Strelitzia Ensemble - Urban Myths

Nino Rota | Trio for Clarinet, Cello & Piano

Nigel Westlake | Urban Myths for Piano Trio

Joseph Twist | La Tombeau de Monk

Dmitri Shostakovich | Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67

In Urban Myths we will explore four very different works from the past seventy years, each with its own distinct sound. Nino Rota was a film composer who wrote both for American and Italian films, and who Federico Fellini relied on to score almost every one of his movies. He composed his Trio for Clarinet, Cello and Piano in 1973, a year before winning an Academy Award for his score to The Godfather II. In addition to his film work, he composed ten operas and five ballets, and his flair for dramatic and characterful writing is very much on display in his extroverted and excitable Trio, full of wit and humour. 

Joseph Twist is a young Australian composer currently based in the USA, whose music also straddles the worlds of film and the concert hall, and which crosses genre boundaries in the process. His quartet Le Tombeau de Monk is a homage to legendary jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk, and uses thematic material loosely based on several of Monk’s tunes. 

Australian composer Nigel Westlake, also no stranger to film writing, composed his first work for Piano Trio in 2001. Described as evocative and mesmerising, Urban Myths is a melodic and lyrical work with a distinct story to tell. 

Finally, Dmitri Shostakovich’s Piano Trio No. 2 stands as one of the finest chamber music works of the twentieth century. Written in memory of one of Shotakovich’s closest friends, the work is also imbued with distinctly Jewish influences. Composed in 1944 at a time when Shostakovich had just become aware of the atrocities committed during the holocaust, this work was Shostakovich’s unique musical response to the unspeakable horror of World War II.

Performers:

Lucy Warren | Violin

Rowena Turner | Clarinet

Eleanor Betts | Cello

Michael Curtain | Piano

* Please feel free to bring along a bottle of wine to enjoy during the performance - we will provide glasses and refreshments!