London Symphony Orchestra Souvenir Tour Program

Her Excellency the Honourable

Linda Dessau AC CVO

Governor of Victoria and MSO Patron

As Patron of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, I would like to welcome you to these special London Symphony Orchestra performances.

This program marks the launch of an exciting new collaboration between two of the world’s finest orchestras. It is a partnership that will add to the vibrancy of Victoria’s musical culture, while providing an opportunity for exchange and learning between musicians.

As we celebrate the Orchestras’ shared passion for bringing music to the community, we also welcome to Melbourne, Sir Simon Rattle OM CBE, LSO’s Music Director and one of the greatest conductors of his generation.

These performances, coinciding with the celebration of the Coronation of His Majesty King Charles III, promise music at the highest standard of orchestral excellence.

Kathryn McDowell CBE DL Managing Director

London Symphony Orchestra

It is a real pleasure to be here in Australia, where the LSO has a long and treasured history of performing. Our 1966 world tour brought the Orchestra here for the first time over 50 years ago, performing 14 concerts across the country, and each time we have returned since (in 1983 and most recently in 2014) has been a momentous occasion, just as this 2023 tour promises to be. Music has the power to inspire, uplift and soothe, as we hope you will experience in the selection of programs we have brought to Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. Over nine days the Orchestra performs vast symphonies by Mahler and Bruckner, delicate showcase works by Ravel and Debussy, plus John Adams’ uniquely creative Harmonielehre and a new piece, Sun Poem, by British composer Daniel Kidane. With over 110 musicians, among them brilliant Australian Members Belinda McFarlane and Naoko Keatley, this is one of the largest ensembles we have ever toured with, and it is wonderful to bring vast pieces that require such forces to your magnificent concert halls.

We hope you thoroughly enjoy the concerts, and that even once we return home to London you will continue to find the joy that music brings through our catalogue of LSO Live recordings, streamed concerts through our partners, and YouTube videos. Thank you for sharing in this music with us.

Sophie Galaise Managing Director

Melbourne Symphony Orchestra

On behalf of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, thank you for joining us as we welcome the London Symphony Orchestra to Melbourne. In a fitting finale to the LSO’s three-city Australian tour, this world-renowned orchestra will deliver two incredible concerts – Adams, Debussy and Ravel, and Mahler 7, proudly presented by MSO Premier Partner, Ryman Healthcare – with internationally revered conductor and LSO Music Director, Sir Simon Rattle OM CBE.

Following the signing of our landmark four-year agreement between the MSO and LSO in late 2022, these concerts mark the first activity of this new partnership between our two great orchestras. We look forward to collaborating with the LSO further over the coming years, and sincerely thank the Gandel Foundation through the MSO’s Now and Forever Future Fund for their support of our international engagement activities.

Collaboration is in the MSO’s DNA. The MSO was the first professional Australian orchestra to tour internationally since 1965. We are proud to be one of Australia’s leading cultural ambassadors. Our promotion of Victoria and Australia through international links and activities, such as this very exciting partnership with the LSO, strengthens our nation’s position as a global contributor to arts and culture. We are happy to contribute actively to the contemporary relevance and importance of Australian voices in the international arena.

The MSO is proud to present our dear friends from London, and to share our home with them over two special evenings.

London Symphony Orchestra

Conducted by Sir Simon Rattle OM CBE

Proudly Presented by MSO Premier Partner, Ryman Healthcare

FRIDAY PROGRAM

JOHN ADAMS Harmonielehre

DEBUSSY La mer

RAVEL Daphnis et Chloé Suite No.2

Duration: approx. 2 hours including interval.

SATURDAY PROGRAM

MAHLER Symphony No.7

Duration: approx. 90 minutes with no interval.

The LSO and Deborah Cheetham Fraillon AO will perform Long Time Living Here at the beginning of each concert. In the first project of its kind in Australia, this musical Acknowledgement of Country was commissioned by the MSO in 2019, with music composed by Yorta Yorta composer Deborah Cheetham Fraillon AO, featuring Indigenous languages from across Victoria.

The Acknowledgement of Country allows us to pay our respects to the traditional owners of the land on which we perform in the language of that country and in the orchestral language of music.

London Symphony Orchestra performances are supported by the Gandel Foundation, through the MSO’s Now & Forever Future Fund.

The London Symphony Orchestra and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra respectfully acknowledge the people of the Eastern Kulin Nations, on whose un-ceded lands we honour the continuation of the oldest music practice in the world. We pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.

In addition to the concerts, as partners of the MSO, the LSO will be engaging with the music community in Melbourne across the following events.

4 MAY

MSO Music & Ideas: Sir Simon Rattle In Conversation

MSO Director of Programming, John Nolan will be joined by Sir Simon, as he reflects on his time at the helm of some of the world’s greatest orchestras, and shares his plans for the future.

5 MAY

Workshop Masterclass with musicians from ANAM

Seven musicians of the LSO will work with musicians of the Australian National Academy of Music in a two hour workshop masterclass made possible through the MSO and ANAM’s Orchestral Training Partnership.

Performance Class with musicians from the MSO Academy

LSO musicians Belinda McFarlane (violin) and Paul Milner (bass trombone) will work with four emerging artists from the MSO Academy.

LSO Discovery Workshop

LSO musicians Joost Bosdijk (bassoon) and Belinda McFarlane (violin) will work with members of the MSO Academy and Short Black Opera’s Ensemble Dutala in a creative engagement session.

Open Rehearsal

600 members of the MSO family including MSO Chorus will have the opportunity to see the LSO at work with Sir Simon Rattle in Hamer Hall before their first Melbourne performance.

London Symphony Orchestra

The London Symphony Orchestra is built on the belief that extraordinary music should be available to everyone, everywhere. From orchestral fans in the concert hall to first-time listeners across the UK, Europe and the world.

The London Symphony Orchestra was established in 1904, as one of the first orchestras shaped by its musicians. Since then, generations of remarkable talents have built the LSO’s reputation for uncompromising quality, and inspirational repertoires.

Today, the LSO is ranked among the world’s top orchestras, with a family of artists that includes Music Director Sir Simon Rattle, Principal Guest Conductors Gianandrea Noseda and François-

Xavier Roth, Conductor Laureate Michael Tilson Thomas and Associate Artists Barbara Hannigan and André J Thomas. In March 2021 it was announced that Sir Antonio Pappano will take up the role of Chief Conductor of the LSO from September 2024.

The LSO is Resident Orchestra at the Barbican in the City of London. The Orchestra reaches international audiences through touring and artistic residencies – in cities including Paris, Dortmund and Tokyo, at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, across Australasia and Latin America, and with the Music Academy in Santa Barbara – and through digital partnerships and an extensive program of livestreamed and ondemand online broadcasts.

Sir Simon Rattle OM CBE

Sir Simon Rattle was born in Liverpool and studied at the Royal Academy of Music.

