Southbank

Winning Piano Trio and String Quartet

Prize announcements including the Monash University Grand Prize and the Musica Viva Australia Prize.

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There are five stages to the 7th MICMC as follows: • Live International Audition Round • Round One • Round Two • Final Round Following a digital Preliminary Screening Round, ensembles were selected to compete in Melbourne following a worldwide live audition tour. Held in December 2014, these live auditions were conducted by Keith Crellin OAM and Ian Munro in Melbourne, Vienna, Hannover, Paris, London and New York. All ensembles accepted to compete in the 7th MICMC will perform in both Rounds One and Two. Three Piano Trios and three String Quartets are invited to proceed to the Final Round at the conclusion of Round Two, as determined by the Jury. The first-placed Piano Trio and the first-placed String Quartet then perform at the Winners’ Concert on Sunday 19 July. The Jury adopts the same voting process for each stream. Following Round Two each Juror votes (in confidence) for his or her first choice. If no ensemble receives a majority vote of the Jury, a preferential voting system is adopted, dropping off ensembles until one ensemble achieves a majority vote. This procedure is repeated until the Jury chooses three finalists in each stream. The Jurors are not allowed to discuss any applicant’s merits or weaknesses and must not disclose personal opinions at any time during the 7th MICMC. This includes making any positive or negative comments or gestures during performance. Competing ensembles communicating or attempting to communicate with a Juror, the Jury Chair or Chamber Music Australia’s Artistic Committee may be disqualified. The reputation of the 7th MICMC depends on the ability of the Jurors and the Jury Chair to ensure that each ensemble is given a fair and balanced hearing. To this end, the Jury Chair, who does not vote, is responsible for ensuring that the Jury follows the competition procedures, rules and regulations.

AU STR ALIAN N EW WO R KS AWAR D Inspired by a rich history of great composers, created for a new age of chamber music

JURY

Chamber Music Australia is proud to present the inaugural Australian New Works Award to celebrate and promote Australian chamber music repertoire.

Kim Williams AM Chair

Open to Australian citizens of any age, this composition award features two streams: the Australian New Work for Piano Trio and the Australian New Work for String Quartet.

Professor Mary Finsterer Chamber Music Australia Chair of Composition, Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music, Monash University

The winning work from each stream, chosen from over 40 applications, will receive its world premiere as part of the Final Round repertoire of the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition on Saturday 18 July 2015. The Australian New Works Award is an opportunity to highlight the current sounds of Australian writing and is a joint initiative of Monash University and Chamber Music Australia.

Professor Paul Grabowsky AO Australian pianist, composer and Executive Director, Academy of Performing Arts, Monash University

MICHAEL BAKRNČEV

CONNOR D’NETTO

Piano Trio No. 2 “Janino”

String Quartet No. 2 in E minor

Michael Bakrnčev is a multi-awardwinning composer, currently residing in Melbourne, Australia. His music is performed regularly throughout Australia, Europe, America and Canada, including recordings and performances by the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (conducted by Benjamin Northey), Queensland Conservatorium Symphony (Johannes Fritzsch), Zelman Memorial Symphony (Mark Shiell) and Macedonian Philharmonic Orchestra (Evan Christ and Borjan Canev). Bakrnčev graduated with first class Honours in Composition at the Queensland Conservatorium, is a current Masters student and tutor in orchestration at Melbourne University and holds a highly coveted Australian Postgraduate Award, studying with the acclaimed composers Elliott Gyger and Brenton Broadstock.

Connor D'Netto is undertaking a Bachelor of Music (Composition) at the University of Queensland. Studying across a number of disciplines including piano and violin, he is under the direction of Robert Davidson in composition, previously learning voice with Shaun Brown. Connor has sung in a number of ensembles, notably at St. John's Cathedral Brisbane under the direction of Dr. Robert Boughen OBE, and the Schola of Stephen's Cathedral Brisbane. Currently performing in the UQ Choral and UQ Chamber Singers conducted by Graeme Morton, he is collaborating with a number of performers and various creatives towards some exciting projects to come.

AUSTRALIAN NEW WORKS AWARD // 9

PR IZE S AN D EN GAG EM ENTS MONASH UNIVERSITY GRAND PRIZE The Monash University Grand Prize offers the winning ensemble of the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition a head start towards an international career in chamber music. Chamber Music Australia works closely with the winning ensemble to recommend and secure Australian and international engagements with the world’s most prestigious chamber music promoters.

MUSICA VIVA AUSTRALIA PRIZE

Musica Viva Australia, the world’s largest chamber music presenter, is pleased to offer the Musica Viva Australia Prize to an ensemble from this year’s Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. Carl Vine, the organisation’s Artistic Director, will invite one of the 16 ensembles to return to present concerts in Australia. The prize is not only the Competition’s major concert engagement prize but also links a rising chamber ensemble with the world’s most renowned presenter at a key time in the ensemble’s development.

The Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition has become a major player in the support network for live chamber music performance that spans the globe. The Competition has brought to our attention many young and emerging ensembles that might have otherwise remained unnoticed. The Musica Viva Prize enables us to offer the best of these groups indispensable performance opportunities in Australia, as well as establishing powerful connections with them that continue to stretch well into the future. Carl Vine, AO Artistic Director // Musica Viva Australia

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STRING QUARTET PRIZES

PIANO TRIO PRIZES

1st Prize – The Robert Salzer Foundation Prize $24,000

1st Prize – The Hamer-Tribe Prize $18,000

Robert Salzer, born in Vienna and a lover of the arts and opera, lived in the UK and Kenya before settling in 1961 in Melbourne, where he was responsible for the construction of many substantial buildings. His Foundation is a trust for the support of the arts, notably the performing arts.

2nd Prize – The Chamber Music Australia Donor Circle Prize $16,000 The Donor Circle, initiated in 2002 by Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, encourages the growth and development of chamber music and young musicians by asking individuals to provide ongoing financial support to Chamber Music Australia.

3rd Prize – The Laura Brown Prize $8,000 The Laura Brown Prize is supported by Beth and Tom Bruce AM in memory of Beth’s mother.

Audience Prize – The Peter Druce Audience Prize – String Quartet $6,000 Peter Druce was a Melbourne lawyer and Chamber Music Australia patron whose wideranging enthusiasms included music, rowing, archaeology and the environment. This prize is supported by his family and friends.

The Hamer-Tribe Trust was established following a Gala Tribute Dinner in March 2000 to honour two of Chamber Music Australia’s founding fathers, Kenneth Tribe AC and Sir Rupert Hamer AC KCMG.

2nd Prize – The Chamber Music Australia Volunteer Prize $12,000 Chamber Music Australia’s loyal family of volunteers provides an invaluable contribution to the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. From driving to page-turning, Chamber Music Australia’s volunteers ensure that artists, jurors and audience members are welcome and make the most of Victoria.

3rd Prize – The Monique Phillips Prize $6,000 Monique Phillips played a vital role for music and culture in Melbourne through her sterling and passionate work at the Goethe-Institut and Chamber Music Australia.

Audience Prize – The Peter Druce Audience Prize – Piano Trio $4,500 Peter Druce was a Melbourne lawyer and Chamber Music Australia patron whose wideranging enthusiasms included music, rowing, archaeology and the environment. This prize is supported by his family and friends.

AUSTRALIAN NEW WORKS AWARD Australian New Works Award for String Quartet $15,000 Supported by Monash University

Australian New Works Award for Piano Trio $10,000 Supported by Julian Burnside AO QC

CHAI R O F TH E J U RY

MAUREEN WHEELER AO Australia

Maureen was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. At age 20 she moved to London, where she met Tony Wheeler. Lonely Planet began in 1973 with a simple idea to document a journey from London across Asia to Australia. Experienced and passionate travellers themselves, Tony and Maureen sensed the fascination that destinations in Asia, India and Africa held for many aspiring travellers in the early 1970s – a time when independent travel was just taking off. While the established guidebook publishers gave little coverage to destinations in the developing world, the Wheelers and their small team of writers travelled the region extensively researching, writing and putting new titles on shelves – all with the aim of producing good travel information on exciting new destinations for like-minded travellers. The philosophy of “written by travellers for travellers” remained central to Lonely Planet’s publishing operations. Lonely Planet grew into the largest travel publishing company in the world with its head office in Melbourne supported by offices in London and San Francisco and a multi-award winning travel website. Maureen was active in the management of the company throughout the 35 years the Wheelers owned Lonely Planet. In 2007 Maureen and Tony sold 75% of Lonely Planet to BBC Worldwide and completed the sale three years later.

Since the sale of Lonely Planet, Maureen has established the Planet Wheeler Foundation which supports educational and health projects in the developing world, and the Wheeler Centre for Books, Writing & Ideas. Her love of opera, particularly of German composer Richard Wagner’s Ring Cycle, has taken her to performances in Manaus, Los Angeles, New York, London, Copenhagen, and Beijing, and her campaign as the principal patron of the Melbourne Ring Cycle saw the operatic extravaganza performed in Melbourne in late 2013. In 2014 Maureen was appointed an officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for her distinguished service to business and commerce as a publisher of travel guides and as a benefactor to Australian arts and aid organisations. She has previously served on the board of Tourism Tasmania and the Northern Territory Tourism Advisory Board, and currently serves on the board of the Melbourne Theatre Company and Text Publishing.

CHAIR OF THE JURY // 11

J U RY

VLADIMIR BALSHIN

MARTIN BEAVER

Russia

Canada/USA

A member of the legendary Borodin Quartet since 2007, cellist Vladimir Balshin was born in Moscow in 1973. After graduating from the Moscow Conservatory he continued his studies as a postgraduate student under Professor Natalia Shakhovskaya. He has competed in many prestigious international competitions, becoming a laureate of the London String Quartet Competition, the Antonio Janigro International Cello Competition in Croatia, the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, the Caltanissetta International Chamber Music Competition in Italy, and the Rostropovich International Cello Competition in Paris. As a Borodin Quartet member, Vladimir Balshin has performed in various venues around the world such as Wigmore Hall in London, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Musikverein in Vienna, the Salle Pleyel in Paris, the Tokyo Bunka Kaikan, Alice Tully Hall in New York, Konzerthaus Berlin and many others. As a chamber musician he has performed alongside names such as Yury Bashmet, Sergei Nakariakov, Elisabeth Leonskaja, Michael Collins, Sabine Meyer, Boris Berezovsky, Oleg Maisenberg, Nikolai Lugansky, Denis Matsuev and Alexei Volodin. Between 1993 and 1998 he was a member of Moscow Soloists, the chamber orchestra led by Yuri Bashmet, and since 1998 he has been a member of Moscow’s Brahms Trio. He has recorded CDs and DVDs for labels Decca, ICA and Onyx, and is proud to have performed works by many Russian composers including Tchaikovsky, Arensky, Shostakovich, Glinka, Schnittke, Alyabiev, Knipper and Pabst. Vladimir Balshin currently teaches at the Moscow State Conservatory, and also regularly leads masterclasses and adjudicates at international competitions.

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Canadian violinist Martin Beaver was First Violin of the world-renowned Tokyo String Quartet from 2002 until its final concert in July 2013, appearing to critical and public acclaim on the major stages of the world including New York’s Carnegie Hall, London’s Wigmore Hall, Tokyo’s Suntory Hall and the Sydney Opera House. Recordings released during this period include the complete Beethoven string quartets for the Harmonia Mundi label. Concerto and recital appearances have taken him to North and South America, Europe and Asia with orchestras such as the San Francisco Symphony, l’Orchestre Philharmonique de Liège, the Montreal Symphony and the Sapporo Symphony with conductors including Pinchas Zukerman, Raymond Leppard and Charles Dutoit. Chamber music collaborations include eminent artists such as Leon Fleisher, Lynn Harrell, Sabine Meyer and Yefim Bronfman. Martin Beaver’s teachers include Victor Danchenko, Josef Gingold and Henryk Szeryng. A laureate of the Queen Elisabeth, Montreal, and Indianapolis competitions, he has subsequently served on juries of many important international violin and chamber music competitions. A devoted educator, Martin Beaver has conducted masterclasses on five continents. He has held teaching positions at the Royal Conservatory of Music, the University of British Columbia and the Peabody Conservatory. More recently, he was Artist in Residence at the Yale School of Music and since August 2013 has served on the faculty of the Colburn School in Los Angeles teaching violin and co-directing string chamber music studies. Martin Beaver recently formed the Montrose Trio with pianist Jon Kimura Parker and cellist Clive Greensmith.

BERIT CARDAS

BORIS KUSCHNIR

Norway

Austria

Berit Cardas was born in Norway in 1969 and started playing violin at the age of eight. She studied violin with Leif Jørgensen at the former Østlandets Musikkonservatorium in Oslo, Jens Ellermann at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Hannover, and Almita Vamos and Roland Vamos at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. She was fortunate to receive additional tuition from renowned chamber music specialists Norbert Brainin and Hatto Beyerle. As a founding member of the Vertavo Quartet, chamber music has always been Cardas’ musical passion. The Quartet celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2009, and Cardas’ membership has seen her perform in the major halls throughout Europe and Australia including London’s Wigmore Hall and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw. The Vertavo Quartet is the recipient of various prestigious awards, including 1st Prize in the Nordic Chamber Music Competition (1997) and the Grieg Prize of Norway (2005). The Quartet also performed in the 1995 Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition where they were winners of the Grand Prize, Audience Prize, Critic’s Prize and the Radio Listener’s Award. Cardas is in high demand as a chamber music tutor and as a practitioner in schools. A background in theatre has seen her develop unique programs for younger musicians featuring theatre sports, improvisation and humour. Her ambition to involve children in high-level music making has led to the development of exercises for classical music listening and a “violins for everyone” program. Cardas has been a concertmaster of the Norwegian Chamber Orchestra, and has performed as soloist with other major Scandinavian orchestras. She performs on a beautiful c.1770 Lorenzo Storioni violin which is on loan to her from Dextra Musica.

Boris Kuschnir was born in Kiev in 1948 and studied the violin at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatoire with Boris Belenky and chamber music with Valentin Berlinsky. His many encounters with Dmitri Shostakovich and David Oistrakh (with whom he also studied), had a lasting influence on his artistic development. He was a founding member of the Moscow String Quartet, the Vienna Schubert Trio, and the Vienna Brahms Trio, and has made numerous recordings for labels including EMI, Naxos and Nimbus Records. He has appeared with such illustrious partners as Elisabeth Leonskaja, Leif Ove Andsnes, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Maxim Vengerov, Renaud Capuçon, Mischa Maisky and Steven Isserlis. Boris Kuschnir is a Professor at the Konservatorium Wien University and at the University of Music in Graz, and frequently gives masterclasses across Europe. He is also a jury member of various international music competitions including the Queen Elizabeth International Music Competition of Belgium, the International Tchaikovsky Competition (Moscow), the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis, the Paganini Competition (Genua), and the Jacques Thibaud International Violin Competition (Paris). In 2008 the President of the Republic of Austria awarded Boris Kuschnir with the “Grand Decoration of Honour in Silver for Services to the Republic of Austria” and in 2013 with the “Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and the Arts, First Class”. He was awarded the use of the Stradivarius violin (La Rouse Boughton, 1698) by the Austrian National Bank in recognition of his services to music.

JURY // 13

IRINA MOROZOVA

HOWARD PENNY

Australia

Irina Morozova, one of Australia’s leading violists, has been principal viola in the Australian Chamber Orchestra, guest principal of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and principal viola of the Elizabethan Trust Orchestra.

Howard Penny was born in Canberra and after studies with Nelson Cooke moved to Vienna, studying with Tobias Kühne, Andre Navarra, Boris Pergamenshikov and William Pleeth.

She is a founding and current member of both the Australia Ensemble @ UNSW and the Goldner String Quartet. With these two groups she has performed in nearly 30 countries around the world and has recorded extensively, particularly for the Hyperion Label in the UK and for Tall Poppies and ABC Classics in Australia.

After successes in the ABC Young Performers Awards and the Prague International Cello Competition, his concerto performances have included concerts at the Sydney Opera House, Vienna Musikverein and Konzerthaus, Berlin Schauspielhaus, Suntory Hall Tokyo and Casals Festival Prades.

After studies with Richard Goldner and Robert Pikler at the NSW State Conservatorium of Music, she undertook advanced studies and work in Europe and the USA before returning to Australia, where she subsequently appeared as a soloist with major Australian and New Zealand orchestras. A member of distinguished chamber music juries, she presided on the juries of the Shostakovich International String Quartet Competition in St Petersburg, Russia, the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, and was invited to perform and adjudicate at the Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition on the Isle of Man. Irina has been a frequent guest principal with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra.

A regular Principal Cello with Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Australian Chamber Orchestra, Camerata Salzburg, Vienna Radio Orchestra and Australian World Orchestra, he is a long-standing member of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, working with the world’s leading conductors and soloists, and participating in over 100 CD and DVD recordings.

She is married to violinist Dene Olding who is concertmaster of the Sydney Symphony and also a member of the Australia Ensemble and Goldner String Quartet. They have had a double concerto written for them by Richard Mills and have performed solos together with many orchestras. They live in Sydney with their son, Nikolai. Irina plays a viola made for Richard Goldner by A.E. Smith of Sydney in 1947.

As a chamber musician he has appeared in Wigmore Hall, Salzburg Festival, Lucerne Festival, Beethoven Festival Bonn and KREMERata Lockenhaus. A regular guest with Concentus Musicus (Harnoncourt) and Lecturer in Performance Practice at the University Mozarteum Salzburg for ten years, he was musical co-director of two Mozart operas for the extraordinary 2006 Salzburg Festival complete cycle. His numerous CD recordings include works for solo cello, a live recording of Beethoven’s Triple Concerto from the Vienna Konzerthaus, major works for piano trio with the Beethoven Trio Vienna, first recordings of Boccherini quintets and sextets, and many other chamber works. Howard frequently directs from the cello – from chamber orchestra works of all periods to Beethoven symphonies and operas – and is a regular guest at all major Australian chamber music festivals, running his own Sanguine Estate Music Festival each year. He also works closely with Australian Youth Orchestra on various projects. Since 2007 Howard Penny has been a member of the Resident Faculty of the Australian National Academy of Music in Melbourne, where he is now Head of Strings.

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TH E WI N N ERS’ TO U R

BRIGHT SHENG

For the first time this year we are sending two of the prizewinning ensembles from the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition on tour to regional Victoria (in addition to the Grand Prize Winners’ tour). The names of the touring groups will of course be announced at the conclusion of the Competition, and regional venues are taking bookings now. We advise booking early to avoid disappointment!

