You can find repertoire info and details of all the concerts in our Sanctum Series in this digital event program. Simply navigate to the content you want via the table of contents.
Sanctum Series
Supported by
Contents
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Welcome
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Concert Details
Perth Festival acknowledges the Noongar people who continue to practise values, language, beliefs and knowledge on kwobidak boodjar. Noongar people remain the spiritual and cultural birdiyangara of this place and we honour and respect the caretakers and custodians and the vital role Noongar people play for our community and our Festival to flourish. We also acknowledge all First Nations people, whose contributions make our Festival culturally and artistically richer. Our hearts are happy that you are here, on the traditional lands of Whadjuk, part of the Bibbulmun nation and its people.
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Echoes Through Time Repertoire Notes Credits About WASO Roomful of Teeth Repertoire Notes Credits About Roomful of Teeth Martin Hayes A Note from Martin Hayes Credits Biographies
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Lonquich-Clerici-Mehner Trio Repertoire Notes Credits Biographies
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Åkervinda Repertoire Notes Credits About Åkervinda
Perth Festival Noongar Cultural Authority Council Roma Yibiyung Winmar, Vivienne Binyarn Hansen, Richard Walley, Barry McGuire & Mitchella Waljin Hutchins
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Acknowledgements
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Sanctum Series A series of rare and radiant sounds.
Welcome
Sanctum is a new Perth Festival series that honours the enduring power of fine and traditional music. Music that has travelled with ease across centuries, carrying human experience from the past into the present. These works have accompanied lives for generations, marking grief and joy, ritual and reflection, belief and doubt. Presented in the unique and glorious space of St Mary’s Cathedral, Sanctum invites audiences to experience music as it was often first intended: resonant, immersive and inseparable from architecture and atmosphere. Sound lingers, time stretches and the distance between past and present gently collapses. I am thrilled that Sanctum begins with our own West Australian Symphony Orchestra. Their presence anchors the series in place and shared cultural memory, a reminder that world- class artistry already lives here. From that foundation, the program opens outward, welcoming extraordinary artists from around the world whose music moves fluidly between eras. Sanctum is tradition in motion, history still resonant and music that continues to stop us in our tracks. Anna Reece Artistic Director
12 – 26 Feb St Mary’s Cathedral Karboordup / Perth CBD Echoes Through Time Thu 12 Feb 7.30pm Duration 90mins including interval Roomful of Teeth Fri 13 Feb 7.30pm Duration 70mins Martin Hayes Thu 19 Feb 7.30pm Duration 90mins Lonquich-Clerici-Mehner Trio Fri 20 Feb 7.30pm Duration 1hr 40mins including interval Åkervinda Thu 26 Feb 7.30pm Duration 70mins
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Repertoire
West Australian Symphony Orchestra Echoes Through Time
Thu 12 Feb 7.30pm WA
Melody Eötvös (b.1984) Meraki Henry Purcell (1659 – 95) The Fairy Queen (excerpts) Wojciech Kilar (1932 – 2013) Orawa Arvo Pärt (b.1935) Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten Benjamin Britten (1913 – 76) Corpus Christi Carol (arr. Robin Brawley – World Premiere). Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 – 1958) Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis
Image: Rebecca Mansell
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Repertoire Notes
This evocative program spans four centuries of musical tradition, from 17th-century England to Australian works of our time. Diverse in era, style and expression, these pieces are united by moments of stillness and repose that are deeply affecting and profoundly powerful. This musical offering has been curated to showcase the extraordinary artistry and musicianship of the West Australian Symphony Orchestra’s string players, led by Associate Concertmaster Riley Skevington. Careful consideration has also been given to the venue and its unique acoustic. The glorious surroundings and resonant sound of St Mary’s Cathedral lend a distinctive and special aura to live performance. This remarkable space calls, on the one hand, for repertoire that allows music to breathe, sing and gently envelop the audience, and on the other, for music that fills the cathedral with energy and power. The selection of dances from Purcell’s The Fairy Queen – a masque loosely based on Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream – highlights the evocative qualities and theatrical nature of his music, as well as the popularity of English forms such as the hornpipe and French forms like the rondeau. Marking the 50th anniversary of Benjamin Britten’s death in 1976, we perform his Corpus Christi Carol in a world premiere arrangement by Robin Brawley, a member of WASO’s double bass section. Arvo Pärt composed his own memorial to Britten in 1977, creating music whose apparent simplicity belies its profound emotional and spiritual depth.
Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis is among his most beloved works. Borrowing a theme from his 16th-century English predecessor, Vaughan Williams expands and transforms it into a fantasia of shimmering, rapturous beauty. Wojciech Kilar’s Orawa takes its name from a region in the southern Tatra highlands, home to the traditional Góral fiddlers. Strongly nationalistic in character, the work blends folk elements with minimalism, growing from a simple repeating pattern to exhilarating climaxes. We open the concert with a recent work by Australian composer Melody Eötvös, who writes: ‘ Meraki is a word that modern Greeks often use to describe doing something with soul, creativity or love – when you put something of yourself into what you’re doing, whatever it may be.’ We hope you enjoy this concert of brilliant string music, and the meraki with which it is performed. Evan Kennea WASO Director of Programming & Engagement
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Credits
About West Australian Symphony Orchestra From the centre of Perth to the furthest corners of the state, West Australian Symphony Orchestra (WASO) has provided the soundtrack to life in WA since 1928. As the State Orchestra, Perth’s first and finest, WASO is the largest employer of performing artists in Western Australia and reaches two million people with musical experiences each year on stage, in our community and online. From concert stages to classrooms, hospitals to aged care, we bring joy, inspire learning and nurture participation in our community, because everybody deserves the opportunity to experience live music. Every year, through community and leading industry partnerships, we engage a new generation of young and emerging artists to help secure a bright future for music in Australia. We celebrate our rich classical music heritage with great artists from all over the world and commission and perform new repertoire to renew and expand it. The Orchestra collaborates widely with major arts companies and independent artists, performing opera to ballet, movies to musicals, jazz to rock. We champion the diversity of music in all its forms, with a team of talented and passionate people who create unforgettable experiences for all West Australians to enjoy.
Director & Violin Riley Skevington Treble Matthew O’Neill Performed by Members of West Australian Symphony Orchestra Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten , composed by Arvo Pärt, is published by Universal Edition.
Image: Rebecca Mansell
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Roomful of Teeth
Repertoire
Fri 13 Feb 7.30pm USA
Missy Mazzoli Vesper Sparrow Leilehua Lanzilotti On Stochastic Wave Behavior Caroline Shaw The Isle --- Interval --- Gabriel Kahane ‘Speaking in Tongues’ from Elevator Songs Angélica Negrón Math, the one which is sweet William Brittelle Psychedelics
Image: Anja Schutz
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Repertoire Notes
Roomful of Teeth presents a dynamic program of music spanning the group’s 16 years of collaboration with today’s most compelling composers, including works from both of their Grammy Award-winning albums. Vesper Sparrow by Missy Mazzoli is based on text from Farnoosh Fathi’s poem ‘Home State’, from her recent book Great Guns . The piece is an eclectic amalgamation of imaginary birdsong and Mazzoli’s own interpretation of Sardinian overtone singing. It tries to capture the exuberance and energy of these individual singers as well as a bit of the magic that is created when this group comes together. Wayfinding, observing nature and respecting the ocean have been present and important to composer Leilehua Lanzilotti since childhood. On Stochastic Wave Behavior was composed as part of the US National Science Foundation-funded ‘A few waves do most of the work’ project, and this piece celebrates and reflects on today’s dynamic landscape where science and indigenous knowledge celebrate the power of nature. The work is sung completely in ‘Ōlelo Hawai’i, a language that is changing, that is evolving, that is new, is alive. The Isle by Caroline Shaw begins with a cloud of murmuring voices – a musical imagining of something hinted at in Shakespeare’s stage directions in The Tempest . The calls for “a burden, dispersedly” and “solemn music” suggest an off-stage refrain and/or perhaps something even more otherworldly. In Shakespearean Metaphysics , Michael Witmore writes: “Like the island itself, which seems to be the ultimate environment in which the play’s action takes place, music is a medium that flows from, within, and around that imaginary place into the ambient space of performance proper. If some of the courtiers from Naples and Milan are lulled to sleep by the island’s ‘solemn music’, the audience can hear this music in a way that it cannot feel the hardness of the boards that the