For some years he was Principal Guest Conductor of the Rotterdam and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestras, in 1980 he became Principal Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, stepping up to Music Director from September 1990 until August 1998. He is also Founding Patron of the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and since the early 1990s, has been a Principal Artist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

In September 2002 Sir Simon became Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Berliner Philharmoniker, where he remained until June 2018.

In September 2017, Sir Simon took up the position of Music Director of the London Symphony Orchestra.

In September 2023, Sir Simon will take up the position of Chief Conductor with the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks in Munich.

Deborah Cheetham Fraillon AO

Deborah Cheetham Fraillon AO, Yorta Yorta/Yuin soprano, composer and educator has championed the voice and visibility of classically trained Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander musicians through her achievements as a composer, performer and as Artistic Director of the Short Black Opera.

Cheetham Fraillon’s career and achievements have been celebrated with many significant awards including most recently the Australian Women in Music Lifetime Achievement Awards (2022), the JC Williamson Lifetime Achievement Award (2021); The Melbourne Music Prize (2019); the Sir Bernard Heinze Memorial Award for service

to music; Limelight Magazine Artist of the Year (2019); Victorian Honour Roll of Women (2013) and Victorian Aboriginal Honour Roll in 2014. In the 2014 Queen’s Birthday Honours List, Cheetham Fraillon was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO), for distinguished service to the performing arts.

In 2021 Cheetham Fraillon began a five year appointment as MSO First Nations Creative Chair. This year, Cheetham Fraillon was appointed inaugural Elizabeth Todd Chair of Vocal Studies at The Sydney Conservatorium of Music at the University of Sydney.

United Through a Passion for Music Making

CULTURAL POWERHOUSES. PARTNERS. FRIENDS.

The landmark partnership between the MSO and the LSO is a story of enduring connection between two Orchestras. A perfect pairing, built on shared histories, creating a dynamic new place in the world of orchestral music.

Whether it is in the concert hall or the digital universe, the affirming spirit of friendship and collaboration between our two Orchestras creates a platform for musicians from both countries to share knowledge, deliver new perspectives and unite our passionate artists in music-making at the highest level.

Whether you are a long-term Patron or considering supporting the MSO for the first time, your involvement plays an important role in developing future international opportunities for our artists. A donation today will enable the MSO to further extend our international reach, perform on the global stage, engage and partner with international artists and organisations, co-commission new works and sustain our long-standing reputation as a key cultural ambassador for Australia.

There are so many ways to become involved and we invite you to join the MSO on this important journey.

London Symphony Orchestra performances are supported by the Gandel Foundation, through the MSO’s Now & Forever Future Fund.

PROGRAM 1

Adams, Debussy and Ravel

JOHN ADAMS (b. 1947)

Harmonielehre

Part I.

Part II. The Anfortas Wound

Part III. Meister Eckhardt and Quackie

Harmonielehre imagines a history of 20th century music in which Arnold Schoenberg never existed. Except, of course, Arnold Schoenberg did exist – and his sounds and ideas have continued to resonate through the music of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

John Adams is Schoenberg-sceptic. He has described his difficultly in reconciling himself to what he terms the ‘aural ugliness’ of Schoenberg’s music, and his instincts veer more towards the other two composers on tonight’s program: Debussy and Ravel. But here’s the paradox. Even for a jazz and rock ’n’ roll loving composer, whose works wear their key signatures proudly, with their echoes of Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler, of Steve Reich and Terry Riley, the spectre of Schoenberg still looms large. And that’s why, in 1985, Adams named his new orchestral piece Harmonielehre, after Schoenberg’s famous philosophical and technical treatise on harmony published in 1911.

As Schoenberg wrote his treatise, his music was transforming from the lush Romantic world of Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night) and Gurrelieder (Songs of Gurre) towards the atonal language of the Five Orchestral Pieces and Pierrot lunaire (Moonstruck Pierrot). For Adams, this period epitomises the crisis of modern music –what he once called the over-ripening of the 19th century Romantic ideal. Harmonielehre represents a very different Adams from the wanton clash of high-minded European ‘art’ music and Yankee pulp fiction heard in his Grand Pianola Music and Chamber Symphony. Adams is sincere about Harmonielehre… sort of.

By fusing the harmonic and expressive lingua franca of European music from the first decade of the 20th century – Strauss, Mahler, Bruckner, Sibelius et al –with the processes of minimalism, in Harmonielehre Adams effectively sidestepped the whole atonal project. Schoenberg’s historical significance was instilled in Adams by his composition teacher, Leon Kirchner, himself being a Schoenberg pupil.

Nevertheless, when Harmonielehre was premiered by the San Francisco Symphony in 1985, Adams realised he had upset two camps of thought. Minimalists were uneasy at any reference to Schoenberg; modernists reckoned the work took

their hero’s name in vain. In fact though, the piece is more of a postmodern, ‘genuine’ fake – and Adams admits ‘a conceit I could only get away with once’.

This conceit is established in the opening moments of Part I as a thunderous and accelerating E minor chord, combining the harmonic economy of the minimalist with the picturesque extravagance of late-Romantic orchestration. The direction of the music hovers around the progress of the note D – heard as sustained stabs in the flutes and oboes – as it passes through a chromatic obstacle course before flowering into a song-like theme in the entire upper woodwinds. Subsequently, the same melodic ideas blossom into a yearning, keening theme born in the upper register of the cellos that voyages to the highest region of the violins. Like early Schoenberg, the melody threatens to desert its tonality framework, and Adams has said that the shape of the movement was inspired by a dream he had of a giant supertanker taking off from San Francisco Bay and launching itself into the sky like a rocket. As if to bring this twilight image to life, the climax of the movement builds colossal velocity and energy as the music rises towards its natural orbit of E minor.

In 1911 – the year Schoenberg published Harmonielehre – Gustav Mahler died, and Adams’ second movement, The Anfortas Wound, retreads the same angst-ridden terrain as the only movement Mahler completed fully of his Tenth Symphony. His title refers to the mythological mediæval King Anfortas, who in the writings of Jung, becomes an archetype for a sickness of the soul that leads to depression and impotence. As a funereal mirror image of the first movement’s string theme, The Anfortas Wound begins with a melody intoning in the bowels of the orchestra, the flow eventually taken up by a glassy and vulnerable solo trumpet pitted against a background of dislocated minor triads. The music staggers towards an apocalyptic Mahlerian howl – a direct allusion to the dissonant climax of the first movement of Mahler’s Tenth Symphony.

The finale, Meister Eckhardt and Quackie, begins with shimmering flecks of tranquil light. The idea of this movement came from another dream – this time, Adams’ daughter (nicknamed Quackie) flying on the shoulders of the great mediæval mystic Meister Eckhardt as ‘they hovered like figures painted on the high ceilings of old cathedrals’. The music accumulates terrific momentum as it subsumes all of its earlier chromatic wanderings and hurtles towards an ecstatic E-flat finale.