China/USA

Composer, Conductor and Pianist Bright Sheng was born in 1955 in Shanghai, China, and moved to New York in 1982. He is currently the Leonard Bernstein Distinguished University Professor at University of Michigan, and the Distinguished Artist-in-Residence at Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, City University of New York. He was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2001.

PIANO TRIO TOUR

GRAND PRIZE WINNER

Tuesday 21 July, 7.30pm Portland Arts Centre Ph: (03) 5522 2263 glenelg.vic.gov.au/ticketing

Bright Sheng has collaborated with many distinguished musicians including Leonard Bernstein, Kurt Masur, Christoph Eschenbach, Charles Dutoit, David Robertson, Neeme Järvi, Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax, Chao-Liang Lin, and Yefim Bronfman. He has been widely commissioned and performed by virtually all important musical institutions in North America, Europe and Asia, including the White House, the 2008 Beijing International Olympic Games, New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orchestra de Paris, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Danish National Symphony, San Francisco Opera, New York City Ballet, and San Francisco Ballet.

Wednesday 22 July, 8pm Hamilton Performing Arts Centre Ph: (03) 5573 0429 hamiltonpac.com.au

Tuesday 21 July Musica Viva Coffee Concert The Independent Theatre North Sydney Tea from 10am Concert from 11am Ph: 1800 688 482 musicaviva.com.au

Exclusively published by G. Schirmer Inc. in New York City, he can also be heard on Naxos, Sony Classical, Telarc, Delos, Koch International, New World, and BIS. His music ranges from dramatic to lyrical and is strongly influenced by the folk and classical music tradition from eastern and central Asia. Since 2000, he has been studying and researching the music phenomenon of the Silk Road culture, and has served as the Artistic Advisor to Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project Inc. Since 2011, he has been the Founder and Artistic Director of The Intimacy of Creativity—The Bright Sheng Partnership: Composers Meet Performers in Hong Kong, an annual event devoted to promoting an intimate dialogue between composers and performers.

STRING QUARTET TOUR Friday 24 July 2015 Delatite Winery, Mansfield 6pm Supper 7pm Performance Ph: (03) 5775 2922 delatitewinery.com.au

Friday 24 July, 7.30pm Peninsula Music Society Mornington Ph: 03 9789 8392 pmsmusic.asn.au Saturday 25 July, 8pm The Capital Theatre, Bendigo Ph: (03) 5434 6100 thecapital.com.au Grand Prize Winners will be flying with Virgin Australia.

THE WINNERS’ TOUR // 15

PIAN O TR I OS

ALLANT TRIO (SOUTH KOREA, USA, CANADA) Hyo Kyoung Nam piano // Jihyun Park violin // Alina Lim cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 25 in G major, Hob XV:25 “Gypsy Rondo” (1790) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839) R O U N D T WO BEETHOVEN Piano Trio in E flat major, Op. 1, No. 1 (1793) MURPHY Give me phoenix wings to fly (1997)

The Allant Trio was formed in 2010 at the Juilliard School of Music. The group is the recipient of the Jonathan Madrigano Entrepreneurship Grant from the Juilliard School and in 2013 they won the prestigious Beverly Hills Auditions in Los Angeles. The Allant Trio has performed at the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival and the Yehudi Menuhin Chamber Music Festival and was a semi-finalist at the Trondheim International Chamber Music Competition in Norway. The ensemble has received coaching from Juilliard professors Toby Appel, Rohan DeSilva, Jonathan Feldman, Clive Greensmith, Nicholas Mann and Vivian Weilerstein as well as being selected for residencies at The Banff Centre in Canada and Hill and Hollow Music in New York.

Most recently, the Allant Trio released its first album, ‘Ignition’, and gave a performance of Beethoven’s Triple Concerto at the Seoul Arts Center with the Seongnam Philharmonic Orchestra, broadcast by Korea’s MBC network. Through the US Embassy in Seoul, the group performed at the Embassy Youth Forum and the US Ambassador’s residence in Korea.

P I A N O T R I O S // 17

CLASSICUS TRIO (RUSSIA) Maxim Bandurin piano // Ekaterina Kanareva violin // Valery Verstyuk cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839) R O U N D T WO SAY Space Jump, Op. 46 (2013) SHOSTAKOVICH Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67 (1944)

Classicus Trio was formed in 2007 and debuted in Carnegie Hall in New York in January 2010. The group was awarded First Prize in the International Chamber Music Competition Donostia Hiria Ciudad de San Sebastian (San Sebastian, Spain, 2008), Second Prize and two special awards in the International Sergey Taneev Chamber Ensemble Competition (Kaluga, Russia, 2008), and Second Prize in the Gianni Bergamo Classical Music Award (Lugano, Switzerland, 2012). Classicus Trio has also received awards from The Russian Performing Art Foundation, the Medal Prize from The Irina Arkhipova Foundation, and a Diploma for Achievements in Musical Art from the International Academy of Creative Endeavors.

Classicus Trio has received tuition from Gérard Wyss, Jean-Marc PhillipsVarjabédian (Trio Wanderer), Antonio Meneses, Orfeo Mandozzi (Brahms Trio), and Alan Weiss. Festival appearances include Festival Midis Minimes (Belgium), and Juventudes Musicales (Spain). Between 2010 and 2012 Classicus Trio collaborated with the Moscow State Philharmonic Society, participating in two concert series titled ‘Philharmonic Debut’ and ‘View of the Future’. In 2012/2013 Classicus Trio presented a series called “The Art of the Piano Trio” at Moscow Conservatory.

P I A N O T R I O S // 19

ESTIVO TRIO (AUSTRALIA) Ying Ho piano // Fox Chan violin // Jonathan Békés cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797) RAVEL Piano Trio in A minor (1914) R O U N D T WO KURTÁG Varga Bálint Ligaturája (2007) TCHAIKOVSKY Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 50 (1881–82)

Sydney-based Estivo Trio made its European debut at the Sala Maffeina, Teatro Filarmonico in Verona, Italy and were the only piano trio selected to attend the inaugural Estivo Summer Chamber Music Festival in Italy. Subsequent concerts at the San Fermo, Verona and the Vigeland Museum in Oslo, Norway were all well-received and the trio was soon invited to perform across Asia and Europe. Upcoming engagements include concerts and masterclasses in Hong Kong, China, Korea, New Zealand and Australia. The Estivo Trio has worked closely with members of Australia’s leading chamber music ensemble, The Goldner String Quartet, and other distinguished musicians Goetz Richter, Ole Böhn, Alice Waten, Klaus Marx, Marco Rapetti and Christian Mueller. Fox Chan is currently on staff at the Sydney Conservatorium Open Academy and teaches violin at the Rising Stars Program. He is also Artistic Director at Arco Music Academy. Jonathan Békés is currently studying at ANAM. Ying Ho is also on staff at the Sydney Conservatorium Open Academy, Rising Stars Program, and the Sydney Conservatorium High School where she teaches chamber music.

P I A N O T R I O S // 21

LINOS PIANO TRIO

(THAILAND, UK, BRAZIL, GERMANY, FRANCE)

Prach Boondiskulchok piano // Konrad Elias-Trostmann violin // Vladimir Waltham cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797) SCHUMANN Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 110 (1851) R O U N D T WO LINDBERG Piano Trio (2008 arr. 2011–12) BEETHOVEN Piano Trio in B flat major, Op. 97 “Archduke” (1811)

The Linos Piano Trio was formed in 2007 in London and was featured in the Tunnell Trust’s ‘Showcase for Young Musicians’. The group was a recipient of the Guildhall School’s Ivan Sutton Award for Chamber Music and was awarded a full recital at the Purcell Room by the Park Lane Group in 2011. In May 2014, the Royal Philharmonic Society awarded the Linos Piano Trio the Albert and Eugenie Frost Prize for Outstanding Young Ensemble. The group is also currently a ‘Mentorship Ensemble’ in the ChamberStudio program at King’s Place.

Praised for the ‘slow burning, gripping’ performance by The Strad as well as an ‘astounding performance’ by the Hannoversche Allgemein for their German debut, the Linos Piano Trio has performed in the most prestigious venues in Europe including the Barbican Hall, Wigmore Hall, King’s Place, Menuhin Hall, Schoenberg Center in Vienna and György Ligeti Hall. In 2014 the Linos Piano Trio pioneered a recording project of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s Complete Piano Trios, which have never been recorded before, and are very rarely performed.

P I A N O T R I O S // 23

TRIO ADORNO (GERMANY) Lion Hinnrichs piano // Christoph Callies violin // Samuel Selle cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797) RAVEL Piano Trio in A minor (1914) R O U N D T WO SCHMIDHAMMER Three Pieces for Piano Trio (2014) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 2 in C minor, Op. 66 (1845)

Based in Hamburg, Trio Adorno was founded in 2003. The group won second prize in the 2004 Hamburg Chamber Music Competition, and at the 15th International Brahms Competition was awarded Second Prize in the Chamber Music Category as well as the Audience Prize and two special awards. In 2013 Trio Adorno was selected to take part in the Bundesauswahl Konzerte Junger Künstler (Young Artists Program). In 2014 the group was in the Finals of the prestigious Osaka International Chamber Music Competition. From 2010 to 2011 Trio Adorno studied with members of the Alban Berg Quartet at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln and they are now under

the tutelage of Heime Müller, a former member of the Artemis Quartet. Other musical influences include: Niklas Schmidt (Trio Fontenay), Martin Löhr (Trio Jean Paul), Menahem Pressler (Beaux Arts Trio) and Arnold Steinhardt (Guarneri String Quartet). A busy concert schedule takes Trio Adorno all around Europe including Vienna, Sienna and Warsaw, and to international music festivals including Festspiele Mecklenburg Vorpommern and the Di Lapedona International Music Festival, as well as performing for the organisation Live Music Now.

P I A N O T R I O S // 25

TRIO BONNENSIS (GERMANY, AUSTRALIA) Fabian M端ller piano // Niklas Liepe violin // Sarah Kim cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 2 in C minor, Op. 66 (1845) R O U N D T WO KURTÁG Varga Bálint Ligaturája (2007) SCHUBERT Piano Trio in E flat major, D.929 (1827)

Trio Bonnenis was founded in 2014 and has been fortunate to work with many esteemed musicians, particularly their main mentors Conradin Brotbek, Anthony Spiri and Gerhard Schulz. The ensemble members have performed concerts throughout the world, and have won a large array of prizes and awards from national and international competitions won throughout Australia and Europe. Trio Bonnensis’ 2015 engagements include concerts at several internationally renowned festivals including the Beethoven Festival in Bonn and the Berlin Chamber Music Festival at the Piano Salon Christophori.

The name ‘Bonnensis’ is taken from Beethoven, who signed off his letters during his time in Vienna with “Beethoven Bonnensis”, serving as a proud reminder to his recipients of his origins. Not only is Beethoven of great inspiration to the trio, but they also share his hometown, Bonn, where the great composer was born and lived and where Trio Bonnensis is based, had their first concert and ‘a great and promising future was foreseen’ (General Anzeiger Bonn).

P I A N O T R I O S // 27

TRIO MEDICI (RUSSIA, FRANCE) Olga Kirpicheva piano // Vera Lopatina violin // Jeremy Genet cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797) BRAHMS Piano Trio No. 1 in B major, Op. 8 (1853–4; revised 1889) R O U N D T WO HERSANT Variations sur la “Sonnerie de Sainte-Geneviéve-du-Mont” de Marin Marais (1998) MENDELSSOHN Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839)

Trio Medici was awarded Second Prize at the 6th International “Joseph Haydn” Chamber Music Competition in Vienna in March 2015 and won the Ravel Prize at the Académie Internationale de Musique Maurice Ravel in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, France in September 2014. Vera Lopatina and Olga Kirpicheva originally performed as part of ARS Trio which was formed in 2004 at Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Conservatory and was awarded First Prize in Beethoven’s Days in Moscow and Concertino Prague competitions in 2005 and 2006 respectively. The ARS Trio also qualified as a semi-finalist during the 56th ARD International Music Competition in Munich. Vera and OIga met Jeremy Genet at the Concert of the Laureates at the Académie Ravel and decided to reform the trio under the name of Trio Medici. Trio Medici performs regularly throughout France and Europe and has received tuition from internationally renowned artists including Itamar Golan, Philippe Bernold, Guillaume Paoletti, Trio Wanderer and the Ebène Quartet. Throughout 2014/15 the group performed a concert tour of France (after winning the Ravel Prize) in venues including the Grand Théâtre in Bordeaux and Théâtre Bouffes du Nord in Paris.

P I A N O T R I O S // 29

TRIO PALMER (FRANCE) Thibault Maignan piano // Alex Diep violin // Augustin GuĂŠnand cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN Piano Trio No. 28 in D major, Hob XV:16 (1790) BRAHMS Piano Trio No. 3, Op. 101 (1886) R O U N D T WO ESCAICH Lettres mêlées (2003) RAVEL Piano Trio in A minor (1914)

Formed in 2011 at the Higher National Conservatory in Lyon (CNSMD), Trio Palmer received their Masters Degrees with Honors under the tuition of Vladimir Nemtanu, Hervé N’Kaoua, and Yvan Chiffoleau. Despite following quite diverse personal careers, the three musicians share a deep interest in chamber music, with a special emphasis on major German Romantic and French composers. Their repertoire has ranged from Joseph Haydn to Philippe Hersant, encompassing the major German romantic composers, along with special emphasis on French music with Maurice Ravel.

Trio Palmer went on in 2013 to enroll in the Chamber Music Master Class at the Conservatory under the tuition of Yovan Markovitch, Emmanuel Strosser, Dana Ciocarlie and Frank Krawczyk, with the more specific aim of working in depth on Brahms trios as well as contemporary music. They have also given focus to works unfamiliar to the general public, such as Kurtág and Escaich. Trio Palmer has performed at the Festival of Contemporary Music in Bourgoin, La Roque d’Anthéron Festival, the Chamber Music Society of Lyon and concerts for the Goethe Institute. They were invited to the Festival of La Roque d’Anthéron and have had the opportunity to work with the Trio Wanderer, Claire Désert, Chantal Stigliani, Emmanuel Strosser and Christian Ivaldi.

P I A N O T R I O S // 31

STR I N G Q UARTETS

ALTIUS QUARTET (USA) Andrew Giordano violin // Joshua Ulrich violin // Andrew Krimm viola // Zachary Reaves cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793) LIGETI String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–4) R O U N D T WO PUTS Dark Vigil (1999) MENDELSSOHN String Quartet in A minor, Op. 13 (1827)

Formed in 2011, Altius Quartet is the resident quartet of the Western Slope Concert Series in Colorado and the Graduate String Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Colorado Boulder, under the mentorship of the Takács String Quartet. The group has received numerous awards including the Silver Medal at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition (2014) and First Prize at both the Coltman Chamber Music Competition (2014) and the Plowman Chamber Music Competition (2013). Altius Quartet has toured throughout the United States and has performed for some of the most respected string quartets and pedagogues in classical music including the Miro Quartet, Shanghai Quartet, Kronos Quartet, Arnold Steinhardt and James Dunham. Altius Quartet is also committed to outreach and often gives concerts and masterclasses in public schools and music education programs. The group has coached chamber music and performed at the Music in the Mountains Conservatory in Durango, Colorado and was resident at the Inspiration Point Fine Arts Colony in Eureka Springs, Arkansas in 2013.

ST R I N G Q UA RT E T S // 33

ARGUS QUARTET (USA) Jason Issokson violin // Clara Kim violin // Diana Wade viola // Joann Whang cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793) BRITTEN String Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 25 (1941) R O U N D T WO GUINIVAN String Quartet No. 1 (2014) MENDELSSOHN String Quartet No. 6 in F minor, Op. 80 (1847)

The Argus Quartet is a Los Angelesbased string quartet dedicated to new and innovative concert presentations of diverse repertoire. Formed in the summer of 2013, the Argus Quartet was recently selected as the first resident ensemble to be mentored by the Brentano String Quartet at the Yale School of Music’s String Quartet Fellowship program.  They have also attended the Juilliard String Quartet Seminar in New York and were also recently given a grant by Chamber Music America to commission a new string quartet from the Grammynominated composer Eric Guinivan. The Argus Quartet has won several competitions including the Beverly Hills Auditions and the Music Teachers’ Association of California San Diego Competition.

The Argus Quartet believes that today’s ensembles must honour chamber music traditions while forging a new path forward. In that spirit, the quartet’s repertoire includes not just staples of the chamber music canon, but also a large number of works by living composers. The quartet collaborates closely with composers in rehearsals, workshops, and master classes. The pieces premiered by the Argus Quartet run the compositional gamut: from indeterminate works, to electronic music, to new music choreographed with dance. The Argus Quartet also aims to engage audiences in unique ways – performing in dive bars and clubs, giving casual home concerts, presenting storytelling along with music, live-Tweeting performances, and weaving visual media into the fabric of the live-music experience.

ST R I N G Q UA RT E T S // 35

ARIS QUARTET (GERMANY) Anna Katharina Wildermuth violin // NoĂŠmi Zipperling violin // Caspar Vinzens viola // Lukas Sieber cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 61 in D minor, Op. 76, No. 2 (1796–7) MENDELSSOHN String Quartet in E minor, Op. 44, No. 2 (1837) R O U N D T WO BEETHOVEN String Quartet in F minor, Op. 95, No.11 “Serioso” (1810) ˇ ÁK String Quartet No. 12 in F major, DVOR Op. 96 (1893) WIDMANN String Quartet No. 3 “Hunting Quartet” (2003)

The Aris String Quartet was founded in 2009 in Frankfurt and is one of the most sought-after emerging quartets in Germany. They were awarded First Prize at the International Johannes-BrahmsCompetition (2012) in Pörtschach, Austria, the European Chamber Music Competition in Karlsruhe (2013) and the Lenzewski Competition for Contemporary Chamber Music in Frankfurt (2014). Aris Quartet was praised by the Jeunesses Musicales Germany as one of the most convincing NewcomerEnsembles in both 2013 and 2014, and gained further international attention through its recordings for radio stations including SWR2 (Germany), Österreich1 (Austria) and CeskaTelevize. The group’s international festival appearances include the MecklenburgVorpommern Festival, the Rheingau Musik Festival, the Mozartfest Würzburg, the Julita International Chamber Music Festival (Sweden) and the Festival Trebonska Nocturna (Czech Republic) as well concerts as in renowned music venues such as Alte Oper Frankfurt, Opera Frankfurt, Hofburg Palace in Vienna and Laeiszhalle in Hamburg.

The Aris Quartet is studying with Prof. Hubert Buchberger (Buchberger Quartet) at the Frankfurt University of Music and has been coached by members of the Alban Berg Quartet, the Artemis Quartet, the Juilliard String Quartet, as well as the Casals, Arditti and Vogler Quartets. The Aris Quartet is sponsored by scholarships from the Juetting Foundation, the Villa Musica and the Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now Foundation.

