Monday nights at QPAC are pretty quiet. Unless the Australian Chamber Orchestra is in town.
Arriving early recently for Silence & Rapture, a collaboration with Sydney Dance Company and featuring Grammy-Award winning countertenor Iestyn Davies, we were shocked that the car park was almost full.
When we got inside, the Concert Hall was chokers. That’s about 1600 people. On a Monday night – when everyone else has the day off. Needless to say, the concert was exquisite – it always is.
It was also surprising to see the full demographic range of people. Classical music attracts the older generation but the ACO attracts everyone. ACO artistic director Richard Tognetti and his musicians have a genius for collaboration and for presenting concerts that are so different each time that one expects to be surprised. Pleasantly. And we always are.
And the ACO has built, over the years, a strong and loyal audience in Brisbane. That’s partly due to their faithfulness. The ACO is the only truly national company, regarding Brisbane. Some other companies claim to be national but we seldom see them. Meanwhile ACO has been faithfully touring here numerous times each year and these Monday nights with them are now part of the cultural fabric of Brisbane.
Clever of them to come on a Monday when there’s nothing else on but, then again, they are a very clever lot. They have just announced their season 2025, so we know we are going to see an awful lot of them again. Good.
But they are not done with 2024, as they will be here during Brisbane Festival for the concert Tognetti. Mendelssohn. Bach. And if that doesn’t have you panting with anticipation, I can’t be your friend anymore.
For this concert “Tognetti directs music close to ACO’s heart”, promises the program. That says it all. That concert is on September 16, a Monday at 7pm, as usual. Fab.
They have a final treat for this year on November 11 with a concert called Scotland Unbound, with guitarist Sean Shibe celebrating his Scottish heritage with a thrilling musical ride through the highlands and beyond. Being 43 per cent Scottish I’m loving their Caledonian theming. The highlight of the Silence & Rapture concert for me was Iestyn Davies singing Robbie Burn’s My Heart’s in the Highlands to a tune by Arvo Part. It was other-worldly.
But as they say in the ads … wait, there’s more. So much more, next year.
In 2025 the ACO celebrates 50 years, with Richard Tognetti at the helm for 35 of them. ACO’s pioneering artistic director encapsulates the intrepid and collaborative spirit for which the orchestra has become internationally renowned. Steeped in a rich musical tradition while simultaneously disrupting expectations of what an orchestra can be and do, the ACO presents bold musical ideas that challenge and inspire, redefining the very nature of classical music in the process.
“In 1975, visionary Australian cellist John Painter gathered an ensemble of string players who shared his dream of creating a group where they could control their musical destinies,” Tognetti explains. “This ensemble, boldly named the Australian Chamber Orchestra, made its debut that November in the Sydney Opera House, performing to a sold-out concert hall.
“In the years since, the ACO has gone on to perform over 5000 concerts for audiences around Australia and the world. From that first concert in the Sydney Opera House to Western Australia’s Ningaloo Reef where we shot and performed one of our first experimental ventures into film, The Reef, to London’s Barbican, becoming the first Australian orchestra invited to hold an international residency in one of the world’s great concert venues.
“For our 50th anniversary season, I am delighted that we will be embarking on new collaborations with friends from around the world, alongside celebrating the remarkable talents of my colleagues in the ACO, some of the finest string players on the globe.”
The ACO will celebrate its 50th anniversary season with extraordinary international guest artists, from South African cello sensation Abel Selaocoe and electrifying violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja to cabaret and drag phenomenon Le Gateau Chocolat.
The orchestra will perform five world premieres, including special ACO commissions from composers Nigel Westlake, Holly Harrison, Valentin Silvestrov and David Lang, and a new work by PatKop (Patricia Kopatchinskaja). It will also present its critically acclaimed film collaboration, Mountain.
The year will kick off for Brisbane fans on February 17 with Brahms & Beethoven with two masterpieces that showcase the artistry and ambition for which the ACO is globally renowned.
Tognetti will take centre stage in Brahms’s mighty Violin Concerto, bringing his characteristic flair to this pinnacle of the violin repertoire, followed by a performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No.7. Joining the ACO onstage will be current and former members of the ACO Emerging Artists Program, which celebrates 20 years in 2025, along with brass and woodwind players handpicked from orchestras around the world.
If you attended and loved ACO’s cinematic concert River in February (it was stunning, inspiring and quite meditative) keep October 27, 2025, free for Mountain. The ACO will bring back one of its most ground-breaking, award-winning and popular cinematic collaborations for a series of limited gala performances. Created in collaboration with BAFTA-nominated director and filmmaker Jennifer Peedom (Sherpa 2015; River 2021), Mountain pushed the creative possibilities of presenting music and film live in concert in an innovative new direction.
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Also pencil in November 10 next year for Cocteau’s Circle. The ACO will conclude the 2025 season with a night of celebration and surprise. Joined by the rather lofty cabaret sensation Le Gateau Chocolat, Tognetti, the orchestra and Australian soprano Alexandra Oomens will venture into the heady world of 1920s Paris, bringing to life the music of Erik Satie, Lili Boulanger and Les Six – six famous composers including Francis Poulenc and Darius Milhaud. Directed by Circa’s and our own Yaron Lifschitz, this promises to be a spectacular evening of storytelling, song and surrealism.
It’s going to be a wonderful 2025 and we still have two concerts to go this year. Joy.
aco.com.au
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