© Philip Clark

CLAUDE

DEBUSSY (1862 – 1918)

La Mer – Three Symphonic Sketches

I. De l’Aube à midi sur la mer (From Dawn to Noon on the Sea)

II. Jeux de vagues (The Play of the Waves)

III. Dialogue du vent et de la mer (Dialogue of the Wind and the Sea)

Though we should not take very seriously his tongue-in-cheek remark that if he had not been a composer he would have liked to be a sailor, there is no doubt that Debussy felt a lifelong fascination for the sea.

It seems to have moved into the centre of his compositional thoughts in his previous orchestral work, the Nocturnes, a set of three evocative ‘sound-pictures’ of which the third and longest is a seascape, Sirènes. But here and in other pieces such as the piano works L’Isle joyeuse and La Cathédrale engloutie (The Sunken Cathedral), the sea remains a backdrop for mythological scenes; in La Mer it comes into its own as the central and only character of the drama.

As Simon Trezise has observed, orchestral excerpts from Wagner were much more commonly performed in France at that time than the operas themselves, and may have inspired the highly original form of Debussy’s three ‘symphonic sketches’ – particularly the first, which unfolds as a succession of different evocative ‘scenes’. Wagner’s evocations of sea-storms and primeval rivers, forests and flames present gradually evolving textures of subtly layered orchestral sound. In the operas these serve as backdrops, though sometimes very important ones; Debussy made them the central focus of his work. For once the term ‘impressionism’, rarely very helpful when applied to music, makes some sense: as with Monet and his colleagues, there is a desire to experience and capture a scene just for its own sake, a loving attention to ever-changing qualities of texture, atmosphere and mood, and an ability through suggestive, unconventional touches to bring the scene alive.

The evocative power of La Mer is uncanny: no other piece of music has so vividly recreated the sea in its infinite variety of moods and textures. The titles of the three movements suggest a progression which has been concisely summed

up as ‘the sea awakening; the sea at play; the wild sea’, and within these simple outlines the music suggests a thousand details, utterly compelling and ‘exact’, even when it can be hard to put into words the sensation that has been so exactly recreated. But this paradox – music that is so strongly suggestive, and yet so evasive with regard to what is suggested – is at the heart of Debussy’s achievement. When composing, he wrote, his ‘innumerable memories [were] worth more than a reality which tends to weigh too heavily on the imagination’. So we should not be surprised to learn that much of the work was written far from the sea.

In fact, Debussy was buffeted by storms of a different kind, for the years 1903–05 in which he wrote La Mer also saw the attempted suicide of his wife Lily, his elopement with singer Emma Bardac, later to become his second wife, and the ensuing scandal (which included the rapid appearance of a highly successful play, closely and obviously modelled on the affair). While we should avoid imputing any direct correspondence, the tumult of the third movement might be felt to bear a trace of Debussy’s own personal melodrama. But perhaps the most important stimulus here came from the visionary sea paintings of Turner, described by Debussy as ‘the finest creator of mystery in the whole of art!’ In its originality of expression and range of feeling, however, Debussy’s musical seascape stands alone, encompassing the majesty and delicacy, fury and stillness, effervescence and power of the sea in one of the great masterpieces of 20th century music.

© Jeremy Thurlow

Debussy found stimulus for La Mer in the sea paintings of Turner, but it was a simplified version of Hokusai’s woodblock print The Great Wave off Kanagawa that he chose for the cover of the score.

MAURICE RAVEL (1875 – 1937)

Daphnis et Chloé: Suite No.2

I. Lever du jour (Daybreak)

II. Pantomime

III. Danse générale

Dance holds a treasured and central place in Ravel’s music, from La Valse and Boléro to the many pavanes, minuets, waltzes, foxtrots and tangos that pervade his instrumental and operatic music. The hour-long ballet Daphnis et Chloé makes a strong claim to be his greatest work; Ravel called it a ‘choreographic symphony’, indicating his pride at the way its kaleidoscopic moods, colours and dance-rhythms are integrated into a compelling musical and dramatic arc. The great impresario Sergei Diaghilev commissioned the new piece for his Ballets Russes in 1909, bringing together an impressive creative team: Vaslav Nijinsky and Tamara Karsavina dancing the title roles; Mikhail Fokine as choreographer; Léon Bakst as designer; and Pierre Monteux to conduct Ravel’s new score. Things did not go smoothly, however, particularly between Ravel and Fokine. Each spoke almost nothing of the other’s language, and their artistic visions differed too. As he said, Ravel aimed ‘to compose a vast musical fresco in which I was less concerned with archaism than with reproducing faithfully the Greece of my dreams, very like that imagined by French artists at the turn of the 18th century’. It did not prove easy to reconcile this with Fokine’s vision of the ‘archaic dancing painted in red and black on Attic vases’, and when arguments also broke out between Fokine and Nijinsky, Diaghilev came close to calling the whole thing off. The last straw was Ravel’s long drawn-out difficulty completing the riotous Danse générale, which in the end took him almost a year. Initially scheduled for the 1910 season, Daphnis et Chloé was twice postponed and finally presented in May 1912.

The scenario is taken from an erotic pastoral by the second-century Greek writer Longus. Daphnis and Chloe are childhood sweethearts in the idyllic hills of Lesbos; Chloe is abducted by pirates, then rescued by Pan and restored to safety. The

second suite follows the course of the ballet’s final tableau, and falls into three broad sequences.

In Lever du jour, dawn steals over the cave where Daphnis wakes, and he is reunited with Chloe; this glorious sequence is one of Ravel’s most sumptuous inspirations, both exquisite and powerful as it evokes the babbling stream, the rising sun and the lovers’ rapturous emotions. In the second tableau – the term ‘pantomime’ has no slapstick connotations here – they show their gratitude to the gods by enacting Pan’s seduction of Syrinx, to a long and infinitely seductive flute solo which is another high point of the work. Finally, forgetting their roles, the lovers fall into each other’s arms; everyone joins them in the final dance, a wild and wine-fuelled affair of sheer pagan joy and exhilaration. Ultimately Daphnis and Chloe is, more than a tale of two lovers, the celebration of an idyllic fantasy-world; his Classical Neverland inspired Ravel to the richest and fullest expression of his art.

© Jeremy Thurlow

Daphnis and Chloé with their sheep – a landscape from Léon Bakst’s set designs for the ballet

Mahler 7

GUSTAV MAHLER (1860 – 1911)

Symphony No.7 in E minor Langsam [slowly] – Allegro risoluto, ma non troppo

Nachtmusik I [Night Music]. Allegro moderato Scherzo. Schattenhaft [shadowy]

Nachtmusik II. Andante amoroso

Rondo–Finale. Allegro ordinario

Leonard Bernstein called it ‘rhetoric, camp and shadows’ – which may not be the most scholarly description of Mahler’s Symphony No.7, but is a useful starting point. For many, this is Mahler’s ‘problem’ symphony: too randomly constructed, with five movements that don’t gel, and a finale of excessive, maybe unconvincing, bombast. But another view is that it ranks among his most ingeniously forward-looking and magical. And although perhaps the least often performed, it brought him to the attention of a whole generation of British listeners – thanks to a famous 1980s TV commercial that used the echoing horn calls of the second movement to sell Castrol Oil.