ST R I N G Q UA RT E T S // 37

CASTALIAN STRING QUARTET

(FINLAND, UK, FRANCE)

Sini Simonen violin // Daniel Llewellyn Roberts violin // Charlotte Bonneton viola // Christopher Graves cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 50 in B flat major, Op. 64, No. 3 (1790) BARTÓK String Quartet No. 6 (1939) R O U N D T WO ADÈS The Four Quarters (2010) WEBERN Langsamer Satz (1905) RAVEL String Quartet in F major (1903)

Winner of the First Prize at the 2015 Lyon International Chamber Music Competition, the Castalian String Quartet is fast becoming a favourite with audiences in the United Kingdom and abroad for its ‘richly romantic energy and passion’ (Strad Magazine). Formed in 2011, the quartet has been the beneficiary of awards from the Royal Overseas League (2011 Elias Fawcett Trust Award), the Countess of Munster Trust, the Tunnell Trust, the Royal Philharmonic Society, St. Peter’s Eaton Square, Kirckman Concert Society and Mozarteum de France. In 2013 it won both the Audience Prize and First Prize in the Kammermusik Hannover Next Generation Competition, broadcast on German radio station NDR. That same year the group gave its German recital debut in the Heidelberger Frühling String Quartet Festival and first concerts in Switzerland at the Ceresio Estate Festival, Lugano.

The 2014-15 season brought the release of the quartet’s recording of Mendelssohn on the Champs Hill label (awarded BBC Music Magazine’s ‘Critic’s Choice’ for September, and ‘Chamber Music Disc of the Quarter’ by the German Record Critics Association), concerts in Germany with violist Nils Mönkemeyer, recitals at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin and the Festival de Musique de Conques, and a France Musique broadcast of quartets by Ravel and Menozzi at the Lyon Opera House. Recent highlights include performances at Wigmore Hall, the Purcell Room, Kings Place, Lake District Summer Music, the Edinburgh Festival (Royal Overseas League concert series) and a BBC Radio 3 recital from the Cheltenham Festival. The quartet also toured China at the invitation of the British Council. In 2014 the members of Castalian String Quartet graduated from the Hannover University of Music, Dance and Theatre with a Masters Degree in Chamber Music, studying with their mentor Oliver Wille. The quartet has also worked closely with Thomas Brandis and Levon Chilingirian.

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GIOCOSO STRING QUARTET Sebastian Casleanu violin // Teofil Todica violin // Adrian Stanciu viola // Bas Jongen cello

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(GERMANY, ROMANIA, NETHERLANDS)

ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 64 in D major, Op. 76, No.5 (1796) KRENEK String Quartet No. 3, Op. 20 (1923) R O U N D T WO PENDERECKI String Quartet No. 3 “Leaves of an Unwritten Diary” (2008) MOZART String Quartet No. 16 in E flat major, K.428 (1783)

The Giocoso String Quartet was founded in Romania in 2003 and is currently based in Vienna. A laureate of several international music competitions, the group has enjoyed success at the Romanian National Music Competition (2003), the International Mozart Chamber Music Competition in ClujNapoca (2006) and the International Charles Hennen Competition in Heerlen, the Netherlands (2009). More recently the ensemble has been the recipient of important chamber music prizes such as the Alban Berg Prize, Krenek Prize and Artis Prize at ISA Reichenau in Austria (2011), the HSBC Prize of the Aix-en-Provence Festival (2012) as well as the Vienna Windisch Chamber Music Prize in both 2012 and 2014. The group has been invited to perform at international chamber music festivals including the Aix-en-Provence Festival in France, the Beethoven and Kalkalpen Chamber Music Festival in Austria, the Orlando Festival in the Netherlands and the Niedersachsen Festival in Germany.

The Giocoso String Quartet has worked extensively with Johannes Meissl (Artis Quartet) at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, Austria. As a member of the renowned European Chamber Music Academy (ECMA) the Giocoso Quartet has also participated in masterclasses with Hatto Beyerle and Gerhard Schulz (Alban Berg Quartet), Eberhard Feltz, Ferenc Rados, Rainer Schmidt (Hagen Quartet), Avedis Kouyoumdjian (Piano), Andras Keller (Keller Quartet) and members of the Aviv, Orlando, Vermeer, Vogler, Bartók, Skampa and Talich Quartets. Since 2011 the quartet has been the recipient of a scholarship from the Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now Foundation in Vienna and in January 2015 they made their Wigmore Hall debut.

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NOGA QUARTET (FRANCE, ISRAEL) Simon Roturier violin // Lauriane Vernhes violin // Avishai Chameides viola // Joan Bachs cello

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ROUND ONE MOZART String Quartet No. 19 in C major, K.465 “Dissonance” (1782–85) LIGETI String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–4) R O U N D T WO KURTÁG 6 Moments musicaux, Op. 44 (2005) SCHUBERT String Quartet in D minor, D.810 “Death and the Maiden” (1824)

The Noga Quartet was established under the guidance of the Artemis Quartet in 2008 in Berlin where it is currently based. In 2010 the group received a scholarship from the Ottilie-Selbach-Redslob foundation in Berlin and in 2014 won First Prize in the competition of the Irene Steels-Wilsing Foundation. The Noga Quartet has also been selected to take part in several other prestigious international competitions and festivals including the Paolo Premio Borciani International String Quartet Competiton (2014), Banff International String Quartet Competition (2013 and 2010), Osaka International Chamber Music Competition (2011), Ravinia Music Festival (2011) and McGill Quartet Academy (2010).

The members of Noga Quartet are currently supported by the Escuela Superior De Musica Reina Sofia in Madrid for the continuation of their studies with Professor Günter Pichler (Alban Berg Quartet) and Professor Heime Müller (Artemis Quartet). The group has also participated in masterclasses with Volker Jacobsen (Artemis Quartet), Philipe de Groote (Chilingirian Quartet), Peter Schuhmayer (Artis Quartet), Atar Arad (Cleveland Quartet), Thomas Riebl, Paul Katz, Timothy Eddy and Miriam Fried.

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PATRONUS QUARTET (AUSTRALIA) Anne-足Marie Johnson violin // Courtenay Cleary violin // Merewyn Bramble viola // Paul Ghica cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 62 in C major, Op. 76, No. 3 “Emperor” (1796–97) ˇEK String Quartet No. 2 “Intimate JANÁC Letters” (1928) R O U N D T WO STANHOPE Elegies and Dances (2008; revised 2010) BEETHOVEN String Quartet No. 9 in C major, Op. 59, No. 3 “Razumovsky” (1806)

The Patronus Quartet was formed in 2014 in Melbourne and gave its first performance in the Beethoven@4 concert series and Quartetthaus as part of the 2014 Melbourne International Arts Festival. The members of Patronus Quartet are musicians with the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra and the Australian Octet. Individually they hold prestigious international awards for solo and chamber music performance, including the Dorcas McClean travelling scholarship, and have participated in the Asia-Pacific Chamber Music Competition and the Munich ARD International String Quartet Competition.

Being keen educators through the worlds of Melbourne Youth Music, the Australian Youth Orchestra, MCO and the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the quartet has a particular interest in keeping chamber music a thriving part of primary and secondary schools of urban and especially regional centres. The quartet is thankful for the support and performance opportunities given by the Australian National Academy of Music where it has rehearsed under the guidance of masters such as William Hennessy and, more recently, the Borodin Quartet.

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VERONA QUARTET (SINGAPORE, CANADA, USA) Jonathan Ong violin // Dorothy Ro violin // Abigail Rojansky viola // Warren Hagerty cello

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ROUND ONE HAYDN String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793) WEBERN Langsamer Satz (1905) LIGETI String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–4) R O U N D T WO MURPHY Dark Energy (2006–7) BEETHOVEN String Quartet No. 8 in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2 “Razumovsky” (1806)

Hailed by critics as ‘thoughtful, impressive musicians’, the Verona Quartet is quickly establishing itself as one of the most exciting young quartets on the music scene today. In March 2015, the group won Second Prize and the ProQuartet-CEMC Prize at the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition in London, England, where its performances were described as ‘impassioned, dynamic and engaging’. Verona Quartet also won the Grand Prize at the Coleman Chamber Music Competition (2014), First Place and the Audience Choice Award at the Chesapeake International Chamber Music Competition (2014), as well as the Bronze Medal at the 8th Osaka International Chamber Music Competition in Osaka, Japan, where critics praised the group’s ‘sensational, powerhouse performance’ (Classical Voice America). The musicians count among their alma maters Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music, the Cleveland Institute of Music, the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music and the Eastman School of Music. In addition to their performance commitments, the Verona Quartet members are also strong proponents of community engagement and education, curating a concert series and masterclasses across the city of Danville, Illinois.

The quartet has performed across North America, Asia and Europe and in April 2015 was quartet-in-residence at the Abu Dhabi Chamber Music Festival in Abu Dhabi U.A.E. In late 2015 Verona Quartet will take up the position of Graduate Resident String Quartet at the Juilliard School in New York. As Lisa Arnhold Fellows, they will work closely with members of the Juilliard String Quartet and will make their Lincoln Centre, Alice Tully Hall debut in May 2016.

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TH E CMA – M O NA S H M U S I CO LO GY I N ITIATIVE The CMA–Monash Musicology Initiative is a collaborative venture between Chamber Music Australia and the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music at Monash University, established by and under the direction of Professor Mary Finsterer, Chamber Music Australia Chair of Composition at Monash. The Initiative affords undergraduate students the opportunity to gain professional experience in the area of programme note writing by working with specialists in the field of Musicology, most notably Dr Joel Crotty, with the support of other Monash staff including Megan Burslem. This creative endeavour realises a commitment from both Chamber Music Australia and the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music to offer the wider community further musical insights, and to enhance lively discussion about the exhilarating music-making that will be found throughout the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. Monash University is Principal Partner of Chamber Music Australia.

M O N A S H U N I V ER S I T Y U N D ER G R A D UAT E S T U D EN T S S EL EC T ED F O R T H E I N I T I AT I V E Jin Hee Lee is from South Korea and currently an undergraduate Arts student at Monash University, majoring in Music. She is also interested in learning languages and is currently studying Japanese.

Dr Joel Crotty, Professor Mary Finsterer Chamber Music Australia Chair of Composition, Michael Hammelmann, Professor John Griffiths Head of School – Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music, Cassandra Ford, Jin Hee Lee, Lecturer Megan Burslem, Benjamin Woodroffe General Manager – Chamber Music Australia 48 //

Michael Hammelmann is a student currently completing a Bachelor of Music degree, majoring in classical voice. Michael began his musical endeavours at age 11, learning the guitar and violin before finally choosing classical voice as his principal study at age 15.

Cassandra Ford is enrolled at Monash University in the double degrees of Bachelor of Music/Bachelor of Arts, majoring in classical voice. She commenced music studies at an early age and still plays the flute and cello. In her spare time Cassandra enjoys participating in judo and taekwondo.

Dr Joel Crotty, Professor Mary Finsterer, Michael Hammelmann, Jin Hee Lee and Cassandra Ford

MESSAGE FROM CHAMBER MUSIC AUSTRALIA CHAIR OF COMPOSITION As the inaugural Chamber Music Australia Chair of Composition, I wish to thank the Chair of the Chamber Music Australia Board Julian Burnside AO QC, President and Vice-Chancellor of Monash University Professor Margaret Gardner AO, Chamber Music Australia, and the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music at Monash University. Being appointed to this role is very exciting. As a composer who has worked in classical concert music for more than thirty years, this position gives me the opportunity to initiate ventures within both institutions. These ventures bring together the various strains that make up the profession of music, these being Musicology, Composition and Performance. Behind the scenes of classical performance is a hive of industry that works to bring all aspects together into a unified presentation. History has provided us with a wealth of repertoire through the dedication of composers, which has been dutifully documented by musicologists to create pathways that allow us to better understand and appreciate where the music has come from. All play their part in the presentation of music that we enjoy in our daily lives. Through the CMA–Monash Musicology Initiative, musicology students were engaged to write programme notes for the concerts presented during the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. This has been a wonderful opportunity for the students to gain work experience and play an integral role in the CMA team. With the introduction of the Australian New Works Award into the CMA programme this year, it was a great privilege for me to join Kim Williams AM and Professor Paul Grabowsky AO as a member of the jury. The applications received were of an extremely high standard, giving the jury members the challenging task of deciding on the winning entries. As part of the process to assist the two winning composers in their final preparation of the performance materials, I was able to establish The Monash Reading Panel. This team of expert instrumentalists attached to the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music provided advice to the composers, which was greatly appreciated. Finally, it is a great pleasure for me to be involved in Chamber Music Australia’s Schools Link program, which will see a special workshop delivered by the winning composers for secondary school students at Wesley College. Under the direction of General Manager Benjamin Woodroffe, Chamber Music Australia continues to grow with the introduction of innovative programs and a continuing standard of excellence in the performance of chamber music. I feel very proud to be a part of the CMA team.

THE MONASH READING PANEL 2015 Elizabeth Sellars violin I

Co-ordinator of Strings, Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music Monash University

Edward Antonov violin II

Alumni, Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music Monash University

Simon Oswell viola

Guest Lecturer, Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music Monash University

Svetlana Bogosavljevic cello

Lecturer, Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music Monash University

Dr Kenji Fujimara piano

Deputy Head of School and Co-ordinator of Classical Performance and Chamber Music, Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music Monash University

Professor Mary Finsterer Chamber Music Australia Chair of Composition

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SCH O O L S LI N K Inspiring young musicians to follow a career in chamber music is important to Chamber Music Australia. Building on the success of its public programs, Chamber Music Australia has been working with Victorian Secondary Schools to provide a rare and international direct connection at the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition in 2015. Fifteen schools from metropolitan and regional Victoria were invited to join Chamber Music Australiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s inaugural Schools Link program. Each of these schools has been paired with one of the brilliant young Piano Trios or String Quartets who have been invited to compete at the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. Students have been introduced to musicians from around the world, followed them through the audition process and competition and have welcomed them to their school for workshops, performances and masterclasses whilst they are in Melbourne. These musical and cultural connections are invaluable to both the competitors and students who are seeking guidance on their own musical journey. Schools Link provides a rare opportunity for students to learn first-hand the preparation and stamina involved in taking part in an international music competition.

PA RT I C I PAT I N G S C H O O L S F O R 2 01 5

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PRO G R AM N OTE S – PIAN O TR I OS Michael BAKRNČEV (b.1989)

Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770–1827)

Piano Trio No. 2 “Janino” (2015)

Piano Trio in E flat major, Op. 1, No. 1 (c.1793-95)

Piano Trio in D major, Op. 70, No. 1 “Ghost” (1808)

I. Allegro II. Adagio cantabile III. Scherzo: Allegro assai – Trio IV. Finale: Presto

I. Allegro vivace e con brio II. Largo assai ed espressivo III. Presto

Currently residing in Melbourne, Australia, composer Michael Bakrnčev’s works have been recorded in Australia, USA and Canada along with performances in European countries. The original conception of Bakrnčev’s Piano Trio No.2 is based on fragments of a Macedonian folk dance melody called the Janino Oro. The Janino Oro is characterised by the use of a Macedonian bagpipe called a Gajda as well as a peculiar time signature of 18/8, all of which is explored in the Piano Trio setting. The Trio is dedicated to Sun-Ju Sung, Bakrnčev’s harmony and theory teacher, who is credited with introducing him to various Beethoven piano trios as well being someone to whom he owes much of his “musical thinking”. This work is the winner of the Piano Trio stream of the Chamber Music Australia New Works Award. Bakrnčev’s trio employs many extended techniques in the violin and cello. Such features include bouncing effects on open strings, as well as high notes that can be taken to any desired pitch by the instrumentalists allowing the trio freedom to take the composition as far as they want. Furthermore, the work features a well-known Bartók influence in his famous snap pizzicato. Bakrnčev pushes the performers to their limits with traits of Romanticism through vibrato of the violin and cello, as well as a fast and heavy ‘bashing’ of the piano in a style suggestive of thrash metal. These heavy moments are, however, balanced by the sweetness of the violin and stability within the sections whilst still maintaining the raw elements of the Eastern European folk music tradition. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

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Beethoven was determined to surprise the world with his new set of Opus 1 trios. With his Piano Trio Op. 1, No. 1, he seems to have made extensive revisions to perfect the trio in its new four-movement structure. The first trio of the set of three may well have been sketched in the late 1780s, but was refined and completed along with No. 2 and No. 3 between the years of 1793 and 1795. The trios were dedicated to Prince Karl Lichnowsky who generously offered support to Beethoven in Vienna. Beethoven first performed all three trios in front of the Prince, as well as for his teacher Joseph Haydn. Despite having some minor reservations, Haydn’s comments on Beethoven’s trio were generally complimentary and the newly structured trio in four movements (rather than three) proved popular amongst musicians and audiences alike.

Beethoven’s two Piano Trios, Op. 70, owe their existence to the countess Marie Erdödy who, towards the end of 1807, offered Beethoven temporary haven under her own roof, and even bribed her servants to put up with his boorish behaviour. This earned him a brief domestic truce during which he completed the trios, and Beethoven duly rewarded her with their dedication. Louis Spohr, witness to a rehearsal of the first trio, recalled: “It was not an enjoyable experience… the piano was terribly out of tune… which did not trouble Beethoven in the least, since he could not hear it… In loud passages the poor deaf man hammered away at the keys, smudging whole groups of notes…I was deeply moved by the tragedy of it all… Beethoven’s continual melancholy was no longer a riddle to me.”

The first movement of the Op. 1, No. 1 trio begins with its theme of innocent clarity in which the piano has a prominent role, leading to the secondary theme where the strings gradually become more significant. The central section of the movement develops further with ascending arpeggios, reaching its conclusion by reintroducing the first theme in its original key. The second movement, an Adagio in A flat major, presents a beautiful cantabile in the piano, soon taken over by the soulful sound of the violin and cello in duet. The third Scherzo movement is an exceptionally original work, with its fast and light touch of the piano and the violin. The wide leaping figure by the piano marks the opening of the Finale. The same figure reveals the central development, expanding it further to the coda in conclusion.

The first movement moves from the élan of the opening unison to the unexpected wistful lyricism of the cello’s melody, and then reaches a peak of uneasiness in the contrapuntal development section. The second movement is the emotional core of the work. Through incessant repetition, the melodic figure introduced at the outset by the piano takes on the quality of a ghostly plea (it is also found among Beethoven’s sketches for a projected opera, Macbeth, and this association with the supernatural accounts for the trio’s old fashioned nickname: ‘The Ghost’). The third movement reverses the falling minor scales of the Largo with upward thrusting major keyed ones. After the nightmare, this is the hard light of reality.

Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770–1827)

Johannes BRAHMS (1833–1897)

Piano Trio in B flat major, Op. 97 “Archduke” (1811)

Piano Trio No. 1 in B major, Op. 8 (1853-4; rev. 1889)

Piano Trio No. 3, Op. 101 (1886)

I. Allegro moderato II. Scherzo: Allegro III. Andante cantabile IV. Allegro moderato, presto

I. Allegro con brio II. Scherzo (allegro molto) III. Adagio IV. Allegro

One of many works dedicated to the Archduke Rudolph, Beethoven dedicated the Opus 97 Piano Trio to his patron in appreciation of Rudolph’s kindness during the tremendous Austrian currency devaluation in early 1811. Although the Archduke was himself a fine pianist, Beethoven was at the piano for the first performance in April 1814.

Brahms sketched this trio in 1853, and showed its draft to Schumann when the two first met that September. It was published in 1854 when Brahms was twenty-one. Thirty years later, with the prospect of another edition (and in the light of his two later, much more economical trios), he thoroughly revised it, cutting about a third of its original length.

The trio is now so well-known as the ‘Archduke’ that it could be called the work’s subtitle; and it could be said that the assumed characteristics of an archduke are evident in the first movement, which opens with the quietly assured, stately first theme. A second theme is also heard, which does not appear in the movement’s development section. Mimicking statement and retort (which harmonically ascend and descend, and descend and ascend, respectively) the development gives way to an unassumingly serene recapitulation.

Despite this, it remains a chamber work on the grandest scale, as hinted at by the spaciousness of the first movement’s opening theme. By dint of repetition and expansion, this exuberant melody still fills some sixty bars before any major new materials are offered. Sometimes Brahms adds sweetness to his string melodies by scoring them in chains of thirds and sixths; others are scored in strong unisons or octaves, to cut through the dense, brilliant piano part.

The second movement, in contrast to the composure of the first, begins with an excited duet; its theme progresses rationally to the movement’s Trio. At its outset, the cello alone begins a journey through distant harmonic relations in a quest to return to the home key. Faultlessly constructed, the movement concludes with a coda quoting both Scherzo and Trio. The third movement displays a set of four variations with a pensive, dignified theme in two parts. Reminiscent of the grandeur of the opening movement, this movement is disrupted in its coda by a chord, propelling the work into its fourth movement. This final movement gives the impression that its whimsical statements can portray only verve and potency, which, when coupled with the splendour of both the third and first movements, round the work off exquisitely.

The second movement alternates a sketchy B minor (Scherzo) with a lush B major (Trio). The 1889 revision left this controlled, Classically motivated piece (recalling Schubert or Mendelssohn) virtually unaltered. The third movement opens with almost religious calm with the piano’s organ like chords, and continues as a dialogue between strings and keyboard. The piece warms to a more fervent Romanticism beginning with the new cello melody. The fourth movement begins off centre tonally, gradually circling through related keys towards its ‘B’ focus. Even then, the ambiguity of B major or minor remains the potent impetus in its unfolding.

I. Allegro energico II. Presto non assai III. Andante grazioso IV. Allegro molto The Piano Trio in C minor is Brahms’ third and last piano trio, also the shortest and, perhaps, best designed. Composed during a highly productive summer in the Swiss Alps, it is characterised by a neo-classical sense of style and proportion, which also extends to the matter of instrumental balance. A few brief cells of melody are the basic components for the construction of a powerful first movement – strong rhythms fitted to more malleable melodic shapes – with the ‘big tune’ saved for the secondary theme. The fast second movement is a kind of duple-time scherzo, beginning with the strings muted. The central (trio) section includes passages of inquisitive pizzicato notes passed between the cello and violin. The third movement starts with the trio divided into two: the strings always together, set apart from the piano. There is a central, slightly faster section (quasi animato) which tends towards minor keys, then a varied reprise of the opening dialogue. Brahms advised performers of the fourth movement: “I should think that the trio’s finale requires, at first, very careful handling, and then the reverse!” To explain: its C minor opening, with short phrases, modulations and crossrhythms, creates an intense atmosphere, which Brahms then triumphantly explodes in the C major coda. © Graeme Skinner

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Antonín DVOŘÁK (1841–1904) Piano Trio No. 4 in E minor, Op. 90 “Dumky” (1891) I. Lento maestoso – Allegro II. Poco adagio – Vivace non troppo III. Andante – Vivace non troppo IV. Andante moderato (quasi tempo di Marcia) – Allegretto scherzando V. Allegro VI. Lento maestoso – Vivace Essentially dramatic in character, Dvořák’s Opus 90 trio has become well-known under the name of ‘Dumky Trio’, dumky being the plural of the Russian word dumka, a literary term for lament. Although Dvořák’s is not the only use of the term in relation to music, the title (and the work itself) represents a sense of melancholy and, in complete contrast, good humour, displaying the rapid mood changes associated with Slavonic folk music. This explains the many contrasts in tempo and mood, and the plethora of melodic interest prevalent in each movement. The trio opens with a brief, dramatic statement which is echoed throughout the work; this melancholic opening is contrasted by a faster, central section. A brief repeat of the opening motif (now developed) follows, which gives way to a reprise of the faster section, by way of a coda. The second movement, almost identical in form to the first, is as mournful in its opening as the first is dramatic. This time contrasted by a minor-mode second section, the movement concludes in a tumultuous, frenzied explosion. The third movement displays a welcome sense of calm, which, although challenged by its insistent central section, returns to conclude the movement. Reminiscent of Russian folk themes, the fourth movement is both reflective and wistful; it encapsulates many emotions, hinting at romantic love as much as it recalls the euphoria of a triumphant victor.

A brief introduction begins the fifth movement (a scherzo), which pulses persistently, interrupted only by momentary echoes of its introduction, towards its conclusion, which mirrors that of the second movement. The final movement recalls the melancholy of the first and second movements, this emotion being finally overcome by the Vivace section, concluding the work triumphantly in C major. © Chamber Music Australia

Thierry ESCAICH (b.1965) Lettres mêlées (2003) I. Modéré II. Modéré III. Trés vif An internationally distinguished French composer, organist and improviser, Thierry Escaich has contributed to promoting contemporary music creation that is most original. He gained recognition as a composer in 1989, after receiving the Blumenthal Prize from the Franco-American Florence Blumenthal Foundation, and his early works such as the saxophone concerto Le Chant des ténèbres (The song of Darkness) and Ad ultimas laudes for choir also contributed to his international reputation as a composer. Escaich currently teaches composition and improvisation at the Paris Conservatoire, where he himself studied and won eight premiers prix. Lettres mêlées was premiered by Trio Wanderer on 27 March 2003, in the Grand Prix Lycéen of Composers. The French title of the Trio means ‘intertwined letters’, which refers to three of the composers that Escaich admires; Brahms, Bach and Bartók, whose names Escaich translated into musical notations. These letters serve as a foundation for each of the three movements that flow without interruption. The first movement opens with six striking notes, played by the piano, which indicate the six letters, B-R-A-H-M-S. The violin and cello join the melody quietly with suspended notes, creating a mysterious atmosphere. A sudden change of mood by the beautiful sound of the piano marks the end of the first movement, yet the dark theme continues in the second movement. The high voice in the strings adds even more suspense to the mysterious mood, gradually building up to its climax. A sudden melodic change led by the fast striking violin marks the third movement. The frantic playing by the strings creates a sense of urgency, hurling the piece towards its climatic end. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

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Joseph HAYDN (1732–1809)

Piano Trio No. 25 in G major, Hob XV:25 “Gypsy Rondo” (1790)

Piano Trio No. 28 in D major, Hob XV:16 (1790)

Piano Trio No. 43 in C major, Hob XV:27 (1797)

I. Andante II. Poco adagio III. Finale ‘Rondo all’ Ongarese’: Presto

I. Allegro II. Andantino più tosto allegretto III. Vivace assai

I. Allegro II. Andante III. Presto

Haydn composed his G major piano trio as one of a set of three trios dedicated to Mrs Rebecca Schroeter, widow of a London-based pianist and composer Johann Samuel Schroeter. Mrs Schroeter became a pupil of Haydn during his stay in London in the summer of 1771, but the relationship progressed beyond musical matters to the point where the pupil and teacher fell in love, deeply so on her side and it appears, sincerely on his. The documentary evidence for a continuation of this relationship during Haydn’s second London visit is lacking, but that may be because Haydn stayed at an address within a short distance of Mrs Schroeter’s residence and had no need to exchange letters with her. The best proof that, at the very least, there was no breach between them is his dedication of three of his finest piano trios to her. They were first published in London in 1795.

Haydn’s Piano Trio No.28 in D major is one of three composed in about 1790 at the beginning of the composer’s greatest maturity. They were originally scored for flute, cello and piano, but optionally permit a violin instead of flute. The first movement of the D major work is full of vitality and Joie de vivre together with an occasional piquant harmonic or melodic innovation. The second Andante movement in D minor is based on a melody steeped in tender melancholy, the full depth of which is now and then suddenly revealed by surprising, poignant chromatic passages where the tensions of feeling bank up before ebbing away to greater calm and even exhaustion. The movement ends on a dominant half-close. The last movement is a rondo with a D major main section and a number of episodes in various related keys where Haydn’s high spirits are never far away.

The Piano Trio (Sonata) in C major is the first of three that make up Haydn’s final published set of trios, composed in Vienna but issued in London in 1797. The trios were dedicated to Therese Jansen, a pianist whose wedding (to Gaetano Bartolozzi) Haydn had witnessed at St James’s Church, Piccadilly, in May 1795, and for whom he had previously composed his last three piano sonatas (1794). Jansen must have been a fine player, for the keyboard writing is the most dazzling and arresting feature of the trios.

The most celebrated work in the set and indeed the best-known of all Haydn’s piano trios is the one in G major. It is often referred to as the ‘Gypsy Trio’ or the trio with the Gypsy Finale, from the fact that the Finale has something of a feeling of Hungarian gypsy music: “in the gypsies’ style” as Haydn noted. The Finale is among the most instantly memorable movements in all chamber music. The first movement (Andante) is also organised as a rondo and at times almost like a set of variations. G major/minor gives way to the submediant, E major, in a central slow movement in a broad singing style. The dominance of the piano in all three movements is characteristic of piano trios of the later eighteenth century.

The first movement is a real display piece for the piano; from the opening flourish, decked out with arpeggiated chords, to the many brief passages in octaves for the right hand (still, at that time, a sign of some virtuosity) and the obligatory rapid accompaniment figures. The second movement, in A major, recalls the simple lyricism of some of Haydn’s popular English canzonets, its potential for unalloyed sentimentality suddenly limited by a shift to A minor for its agitated middle section. The third movement is one of Haydn’s playful (‘patter’) last movements, spiced with occasional attempts – off-beat accents, odd chord changes and unprepared reprises – to upset his listeners’ expectations. © Graeme Skinner

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Joseph HAYDN (1732–1809)

Philippe HERSANT (b.1948)

György KURTÁG (b.1926)

Piano Trio No. 44 in E major, Hob XV:28 (1797)

Variations sur la “Sonnerie de SainteGeneviéve-du-Mont” de Marin Marais (1998)

Varga Bálint Ligaturája (2007)

I. Allegro Moderato II. Allegretto III. Finale: Allegro Haydn was greatly influenced by London’s music culture when he was there in 1794. At the time, London was the centre of musical Europe, overflowing with professional pianists and amateurs. During his stay in London from 1794 to 1795, Haydn completed his thirteen larger piano trios (Hob XV: 18-29, 31) which were then published in 1797. The most outstanding trios from the period are Hob XV: 27, 28, and 29. This set of three trios was dedicated to his friend, Therese Jansen, who was an accomplished pianist living in London. The Piano Trio No.44 in E major is infused with Haydn’s typical compositional characteristics, namely wit and charm. The quirky opening theme starts with grace notes in the piano, doubled by the plucking sound of the strings. The lively principle theme is repeated by the piano in the higher register, developing further until the shift of key to A flat major. The second movement, marked Allegretto, is in E minor. Its initial theme shared by all three instruments introduces a somewhat darker mood. Soon, the piano takes over the melody, leaving the violin and cello to 28 bars of silence, until the music shifts to G major. The final movement then travels back to the original theme. Possibly not as often performed today as his other trios, this piano trio remains one of the best kept secrets of Haydn’s instrumental music. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

A renowned French composer, Philippe Hersant was a composition student of André Jolivet at the Paris Conservatoire. Influenced by composers as diverse as Monteverdi, Janáček and Stockhausen, he describes himself as a “tonal” composer. By using melodic quotation as a key element, Hersant puts his emphasis on the actual sound of music rather than endlessly searching for an innovative way to present a new work. Additionally, the unique poetic style in which he writes often evokes an emotional and reflective response from the listener. Such characteristics are evident in his Trio, which draws inspiration from a Baroque composer, Marin Marais. The premiere in 1998 was performed by members of the Chameleon Arts Ensemble of Boston, and was very well received. The Trio brilliantly expands upon ideas taken from a piece by Marin Marais, the Sonnerie de Sainte-Geneviéve-du-Mont (the Bells of St Genevieve). The “hunting character of the three note peal” by Marais is what triggered Hersant’s imagination into casting the piece in its newly created form. The Trio is in one continuous movement and the main theme does not reveal itself at the beginning. Instead, it begins with a rapid melodic figuration by the violin and uses the four melodic quotations from Marais’ Sonnerie de Sainte-Geneviéve-du-Mont as a basic idea throughout the piece. Combined with new materials, these quotations seem to contrast with common rhythmic, harmonic and melodic ideas. Yet, the four quotations are closely inter-woven into one single idea, providing a sense of unity in this unique style of music. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

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The Varga Bálint Ligaturája piano trio was inspired by Kurtág’s interest in the works of Bartók, Webern and Stravinsky. Born in 1926, Kurtág started composing during the era of glorious Hungarian music which saw his work continue the legacy of composers such as Bartók and Kodály as proudly exhibiting Hungary’s culture and history. At the end of 2013 he was awarded the Royal Philharmonic Society Gold Medal at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, and in 2014 received the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award. Varga Bálint Ligaturája was premiered in Vienna in 2007 by the Vienna Piano Trio. The work starts in a haunting style, reminiscent of compositions by his Hungarian counterpart Béla Bartók. The violin and cello wane in and out between the piano, a common aspect that occurs throughout. Harmonics feature prominently in the violin and cello with nonharmonic notes used to break up the eerie quietness of the harmony. The piano provides a solid chordal base from which the violin and cello parts develop. Kurtág maintains the essence of the melancholic theme that occurred in the beginning all the way to the end of the work. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

Magnus LINDBERG (b.1958) Piano Trio (2008 arr. 2011–12) I. Ljud stort, ljud II. Som det stilla vi söker III. Slå våg, slå Magnus Lindberg has gained a reputation as one of the most exciting composers in today’s contemporary classical music scene. A recipient of various prestigious awards, he was the New York Philharmonic’s composer-in-residence from 2009-2012, and assumed the same role with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for the beginning of their 2014/15 season. He is also an accomplished pianist, and has performed many of his own compositions, including the premiere performance of his Piano Trio. Born in Helsinki in 1958, Lindberg studied composition at the Sibelius Academy under Einojuhani Rautavaara and Paavo Heininen, before travelling to Paris in 1981 for further studies with Vinko Globokar and Gérard Grisey. Prior to moving to Paris, Lindberg co-founded the experimental Toimii Ensemble with other composers and instrumentalists connected to the Sibelius Academy. Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, the ensemble provided Lindberg (and other composers) with a laboratory for sonic development, and exposed Finnish, and later, European and US audiences, to much new contemporary music. Lindberg is best-known as an orchestral composer, but his output of chamber music constitutes almost as large a part of his production. His musical language is as fascinating as it is complex and draws inspiration from a broad range of musical and non-musical sources. Lindberg’s Clarinet Trio of 2008 is the basis for this Piano Trio, with the latter differing only in instrumentation and some minor re-voicing; essentially however, it is the same work.

