2008 National Season Announced!

I am delighted to announce the details of the Selby & Friends 2008 National Season are now available! I hope by now you have received your own copy of the 2008 season brochure, but if not, you can access the details of the season, including printing out a ticket order form, by following this link to the website - http://www.selbyandfriends.com.au/2008/index.html

The season has many highlights indeed. As you can see from the photo above, the season boasts a cast of wonderfully talented individuals who are eager to share their love of music, and their craft, with you. TRIOZ will be presented in three programs during the year, and in a fourth, we will be joined by our friend, violist Irina Morozova, in a program of piano quartets.

Following the incredible popularity of our US guests this year, I have invited the brilliant and virtuosic Parker String Quartet from Boston to join me in 2008. With works ranging from our dearly loved Mozart, Schubert, Beethoven, Brahms and Dvorak to Faure, Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov, there is something for everyone in 2008, including those who love exploring the more recent masterworks for the chamber music genre. Two brilliant women composers, Englishwoman Rebecca Clarke and Australian favourite Elena Kats-Chernin are represented as well as the Classical Irish composer John Field who was to inspire Chopin so much with his Nocturnes, Bela Bartok and Barber with his gorgeous Adagio for Strings.

All in all, it is a very exciting season which also includes some wonderful new venue arrangements in 2008! In Sydney we will be moving to the wonderful City Recital Hall Angel Place, a venue that can easily boast about its wonderful accoustics and position in the centre of the city. I am really thrilled to be able to present the Sydney season in such a fine chamber music venue and hope you will be equally delighted about the move. In Canberra, Melbourne and Adelaide we will remain in our current favourite venues, and S&F will be starting a new Saturday Twilight series in Bowral in the NSW Southern Highlands which is proving to be very popular already.

TRIOZ Special News!

City Recital Hall Angel Place has appointed TRIOZ it's very first ensemble in residence! This is a great honour for us and gives us a most marvellous home in which to perform. All TRIOZ Sydney evening performances will take place at City Recital Hall Angel Place and the residency will also include performances in a marvellous new lunch time concert series that City Recital Hall Angel Place has asked me to program beginning in March 2008. I will send you details of these concerts when they are finalised.

As the General Manager of City Recital Hall Angel Place, Bronwyn Edinger, has said, “When the architects and acoustician designed the City Recital Hall Angel Place based on the classical configuration of the 19th century European concert hall - the ideal shape for hearing western classical music - they had in mind performances from musicians as outstanding as TRIOZ. It is fitting that at a time when this venue has recently been announced a finalist the 2007 City Of Sydney Business Awards, that we are able to present musicians of such international calibre and recognition in residence.”

Upcoming Tour with Li-Wei!

This will be your gentle reminder that the brilliant young Australian cellist Li-Wei will be arriving in just a couple of weeks to tour with me for the September 5-11 tour. Described by the New York Times as a cellist with "...a meltingly beautiful tone, flawlessly centered intonation and an ironclad technique” and by Strad magazine as "...the most gifted young cellist I have heard. Aside from an extraordinary technical fluency, he has a musical intelligence and sensitivity which is breathtaking both for its maturity and profound vision”, it is easy to understand why his visit is so eagerly anticipated. In addition to his busy international career as a performer, Li-Wei has recently been appointed Artistic Director of the Jin Mao Concert Hall in Shanghai and is also the Head of Cello Studies at the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music. And to top it all off, he has just become a father for the first time!

For Sydneysiders, I have checked with the RTA and Apec websites and from what I have researched, the Harbour Bridge will be open and all public transport will be operating for the Sunday 9th September concert in North Sydney which occurs at the end of the conference timetable. Free parking as you know is available onsite under the venue.

Tickets are available to the concerts listed below and start from just $27. Please call me on 02 9969 7039 to book your tickets now.

Program
Beethoven – Sonata for Cello and Piano in F major, Op. 5 #1 Sollima - 'Alone'
Schumann - Adagio and Allegro for cello and piano in A flat major, Op.70
Beethoven - Sonata for Cello and Piano in A major, Op.69
Paganini - Moses Variations

Dates and Venues
Melbourne - Wednesday 5 September@ 8pm at Melba Hall
Adelaide - Saturday 8 September@ 6:30pm at Elder Hall, University of Adelaide
North Sydney - Sunday 9 September@ 2:30pm at Monte Sant' Angelo College, Miller Street
Canberra - Monday 10 September@ 7:30pm at the NGA
Sydney City - Tuesday 11 September@ 7pm at St Andrews Cathedral, Town Hall

TRIOZ tour a pleasure !

Niki, Emma-Jane and I had a marvellous time touring in July/August. Here is just a sample from the critics:

"Beethoven's Op.1, the Piano Trio in E flat major, demanded a dramatic switch from the languid themes of Andalusia to a highly energised, tight construct. The transition was instant - glance from violinist to cellist to pianist, then into the intricate rhythms with a newly classical spring. Vasilakis's seductive legato again prevailed in the slow movement, and in the scherzo the joke was on the audience, with Selby and cellist Emma-Jane Murphy playing the recurring ornaments with an almost caricatured diligence. As for the finale, it was like a floodgate had opened. The notes rushed out, pell mell, almost too fast to hear, but thrilling nevertheless."
Sydney Morning Herald, 3 August, 2007

"The E Flat Trio from Beethoven's Opus 1 set brought back memories of the recent chamber music competition where pretty well every piano trio by this composer was attempted, even if the TrioZ version demonstrated the incalculable advantages of experience and insight. Selby kept the pace moving without having to urge, her contribution firm and consistently at the centre of the action. ... the second movement Adagio which showed the group speaking as one in an illuminating performance of rich sonority."
The Age, 3 August, 2007

"The standout was indoubtedly Trioz's splendid handling of Beethoven's controlled emotion in the slow movement Adagio of his Piano Trio Op.1 No 1, an early gem in the composer's output, with long lyrical lines that sparkled with vibrant colours undr the player's attention. Also memorable were the sturdy Brahmsian harmonies and rhythms of the Finale of Dvorak's Piano Trio No 3 Op 65. Trioz played with true grit and determination to give a triumphant and vital end to this symphonically scaled work... "
The Adelaide Avertiser, 8 August, 2007

Prizes!

As you know, I love giving gifts and I think this bumper newsletter deserves lots of them! Here goes:

1) the first person to email me with what they believe is the correct reason the last tour for 2008 is called 'One and Only' will receive one free full subscription to the series of their choice for 2008!
2) the second and third people to correctly respond will each receive two free tickets to Li-Wei's recital coming up shortly in September.
3) my dear friend and colleague Niki Vasilakis is one of the superstars of the critically acclaimed new film '4' which features the music of Vivaldi's Four Seasons and opened this week in both Sydney and Melbourne. The first 5 people from both Sydney and Melbourne to respond with 'Movie' as the subject of their return email will receive a complimentary double pass each to attend a session of '4' in their hometown.


(Canberrans and Adelaideans will hopefully receive the same opportunity later in the year or next year when the movie opens in those cities, so stay tuned!)

Best of Luck!

Ciao!

I hope to see you in September and in the meantime, I look forward to hearing from you.

Warm regards,

Kathy