It certainly caused Mahler problems to compose. He started work in 1904, completing the draft score in 1905. But the first performance didn’t take place until 1908, delayed partly by a complicated life that, in the intervening years, saw him leave his conducting post in Vienna and relocate to New York, but it was equally delayed by three years of meticulous revisions.

He knew the Seventh Symphony would puzzle people, and it did. But if there’s a unifying theme to all that Mahler crammed into this long, 80-minute work, it’s the idea of walking through a dark night into morning. Early 20th century promoters tried to pin a name to the piece and came up with Song of the Night – which didn’t stick but was appropriate for a score that describes a sequence of nocturnal experiences: some romantic, some portentous, some disturbing.

The second and fourth movements both bear the title ‘Nachtmusik’ or Night Music. And as they were the first to be written, the symphony was effectively composed from inside outwards – building into a symmetrical, archlike structure with two big movements (2 and 4) book-ending three smaller ones, and the whole thing turning around a central Scherzo (movement 3) whose sense of the fantastical and grotesque stands in every way at the music’s heart.

The first movement sets the scene, suggesting what Mahler called a ‘tragic night, without stars’. Settling into the symphony’s titular key of E minor,

it begins with a B-minor introduction whose uneven rhythms supposedly reflect those of an oarsman rowing Mahler across Lake Worthersee in Austria, where the composer had his summer home. The mood is anxious, restless, passing through a mosaic of ideas that define Mahler’s compositional style – relying more on contrast than coherence, clarity than blend, and using a large orchestra in a soloistic way that focuses on specific instruments rather than use the whole ensemble together. Distant trumpet fanfares are answered by hushed strings chords. And then, in a truly magical gesture, harp glissandi herald an ecstatic, visionary climax in which (it seems) the stars eventually come out – though only for a moment because darkness soon returns before the resolution of an epic coda ending to the movement.

The second movement is the first of the specifically designated Nachtmusik sections –closer to a nightmare than sweet dreams, though possessed of poise and elegance. Echoing horn calls summon up a fairy woodland before a trudging march sets off as though on patrol, with instrumental effects like brush-strokes on drums and the sharp slap of bows on strings to suggest the sound of crunching undergrowth.

With the third movement we reach the heart of the piece: a D-minor Scherzo that doesn’t deliver the joke the word ‘scherzo’ implies, but instead takes you deep into the world of German Romanticism. Mahler marks it Schattenhaft (shadowy), and what you hear is unequivocally eery, brushing against cobwebs – although tempered by an element of entertainment, its potential softened by lullaby riffs and the ghost of a Viennese waltz before a concluding danse macabre.

The fourth movement brings the second designated Nachtmusik, this time in the more romantic guise of a serenade with solo writing for mandolin and guitar. The night has evidently turned into a night of love – which Mahler marks Andante amoroso.

But more drastic transformation comes in fifth movement when, with a sense of shock, we seem to have emerged from night into a dazzling sunlit morning. Presented as a rondo-finale that alternates repeated material with variations, in a blazing C major, the bravado of this movement with its rapid turnover of rustic dances, fanfares, pageantry and parody (including quotes from unlikely bedfellows: Wagner’s Meistersinger and Lehar’s Merry Widow) attract different readings. For some listeners its jubilation is jarring and vacuous. For others it can only work as irony. But with an open mind it’s surely possible to take

this music at face value: as a radiantly sunny destination reached after that long haul through the night. If nothing else, the clattering cowbells thrown into the texture raise a smile. Pure, childlike innocence, and utterly Mahlerian.

Michael White © 2023

Rembrandt’s Night Watch (1642), showing a group of City Guardsman awaiting their call to march. It’s famous for its use of light and shadow, and Mahler is known to have compared the painting, with its ‘night patrol’ theme and dramatic chiaroscuro, to the first Nachtmusik in his Seventh Symphony. Image credit: Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

MSO Managing Director Sophie Galaise with cellist Nick Bochner and harpist Yinuo Mu

A TALE OF T WO O RCHESTRAS

A landmark partnership between the London and Melbourne Symphony orchestras is fostering new creative collaboration – including an Australian visit from the LSO that promises to be bold.

By Kim Thomson.

Photography JOHN DAVIS and DANIEL MAHON

LSO Managing Director Kathryn McDowell CBE DL with violinists Belinda ‘Bindi’ McFarlane and Naoko Keatley

It was during the London Symphony Orchestra’s 2014 east-coast tour of Australia that Managing Director Kathryn McDowell CBE DL was first inspired by the land Down Under. But it wasn’t just the beauty of the landscape and the laid-back culture that left McDowell with warm memories, it was the unprecedented reception the LSO received during the visit. “The reaction that we had, in Queensland, in Sydney and in Melbourne, was so memorable – a real sense of a festival, of a very special occasion,” she says. “I absolutely loved it.” It was then McDowell first met Sophie Galaise, now Managing Director of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. The pair have since stayed in contact, often discussing how they may one day bring the two orchestras together to collaborate. In May 2023, the LSO return to Australian shores for the first time since 2014 – marking the LSO’s fourth visit in its almost 120-year history. The visit is part of a freshly inked, multi-pronged partnership between the two organisations, which will produce bold new works, facilitate knowledge sharing and see reciprocal international visits.

Galaise describes the two orchestras as “kindred spirits” – both artistically and in their commitment to doing things differently – and says these shared values will underpin the union.

“The LSO is an amazing orchestra to watch – they are in true partnership with the conductor onstage; the responsiveness of the musicians to the conductor is not one-way,” she says.

“We also have an orchestra that loves to show their passion, which can be seen in the way it engages and collaborates with, and responds to our chief conductor.”

The orchestras have something of a parallel history: in 1904, after a group of musicians broke away from the Queen’s Hall Orchestra, the LSO came into being; just two years later, halfway around the world, the MSO was formed.

Over the past few years, they’ve each been characterised by a fierce resolve to keep the wheels turning through dire circumstances. “At the MSO, there was a real galvanisation that I very much identified with [during the pandemic],” says McDowell. “The situation was really, very serious for musicians and artists, and remains so. I think there was a certain similarity in the way that we had to approach simply saving our organisations and moving things forward.”

McDowell says this year’s Australian tour will have

particular resonance in light of the past few years, and that the wide-ranging partnership aims to meaningfully consider the relationship between the two countries.

“There are still huge elements that bind our two nations – there’s a complex history that is something I think we’re all grappling with – so, in this moment, a shared understanding between organisations across the globe is a really valuable thing.”

Clockwise from top: The LSO rehearsing during COVID-19 lockdown; the MSO on stage during their 2022 Mid-Season Gala.