Parallels have been drawn between Lindberg’s music and the music of Maurice Ravel, and the Piano Trio is evidence of this with its bold rhythmic, textural and emotional juxtapositions combined with an expansive and unique treatment of harmony. The Piano Trio is a grand statement in a traditional Classical genre. It is accessible and evocative, and the balance of instruments (the strings appear ‘paired’ whilst the piano provides more independent material) allows for a clear interpretation of Lindberg’s intentions. Its three movements encompass four, with the central slow movement “Like the tranquillity we seek” morphing into a scherzo replete with frenetic scales and arpeggios, glissandi, and use of all instruments’ higher registers. Ghostly artificial harmonics in the strings maintain perhaps the yearning for tranquillity suggested by the movement title. The first movement, “Sound big, sound” opens with the piano presenting an ominous rumble in its lowest range. There is a sense of increasing urgency and intensity that builds throughout this movement and the last, “Crash wave, crash”, that is emphasised by moments of rhythmic unison, sometimes between all instruments but more often between the strings. Both outer movements feature constant and arch-like climaxes of sound associated with the rise and fall of pitch and the density of the rhythm, with calmer and quieter material settling the mood momentarily, only to be interrupted by another wave of sound. © Lucien Fischer

Felix MENDELSSOHN (1809–1847) Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 49 (1839) I. Molto allegro agitato II. Andante con moto tranquillo III. Scherzo: Leggiero e vivace IV. Finale: Allegro assai appassionato Mendelssohn’s first trio is probably the defining work of the piano trio genre in the period between Schubert and Brahms (with which, however, the slightly later trio by his sister, Fanny, makes a worthy comparison). Its characteristics include the frequently concerto-like brilliance of the piano part, balanced by the strong melodic focus on the two strings (cello especially) and passages in which the entire ensemble shares in Mendelssohn’s continuing creative interest in traditional contrapuntal devices. Paradoxically, one of the memorable features of the first movement is its controlled but brilliantly detailed accompanimental writing for the piano. Ferdinand Hiller, having heard an early draft of the work in which he thought Mendelssohn relied too heavily on old fashioned piano figurations, recommended he emulate the ‘richness of passages which marked the new piano school’ of Liszt and Chopin, advice which Mendelssohn claimed to have followed in his rewrite. The piano leads in the song-like second movement, the phrases of melody it has given out alone then repeated full. The climactic middle section, however, has real trio writing. The light, dancing third movement is a scherzo in a single span, having no marked-off trio section, but a contrapuntal development episode at its core. In the fourth movement the piano behaves almost like a concerto soloist, prancing its way through the agile thematic material, and shamed into an accompanimental role only for the contrasting lyrical secondary material. © Graeme Skinner

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Felix MENDELSSOHN (1809–1847)

Kelly-Marie MURPHY (b.1964)

Maurice RAVEL (1875–1937)

Piano Trio No. 2 in C minor, Op. 66 (1845)

Give me phoenix wings to fly (1997)

Piano Trio in A minor (1914)

[ in three movements ]

I. Modéré II. Pantoum (Assez vif) III. Passacaille (Très large) IV. Final (Animé)

I. Allegro energico e fuoco II. Andante espressivo III. Scherzo: Molto allegro quasi presto IV. Finale: Allegro appassionato Mendelssohn’s only two piano trios were written towards the end of his life. The second, in C minor, is the lesser-known and more severely Classical work. The first movement, written in an extensive sonata form, engages a busy and agitated principal subject in quavers to provide the material for much ingenious thematic development. A soothing second subject is stated in E flat major in the exposition and in C major in the recapitulation, only to be drawn back soon into the minor mode. The second movement, in E flat major, is calm and idyllic. Written in A–B–A form, it seems to be taken straight from the world of Mendelssohn’s own Songs without Words. The brilliant Scherzo, in G minor, is one of the fleet-footed dance scherzos that are Mendelssohn’s specialty and perhaps the most original and popular of his innovations. Returning to C minor, it reintroduces the agitation of the first movement with a stormy first subject. The movement is written in a large-scale Rondo form. A second subject is very soon abandoned for a return to the first; but that in turn is suddenly broken off for a quotation of the melody of the solemn funeral chorale, Vor deinen Thron, in A flat major. Its statement is interspersed with fragments of the principal subject and they are soon involved together in a short development. The recapitulation that follows features the second subject only, now in a dark C minor. The return of the first subject is held off until the opening of the long coda, where after a short while the spell of storm and passion is finally broken. In a blazing C major fortissimo, the chorale tune reappears. A second apotheosis is achieved with the entry of fragments of the principal theme, leading to a powerful conclusion. © Musica Viva Australia

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Kelly-Marie Murphy’s work has been well established in the Canadian music scene with unforgettable works created for Canada’s leading ensembles including the Toronto, Winnipeg and Vancouver Symphony Orchestras. She has also enjoyed much international success with her music being broadcast on radio across 22 different countries, as well as performances at notable concert halls including Carnegie Hall, The Mozarteum in Vienna, and the National Concert Hall in Dublin. Give me phoenix wings to fly was debuted in 1997 by the Gryphon Trio. The first movement of this work begins with a quick and agile piano part accompanied by glissandi (slides) and very short pizzicato playing in the violin and cello. A sense of urgency is felt throughout this virtuosic movement with only brief releases in tension. The movement concludes with an ascending slide in the violin and cello parts. The second movement continues the ideas from the first movement with the cello demonstrating individual skill in executing sustained expressive notes. The feature of harmonics is a highlight of the movement as is the unique layering of cello and piano, with the violin fading in and out of the music. The conclusion of this work is signalled by the hauntingly beautiful piano part. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

This work was composed in the early months of World War I, while Ravel was awaiting news of his future in the armed forces (he hoped to become a pilot) and working on two ‘historical’ projects: an edition of Mendelssohn’s piano music, and sketches for a suite in honour of the 18th-century composer, Couperin (eventually Le tombeau de Couperin). Ravel composed the first movement of his Piano Trio in A minor during March of 1914, and completed the work in July and August. He wrote, “I wanted to finish my trio before joining up”, which he did the following March, as a truck driver. The theme of the first movement (taken from abandoned sketches for a piano concerto on Basque themes) is written in rhythmic groups of 3+2+3 beats. This pattern, with its eccentric lean, is repeated throughout this movement to almost hypnotic effect. During the long coda, it is constantly in the bass of the piano. The title of the skittish, changeable second movement, Pantoum, derives ultimately from Malay poetry, via Hugo and Baudelaire (in Harmonies du Soir), who adapted it as a verse form in which the same lines (by analogy here, themes) reappear in different positions in each stanza. The third movement is a slow passacaglia in which the piano’s eight-bar bass theme is repeated and, against new counterpoints, slowly varied; intensifying then fading away. The fourth movement is based on irregular rhythms recalling the work’s opening theme, and climaxes in extrovert chordal outbursts from the piano. © Graeme Skinner

Wolfgang RIHM (b.1952)

Fazil SAY (b.1970)

Mathias Johannes SCHMIDHAMMER

Fremde Szene III (1983–84)

Space Jump, Op. 46 (2013)

(b.1991)

German composer Wolfgang Rihm was born in 1952, and finished both his schooling and his studies in music theory and composition in 1972. His early work, Morphonie, which premiered at the 1974 Donaueschingen Festival, launched his career as a prominent figure in the European new music scene. Rihm’s early work, combining contemporary techniques with the emotional volatility both of Mahler and of Schoenberg’s early expressionist period, was regarded by many as a revolt against the avant-garde generation of Boulez, Stockhausen (with whom he studied in 1972–73) and others, and led to a large number of commissions in the following years. In the late 1970s and early 1980s his name was associated with the movement called ‘New Simplicity’. His work continues to plough expressionist furrows, though the influence of Luigi Nono, Helmut Lachenmann and Morton Feldman, among others, has affected his style significantly.

I. Andantino meditativo II. Allegro maestoso III. Maestoso

In his essay ‘Fremde Blätter’ [‘Strange Pages’], about Robert Schumann, Wolfgang Rihm occupied himself with the strange, sometimes uncomfortably different and wayward nature of Schumann’s music, which embraces fantasy rather than complying with academic prescriptions. His Fremde Szenen (Strange Scenes) I–III (1982–84) are three essays for piano trio composed in tribute to Schumann. Rihm invents a personal portrait of Schumann and his strange, disordered sound, but without any direct quotations from his strange, hysterical pictures, “in which something is not right”. © Boulanger Trio

Fazil Say’s Space Jump was inspired by a record-breaking skydive performed in 2012 by the extreme sportsman Felix Baumgartner, who made the 24-mile jump from the stratosphere. Say’s music, about ten minutes in duration, follows the stages of this adventure from beginning to end. The work opens with a light and airy theme in the violin. The music is as light as butterflies in the stomach, representing the skydiver in his capsule on the edge of space, checking instruments, waiting and preparing. The piano joins in to interlock delicate melodic patterns with the violin. Perhaps it is the skydiver’s nerves we hear, and perhaps the cold and airy space twenty-four miles above the earth. After a vertiginous descending slide in the cello, the music gives way to gut-wrenching adrenaline expressed with crunching cello rhythms in a 5/8 metre, depicting the skydiver in freefall at over 800 mph. Soon a new theme emerges, a triumphant dotted rhythm on a major third as the skydiver’s parachute opens and allows him to land gently on his feet. Before the end, however, the first airy theme returns.

Three Pieces for Piano Trio (2014) I. …in starrer Erwartung II. …nach den Funken III. …vor dem Tau Born in 1991 in South Tyrol, Italy, Mathias Johannes Schmidhammer began his piano career at the age of 6 in the music school of Merano, Italy, where he studied for 13 years under the tutelage of Magrit Schild. Since 2011, Schmidhammer has been studying composition along with musical education (piano) at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna under the direction of Axel Seidelmann and Periklis Liakakis, while also being a current student of Michael Jarrell’s. His Three Pieces for Piano Trio have enjoyed some success, with the work being chosen as an obligatory piece at the international Josef Haydn competition in Vienna, Austria. Schmidhammer is the pianist in the piano trio Pas de Trois which has enjoyed success in the European competition circuit, winning prizes between 2008 to 2011. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

Fazil Say began piano studies at the age of four, composition at the age of fourteen and at seventeen left Turkey to pursue his musical studies in Germany. In his composition, he often enriches the modern and classical with Turkish influences, writing music inspired by Turkish folklore and scored with traditional Turkish instruments. Say is also a pianist of repute, playing with orchestras across the world including the New York Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, and others. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

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Franz SCHUBERT (1797–1828)

Robert SCHUMANN (1810–1856)

Piano Trio in E flat major, Op. 148, D.897 “Notturno” (1827)

Piano Trio in E flat major, D.929 (1827)

Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 110 (1851)

I. Allegro II. Andante con moto III. Scherzando – Allegro moderato – Trio IV. Allegro moderato

I. Bewegt, doch nicht zu rasch II. Ziemlich langsam III. Rasch IV. Kräftig, mit Humor

In 1827, just a year before his death, Schubert composed his last Piano Trio in E-flat major, considered to be a great masterpiece in the chamber music literature. Intended for larger audiences, the trio in E flat major was his only work that was performed in public during his lifetime. The premiere performance at the hall of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde on March 26, 1828 was a huge success, bringing an opportunity for the composer to finally publish his work outside Austria. However, the publisher, Probst, delayed the work’s publication questioning its length, the same reason that other publishers had rejected his work. Schubert agreed to cut the final movement by nearly 100 bars, and the work was eventually published in October of 1828. Schubert was dead one month later, before he’d had a chance to see the score he so longingly looked forward to receiving.

The Piano Trio in G minor, Opus 110, is among Schumann’s last chamber works. It was composed in 1851 and published in the following year. It had been preceded by the Fantasiestücke for piano trio, Opus 88, but is an altogether more substantial piece.

In 1827, although in the second-last year of his life, Schubert was still distinguished by his incredible compositional productivity, producing his famous song cycle Die Winterreise and two piano trios, among other works. The Notturno piano trio is in ternary form, or A-B-A form. The A section features a lyrical flowing tempo introduced by the strings, which play it in harmoniously twined lines while the piano accompanies with harp-like arpeggios. The lyricism of this section brings to mind the human voice, perhaps showing the influence of Schubert’s extensive vocal experience. In the B-section, the long singing phrases give way to shorter dotted phrases, during which the piano carries a large part of the melody as well as a long series of accompanying arpeggios. It has been suggested that this section makes reference to a working song that Schubert heard sung by a group of pile drivers while on holidays in 1825. The workers’ song was in a triple metre, and the second count was left silent, as it was on this beat that the sledgehammers fell. The rhythm of the song thus blended music seamlessly with the sounds of men at work. As in the working song, the B-section melody of Schubert’s Notturno leaves the second beat empty. After the more rhythmic middle section, the ‘A’ theme returns to bring the trio to a tranquil close. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

The first movement is full of energy, passion, and possibly even anger, but exhibits joyfulness and beauty at the same time. The song-like theme flows with a set of key motifs, which keeps recurring throughout the trio. The Andante movement opens with a marching theme presented by a grim, sad singing cello in a minor key. The sombre marching theme then moves to the dramatic and epic Scherzando, the most recognised movement of the trio. In this movement, the piano and strings imitate each other with various combinations of intertwined textures of Viennese dances. The final Allegro moderato opens with the piano playing a light and bright melody and brings back the marching theme to its triumphant conclusion. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

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The first movement has an incessantly flowing motion, proceeding from the nervous agitation of the beginning. The second movement, in E flat major, is a lyrical piece related to Mendelssohn’s Songs without Words; but in Schumann’s more personal, glowing vein, featuring violin and cello singing in duet. A more agitated and energetic ‘etwas bewegter’ (‘poco più mosso’) middle section begins in F minor and soon quickens even further while turning to C minor, finally leading to the return of the calmer principal section. The third movement, in C minor, is not in the classical 3/4 scherzotime, but in 2/4. The G major Finale resolves the tension and turns to whimsical good humour. Its form is one favoured by Schumann for such movements: a free, extensive Rondo. © Chamber Music Australia

Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH (1906–1975)

Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840–1893)

Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67 (1944)

Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 50 (1881–82)

I. Andante II. Allegro non troppo III. Largo IV. Allegretto

I. Pezzo elegiaco: Moderato assai – allegro giusto IIa. Tema con variazioni: Andante con moto IIb. Variazione finale e coda: Allegro risoluto e con fuoco

The dual ‘program’ behind Shostakovich’s Piano Trio in E minor is the composer’s rejection of wartime anti-Semitism (it features many Russian–Jewish folk tunes), mixed with a concern about oppression within his own country. The music’s eloquence in making this impetus plain was proven when the trio was banned soon after its first performance. ‘Ghostly’ best describes the opening cello melody of the first movement – all harmonics, and muted. The main part of the movement follows, with soft, tapping quavers on the stillmuted strings, above which the piano states the main theme eerily in octaves. Shostakovich may have structured his trio loosely on Ravel’s (its composer’s response to World War I): both have a scherzo as a second movement (Shostakovich’s features wild dance rhythms) followed by a passacaglia. This third movement is based on a sequence of eight chords repeated, unaltered, by the piano throughout, while the strings weave increasingly elaborate counterpoints. The penultimate chord of the last repetition lingers, then slips directly into the fourth movement. In the 1960s, Soviet musicologist Ivan Martinov praised the last movement of this once-errant trio: “Angular and menacing, it develops with a mechanical, rhythmic motion, accompanied by weird, automatic repetitions of its contrapuntal elements – the combined effect of which evokes the image of a monstrous procession, and fills the imagination with a frieze of cruel and sinister shapes.” Towards the end, both the opening melody of the first movement and the passacaglia sequence of the third are rewoven into the structure as it nears its deathly-quiet ending. © Graeme Skinner

Tchaikovsky’s only piano trio bears the subtitle ‘In memory of a great artist’, referring to his friend and mentor Nikolai Rubinstein. Rubinstein befriended the young composer at a time when, newly graduated, he came to work as a teacher in the Moscow Conservatoire, of which Rubinstein was the director. He took great care of Tchaikovsky, taking him into his own house and providing him with appropriate clothing from Rubinstein’s own tailor. Tchaikovsky wrote that ‘he looks after me like a nurse’. Tchaikovsky’s friendship with Rubinstein was multifaceted. Rubinstein supported the composer, but spoke out harshly when he felt his friend’s music was below his normal standard. Accordingly the pair had some strong disagreements, but overall remained close. Tchaikovsky wrote the piano trio in memory of Rubinstein after Rubenstein died of tuberculosis in 1881. It was not a configuration that endeared itself to him, as he found the combination of instruments unpleasant. Yet after Rubinstein’s death, perhaps as a tribute to his friend’s prowess at the piano, Tchaikovsky attempted the genre. The first movement, Pezzo elegiaco, is an emotional outpouring over the loss of a friend. It is followed in the second movement by an energetic series of twelve variations on a theme, which returns at the end to a sombre sound and a restatement of the first elegiac theme. It is suggested that the variations refer to a memory of a picnic Tchaikovsky had with Rubinstein and others in 1873, during which the party was entertained by the songs and dances of a group of peasants. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University musicology student)

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PRO G R AM N OTE S – STR I N G Q UARTETS Thomas ADÈS (b.1971)

Béla BARTÓK (1881–1945)

The Four Quarters (2010)

String Quartet No. 5 (1934)

I. Nightfalls II. Morning Dew III. Days IV. The Twenty-Fifth Hour

I. Allegro II. Adagio molto III. Scherzo. Alla bulgarese – Trio IV. Andante V. Finale. Allegro vivace – Presto

The Four Quarters refers to the times of the day within twenty-four hours, in much the same way as Vivaldi’s Four Seasons refers to the times of year. The work begins at dusk with Nightfalls; two violins criss-cross delicate wires of sound above droning notes from the cello and viola. Morning Dew opens in a flourish of pizzicato and continues with some intricate plucked rhythms. During the first half of the movement, the time signature changes almost every bar, including such markings as 2/12 and 5/8. Halfway through, the players take up their bows and repeat the same melodic material bowed rather than plucked. The third movement, Days, opens with a single-note rhythm in the second violin that continues through most of the piece. Beginning with low-key melodic material, the music grows and then recedes in dynamic and intensity, perhaps mirroring the course of the day from sunrise to sunset. The TwentyFifth Hour is perhaps the most rhythmically challenging movement of the piece. The time signature is 25/16, which is divided into 2/4 + 3/16 + 2/4 + 6/16. The movement refers to time outside time, or a transcendence of time altogether. The Four Quarters was commissioned by the Carnegie Hall Corporation for a 2011 performance in that venue by the Emerson String Quartet. This work subsequently won the chamber music section of the British Composer Awards in 2012. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

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In the final creative period of his life, Bartók increasingly worked to synthesise eastern and western influences and turned increasingly towards intricate formalist structures. The string quartets bear strongest testimony of this stylistic development, being not only the form to which he most regularly returned, but also that which bore some of his most personal outpouring. This quartet, Bartók’s penultimate, was written in four weeks after a commission from US philanthropist Elizabeth Coolidge, one of the most significant musical patrons of the 20th century, pleading of modern music: “…not that we should like it, nor necessarily that we should even understand it, but that we should exhibit it as a significant human document”. The structural design of the work is highly detailed, a web of motivic imitation and variation. Symmetrical and palindromic features are found at all levels: from the five-movement structure whereby first and fifth, and second and fourth movements are paired about an inner Scherzo, to the forms of each movement, even individual phrases. The importance placed on symmetrical elements in Bartók’s own analysis of the work makes clear its significance to a proper understanding of the work.

The outer pair of fast movements are each in arch forms: the first is in a sonata form, modified to render it symmetrical, whilst the fifth is a palindromic rondo: A–B–C–B–A. Yet the first is even more tightly controlled, by way of key, with its main key areas spelling a whole-tone scale on B flat. The overall character of the movements is one of a forceful, driving impetus, dominated by repeated note motifs, lightened only occasionally by more playful trilling motifs and lightly satirical imitative textures. The paired slow movements, both in ternary form, are strongly tied by motivic material: Bartók described the fourth movement as a “free variation” on the second, with many of the themes transformed by altering the instrumental techniques. Typical for Bartók’s slow works, these movements exemplify his iconic ‘night music’ style, where angst and unrest are omnipresent forces. The inner movement of the work is the clearest manifestation of eastern material in the work. It is a Scherzo, based not upon a waltz, but rather on the rhythms of Bulgarian dances, which break bars into distinctive juxtapositions of duple- and triple-beat units, repeating themselves in a complex fabric at once hypnotic and restless. © Cameron McCormick, University of Melbourne

Béla BARTÓK (1881–1945)

Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770–1827)

String Quartet No. 6 (1939)

String Quartet No. 7 in F major, Op. 59, No. 1 “Razumovsky” (1806)

String Quartet No. 8 in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2 “Razumovsky” (1806)

I. Allegro II. Allegretto vivace e sempre scherzando III. Adagio molto e mesto IV. Théme Russe: Allegro

I. Allegro II. Molto adagio. Si tratta questo pezzo con molto di sentiment III. Allegretto – Maggiore (Théme Russe) IV. Finale. Presto

I. Mesto – Più mosso, pesante – Vivace II. Mesto – Marcia III. Mesto – Burletta IV. Mesto Bartók wrote the String Quartet No. 6 in 1939 just before he left for the USA and dedicated it to the Kolisch Quartet who also gave the work its premiere in New York in 1941. It is one of Bartók’s most deeply expressive and personal works; central to his output and considered to be amongst his finest compositions. This string quartet was heavily influenced by Hungarian folk song, something that had inspired Bartók since 1904 when he first heard a Transylvanian folk tune. The viola begins the opening movement of this quartet with an extremely mystifying solo before being joined by the rest of the ensemble in unison. Throughout the course of the movement each member of the quartet has to play their own individual melody simultaneously with one another, which causes a sense of urgency and uncertainty. The second movement maintains a similar sense of urgency, although it is written in a richer and more flamboyant style. This movement highlights Bartók’s pain of the looming prospect of World War II as well as the recent death of his mother, which is expressed through sharp and abrupt chords. The third movement begins in a similarly haunting manner to the previous movements. The lengthy use of plucked strings in this movement creates variety and produces another avenue through which to highlight the performers’ skills. This section of the work expresses light thematic material, owing to Bartók’s use of ideas from a burletta – a light comic opera. The last movement again starts slowly, and concludes with a similar melancholic feeling as the beginning.