sleeping players lie on.” In taking cues from this reading of the play, Shaw has constructed her own musical reading of the island of The Tempest . ‘Speaking in Tongues’ is the first song from Elevator Songs by singer-songwriter/composer Gabriel Kahane. The entire Elevator Songs songbook includes fizzy hooks, slippery chord changes and the sublime counterpoint of eight voices combine to create a singular, panoramic vision. It sounds like nothing so much as itself and yet, for all of its freshness, it is, first and foremost, a rich and resonant collage of the timeless travails of the human condition. Math, the one which is sweet by Angélica Negrón is the sound of getting lost in new love – of giving in to excitement, savouring anticipation, surrendering to daydreams. It’s the thrill of getting to know someone new, and the lens of tenderness through which everything about them is perceived. It dismantles and plays with the false dichotomies of love: logic and emotion, order and abandon, repression and disinhibition. It’s an invitation to these dualities, like two people falling in love, to coexist in the dazed delight of newfound connection. This piece speaks to the intimacy and vulnerability inherent in giving, receiving and letting go of love. Psychedelics by William Brittelle is, in part, an effort to integrate the many vocal techniques and effects mastered by Roomful of Teeth into one (semi-)coherent whole. The term psychedelic here is meant to evoke a plethora of bright and vivid (almost surreal) colours blended and twisted in strange, otherworldly ways. Brittelle’s aim was to create a piece that aggressively challenged the notion of what a long-form choral piece can be – both in terms of its delivery and subject matter. The piece is an attempt, albeit an abstract one, to reckon with a psychological breakdown that the composer experienced as a young adult, and to parallel that with the
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seemingly apocalyptic strains of our current collective state – his objective being to humanise and somehow come to terms with the inevitability and, ultimately, healing nature of destruction. In this sense, the term ‘psychedelic’ refers more to the ability to observe startling and strange occurrences with a fluid, dreamlike sense of attachment. Lyrically, his aim was collage rather than traditional narrative – a fabric of text that reflects the growing chaos of stimuli in our society interrupted by moments of clarity and longing. There are a number of cultural reference points, but they are meant to form a swarm of images, not a literal, linear narrative.
Image: Great Sky Media
Credits
About Roomful of Teeth Roomful of Teeth is a Grammy Award-winning vocal group dedicated to reimagining the expressive potential of the human voice. Teeth have collaborated with today’s most compelling musical creators to build a continuously growing repertoire of over 100 new works. Recent performances include Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Paris Philharmonie, the Barbican and many others. Roomful of Teeth won a 2024 Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance for the album Rough Magic , having won a Grammy Award in the same category in 2013 for their debut album. Member-composer Caroline Shaw was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music for her work Partita for 8 Voices , which is featured on that album. Teeth’s recordings have been featured on television and in film, including Josephine Decker’s Madeline’s Madeline , Netflix’s Dark and Homecoming: A Film by Beyoncé .
Singers Estelí Gomez, Mingjia Chen, Tynan Davis, Virginia Kelsey, Jodie Landau, Steven Bradshaw, Thann Scoggin, Cameron Beauchamp Executive Director
Amanda Crider Sound Engineer Randall L Squires Tour Manager Alicia Walter
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Martin Hayes
A Note from Martin Hayes
Thu 19 Feb 7.30pm IRELAND
Traditional Irish music is a grounded and earthy music vernacular that is also capable of expressing something universal and timeless. It carries within it both joy and sorrow, the dance and the lament, it mirrors life itself. When I play, I’m trying to connect with that emotional truth, and when audiences respond to it, whether in Clare, New York or Australia, it’s a reminder that this music transcends geography. It’s a language of the heart, and for me, playing it is its own reward. Our concerts are intimate journeys in search of the many possibilities that the melodies of Irish traditional music offer. There will an improvisational element and a conversational quality that will hopefully keep each performance feeling spontaneous. In my opinion, the most important quality that any performance should have is ‘aliveness’; I feel it is important to take risks and attempt to find something new in every performance. Listeners can expect to hear familiar traditional tunes that will sometimes go on journeys of variation and improvisation. Over the course of an evening, you can hopefully expect to experience moments of stillness, exuberance, wildness and reflection. Kyle and I first played together in New York more than a decade ago and over the years we have played together in the Common Ground Ensemble. Kyle is a multi-faceted musician who brings a deep harmonic awareness, a sensitivity to mood and powerful improvisational skill to every performance, while I bring the melodic and rhythmic language of traditional Irish music. What makes it work is our mutual trust: we leave room for the music to breathe, to change, to surprise us. Each performance feels alive and conversational, like a dialogue that keeps unfolding.
