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SECOND INTERVIEW RACHEL SMITH SECOND VIOLIN
You were appointed SCO Second Violin
education programmes alongside and
back in 2014 – what has been your most
have incredible community involvement.
memorable SCO concert to date?
Over the past few years wonderful SCO
Two concerts immediately pop into
friends and colleagues have joined me
my mind – firstly, Beethoven 7 with
there to perform (including, of course,
Emmanuel Krivine – it was exhilarating.
my husband, cellist Eric de Wit).
The other was a recent Baroque concert with Maxim Emelyanychev – what an
Some of our concerts this winter will be
unparalleled energy he has, and such fun.
curated by SCO Players, including you! Can you tell us a bit about your own
Outside of the SCO you are Artistic
approach to programming?
Director of the Stradbroke Chamber
It’s important to me that the audience
Music Festival in Australia. Can you tell
can be drawn in to the programme
us a little bit about the festival and how
as a whole, as well as each individual
it came about?
piece. Sometimes this means that there
North Stradbroke Island (Minjerribah)
are tangible connections between the
is a beautiful, special place that I
composers or the pieces. It can also
have been visiting since I was a little
mean that (like a good meal) each piece
kid. An island-resident friend and I
contributes a certain texture or flavour
concocted the first festival at Pilates
which complements the others. We are
class, amongst trap tables and
fortunate enough at Stradbroke over
reformers in 2007. It began that year
the years to have developed a special
as one concert and ballooned into
relationship between audience and
three very quickly. We did everything
performers so that I feel we can easily
ourselves – flyers, biscuits, ticketing and
programme the unfamiliar along with
of course performing (I programmed
the familiar. It’s a wonderful thing to feel
all my favourite pieces side-by-side
that the bond between audience and
as I thought it would just be a one-off.
performer is part of the performance
Here we are 13 years later!). Now we
itself – something that we’ve all missed
do six concerts over a weekend, run
in the last few months!
André Cebrián Garea