Beethoven’s three string quartets Op. 59, were commissioned by Count Razumovsky, Russian Ambassador in Vienna. The quartets are typical of Beethoven’s so called ‘middle-period’, when works became true individuals, each with its own idiosyncrasies of form and expression. Thus, each of the Op. 59 quartets is a new experience. The Allegro is remarkable for its textural diversity: incessantly repeated quavers accompanying the main theme, a passage of alternately sustained and staccato chords, triplet arpeggios which pass between the instruments, and a great deal of contrapuntal discussion, climaxing in the hushed fugue in the central development section. A rhythmic monotone and a tiny fragment of melody are the themes of the second movement. Beethoven creates a series of fleeting glimpses, the coordination and balancing of which demands great concentration from the performers. The chordal theme of the slow third movement is prelude to a sequence which, though steady in tempo and feeling, is replete with faster ornamental figurations and exotic effects (such as guitar-like pizzicato strumming towards the middle of the piece). As a coda, there is a solo cadenza for the first violin, culminating in a trill which carries over directly into the fourth movement. From underneath, the cello enters with the Russian theme which Beethoven incorporated into the work at Razumovsky’s request. Author Unknown

In the margin of sketches for one of the Opus 59 quartets, Beethoven left himself a reminder: “Let your deafness no longer be a secret, not even in art”. Particularly in this second quartet, Beethoven seems to be composing with his ‘inner ear’: classical emphases on balance and form give way to dramatic and unexpected reactions. The first movement’s climax includes such seismic textural ideas as when, beginning with the cello, running semiquavers take over the whole texture in a massive, unison upward surge. Another, a series of fortissimo trills with all the instruments again in unison, leads into the return of the home key. The second movement is the centre of gravity of the work, both in length and in its dense, warm major harmonies. According to a member of the quartet that first played the work, the idea for it came to Beethoven while stargazing one night outside Vienna. Beethoven directed: “This piece must be played with much sentimento.” In the third movement, strong off-beat accents make it lunge rather than sprint forward. The ‘Russian theme’ of the contrasting major-keyed fugue is a concession to the nationality of its commissioner, count Razumovsky. The fourth movement begins unexpectedly in C major, and right to the very last pages derives as much energy from juxtapositions of C major and the home key E minor, as from the pervasive opening rhythm. © Graeme Skinner

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Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770–1827)

Johannes BRAHMS (1833–1897)

String Quartet No. 9 in C major, Op. 59, No. 3 “Razumovsky” (1806)

String Quartet in F minor, Op. 95, No. 11 “Serioso” (1810)

String Quartet in B flat major, Op. 67 (1875)

I. Introduzione. Andante con moto – Allegro vivace II. Andante con moto quasi allegretto III. Menuetto grazioso IV. Allegro molto

I. Allegro con brio II. Allegretto ma non troppo III. Allegro assai vivace ma serioso IV. Larghetto espressivo – Allegretto agitato

I. Vivace II. Andante III. Agitato: Allegretto non troppo IV. Poco allegretto con variazioni

According to Joseph de Marliave (1928):

Composed in October 1810 and the last of Beethoven’s compositions in this genre before a 14-year break, the ‘Serioso’ quartet is one of only a handful of sombre works written in a period of generally optimistic ones. The work’s subtitle was allocated by Beethoven himself and was probably meant to imply that this work was the opposite of the many quartets which were perceived, simply, as ‘public entertainments’. Although it is a short, abrupt and tragic work, it shares many characteristics with the quartets of the later period, particularly in issues of style and mood.

“The quartets of Op. 59 should more properly be called quartet-symphonies… especially in the third, one has the sense that the composer is striving after the symphonic idiom, with orchestral effects that somehow seem to burst the slender framework of the quartet genre.” Like the Fifth Symphony, which Beethoven was sketching at the same time, the String Quartet No. 3 progresses from the uncertainty of its opening, towards a dynamic affirmation of C major in the finale. The first movement begins with a slow introduction, made up of chords which, ambiguously, belong to no major or minor key. Then there is a rhythmic soloviolin cadenza, after which the main theme is stated climatically over a throbbing low-C from the cello. The second movement adds an ersatz Russian folk-music flavour to this Razumovsky commission. In A minor, it gives the impression of surreptitious activity, with its highly chromatic progress through distant keys. The third movement is as notable for its simple-minded affirmation of C major (the first half does not even modulate), as the preceding movement was for its waywardness. There is a more sophisticated F major Trio, and a tacked-on Coda, forming a bridge to the fourth movement. In itself, this bustling fugal finale is of no great complexity, but compels through sheer force, which increases constantly until all four parts are infused with perpetual motion. © Graeme Skinner

The work opens with a first movement in a truncated sonata form, the highlight being the undiluted development which concentrates its themes with blunt tenacity. The second movement lacks any display of emotion: it is detached in both its sentiment and key centre, the remote D major. The theme is developed in a middle section which moves through minor tonalities; however the principal repeats and the movement ends with a brief coda, quietly and, as it began, in D major. The third movement commences by way of a pianissimo discord, repeated forte; the Scherzo is based on an obsessively accented, insistent four-note figure, which is extended unrelentingly until the Trio lulls the storm in calm, reassuring tones. The opening of the fourth movement is reminiscent of the style of a slow movement; this soon gives way to the Allegro agitato which, unlike the usually placid nature of the rondo, uses the form to imply doom and fatalism. The work, however, changes tack again here by modulating into F major for its confident and sparkling conclusion. © Chamber Music Australia

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The distinguished 19th century music critic, Eduard Hanslick, recognised Brahms as the successor of the great master, Beethoven. Brahms contributed significantly to the development of the chamber music repertoire. Brahms may have been compelled to equal Beethoven in the genre, but took almost twenty years to publish his first two string quartets which appeared in print in 1873. However, he managed to complete the third String Quartet Op. 67 within a year in 1875. The Op. 67 quartet was dedicated to a well-known physician, Theodor Wilhelm Engelmann, who was also a keen amateur cellist. Brahms told Theodor, “This quartet rather resembles your wife— very dainty, but brilliant! … It’s no longer a question of a forceps delivery; but of simply standing by. There’s no cello solo in it, but such a tender viola solo that you may want to change your instrument for its sake!” The first movement features one of the common figures of classical music, a hunting call and polka dance that Brahms loved. The second movement, the Andante, is the only movement that does not feature polka idioms. The tranquil melody in the Andante gets disrupted in the middle, but returns to its original peaceful state. The Agitato sees an Austrian dance, the Ländler, presented by a beautiful highvoiced viola with the violins and cello in the background. The final movement features a set of eight variations that uses the hunting theme from the first movement. The quartet reaches its brilliant conclusion in the coda, reintroducing the theme from the first and the fourth movement. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

Benjamin BRITTEN (1913–1976)

Connor D’NETTO (b.1994)

Antonín DVOŘÁK (1841–1904)

String Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 25 (1941)

String Quartet No.2 in E minor (2015)

String Quartet No. 12 in F major, Op. 96 “American” (1893)

I. Andante sostenuto: Allegro vivo II. Allegretto con slancio III. Andante calmo IV. Molto vivace Written and first performed in 1941, the String Quartet No. 1 was the last important score of Britten’s American period and is indicative of his humour and full of his wit. The quartet’s first movement alternates the Andante with the Allegro in a style which has been compared with the ‘Pathétique Sonata’ and the Op. 130 string quartet of Beethoven. The work as a whole is dominated by a harmonic structure built around the interval of a third, as is highlighted by the central recurrence of the main motif in this movement in the distantly related F major. Each repeat of one motif or the other witnesses their re-thinking and development, this tension resolved by the final collation of the two ideas. The second movement (again in F major) can be considered a scherzo, its three main motifs growing ostensibly from the triplet anacrusis rhythm. The Andante calmo is a nocturne-like reprieve (in B flat major) from the insistent triplet rhythms of the scherzo. Again related harmonically by the interval of a third, this movement echoes the work’s opening in its own, by means of an initial, chordal major third. Combining Rondo and Sonata forms, the scurrying finale hints at Britten’s approach to modality by the repeated occurrence of the raised fourth scale degree; this chromatic change in the scale implies some kind of allusion to the Lydian mode. The movement is based in the key of D and the recapitulation of the main motifs of the movement comes, interestingly, in reverse order. As has often been stated, this movement strongly echoes Haydn’s approach to the composition of finales in this genre, in both its developmental tools and its overall exuberance. © Graeme Skinner

Presently studying at the University of Queensland, composer Connor D’Netto fuses a combination of old and new musics in the creation of his own unique compositional style. He is highly influenced by Barber, Bartók and Stravinsky, however he became increasingly affected by the compositions of Caribou and Flying Lotus when creating his String Quartet No. 2 in E minor. In addition to composition, D’Netto studied piano and violin since an early age, and is also an accomplished bass-baritone, learning from vocal teachers Shaun Brown and Celia Mylne. This work is the winner of the String Quartet stream of the Chamber Music Australia New Works Award. D’Netto’s String Quartet No.2 in E minor is influenced by the contours of the Australian landscape, namely the plains and deserts, lush tropical vegetation, mountains, and the beach. D’Netto’s approach to this work is different to his previous compositions. In this string quartet he uses a more measured means of composition instead of creating works out of loose structures, subject to spontaneous changes. For this work, he became entrenched in numerical ideas and even measured out the entire work to the bar. The string quartet features evolving rhythmical ideas which give way from one section to the next, with the rhythms eventually adding up across the entirety of the work. D’Netto’s string quartet is full of contrasting moments, but at the same time features undercurrents of repetitive and slowly evolving rhythmic textures that manage to skilfully disguise some of the transformations that occur throughout the work. The various moments of rhythmic unity that suddenly emerge lend the piece a great sense of clarity and stability, and provide the fiery and furious final bars with appropriate gravity. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

I. Allegro ma non troppo II. Lento III. Molto vivace IV. Vivace In 1892, Dvořák travelled from Czechoslovakia to America to take up a position as musical director at the National Conservatory in New York. Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 12, nicknamed the “American”, was written during his three-year stay in that country, shortly after the completion of his Symphony No. 9 in E minor, ‘From the New World’. Dvořák spent the summer holidays of 1893 in Spillville, a small town in Iowa populated mainly by Czech immigrants, where his children travelled over from Czechoslovakia to join him for the holidays. There in Spillville, Dvořák spent a happy and relaxed holiday period composing. Soon after his arrival, he began work on his quartet, and finished it within fifteen days of its commencement. His String Quartet No. 12 is an open and cheerful piece of music, and has been popular with audiences ever since its first performance on New Year’s Day, 1894. The first movement, written in the major pentatonic scale, takes the unusual step of introducing the main theme in the viola. The second movement, a minor Lento, has been suggested to have correlations with Dvořák’s possible feelings of loneliness and homesickness. It provides a calm space for reflection that complements the irrepressible high spirits of the surrounding movements. In the third movement, a clear naturalistic reference is heard with the entry of the violin, which plays a stylised rendition of the song of the Scarlet Tanager. Dvořák heard this bird’s song while in America, where he transcribed it and included it in his composition. The fourth movement unfolds in rondo form, bringing the quartet to a close in an effusion of high spirits. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

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Antonín DVOŘÁK (1841–1904)

Eric GUINIVAN (b.1984)

String Quartet No. 14 in A flat major, Op. 105 (1895)

String Quartet No. 1 (2014)

I. Adagio ma non troppo – Allegro appassionato II. Molto vivace III. Lento e molto cantabile IV. Finale. Allegro non tanto The original conception of Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 14 began just before the composer left America to return to his native Czechoslovakia in March 1895. He did not look at the original sketches he made for this piece until December of the same year; however once he refocused on writing, this piece was completed in less than three weeks. There is a noticeable lack of compositional traits from the composer’s time in America, Dvořák instead opting to have a strong presence of Czech folklore embedded within this work. The first movement begins with the cello introducing a mysterious opening theme with the other instruments of the quartet entering one by one over the next three bars. The ideas in this theme are chaotic with all sections of the quartet needing to hold down their own phrases. Syncopation takes place in the opening moments of the second movement in the first violin part. Dvořák goes back and forth between this motive and another in a singing style throughout this section of the work. Virtuosic moments for the first violin appear especially during the singing-style moments of the movement, with each instrument playing in a very expressive manner. The third movement is full of vintage Dvořák lyricism and is layered evenly for the most part with all sections being equally important, however the work does contain brief concerto like moments for the first violin and cello. The last movement features a similar flowing lyricism as expressed in the third movement; however it’s enhanced with Dvořák’s love for Czech folklore and is infused with elements of the polka which culminate in a final Eastern European-inspired conclusion. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

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I. Flowing II. Reserved III. Fierce *This commission has been made possible by the Chamber Music America Classical Commissioning Program, with generous funding provided by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Chamber Music America Endowment Fund. An acclaimed percussionist and composer, Eric Guinivan is a rising star in the contemporary chamber music scene. His study in percussion started when he was 10 and he is now an active performer based in Harrisonburg, Virginia. As a founding member of the Grammy-nominated ‘Los Angeles Percussion Quartet’, he has performed with orchestras and chamber ensembles across the country. His reputation grew after his debut at Carnegie Hall in 2011, where he premiered his work Meditation and Awakening for percussion and orchestra, and performed to critical acclaim as soloist with the New York Youth Symphony. The String Quartet No. 1 is his first work in the genre and was commissioned by Chamber Music America for the Argus Quartet. The quartet gave the premiere performance in October 2014 at the Cello Biennale Amsterdam. The three movements of Guinivan’s String Quartet No. 1 are continuous, and the piece captivates the listener with its mysterious and haunting sound. The first movement starts with a suspenseful melody in the first violin paired with fast and chaotic playing in the second violin. Soon, the viola and the cello join the melody, intensifying the mood. The second and third movements continue the suspenseful theme without a pause and evoke a sense of danger to the listener.

The dark motifs are accentuated by the complex rhythmic figures layered with solos that pass between players throughout the piece. Towards the end of the piece, Guinivan provides a contrast to this thick texture by presenting passionate melodic elements in the first violin and viola, and a relentless rhythmic accompaniment in the second violin and cello. The intensity continues to build until the final fortississimo conclusion. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

Joseph HAYDN (1732–1809)

String Quartet No. 50 in B flat major, Op. 64, No. 3 (1790)

String Quartet No. 57 in C major, Op. 74, No. 1 (1793)

String Quartet No. 61 in D minor, Op. 76, No. 2 “Fifths“ (1796–7)

I. Vivace assai II. Adagio III. Menuetto: Allegretto IV. Finale: Allegro con spirito

I. Allegro II. Andantino grazioso III. Menuetto: Allegro; Trio IV. Finale: Vivace

I. Allegro II. Andante o più tosto allegretto III. Menuetto: Allegro ma non troppo IV. Finale: Vivace assai

The year of 1790 was a significant one for Haydn as he was going through a major change in his career. Haydn was 58 and for 30 years had been producing musical works with the support of the court of Esterházy. However, after the death of his patron Prince Nikolaus in 1790, Haydn was released from the contract by Nikolaus’s successor, Prince Anton. Yet, this turn of events became an opportunity for Haydn to come to London, where he matured the genres of the symphony and string quartet. Larger audiences and grand concert halls in London certainly had an impact on his string quartets, but the Op. 64 No. 3 quartet still retains the characteristics of Haydn’s composition style from his days as a court composer; that is, innovative, curious and experimental.

During Haydn’s lifetime the string quartet rose to prominence and was eventually considered to be in a league of its own, distinct from other styles and also considered to be superior to other forms of the chamber music genre. Haydn’s string quartets were credited as being one of the primary forces in the increased status of the string quartet.

Haydn’s Op. 76, No. 2 String Quartet is a unique composition as it embraces the styles of the previous quartets while still providing for new ideas. Composed in 1797 and dedicated to Count Joseph Georg von Erdödy, it is part of the second last set of string quartets that Haydn composed. It was given the nickname ‘Fifths’ due to the prominence of that interval in the work.

