an unforgettable April - Queensland Symphony Orchestra

MEDIA RELEASE
20 March 2015
Queensland Symphony Orchestra presents…
an unforgettable April
QSO & MISCHA MAISKY
VIVALDI VS PIAZZOLLA
QSO & SARAH CHANG
Queensland Symphony Orchestra will deliver an unforgettable line up this April with performances by leading
cellist Mischa Maisky, celebrated violinist Sarah Chang and a repeat performance of the sold out, Vivaldi vs
Piazzolla.
Mischa Maisky makes a welcome return to Australia playing Dvořák’s famous Concerto under the baton of Yan
Pascal Tortelier, in the second concert of QSO’s signature Maestro Series which sees the world’s great
conductors and soloists perform live over 10 concerts this year.
Although he considers himself a citizen of the world, Maisky was born in Latvia and educated in Russia. He has
been applauded in London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, New York and Tokyo, along with the rest of the world’s great
major music centres.
“I’m playing an Italian cello, with French and German bows, Austrian and German strings; my daughter was
born in France; my oldest son in Belgium; the middle one in Italy and the youngest one in Switzerland; I’m
driving a Japanese car; wear a Swiss watch; an Indian necklace and I feel at home everywhere where people
appreciate and enjoy classical music,” he said.
Then, on April 12, the QSO will hold two performances of Vivaldi vs Piazzolla—a concert which joins Vivaldi's
The Four Seasons and Piazzolla's The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires.
Tango meets Baroque, and 18th century Venice blends with 20th century Buenos Aires, in this invigorating
cocktail of musical styles. With the first performance now sold out, a second and final show at 11.30am has
been released on the same day.
Finally, on Saturday 18 April, celebrated international violinist Sarah Chang will bring warmth and color to
Bruch’s Violin Concerto as part of a harmonious alliance with conductor Jessica Cottis.
Since her debut with the New York Philharmonic at age eight—the day after she auditioned—Sarah has
performed with orchestras and conductors across the world and collaborated with the most famous names in
the business - Pinchas Zukerman, Wolfgang Sawallish, Yefim Bronfman, Leoif Ove Andsnes, Yo-Yo Ma, Isaac
Stern and members of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, to name but a few.
Hailed in the UK music press as ‘the one to watch', conductor Jessica Cottis is fast gaining an international
reputation as one of the most promising of the younger generation. She is currently Assistant Conductor of the
Sydney Symphony Orchestra where she conducts the orchestra in over 30 concerts per year.
The grandiose solitude of Bruch’s Violin Concerto, along with Chen Qigang’s Enchantements oubliés, and
Shostakovich’s Symphony No.5, are the perfect showpieces for this exciting collaboration between QSO, Sarah
Chang and Jessica Cottis.
Queensland Symphony Orchestra presents an Unforgettable April:
Thursday 2 April at 7.30pm, QPAC Concert Hall (Maestro)
QSO & MISCHA MAISKY
Featuring: Conductor Yan Pascal Tortelier, Cello Mischa Maisky
Program: Dvořák Cello Concerto, Tchaikovsky Symphony No.4
A night of music so emotional it could make a stone weep. Mischa Maisky’s famously warm tone will
capture the aching, yearning feeling for home in Dvořák’s Cello Concerto, written in New York as he sat on
the docks watching the steamers heading back toward Europe. And then, prepare for inexhaustible
melodies to tear at your heartstrings, brass fanfares to raise the roof, and some of music’s most riotous
explosions of orchestral colour to pin you to the back of your seat in Yan Pascal Tortelier’s grand vision of
Tchaikovsky.
Sunday 12 April at 11.30am, QSO Studio, South Bank (QSO Chamber Players)
Repeat performance at 3pm SOLD OUT
VIVALDI VS PIAZZOLLA
QSO Strings with Warwick Adeney, Solo violin and Stephen Tooke, solo violin
Vivaldi The Four Seasons, Piazzolla The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires
‘Spring has returned and with it gaiety is greeted by the birds in joyous song’. So goes the sonnet prefacing
Vivaldi’s immortal Four Seasons, a work of creative vitality and sheer joy that has been drawing people to
classical music for centuries. Tango master Astor Piazzolla quotes the Vivaldi masterpiece in his loving
depiction of his adopted city. Written for tango quintet between 1964 and 1970, it was later adapted for
string orchestra by Russian composer Leonid Desyatnikov, and alongside the Vivaldi it now makes an ideal
coupling of classics old and new.
Saturday 18 April at 7.30pm, QPAC Concert Hall (Maestro)
QSO & SARAH CHANG
Featuring: Conductor Jessica Cottis, Violin Sarah Chang
Program: Chen Qigang Enchantements oubliés Bruch Violin Concerto Shostakovich Symphony No.5
She auditioned for the New York Philharmonic at age eight, and the next day was playing live with them,
without rehearsal. Sarah Chang still brings that immediacy to the stage, in Bruch’s show-stopping concerto
with its immortal finale. Shostakovich too flirts with danger in a symphony about struggle for survival within
oppression, with esteemed Australian-British conductor, Jessica Cottis, ensuring the slow movement brings
radiance into darkness, and warmth into the bitter Soviet winter.
Tickets are on sale NOW at qso.com.au.
For media information, program copies, backgrounders and biographies, images and interviews, please contact Kath Rose
& Associates for the Queensland Symphony Orchestra on 07 3357 9054 or 0416 291 493 or email kath@kathrose.com.