End of an era

For Australian audiences – in Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane – the LSO’s 2023 tour will feature beloved Music Director and symphonic superstar Sir Simon Rattle in his last Australian tour with the LSO before concluding his tenure as Chief Conductor to become Conductor Emeritus. Sir Simon says the chosen repertoire – to be performed by more than 110 LSO musicians – is deliberately bold and includes some of his “personal favourites”: Debussy, Ravel, Mahler and John Adams.

“There is Debussy and Ravel – La Mer and Suite No.2 from Daphnis and Chloé – delicate works that showcase the orchestra’s innate feel for French music,” he says.

“[And Adams’ Harmonielehre, which is] like nothing else – this is music on a vast scale, requiring a huge number of musicians, which we simply couldn’t have performed while social distancing measures were in place – so it’s incredibly exciting to be able to stage music on this scale again,” he says. McDowell is equally as enthusiastic about the chance to tour this selection. “We wanted to bring a really dynamic repertoire to Australia – like John Adams’ Harmonielehre, which is an absolutely blistering piece; it’s what I would call a very LSO piece – it has a bravura, a sort of sparkle and precision,” she says. “There’s also Mahler 7, which is an extraordinary work that is very close to the heart of the LSO and Sir Simon Rattle, so it’s lovely to be bringing that as well. If one’s going to make the effort to travel across the world, it has to be special.”

Galaise says the LSO are set for another warm reception from Australian audiences. “We’re lucky to have one of the greatest orchestras on this planet come to visit us – and with Sir Simon at the end of his tenure, it will be very significant; it will be the end of an era for the LSO and we will be witness to that.”

Thanks to the Gandel Foundation

The milestone partnership between the Melbourne and London Symphony Orchestras has been made possible by the Gandel Foundation’s contribution to the MSO’s Now and Forever Future Fund, which supports international engagement and collaboration.

John Gandel AC and Pauline Gandel AC said they were delighted and excited to join forces yet again with the MSO and are keenly anticipating the LSO’s visit to Australian shores.

“The role of the arts – including music – in helping people look to the future with hope and brightness in their hearts is possibly more important now, in the times of COVID, than ever before,” they said.

“Indeed, the MSO plays a vitally important role in enriching our lives, and by connecting internationally, they also help Australians to have that important window to the rest of the world and experience the best it has to offer.”

The Gandel Foundation provides grants to organisations in a range of spheres, including education, disadvantage, mental health, digital equality and the arts.

Photography: Mark Allan; Dylan Stewart

Uplifting emerging artists

As well as assistance to tour in each other’s country, another key plank of the partnership is the chance to support emerging artists from each country, including those from MSO Academy and the LSO String Academy.

Galaise says there will be a particular focus on supporting First Nations artists. “To my knowledge, the MSO is the only orchestra in Australia that has a First Nations ensemble in residence – young, amazing Indigenous musicians coming from all over the country – who are being trained and accompanied in their development by the MSO,” she says. “We would like to give these emerging artists a chance in London, and an opportunity to be in close contact with amazing musicians from the LSO – to learn about their activities and to showcase their tradition,” she says.

McDowell adds that the LSO will share its depth of experience in education and community work, which has long been a priority area for the Orchestra. “The LSO works a lot with socially disadvantaged and culturally diverse young people in London … in fact, one of our violinists, Belinda McFarlane, who is Australian, has been a driving force behind our Discovery program for 25 years now.”

An innovative future

The four-year deal will see new works cocommissioned by composers from each country, to be performed by both Orchestras. “The voices of Australian artists will be heard in the UK and the voices of British composers will be heard here in Australia,” as Galaise puts it. The partnership will also create new digital audio opportunities, including MSO content being distributed across the LSO’s pioneering platform, LSO Live. The orchestra-owned recording label, set-up more than two decades ago, aims to bring classical music to new audiences, and ensures its players and conductors remain stakeholders in their own recordings. “We’ve built that over the years and shared that practice around the world with certain territories, but we haven’t yet had a partnership in Australasia, so that’s a very interesting area,” says McDowell. Galaise says there are several projects already underway and more ideas keep developing organically.

“This is what real exchange is like,” she says, “you collaborate and start with one thing, but then it grows bigger and bigger over time.” ■

Two Australians in London

The Australia visit holds particular significance for two LSO members. Violinists Belinda ‘Bindi’ McFarlane, originally from Adelaide, and Naoko Keatley, from Sydney, will relish the chance to perform for family and friends in Australia – the first time they’ve done so with the LSO since 2014.

Keatley says it’s still a thrill to be playing to large live audiences and touring internationally again. “The first time we played for an un-distanced audience [since the pandemic began] was in Aix-en-Provence in June 2021, performing Tristan to a packedout opera house,” she says. “We got a standing ovation and actually had tears in our eyes –it was that moving!”

For McFarlane, she is excited to be exploring further opportunities to work with young musicians from underrepresented backgrounds during the MSO and LSO partnership.

“At the LSO, we’re very committed to reaching out in the community around us,” she says. “It’s not enough to be solely on stage, performing to an audience, it’s also important to take the music out of the concert hall – it gives a deeper validity to our existence as an orchestra.”

Iconic conductor

Sir Simon Rattle leading the Orchestra.