Haydn’s humour and witty personality is evident in the opening Vivace assai, where the listener is tricked with irregular, interrupted and unpredictable musical phrases. The only ‘regular’ musical phrase, near the opening, is accompanied by galloping rhythms intended to sound almost foolish. The second movement opens its beautiful theme with the two violins, closely communicating with each other in E flat major. Its central section then switches to the minor mode, moving towards a brilliant unexpected coda that is intensely dark in character. The minuet is playful in its rhythm, which stimulates the listener to guess where the downbeat is. The final movement continues to entertain the listener with unexpected modulations, swift dynamic changes and short moments of suspense towards the end of the movement, marking a brilliantly genius conclusion to the piece. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

The first movement of Haydn’s Op. 74, No. 1 quartet begins with a soft melody, only for the first violin to intervene with a burst of quick rhythmical notes. A call and response motive soon appears between the first violin and the second violin, as well as the cello who shares their rhythms. This compositional ploy occurs several times throughout the movement. Virtuosity for the first violin is a prevailing theme throughout this section of the work in terms of speed and co-ordination between both hands. The next movement opens with the first violin playing the theme, a more subdued and less temperamental introduction than the first movement. Precision in string crossings is vital in these movements especially for the viola and second violin parts. The third movement – whilst only short – introduces a light and uplifting style not previously heard in this work. The difference between movements can be accredited to embellishment and Haydn’s use of short notes which breaks up the smoother notes in between. The Finale, which is characterised by the largest contrast of dynamics in the entire work, is further laden with syncopations and brings the piece to its triumphant conclusion. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

It becomes extremely apparent in the first movement where the work got its nickname, with falling fifths occurring in the first violin part from the opening of the movement and recurring in all instruments throughout the rest of the work. The second movement is slow and gentle in nature with the quartet having plucked notes to begin with, except for the first violin which has the ability to add flare through bowed notes. There are virtuosic moments for the first violin through the movement with the other members of the quartet having long sustained or short plucked notes at various stages in the section. The brief Menuetto takes on a different tone, with a mystical and lively theme. Haydn transfers the energy of the third movement into the fourth movement. This section requires considerable technical ability in the playing of intervals due to the many notes that fall outside the key, as well as two note chords played by the first and second violins and also the viola. The quartet seems to almost grind to a halt momentarily, only to emerge with a crescendo and finish on a loud thunderous chord. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

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Joseph HAYDN (1732–1809) String Quartet No. 62 in C major, Op. 76, No. 3 “Emperor“ (1796-97) I. Allegro II. Poco adagio, cantabile III. Menuetto: Allegro IV. Finale: Presto Haydn’s life took an unexpected turn in 1790 with the death of his employer Prince Nikolaus Esterházy. Nikolaus often spent ten months a year at the relatively remote palace of Esterháza with his retinue, including musicians for his orchestra, opera house and chapel. Prince Anton, who succeeded Nikolaus, disbanded the orchestra. Haydn could at last accept invitations to travel – while he had been working in the seclusion of Esterháza his music had become renowned throughout Europe. (As he once quipped, isolation had “forced me to be original”.) His visits to London in the early 1790s established him as the most sought-after composer of his time. In 1795 Haydn settled in Vienna and devoted himself largely to choral and vocal music. The only kind of instrumental music which it seems interested him at this time was his beloved string quartet. Opus 76 was completed in 1797 and is dedicated to the Hungarian Count Erdödy (a member of the same family that supported Beethoven some years later). This opus is the work of someone in full control of his technique, with the same sense of popular idiom and expansive scale as we hear in works written for the large, appreciative middle-class audience of London.

In London Haydn had experienced the galvanising effect of the mass singing of the National Anthem. On returning to Vienna he agreed to write a similar tune to words by Lorenz Haschka to celebrate the birthday of Emperor Franz II. This Volkslied (a ‘folksong’ or ‘song of the people’) was sung to the imperial couple at the Burgtheater on 12 February 1797. Never one to waste a good tune, Haydn used it as the theme for variations which form the slow movement of this work. And as Marc Vignal has noted, the first movement begins with an acrostic: the notes G–E–F–D–C ‘spell’ G(ott) E(rhalte) F(ranz) D(en) C/K(aiser) (God preserve the Emperor Franz), the first line of Haschka’s poem. © Gordon Kerry

Joseph HAYDN (1732–1809) String Quartet No. 64 in D major, Op. 76, No. 5 “Largo“ (1796) I. Allegretto – Allegro II. Largo cantabile e mesto III. Menuetto: Allegro IV. Finale: Presto Haydn’s Op. 76, No.5 String Quartet contrasts in many ways to the other quartets in this opus. It is full of novelties and is slower in nature and therefore inspired the nickname “Largo”. Furthermore, this quartet contains a viola solo described as the deepest viola solo in all of Haydn. The first movement begins in typical Haydn fashion with a flowing melodic line presented by the first violin. This smooth melodic phrasing is eventually greeted with an outburst of fast notes that every member of the quartet takes turns in playing. The second movement is slower in its manner, living up to the meaning of its nickname. During this subdued movement the viola has a short heartfelt solo which later transfers to the cello, with the first and second violin unusually bearing the role of the accompaniment. The slow feeling is kept throughout this section of the work and ends with smooth moving phrases from the first violin along with a warm accompaniment from the other instruments. The third movement is a stark contrast to the previous movement with a lively theme played by the first violin. The cello cuts in with a slightly darker motive which requires agility and technique and contributes tonal complexity to the movement. The fourth movement builds upon the third movement’s livelier theme with a faster motive being played. A duet ensues between the first violin and the cello as the movement continues building towards its three final chords. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

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Paul HINDEMITH (1895–1963)

Leoš JANÁČEK (1854–1928)

String Quartet No. 2 in F minor, Op. 10 (1918)

String Quartet No. 2 “Intimate Letters” (1928)

I. Sehr lebhaft, straff im Rhythmus II. Thema mit Variationen: Gemachlich III. Finale: Sehr lebhaft

I. Andante – Con moto – Allegro II. Adagio – Vivace III. Moderato – Adagio – Allegro IV. Allegro – Andante – Adagio

Paul Hindemith was an important musical figure in the 20th century for his use of tonality. While other composers abandoned tonality, Hindemith retained it, instead concentrating on exploring it to the limits and making it new. Thus his music formed a separate stream from Schoenberg’s 12-tone approach. Hindemith experienced an uneasy relationship with Nazi Germany. One of his key works, the opera Mathis der Maler, was denounced as ‘degenerate music’ and ‘Jewish’. Nonetheless, Hindemith later signed an oath of loyalty to Hitler, but this peace with Nazi Germany did not last long. His works were banned, and included in the anti-Semitic exhibition of 1938 entitled Entartete Musik, or Degenerate Music. Hindemith left Germany for Switzerland and then in 1940 settled in the USA where he became a professor at Yale University. The String Quartet in F minor was written whilst Hindemith was serving during the First World War, and is a blend of classical and modern styles. The first movement is agitated and lively. In the second, an insinuating melody begins, breaks off in a flurry of chromatic notes and begins again. The theme is then repeated with variations before returning in its original form at the close of the movement. The third movement’s dynamic and exciting opening features a fast-moving theme passed around between the players. This theme is restated after a slow middle section, bringing the quartet to a close. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

Much new music at first seemed puzzling. Beethoven’s ‘Razumovsky’ quartets are a case in point; but we who have come to terms with the late Beethoven quartets may be puzzled that audiences found them so challenging. One pair of quartets, however, remains strange no matter how often we hear them; and not so much for their modernity – their composer was born, after all, in 1854 – as for their sheer originality of language.

I struggle with it... It prevails. You are giving birth [the childlike, playful theme?]…falling from tears into laughter.” The third movement, with overtones of a Slavonic lullaby, refers to a recent experience he and Kamila had had together: “How could I not be overjoyed when I felt as though the earth was trembling under my feet?” The greatest wealth of invention is in the last movement, a kind of Rondo, with clear references towards the end to themes from Janáček’s opera Kát’a Kabanová, though here with a brightening of the mood to go with this movement’s grand chordal affirmation. © David Garrett, Musica Viva Australia

Janáček originally wanted to call the second quartet ‘Love Letters’, and it is a confession of his last love, for the young and married Kamila Stösslová, who he first met in 1917 and who became his beloved and muse – though the relationship existed mainly in the composer’s mind. Janáček asked the writer Max Brod whether any composer had openly admitted such a passionate relationship. Kamila was willing, he thought, because “both she and I want to be free of being suspected of any other relationship than is ours, a purely spiritual one”. All the same, he prudently settled for the title, ‘Intimate Letters’. Bewildering chopping and changing tempo indications reflect an almost gasping alternation of feelings. The first phrase played by the violins, warm and even radiant over a throbbing accompaniment, may represent “my impressions when I saw you for the first time”. It is immediately followed by a glacial sul ponticello for the viola – the painful emotions found in the ‘Kreutzer Sonata’ quartet. The whole movement can be read as a series of emotional discoveries. The almost peaceful beginning of the second movement may sound the tones about which Janáček writes to Kamila: “of sweetest desire.

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Ernst KRENEK (1900–1991)

György KURTÁG (b.1926)

György LIGETI (1923–2006)

String Quartet No. 3, Op. 20 (1923)

6 Moments musicaux, Op. 44 (2005)

I. Allegro molto vivace II. Adagio – Quasi tempo 1 – Adagio III. Allegro moderato, ma deciso IV. Adagio V. Allegro molto moderato – Gemächliches Walzertempo – Ganz Langsames...

I. Invocatio (un fragment) II. Footfalls (…mintha valaki jönne…) III. Capriccio IV. In memoriam Sebo''k György V. …rappel des oiseaux… (étude pour les harmoniques) VI. Les adieux (in Janác ˇeks Manier)

String Quartet No. 1 “Métamorphoses Nocturnes” (1953–1954)

Ernst Krenek composed in a variety of musical styles over the course of his life, but as a young composer he was influenced by Bartók, Mahler and his Post-Impressionist teacher Franz Schreker, with whom he studied for six years from 1916 to 1922. Krenek’s String Quartet No. 3 was written at a time when he was breaking free from the influence of his teacher’s extended tonality, preferring to try his hand at non-tonality.

György Kurtág studied at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, a contemporary of György Ligeti. As a consequence of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, Kurtág left to study in Paris with Olivier Messiaen and Darius Milhaud. It was an intensive period of philosophical and musical development for the composer, which led to his first string quartet, in 1959, being denoted Opus 1. He returned to Budapest to teach chamber music and piano until 1993. His first work to receive wide acclaim was Messages of the Late Miss R.V. Troussova for soprano and chamber ensemble (1976–80). He has since been commissioned by the world’s most eminent ensembles and festivals. He is the recipient of numerous significant awards; in 2006 he received the Grawemeyer Award for his 2003 composition …concertante… for violin, viola and orchestra, Op. 42.

Although an Austrian Catholic, Krenek’s association with Schoenberg, his marriage to Mahler’s daughter Anna and his jazz opera Jonny Spielt Auf were enough to put him under suspicion from the Nazis in the years prior to World War Two. The Vienna premiere of his opera Karl V, which had been scheduled to open in 1934, was cancelled by Nazi forces in Austria after his music was deemed ‘degenerate.’ Later, in 1938, Krenek’s Jonny Spielt Auf, an opera with a black jazz musician as the title character, was featured prominently in the exhibition Entartete Musik, or ‘Degenerate Music’ in Nazi Germany, alongside music of Hindemith and others. Krenek’s String Quartet No. 3 opens with jangling and dynamic chords which recur throughout the first movement. Over the course of the middle movements, the music alternates slower thoughtful playing with sections of increased energy. The work ends with a short and frenetic finale, at the end of which the chords heard in the first movement are briefly restated. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

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6 Moments musicaux, the composer’s fourth string quartet, was commenced in 1999 and completed in 2005. It comprises a suite of six movements; personal reminiscences and reflections, some with dedications, often based on other compositions – particularly his collection of works called Játékok (Games) for piano (two and four hands), favourite pieces which the composer performs with his wife, Márta. 6 Moments musicaux was first performed by the Keller Quartet in Bordeaux, France (where the composer now lives), during a celebration of the composer’s 80th birthday. © David Barmby

[ 17 sections, in one movement ] Métamorphoses Nocturnes was written ‘for the bottom drawer’, as at the time of its composition Ligeti lived in Hungary, which after the Second World War was under strict Soviet rule. ‘Western decadence’ was frowned upon, as was anything modern, including modernism in music. Composers were expected to write music that was based on folk-song, was readily accessible, not challenging, and not too ‘intellectual’. As Ligeti later recalled, the censorship had the effect of stimulating curiosity and experiments with the modern, albeit in private. Many artists, painters and composers worked in their spare time ‘for the bottom drawer’ and regarded it as an honour to do so. Métamorphoses Nocturnes lay in Ligeti’s bottom drawer until after his emigration from Hungary in 1956, when it received its 1958 premiere in Vienna by the Ramor Quartet. It alternates fast scurrying activity with slow and reflective moments, rhythmic sections, frenetic chords or a barelythere texture reminiscent of the whine of flying mosquitoes. Perhaps in reaction to the Soviet requirements of accessibility and political correctness imposed upon artists, Métamorphoses Nocturnes defies classification. It might be described as variations on a theme, but the theme itself is lacking. There is only a small motivic cell which Ligeti describes as ‘two major seconds displaced by a minor second’. Each movement undergoes metamorphosis into the next, often bearing no more obvious relation to the previous one as a mature insect does to the larva. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

Felix MENDELSSOHN (1809–1847) String Quartet in A minor, Op. 13 (1827) I. Adagio – Allegro vivace II. Adagio non lento III. Intermezzo IV. Presto – Adagio non lento In 1827, at age 18, Mendelssohn had already composed a formidable amount of music, including the 13 sinfonias (composed for Sunday concerts in the family home), which established his effortless technique in writing for strings. His early masterpiece, the Octet for strings, dates from 1825, and the overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, one of his most defining works, was composed a year later. The String Quartet Op. 13 was written in 1827, during Mendelssohn’s summer vacation from the University of Berlin, where his mother hoped he would get an education – “so rare in musicians”. Beethoven had recently died, and Mendelssohn had obviously understood the importance of the late Beethoven quartets better than many of his contemporaries. This quartet shows a number of subtle influences from Beethoven’s Opus 95, 74, 130 and 132 works without, however, sounding derivative. Like Beethoven, Mendelssohn is able to create moments of extraordinary grace out of seemingly no material and, as in late Beethoven, there is a fruitful tension between the popular and the ‘learned’. Mendelssohn shows his mastery of fugue, for instance, but can then write the simplest melody and accompaniment, as in the Intermezzo, which is itself balanced by a shimmering trio section which recalls the fairy music from the A Midsummer Night’s Dream overture. The whole work, more interestingly, is derived from the melody of his song ‘Frage’, Op. 9, No. 1, known also as ‘Ist es wahr?’ (‘Is it true?’). The first three notes of the song form a characteristic ‘motto’ theme similar to Beethoven’s ‘Muss es sein?’ (‘Must it be?’, in his Opus 135), which is heard, transformed, in all four movements.

Just how Beethovenian the work is was brought home to the composer some years later when he attended a performance of the work in Paris. The man next to him at one point said, “He has that in one of his symphonies”. When asked, “Who?” he replied, “Beethoven, the composer of this quartet”. In a letter home, Mendelssohn described it as “a very dubious compliment”. © Musica Viva Australia

Felix MENDELSSOHN (1809–1847) String Quartet in E minor, Op. 44, No. 2 (1837) I. Allegro assai appassionato II. Scherzo: Allegro di molto III. Andante IV. Presto agitato It was during his honeymoon in the summer of 1837 that Felix Mendelssohn composed his three Opus 44 string quartets, of which this is the second. At the time, Mendelssohn was director of the Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestra, and this work was premiered by a string quartet led by its concertmaster. The poet Goethe, a contemporary and acquaintance of Mendelssohn, likened the string quartet genre to “a conversation of four reasonable persons” – an attitude that Mendelssohn adopts in this composition. This egalitarian, conversationalist mindset sees musical themes presented and echoed by all instruments in the quartet, with a slightly more vocal first violin presiding over the meeting of ideas. Although he was certainly capable of highly dramatic composition, it has been suggested that the overall easy-going nature of this quartet is a reflection of Mendelssohn’s new marital content. Accordingly, there is little frivolous material, and similarly, little that is grave or severe. Mendelssohn went to great lengths to ensure ‘clarity’ in his music – that is, he felt that the intelligent listener should be able to understand its ‘meaning’, without the need for further verbal or literary explanations such as program notes. Mendelssohn sought to achieve this clarity through the recycling of thematic material throughout the quartet. This quartet is frequently noted as a regression into classicism after Mendelssohn’s other, more ‘advanced’ Romantic works. This has earned it both praise and criticism – some lauding its restrained, nuanced style, others condemning it as unadventurous and safe. In the first movement’s Allegro, a flowing bass supports soaring melody lines, contrasted with

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a fast semiquaver pattern which is developed throughout. The second movement’s playful Scherzo brims with cheeky energy, save only for a few moments of gentle, but not selfindulgent, reflection. Glowing with warm, uncomplicated tenderness, the third movement’s graceful Andante melody is poised, effortlessly, over a simple texture. The final movement’s sense of agitated virtuosity gives way to moments of calm respite, before a gratified closure ends this quartet – an affectionate balance of delicate romantic passion within the classical style. © Emma Muir-Smith

Felix MENDELSSOHN (1809–1847)

Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756–1791)

String Quartet No. 6 in F minor, Op. 80 (1847)

String Quartet No. 16 in E flat major, K.428 (1783)

I. Allegro vivace assai II. Allegro assai III. Adagio IV. Finale: Allegro molto

Felix Mendelssohn’s sister Fanny, whose death occasioned his String Quartet No. 6 in F minor, was no less musical than himself. Both children received the same musical education and displayed similar talent. Although Fanny never became a professional musician, she ran an influential salon in her own home and composed over 400 works.

Following his move to Vienna in 1782, Mozart concentrated on producing the piano concertos with which he could establish himself as both a composer and a performer. Among the few chamber works from this period are the set of six string quartets dedicated to his colleague, Joseph Haydn, composed between late 1782 and the end of 1784. In his dedication, Mozart described them as “the fruits of a long and laborious toil”. This is borne out in the number of corrections in Mozart’s manuscripts and the number of unfinished fragments which date from this time. It is a much more complex picture than the popular view of Mozart’s ‘effortless genius’. As biographer Maynard Solomon points out, Mozart and Haydn had “neither an intimate nor a convivial relationship”. But it was mutually respectful, and Mozart’s works were a deliberate act of homage as well as a means of assimilating the technical advances of Haydn’s Opus 33 set.

