Musica Viva unveils 2022

Musica Viva Australia has unveiled their 2022 program, featuring partnerships that span both the country and the world as they bring audiences back to concert halls around Australia to experience a diverse range of live music and the sheer astonishing joy of live performance.

Musica Viva’s Artistic Director Paul Kildea said, “Chamber music remains my great love, and in 2022 we are presenting the broadest possible definition of the art form. Can an unscored performance be considered chamber music? A concerto? A staged song cycle? Yes to all three! And this is the thrill of our season: unparalleled performers in unexpected settings.”

One of the highlights of the year promises to be A Winter’s Journey a reimagining of Schubert’s Winterreise in a cross-genre, visually stunning performance. Tenor Allan Clayton (described by the UK’s Sunday Times as ‘the most exciting British tenor to emerge for decades’) performs the song-cycle with pianist Kate Golla, directed by Lindy Hume. For the first time, this work will be explored from an Australian context with 24 landscapes of the late Australian artist Fred Williams, animated by videographer David Bergman (STC’s The Picture of Dorian Gray).

Musica Viva presents the debut Australian tour of the Signum Saxophone Quartet with a program spanning from Bach to Gershwin. This young charismatic group have been described as revolutionaries and pioneers and will be performing with conductor-violinist Kristian Winther. Musica Viva has commissioned Australian composer Jessica Wells to arrange Kurt Weill’s Violin Concerto for the quartet, with Winther performing the infamously tricky solo.

In June, pianist, composer and collaborator Paul Grabowsky combines forces with Andrea Lam to present a new take on Bach’s Goldberg Variations, with Lam performing the Variations as Bach intended before Grabowsky twists the notes into something completely different, performing his own improvised variation.

February and March will see classical guitarist Karin Schaupp and the Flinders Quartet (touring for the first time with Musica Viva’s own Artistic Director of Competitions, Wilma Smith) performing Imogen Holst’s Phantasy Quartet, Italian guitar works, Charlton’s Southern Cross Dreaming and Boccherini’s Fandango, as well as a brand new Australian work commissioned by Paul Kildea from his predecessor, Carl Vine AO. This new commission immortalises the joyous memory of a Musica Viva subscriber’s late daughter.

One of Musica Viva’s FutureMakers, emerging leader Matt Laing composes music of great virtuosity and originality. For this tour, he has penned a new composition to embody the strengths of the Z.E.N. Trio, a group of BBC New Generation Artists. Also featuring Babajanian’s trio, these national performances feature two programs (depending on the city) that will include either Dvořák’s Dumky or Brahms’ Romantic trio.

Israeli mandolinist Avi Avital returns to Musica Viva after well-received performances in 2018. In 2022, he performs with Italian cellist Giovanni Sollima presenting four centuries of culture from opposite sides of the Mediterranean, sharing traditional Salento, Bulgarian, Turkish, Sephardic, and Macedonian works. Nestled between these works are Baroque sonatas and Frescobaldi’s 17th Century Canzona Terza, which round out this diverse program.

Tasmanian Baroque ensemble, The Van Diemen’s Band, and violinist Julia Fredersdorff present a program exploring the historic borderlands of Europe through composers such as Samuel Scheidt and Dietrich Becker alongside and living composers María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir and Donald Nicolson.​

“Any concert season tells a story, and the one Musica Viva Australia tells in 2022 is simple, if boldly told: it is a tale of creativity during adversity; of partnerships that span the country and the world; of resilience, communal experience and the sheer, astonishing joy of live performance.” Paul Kildea, Artistic Director

FOR the FULL PROGRAM visit MUSICA VIVA