hotography: Tina Korhonent

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Credits

LONDON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

FIRST VIOLINS

José Blumenschein

Guest Leader

Carmine Lauri

Clare Duckworth

Ginette Decuyper

Maxine Kwok

William Melvin

Laurent Quénelle

Harriet Rayfield

Sylvain Vasseur

Rhys Watkins

Julian Azkoul

Morane Cohen-Lamberger

Grace Lee

Dániel Mészöly

Patrick Savage

Momo Wong

SECOND VIOLINS

David Alberman

Thomas Norris

Sarah Quinn

Miya Väisänen

David Ballesteros

Matthew Gardner

Naoko Keatley

Alix Lagasse

Belinda McFarlane

Iwona Muszynska

Csilla Pogany

Sabrina Bradford

Chelsea Sharpe

VIOLAS

Jane Atkins

Gillianne Haddow

Malcolm Johnston

Germán Clavijo

Steve Doman

Robert Turner

Cynthia Blanchon

Luca Casciato

Errika Collins

Cynthia Perrin

Alistair Scahill

CELLOS

Rebecca Gilliver

Anna Garde

Alastair Blayden

Daniel Gardner

Laure Le Dantec

Ken Ichinose

Desmond Neysmith

Peteris Sokolovskis

Francois Thirault

DOUBLE BASSES

David Stark

Patrick Laurence

Matthew Gibson

Joe Melvin

Jani Pensola

Chaemun Im

Kai Kim Simon Oliver

FLUTES

Gareth Davies

Amy Yule

Sarah Bennett

PICCOLOS

Sharon Williams

Patricia Moynihan

OBOES

Juliana Koch

Olivier Stankiewicz

Henrietta Cooke

COR ANGLAIS

Maxwell Spiers

CLARINETS

Chris Richards

Ben Mellefont

Chi-Yu Mo

Andrew Harper

BASS CLARINETS

Kenny Keppel

Andrew Harper

BASSOONS

Daniel Jemison

Todd Gibson-Cornish

Joost Bosdijk

CONTRA BASSOON

Rebecca Koopmans

HORNS

Timothy Jones

Nick Mooney

Angela Barnes

Olivia Gandee

Jonathan Maloney

TRUMPETS

James Fountain

Gareth Small

Adam Wright

Niall Keatley

David Geoghegan

TROMBONES

Peter Moore

Simon Johnson

Jonathan Hollick

BASS TROMBONE

Paul Milner

TUBAS

Ben Thomson

Carl Woodcroft

TIMPANI

Nigel Thomas

Patrick King

PERCUSSION

Neil Percy

David Jackson

Patrick King

Tom Edwards

Jeremy Cornes

Paul Stoneman

Jacob Brown

John Arcaro

Shaun Trubiano

HARPS

Bryn Lewis

Manon Morris

PIANO

Joseph Havlat

CELESTE

Zeynep Özsuca

GUITAR

Tom Ellis

MANDOLIN

Daniel Thomas

MUSIC DIRECTOR

Sir Simon Rattle OM CBE

PRINCIPAL GUEST CONDUCTORS

Gianandrea Noseda, François-Xavier Roth

ASSOCIATE ARTISTS

Barbara Hannigan, André J Thomas

CONDUCTOR LAUREATE

Michael Tilson Thomas

MANAGING DIRECTOR

Kathryn McDowell CBE DL

HEAD OF PRESS & EXTERNAL AFFAIRS

Christopher Millard

PRODUCER, SPECIAL PROJECTS & TOURS

Tim Davy

PERSONNEL MANAGER

Emily Rutherford

TOURS MANAGER

Mary Phillips

LIBRARIAN

Alice Gray

SENIOR STAGE MANAGER

Sophia Tuffin

STAGE MANAGER

Seif O’Reilly

Percussion equipment for the London Symphony Orchestra’s 2023 Australia Tour has been provided by the Royal Australian Air Force Band.

Thank you to our Supporters

MSO PATRON

The Honourable Linda Dessau AC CVO, Governor of Victoria

CHAIRMAN’S CIRCLE

Mr Marc Besen AC and the late Mrs Eva Besen AO

Gandel Foundation

The Gross Foundation

Di Jameson and Frank Mercurio

Harold Mitchell Foundation

Lady Potter AC CMRI

Cybec Foundation

The Pratt Foundation

The Ullmer Family Foundation

Anonymous

ARTIST CHAIR BENEFACTORS

Chief Conductor Jaime Martín

Mr Marc Besen AC and the late

Mrs Eva Besen AO

Cybec Assistant Conductor Chair

Carlo Antonioli

Cybec Foundation

Concertmaster Chair Dale Barltrop

David Li AM and Angela Li

Assistant Concertmaster

Tair Khisambeev

Di Jameson and Frank Mercurio

Young Composer in Residence

Melissa Douglas

Cybec Foundation

2023 Composer in Residence

Mary Finsterer

Kim Williams AM

PROGRAM BENEFACTORS

MSO Now & Forever Fund: International Engagement

Gandel Foundation

Cybec 21st Century Australian Composers Program

Cybec Foundation

Digital Transformation

The Margaret Lawrence Bequest –

Managed by Perpetual, Perpetual Foundation – Alan (AGL) Shaw

Endowment

First Nations Emerging Artist Program

The Ullmer Family Foundation

East meets West

The Li Family Trust, National Foundation for Australia-China

Relations

MSO Live Online

Crown Resorts Foundation, Packer Family Foundation

MSO Education Anonymous

MSO Academy

Di Jameson and Frank Mercurio

MSO For Schools

Crown Resorts Foundation, Packer Family Foundation, The Department of Education, Victoria, through the Strategic Partnerships Program

Melbourne Music Summit

The Department of Education, Victoria, through the Strategic Partnerships Program

MSO Regional Touring

Creative Victoria, Freemasons Foundation Victoria, Robert Salzer Foundation, The Sir Andrew & Lady Fairley Foundation

Music and Ideas and Ears Wide Open City of Melbourne

The Pizzicato Effect

Hume City Council’s Community Grants program, The Marian and E.H. Flack Trust, Flora & Frank Leith Charitable Trust, Australian Decorative And Fine Arts Society, Anonymous

Sidney Myer Free Concerts

Sidney Myer MSO Trust Fund and the University of Melbourne

PLATINUM PATRONS $100,000+

Mr Marc Besen AC and the late Mrs Eva Besen AO

The Gandel Foundation

The Gross Foundation

Di Jameson and Frank Mercurio

David Li AM and Angela Li

Lady Primrose Potter AC CMRI

Anonymous (1)

VIRTUOSO PATRONS $50,000+

Margaret Jackson AC

Weis Family

The Ullmer Family Foundation

Anonymous (1)

IMPRESARIO PATRONS $20,000+

Harold Bentley

The Hogan Family Foundation

David Krasnostein AM and Pat Stragalinos

Paul Noonan

Opalgate Foundation

Lady Marigold Southey AC

Kim Williams AM

Anonymous (1)

MAESTRO PATRONS $10,000+

Christine and Mark Armour

Margaret Billson and the late Ted Billson

Shane Buggle and Rosie Callanan

Krystyna Campbell-Pretty AM

Andrew Dudgeon AM

Colin Golvan AM KC and Dr Deborah Golvan

Danny Gorog and Lindy Susskind

Peter Lovell

Maestro Jaime Martín

Ian and Jeannie Paterson

Elizabeth Proust AO and Brian

Lawrence

Yashian Schauble

Glenn Sedgwick

The Sun Foundation

David and Gai Taylor

Athalie Williams and Tim Danielson

Lyn Williams AM

Wingate Group

Jason Yeap OAM – Mering

Management Corporation

Anonymous (2)

PRINCIPAL PATRONS $5,000+

Mary Armour

John and Lorraine Bates

Barbara Bell in memory of Elsa Bell

Bodhi Education Fund (East meets West)

Julia and Jim Breen

Oliver Carton

John Coppock OAM and Lyn Coppock

Perri Cutten and Jo Daniell

Ann Darby in memory of Leslie J. Darby

Mary Davidson and the late Frederick Davidson AM

The Dimmick Charitable Trust

Tim and Lyn Edward

Jaan Enden

Bill Fleming

Dr John and Diana Frew

Susan Fry and Don Fry AO

Sophie Galaise and Clarence Fraser

Geelong Friends of the MSO

Jennifer Gorog

Dr Rhyl Wade and Dr Clem Gruen

Cecilie Hall and the late Hon Michael Watt KC

Hilary Hall in memory of Wilma Collie

Louis J Hamon OAM

Nereda Hanlon and Michael Hanlon AM

Dr Alastair Jackson AM

Paul and Amy Jasper

Merv Keehn and Sue Harlow

Suzanne Kirkham

Dr Elizabeth A Lewis AM

Sherry Li

Dr Caroline Liow

Gary McPherson

The Mercer Family Foundation

Marie Morton FRSA

Anne Neil

Hyon-Ju Newman

Newton Family in memory of Rae Rothfield

Ken Ong OAM

Bruce Parncutt AO

Sam Ricketson and Rosemary Ayton

Andrew and Judy Rogers

Rosemary and the late Douglas Meagher

The Rosemary Norman Foundation

Guy Ross

The Kate and Stephen Shelmerdine Family Foundation

Helen Silver AO and Harrison Young

Anita Simon

Brian Snape AM

Dr Michael Soon

Dawna Wright and Peter Riedel

Anonymous (2)