The pair remained close throughout their lives. Felix relied on Fanny for comments and criticism of his work, and Fanny on Felix for support and encouragement of her own. Felix was devastated, therefore, to learn of his sister’s death in 1847. When informed, he shrieked and collapsed, having burst a blood vessel in his brain. He later found it necessary to take a rest in Switzerland to recover from the shock. During this period he wrote his String Quartet No. 6 in F minor, in memory of his sister. Fastmoving agitated rhythms prevail through the first, second and fourth movements, set off by the third Adagio movement. Surrounded by the anger and turbulent emotion of the other three movements, the Adagio tells its own quietly poignant story of loss. After the completion of String Quartet No. 6 in F minor, Mendelssohn lived to hear it played in private on the 5th of October 1847, before a series of strokes took his life on the 4th of November that year. The work received its public premiere on the 4th of November 1848, exactly one year after the composer’s death. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

Mozart neglected to enter a precise date for the third of these works, K.428, in this catalogue, but it was probably written around June to July 1783. It is an enigmatic work. The opening movement begins with a striking and sinuous melody in unison, and seems to veer between gaiety and grief. The long second movement (as one writer has noted) prefigures the erotically charged music of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde with its chromatic harmony and fluid rhythms, contrasting with the emphatic rhythm of the Menuetto and Trio. In the Finale, with its witty use of surprise and silence, Mozart comes closest to imitating the music of his friend Haydn. © Musica Viva Australia

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Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756–1791) String Quartet No. 19 in C major, K.465 “Dissonance” (1782-85) I. Adagio – Allegro II. Andante cantabile III. Menuetto. Allegro – Trio IV. Allegro molto When Mozart published his first six Viennese quartets in 1785, he referred to them as “the fruits of long and laborious endeavour” and dedicated them to Joseph Haydn, his “most dear friend”. The final quartet of the six, in C major (K.465), composed in January 1785, is the only one (indeed, the only one of Mozart’s mature quartets) to be prefaced by a slow introduction. The cello establishes the expected key with a low, throbbing C, but immediately the viola and second violin contradict this by adding notes that make up the distant chord of A flat major, while the opening high A natural of the first violin intensifies the confusion. Twenty-two bars of counterpoint, in which resolutions from dissonance to consonance overlap so intricately as to keep the listener suspended in uncertainty, have earned the entire quartet the nickname ‘Dissonance’. So singular and strange is the slow introduction that one suspects it may have been more than just a musical idea. The progression from the stifling dissonance and repeated quavers of the Adagio into the easy Allegro suggests some obscure initiation, some progress from darkness to enlightenment, such as Mozart had just undergone in being admitted to the Masonic Lodge ‘Zur Wohltätigkeit’ in Vienna. Familiarity, and C major itself, is re-established in the Allegro, but in the end the movement returns, albeit without the dissonance and intensity, to the quiet and secrecy of the coda.

however, serves for many bars of music, by itself and combined contrapuntally with the other themes. The Menuetto is characterised by its calm but constantly varied dance rhythms, and by the dark turn to C minor taken in the Trio. The Finale introduces the fast tempo again, although a darker mood is never obliterated entirely. A sort of embryonic Romanticism is a feature of the serene coda, one of Mozart’s most moving quartet endings. © Musica Viva Australia

Kelly-Marie MURPHY (b.1964) Dark Energy (2006–7) Music meets with theories of matter in Murphy’s work for string quartet entitled Dark Energy. Commissioned by the Banff International String Quartet Competition, it is inspired by theories of dark energy, first suggested by Einstein in 1917. Dark energy is a force antithetical to known energy, which holds the universe together – such is the hypothesis. Einstein later discarded the idea, but it has been revived in recent times, whilst still remaining a hypothesis. Dark Energy evokes sounds and images of space. At the opening, a combination of drawnout long notes and skittering strings reminds the listener of radio-waves recorded from space. The texture is open, leaving a feeling of surrounding silence, and the harmony is chromatic and spooky. Towards the second half of the single-movement piece, the music speeds up and the texture changes. Syncopated rhythms emerge, and the players exchange vehement chords as the piece comes to a close. Murphy is a Canadian freelance composer, and the recipient of a Ph.D in composition from the University of Leeds. Her work has been performed by notable ensembles across Canada including the Gryphon Trio and the Cecilia Quartet. Her accessible music has been described as ‘completely of our time’. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

Haydn’s example is nowhere more keenly felt than in the F major Andante. In simple Binary form, it utilises three separate themes in both sections, the middle theme so compressed that it is hardly a melody at all. This small fragment,

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Krzysztof PENDERECKI (b.1933)

Kevin PUTS (b.1972)

Maurice RAVEL (1875–1937)

String Quartet No. 3 “Leaves of an Unwritten Diary” (2008)

Dark Vigil (1999)

String Quartet in F major (1903)

Dark Vigil was written for the Ying Quartet’s Life Music project, for which the ensemble commissions two quartets each year. The project requires the commissioned works to be inspired by some aspect of American life, such as landmark literary works, historical events or current social issues. Puts’ work Dark Vigil was one of the inaugural commissioned works. It is inspired by the growing trend in school violence, in particular by news footage of a drill carried out at a high school to ready students and staff for the occasion of a student shooting. “For me,” Puts wrote of it, “this conjured up an horrific image of the students as soldiers on a battlefront, their eyes and ears always alert to the threat of attack.” Puts’ work encapsulates a sense of loss, not only of the lives of victims, but also the loss of innocence which leaves students with the grim ritual of such preparations. Mournful lines in the strings pour a sense of bewilderment and loss over the listener at the outset of the piece. It goes on to lead the way through turbulence and bleak sadness, but finds a sense of peace at the end with a tranquil violin line floating above gently pulsing strings.

I. Allegro Moderato – très doux II. Assez vif – très rythmé III. Très lent IV. Vif et agité

Krzysztof Penderecki is a Polish composer and conductor. As a child he took violin and piano lessons, and at the age of eighteen entered the Kraków Conservatory of Music in Poland. Among his best-known works are Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima, St Luke Passion, and Polish Requiem. Forty years separates Penderecki’s second and third string quartets. Taking Penderecki a decade to write, his latter work is markedly different in style to his earlier string quartets composed in 1960 and 1968 respectively. Lacking the experimental techniques that characterise the two earlier works, the third quartet is overall more melodic. The opening melody in the viola creates a melancholic mood. A waltz revolving around a minor third soon appears, bringing with it a brooding intensity. In the later stages of the quartet a gypsy melody appears that Penderecki states is based on a Romanian folk tune that his father played to him as a child. The melody is wistful, and evokes a wild and dreamlike atmosphere that hints at memories from a distant past. In the final moments, the cello represents a fading heartbeat that reminds us of our own mortality. © Gabrielle Troup

Kevin Puts’ compositional abilities span symphonies, concerti, vocal and chamber music, and opera. His opera Silent Night, which was described as ‘cutting straight to the heart’, won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Music. Recently in 2015 he received the A.I. du Pont Composer’s Award, which recognises a distinguished living American composer who has made a significant contribution to contemporary classical music. © Cassandra Ford (Monash University Musicology student)

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At the end of the Nineteenth Century, Paris was the centre for the manifestation of new forms and genres in all the arts. The Impressionist painters and the Symbolist poets had a major impact on the musical composition of the time, influencing composers in their ability and desire to represent a momentary (or captured) subconscious impression. Ravel’s music aptly portrays all the light of the Impressionists, and the ambiguousness of the Symbolists in the restraint and delicacy of its portrayals of suggestion, colour, elegance and refinement. Ten years after Debussy’s masterful Premier quatuor, Ravel’s only work in the genre was completed in 1903 and first performed in 1904, two days before the composer’s 29th birthday, on March 5. Both the Ravel and Debussy quartets have become inextricably linked in popular consciousness, the products of the early maturity of two highly individual and brilliant minds. Form was Ravel’s first consideration, describing the work as representing ‘a conception of musical construction, doubtless imperfectly realised, but emerging much more clearly than my earlier compositions’. The work is dedicated ‘to my dear teacher, Gabriel Fauré’, who received the work somewhat cautiously, criticising its last movement for its problems in structural balance. Debussy was ecstatic, reporting ‘In the name of the gods of music (and in my own also) do not touch a single note of what you have written in the quartet’. Certain revisions were, however, undertaken and incorporated in the published score of 1910.

The first movement’s ternary form opens with a graceful violin melody, its second theme doubled two octaves below on the viola, a typically Ravellian technique. The Scherzo is full of the energetic cross-rhythms implied by its title; the use of pizzicato is particularly spectacular here. The slow movement is episodic with no strict, Classical form; it is an impressive and apt contrast to the first movement whilst still including its themes. The last movement is full of brilliance, again contrasting the previous movement which, in retrospect, acted almost as a prelude. Ravel’s brilliant string writing is here displayed to the full, a herald of the skill and mastery found in the later orchestral works. Author Unknown

Franz SCHUBERT (1797–1828)

String Quartet in C minor, D.703 “Quartettsatz” (1820)

String Quartet in D minor, D.810 “Death and the Maiden” (1824)

I. Allegro assai

I. Allegro II. Andante con moto III. Scherzo – Allegro molto IV. Presto

The Quartettsatz in C minor remained incomplete at the time of Schubert’s death, but is still regularly performed. It was composed in 1820 during a period in Schubert’s life often referred to as his ‘years of crisis’ due to the large amount of works that went incomplete at this point in his career. The work begins with an intense theme introduced by the first violin, which is soon played by the second violin, viola and cello in canon with one another. The dramatic nature of this piece is further highlighted by the aggressive nature of the cello which occurs after the first violin plays a fast ascending scale. The cello assumes a pivotal role throughout the work, a role bestowed upon it by Schubert in respect of the composer’s father who played the instrument in the family string quartet, of which Franz was a member. Inclusions of the scalic motives continue and lead to sharp accented beats from the entire quartet before returning to the initial motive, which develops into a rich pompous tune led by the first violin. This tune encompasses a majority of the work and it would seem the opening theme has been abandoned. However, the challenging yet vital role of the cello leads into the opening tune only for it to be cut short by three brash chords signalling the work’s conclusion. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

Schubert’s String Quartet in D minor is considered by many to be the pinnacle of Schubert’s work in chamber music due to his exploration of dark and intense themes. This work’s dark-themed nature is attributed to Schubert’s realisation that he was dying of what we know now as syphilis. The opening movement begins with an intense and confronting motive with a similar feeling to his art song of the same name, Der Tod und das Mädchen, which he composed in 1817. The abrupt introduction eventually transforms into soothing melodic phrases established by the first violin. Schubert’s idea of imitating a full size orchestra is recognised in this movement, due to the large volume of notes played by all parts of the quartet. The second movement contains a theme full of misery, highlighting Schubert’s realisation of his declining health and resignation that he would never recover. Despite this dark predicament, there are moments of clarity driven by the vibrant tune of the first violin and the movement ultimately has a pleasant conclusion. The third movement is brief but displays similar traits of intensity to the first movement, as well as a mixture of gentle lyricism and an aggressive driving force of rhythm which comes to an abrupt ending. In the fourth movement Schubert uses a Tarantella – an Italian folk dance which is light and quick in character and originally used by peasants to ward off madness and death. The tarantella’s quickness occurs throughout the movement and is repeated in a canon-like fashion which leads to a crashing end to the work signified by three joyous chords. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

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Paul STANHOPE (b.1969)

Anton WEBERN (1883–1945)

Jörg WIDMANN (b.1973)

Elegies and Dances (2008; revised 2010)

Langsamer Satz (1905)

This arch-shaped piece begins with an introduction comprising a series of sighing, brooding, elegaic figures. An argumentative solo part in the first violin is pitted against the more understated music in the other parts which respond to it, including an answering second violin part. The violin solos act as an agent provocateur and drives the music headlong into a series of interlinked fast– tempo dance episodes. Solo instruments and different sections are featured in this dance with hypnotic pizzicato ostinatos and other percussive effects.

Composed in 1905, this work provides evidence of Webern’s early diatonic approach to composition. Webern first started composing in 1899 at the age of 16 and was influenced early in his compositional career by Wagner’s operas. In 1904, a year before the composition of the Langsamer Satz string quartet, Webern became a private pupil of Arnold Schoenberg who had a huge bearing on Webern’s music. Although Webern was considered a progressive 20th century composer, his Langsamer Satz is very much a product of the late Romantic period, and is one of the last pieces to be written in this style before Webern truly turned to non-tonal composition in 1908.

String Quartet No. 3 “Hunting Quartet” (2003)

Thematic elements introduced earlier are now elaborated throughout the course of the movement: for example the rising tone and descending semitone figures of the opening are superimposed to form symmetrical scales. As the movement climaxes, the brittle and uneasy dance elements start to tether. Each part becomes more individualistic and assertive with machine-like repetitive figures pitted in different time groupings against each other. These argumentative elements gradually and reluctantly release to echoes of the opening elegies in a series of slowly descending harmonic spirals and a more resigned statement of the material heard in the introduction. String Quartet No. 1 was commissioned for Musica Viva Australia by Julia Hickman Potter, in honour of Peter Hickman’s sixtieth birthday. It was premiered by the Tinalley String Quartet at the Huntington Festival in Mudgee, NSW in November 2008. © Paul Stanhope

The first violin commences the work using bowed notes but soon switches to plucked notes allowing the second violin to take over and lead the quartet. This happens again, only for the second violin’s prominent role to be taken away by the first violin who swoops in with long high pitched notes. The quartet eventually emerges with a crescendo which evaporates into quick short notes that are passed around the quartet and ultimately returns to the ideas of the sweetness of the beginning of the work. The cello interjects with brief cameo appearances before the second violin obtains the melody once more. The work reaches its end in a similar way that it began, with a soft, innocent romantic theme. © Michael Hammelmann (Monash University Musicology student)

Jörg Widmann is a highly-praised composer and clarinettist. He studied clarinet at the Hochschule für Musik and later at the Juilliard School in New York. He began learning composition at the age of eleven with Kay Westermann and then continued his studies with Wilfried Hiller, Hans Werner Henze, as well as Heiner Goebbels and Wolfgang Rihm. His passion lies especially with chamber music performance. Nonetheless, he has also performed as a soloist with many orchestras such as the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Irish Chamber Orchestra. He is currently professor of clarinet at the University of Freiburg. Widmann’s String Quartet No. 3 or Hunting Quartet is the third piece in an intended cycle of five quartets. Composed as one large scherzo movement, the quartet borrows its inspiration from the finale of Schumann’s piano suite Papillons. The hunting motif opens with robust shouts along with a lively and cheerful melody, suggesting that the hunters have begun their chase. However, this triumphant hunting gesture transforms into a manic pursuit where the three hunters played by the upper strings conspire against the hunted, played by the cello. The theme and its dotted rhythms are shattered by shouts and percussive blows, which mark a sombre ending to what is left; a skeletal carcass. Widmann writes, “that the mood of exaggerated playfulness can mask the grim seriousness that has suddenly overtaken the piece.” The Hunting Quartet was premiered by the Arditti Quartet in 2003 to great acclaim. © Jin Hee Lee (Monash University Musicology student)

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C A Alston Sally Romanes and Graeme L Black Bernadette Brodribb Roger Buckle Maggie Cash Suzanne Crowe AM and John Mills AO Hon Mary Delahunty Jean Hadges Glen Kwok Peter Larsen Anne Latreille Anthony and Suzanne Maple-Brown Rowley Miller OAM John and Marion Poynter Greg J Reinhardt Felicite Ross Ian A Watts Anonymous (1)

Donor ($100–$499)

L Howden and D Beauchamp Lynley Bramble Robert Buckingham Michael Campi Greg Coldicutt John and Chris Collingwood Sue Course Cope-Williams Winery and Arts Foundation Lynn Dalgarno Charles Deak Helen Dick Marion Downe Arnis Dzedins John Edmonds Eveleigh Frankly T Fraser Margrette Glynn Margaret and David Griffiths Sir Andrew Grimwade Penny and Murray Johns Aviva Kipen Anthony Knight Anne Lewis Leigh Mackay Fiona Mahony Lesley McGarvie Margaret McNaughton Elizabeth Pender Peninsula Music Society Alla Petrov Michelle Rayner David Recht Joan Spiller Sylvia Urbach Erna and Neil Werner OAM Jennifer Whitehead Peter Wright and Natasha Wood Dr and Mrs Evan and Ingrid Suesse Youth Music Foundation of Australia Anonymous (19) For more information on how you can support Chamber Music Australia, please contact Jaci Maddern, Development Manager, on (03) 9682 3411 or email jmaddern@chambermusicaustralia.com.au.

Names current at time of publication

PARTN ERS

PLATINUM PARTNER

FOUNDING PATRON

PRINCIPAL PARTNER

THE LATE

DAME ELISABETH MURDOCH AC DBE

IN ASSOCIATION WITH

GOVERNMENT PARTNER

MAJOR PARTNERS

PARTNERS

PHILANTHROPIC PARTNERS

BROADCAST PARTNER

COMPETITION INSTRUMENT REPAIRER

COMPETITION CD SUPPLIER

AUDITORS

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ACKN OWLED G EM ENTS Founding and Honorary Patron The late Isaac Stern

Founding Patron

The late Dame Elisabeth Murdoch AC DBE

Board

Julian Burnside AO QC – Chair Michelle Rayner – Deputy Chair Anthony Grigg Emma Sakellaris Wilma Smith Darren Taylor Sue Walker AM

Hamer–Tribe Trust

Lady Potter AC – Patron Michael Bertram William J Forrest AM Garry Krauss AM John Poynter AO OBE

International Artistic Advisors UK William Lyne CBE AM Director Emeritus – Wigmore Hall

Europe Carl Adalsteinsson Artistic Director – Centre des Arts Pluriels USA David Finckel and Wu Han Artistic Directors – Chamber Music Society of the Lincoln Center

Artistic Committee

Marco van Pagee Founding Artistic Director  Anna Goldsworthy David Griffiths William Hennessy (on leave 19 March–20 July 2015) Irina Morozova Ian Munro Howard Penny Wilma Smith Curt Thompson

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7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition Preliminary Round Adjudicators David Griffiths Curt Thompson

7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition Live International Audition Round Adjudicators Keith Crellin OAM Ian Munro

First Edition 25th Anniversary Silver Ticket Pass Holders* Brian and Esther Benjamin Geoffrey and Sarah Cains Elise Callander William J Forrest AM Irene and John Garran Sylvia Geddes Kingsley Gee Anthony Grigg Mark Lazarus Cathy Lowy Ronald McCoy

Ensemble Hosts

Douglas Beecroft, Fiona Bell, Toni Bucknell, Wanda Bystrzycka, Pam Davies, Greg Davies, Svetlana Fridman, John Garran, Elizabeth Tupper, Penny Johns, Murray Johns, Annie Kim, Ian Miller, Traudl Moon, Jill Murray, Sujatha Pannell, Richard Pannell, Josephine Vains, Jarny Choi, Libby Vorrath, Christine Johnson Chamber Music Australia greatly acknowledges the support of over 75 event volunteers, drivers and page turners whose help in the lead-up to and throughout the 7th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition is invaluable. We would also like to sincerely thank Scotch College, St Kevin’s College and Wesley College for generously providing rehearsal rooms for the ensembles in the lead-up to the Competition.

Administration

Benjamin Woodroffe – General Manager Edwina Dethridge – Executive Assistant and Artistic Administrator Jaci Maddern – Development Manager Lucien Fischer – Ticketing Manager Kate Mazoudier – Marketing and Communications Manager Mariese Shallard – Stage and Production Manager David Hauser – Sponsorship Consultant Xenia Hanusiak – International Consultant Traudl Moon – Volunteer Manager Helen Vorrath – Jury Manager Ian Miller – Travel Manager Lynne Featonby – Visa Consultant Annie Reid – Stage Manager Alla Petrov – Event Liaison Geoff Jowett – Front of House Manager Astrid Connelly – Medley Hall Host Gabrielle Troup – Medley Hall Host Nose to Tail – Brand and Design Business Lighthouse – Accountant Stannards Accountants and Advisors – Honorary Auditors

*Names current at time of publication

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11-19 JULY 2015

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