ASSOCIATE PATRONS $2,500+

Carolyn Baker

Marlyn Bancroft and Peter Bancroft OAM

Sascha O. Becker

Janet H Bell

Alan and Dr Jennifer Breschkin

Patricia Brockman

Drs John D L Brookes and Lucy V Hanlon

Stuart Brown

Lynne Burgess

Dr Lynda Campbell

Janet Chauvel and the late Dr Richard Chauvel

Breen Creighton and Elsbeth

Hadenfeldt

The Cuming Bequest

Katherine Cusack

Leo de Lange

Sandra Dent

Barry Fradkin OAM and Dr Pam Fradkin

Carrillo Gantner AC and Ziyin Gantner

Kim and Robert Gearon

Janette Gill

R Goldberg and Family

Goldschlager Family Charitable Foundation

Catherine Gray

Hartmut and Ruth Hofmann

John Jones

LRR Family Trust

Margaret and John Mason OAM

H E McKenzie

Dr Isabel McLean

Ian Merrylees

Patricia Nilsson

Dr Paul Nisselle AM and Sue Nisselle

Alan and Dorothy Pattison

Sue and Barry Peake

David and Nancy Price

Peter Priest

Ruth and Ralph Renard

Tom and Elizabeth Romanowski

Liliane Rusek and Alexander Ushakoff

Jeffrey Sher KC and Diana Sher OAM

Barry Spanger

Steinicke Family

Peter J Stirling

Jenny Tatchell

Clayton and Christina Thomas

Elaine Walters OAM

Janet Whiting AM

Nic and Ann Willcock

Anonymous (4)

PLAYER PATRONS $1,000+

Dr Sally Adams

Anita and Graham Anderson

Australian Decorative & Fine Arts

Society

Geoffrey and Vivienne Baker

Michael Bowles and Alma Gill

Joyce Bown

Miranda Brockman

Nigel Broughton and Sheena Broughton

Suzie Brown OAM and the late Harvey Brown

Dr Robin Burns and Dr Roger Douglas

Ronald and Kate Burnstein

Kaye Cleary

John and Mandy Collins

Andrew Crockett AM and Pamela Crockett

Dr Daryl and Nola Daley

Panch Das and Laurel Young-Das

Michael Davies

Natasha Davies for the Trikojus Education Fund

Rick and Sue Deering

Suzanne Dembo

John and Anne Duncan

Jane Edmanson OAM

Diane Fisher

Grant Fisher and Helen Bird

Alex Forrest

Applebay Pty Ltd

David and Esther Frenkiel OAM

Anthony Garvey and Estelle

O’Callaghan

David I Gibbs AM and Susie O’Neill

Sonia Gilderdale

Dr Celia Godfrey

Dr Marged Goode

Dr Sandra Hacker AO and Ian Kennedy AM

Dawn Hales

David Hardy

Tilda and the late Brian Haughney

Susan and Gary Hearst

Cathy Henry

Jennifer Henry

Dr Keith Higgins

Anthony and Karen Ho

Peter and Jenny Hordern

Katherine Horwood

Penelope Hughes

Shyama Jayaswal

Basil and Rita Jenkins

Sandy Jenkins

Sue Johnston

John Kaufman

Angela Kayser

Drs Bruce and Natalie Kellett

Dr Anne Kennedy

Tim Knaggs

Dr Jerry Koliha and Marlene Krelle

Jane Kunstler

Ann Lahore

Kerry Landman

Kathleen and Coran Lang

Janet and Ross Lapworth

Bryan Lawrence

Phil Lewis

Andrew Lockwood

Elizabeth H Loftus

Chris and Anna Long

Gabe Lopata

John MacLeod

Eleanor & Phillip Mancini

Aaron McConnell

Wayne McDonald and Kay Schroer

Ray McHenry

John and Rosemary McLeod

Don and Anne Meadows

Dr Eric Meadows

Professor Geoffrey Metz

Sylvia Miller

Ian Morrey and Geoffrey Minter

Dr Anthony and Dr Anna Morton

Laurence O’Keefe and Christopher

James

Roger Parker

Ian Penboss

Eli Raskin

Jan and Keith Richards

James Ring

Dr Peter Rogers and Cathy Rogers OAM

Dr Ronald and Elizabeth Rosanove

Marie Rowland

Jan Ryan

Martin and Susan Shirley

P Shore

John E Smith

Dr Peter Strickland

Dr Joel Symons and Liora Symons

Russell Taylor and Tara Obeyesekere

Geoffrey Thomlinson

Frank Tisher OAM and Dr Miriam Tisher

Andrew and Penny Torok

Christina Turner

Ann and Larry Turner

Leon and Sandra Velik

The Reverend Noel Whale

Edward and Paddy White

Terry Wills Cooke OAM and

the late Marian Wills Cooke

Robert and Diana Wilson

Richard Withers

Lorraine Woolley

Youth Music Foundation

Shirley and Jeffrey Zajac

Anonymous (12)

OVERTURE PATRONS $500+

Margaret Abbey PSM

Jane Allan and Mark Redmond

Mario M Anders

Jenny Anderson

Peter Batterham

Benevity Australia Online Giving Foundation

Peter Berry and Amanda Quirk

Dr William Birch AM

Allen and Kathryn Bloom

Linda Brennan

Dr Robert Brook

Elizabeth Brown

John Brownbill

Roger and Coll Buckle

Cititec Systems

Charmaine Collins

Dr Sheryl Coughlin and Paul Coughlin

Judith Cowden in memory of violinist

Margaret Cowden

Dr Oliver Daly and Matilda Daly

Merrowyn Deacon

Bruce Dudon

Melissa and Aran Fitzgerald

Brian Florence

Elizabeth Foster

Mary Gaidzkar

Simon Gaites

Dr Mary-Jane Gething

David and Geraldine Glenny

Hugo and Diane Goetze

Louise Gourlay OAM

Robert and Jan Green

George Hampel AM KC and Felicity Hampel AM SC

Geoff Hayes

Jim Hickey

William Holder

Clive and Joyce Hollands

Rod Home

R A Hook

Gillian Horwood

Geoff and Denise Illing

Wendy Johnson

John and Christine Keys

Belinda and Malcom King

Professor David Knowles and Dr Anne McLachlan

Pauline and David Lawton

Paschalina Leach

Dr Jenny Lewis

Sharon Li

The Podcast Reader

Janice Mayfield

Shirley A McKenzie

Dr Alan Meads and Sandra Boon

Marie Misiurak

Joan Mullumby

Dr Judith S Nimmo

Estelle O’Callaghan

Brendan O’Donnell

David Oppenheim

Sarah Patterson

Adriana and Sienna Pesavento

Kerryn Pratchett

Professor Charles Qin OAM and Kate Ritchie

Alfonso Reina and Marjanne Rook

Professor John Rickard

Dr Anne Ryan

Viorica Samson

Carolyn Sanders

Dr Nora Scheinkestel

Julia Schlapp

Dr Alex Starr

Dylan Stewart

Ruth Stringer

Tom Sykes

Reverend Angela Thomas

Rosemary Warnock

Nickie Warton and Grant Steel

Amanda Watson

Deborah Whithear and Dr Kevin Whithear OAM

Dr Susan Yell

Anonymous (15)

CONDUCTOR’S CIRCLE

Jenny Anderson

David Angelovich

G C Bawden and L de Kievit

Lesley Bawden

Joyce Bown

Mrs Jenny Bruckner and the late Mr John Bruckner

Ken Bullen

Peter A Caldwell

Luci and Ron Chambers

Beryl Dean

Sandra Dent

Alan Egan JP

Gunta Eglite

Marguerite Garnon-Williams

Drs L C Gruen and R W Wade

Louis J Hamon AOM

Charles Hardman

Carol Hay

Jennifer Henry

Graham Hogarth

Rod Home

Lyndon Horsburgh

Tony Howe

Lindsay and Michael Jacombs

Laurence O’Keefe and Christopher James

John Jones

Grace Kass and the late George Kass

Sylvia Lavelle

Pauline and David Lawton

Cameron Mowat

Ruth Muir

David Orr

Matthew O’Sullivan

Rosia Pasteur

Penny Rawlins

Joan P Robinson

Anne Roussac-Hoyne and Neil Roussac

Michael Ryan and Wendy Mead

Andrew Serpell and Anne Kieni Serpell

Jennifer Shepherd

Suzette Sherazee

Dr Gabriela and Dr George Stephenson

Pamela Swansson

Lillian Tarry

Tam Vu and Dr Cherilyn Tillman

Mr and Mrs R P Trebilcock

Peter and Elisabeth Turner

Michael Ulmer AO

The Hon. Rosemary Varty

Terry Wills Cooke OAM and the late Marian Wills Cooke

Mark Young

Anonymous (19)

The MSO gratefully acknowledges the support of the following Estates:

Norma Ruth Atwell

Angela Beagley

Christine Mary Bridgart

The Cuming Bequest

Margaret Davies

Neilma Gantner

The Hon Dr Alan Goldberg AO QC

Enid Florence Hookey

Gwen Hunt

Family and Friends of James Jacoby

Audrey Jenkins

Joan Jones

Pauline Marie Johnston

C P Kemp

Peter Forbes MacLaren

Joan Winsome Maslen

Lorraine Maxine Meldrum

Prof Andrew McCredie

Jean Moore

Joan P Robinson

Maxwell Schultz

Miss Sheila Scotter AM MBE

Marion A I H M Spence

Molly Stephens

Gwennyth Muriel St John

Halinka Tarczynska-Fiddian

Jennifer May Teague

Albert Henry Ullin

Jean Tweedie

Herta and Fred B Vogel

Dorothy Wood

COMMISSIONING CIRCLE

Mary Armour

Cecilie Hall and the Late Hon Michael Watt KC

Tim and Lyn Edward

Kim Williams AM

Weis Family

FIRST NATIONS CIRCLE

John and Lorraine Bates

Colin Golvan AM KC and Dr Deborah Golvan

Sascha O. Becker

Maestro Jaime Martín

Elizabeth Proust AO and Brian

Lawrence

The Kate and Stephen Shelmerdine

Family Foundation

Michael Ullmer AO and Jenny Ullmer

Jason Yeap OAM – Mering Management Corporation

ADOPT A MUSICIAN

Mr Marc Besen AC and the late Mrs Eva Besen AO

Chief Conductor Jaime Martín

Shane Buggle and Rosie Callanan

Roger Young

Andrew Dudgeon AM

Rohan de Korte, Philippa West

Tim and Lyn Edward

John Arcaro

Dr John and Diana Frew

Rosie Turner

Sophie Galaise and Clarence Fraser

Stephen Newton

Dr Mary-Jane H Gething AO

Monica Curro

The Gross Foundation

Matthew Tomkins

Dr Clem Gruen and Dr Rhyl Wade

Robert Cossom

Danny Gorog and Lindy Susskind

Monica Curro

Cecilie Hall and the late Hon Michael Watt KC

Saul Lewis

Nereda Hanlon and Michael Hanlon AM

Abbey Edlin

Margaret Jackson AC

Nicolas Fleury

Di Jameson and Frank Mercurio

Benjamin Hanlon, Tair Khisambeev, Christopher Moore

Dr Elizabeth A Lewis AM

Anthony Chataway

David Li AM and Angela Li

Dale Barltrop

Gary McPherson

Rachel Shaw

Hyon-Ju Newman

Patrick Wong

Newton Family in memory of Rae Rothfield

Cong Gu

The Rosemary Norman Foundation

Ann Blackburn

Andrew and Judy Rogers

Michelle Wood

Glenn Sedgwick

Tiffany Cheng, Shane Hooton

Dr Martin Tymms and Patricia Nilsson

Natasha Thomas

Anonymous

Prudence Davis

HONORARY APPOINTMENTS

Life Members

Mr Marc Besen AC

John Gandel AC and Pauline Gandel AC

Sir Elton John CBE

Harold Mitchell AC

Lady Potter AC CMRI

Jeanne Pratt AC

Michael Ullmer AO and Jenny Ullmer

Anonymous

MSO Ambassador

Geoffrey Rush AC

The MSO honours the memory of Life Members

Mrs Eva Besen AO

John Brockman OAM

The Honourable Alan Goldberg AO QC

Roger Riordan AM

Ila Vanrenen

MSO ARTISTIC FAMILY

Jaime Martín

Chief Conductor

Xian Zhang

Principal Guest Conductor

Benjamin Northey

Principal Conductor in Residence

Carlo Antonioli

Cybec Assistant Conductor Fellow

Sir Andrew Davis

Conductor Laureate

Hiroyuki Iwaki † Conductor Laureate (1974–2006)

Warren Trevelyan-Jones

MSO Chorus Director

Siobhan Stagg

2023 Soloist in Residence

Gondwana Voices

2023 Ensemble in Residence

Christian Li

Young Artist in Association

Mary Finsterer

2023 Composer in Residence

Melissa Douglas

2023 Cybec Young Composer in Residence

Christopher Moore

Creative Producer, MSO Chamber

Deborah Cheetham Fraillon AO

MSO First Nations Creative Chair

Dr Anita Collins

Creative Chair for Learning and Engagement

Artistic Ambassadors

Tan Dun

Lu Siqing

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