Image: Laura San Segundo
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Irish music is a treasury of beautiful expressive melody that can find a natural home in many musical contexts. In these collaborations, I didn’t try to make Irish music sound like something else, instead, I try to dig deeper into its true essence so that at an emotional level it can be understood by musicians I am working with. With all the musicians that I collaborate with, it is always about listening deeply and finding common ground at the level of feeling. One thing that I have learned over many years reaching out to musicians of different backgrounds is that both tradition and innovation can coexist beautifully when approached with openness and respect.
Image: Laura San Segundo
Biographies
Martin Hayes Martin Hayes is regarded as one of the most significant talents to emerge in the world of Irish traditional music. Growing up in a musical family in rural County Clare, in a remote mountainous locality with a rich music tradition, instilled in him a deep love, understanding and connection to traditional music. Martin is the founder of the musical super group The Gloaming, The Common Ground Ensemble and the Martin Hayes Quartet. He is the artistic director of Masters of Tradition, an annual festival in Cork, Ireland, and a co-curator for the Marble Sessions at the Kilkenny Arts Festival. Martin has performed in venues including the Barbican, Elbphilharmonie, Philharmonie de Paris and Muziekgebouw Amsterdam. He has created collaborations in the classical, folk and contemporary worlds with musicians such as Bill Frisell, Ricky Skaggs, Jordi Savall, Brooklyn Rider and the Irish Chamber Orchestra, as well as many of the greatest traditional Irish musicians over the past forty years. He has performed on stage with musicians such as Sting and Paul Simon, has recorded with Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project and contributed music, both original and traditional arrangements to modern dance, theatre, film and television.
Credits
Violin Martin Hayes Guitar Kyle Sanna Support artists Robert Zielinski & Manuela Centanni
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The 2025 – 26 season sees Martin curate a celebration of Irish traditional music at Cork Opera House, return to the Belfast International Festival and Concertgebouw Amsterdam and debut at Rheingau Music Festival with the Martin Hayes Quartet. In spring 2026 he will curate and lead a major Irish music celebration featuring the Common Ground Ensemble, launching at the National Concert Hall in Dublin before embarking on a U.S. tour. The centrepiece of the tour will be a landmark concert at Carnegie Hall on Saint Patrick’s Day, inaugurating a new tradition annual tradition. Joined by special guests, the performances will blend Irish music, song, dance, spoken word and contemporary interpretations of Irish culture. Kyle Sanna Kyle is a Brooklyn-based guitarist and composer whose musical work spans four divergent disciplines – contemporary composition; jazz and improvisation; the traditional music of Ireland; and music, technology and production. He studied jazz at the University of Oregon and composition at the Université Lumière Lyon II in France. His recent releases include The City Sleeps (traditional Irish tunes on solo guitar), Everything Again Is New (an album of algorithmic electronic music) and Ground Patrol’s Converge (conceptual improvisations). An album featuring Undone Landscape , his 30-minute piece for clarinet, percussion, string orchestra and live electronics, written and performed by Kinan Azmeh and The Knights will appear on Phenotypic Recordings in 2027. Kyle’s compositions have been performed at venues around the world, have featured in two recent Ken Burns’ films and he has received commissions from artists including Brooklyn Rider, Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra, Palaver Strings and soprano Daniela Birrittella. His ‘ruminative and shape-shifting’ ( San Francisco Chronicle ) work for string quartet Sequence for Minor White won First Prize in the 2018 Charlottle New Music Festival Composition Competition.
Kyle has arranged music for Béla Fleck, Jan Vogler, the Amsterdam Sinfonietta and for Yo-Yo Ma on two Grammy Award-winning albums. In 2025 his arrangements were performed at Carnegie Hall by The Knights and in Dublin by Martin Hayes and the Irish National Symphony Orchestra. His arrangements have appeared on The Colbert Report , NPR’s Performance Today , and on the Sony Classical, Sony Masterworks, In a Circle and Naive labels. In addition to his composing and arranging, Kyle performs regularly as an improvising guitarist with Kinan Azmeh’s CityBand, Ground Patrol and We The Gleaners, and he performs music based in the Irish tradition with Martin Hayes, Seamus Egan, Maeve Gilchrist and Dana Lyn. He is equally at home in the recording studio as on the stage and has produced nine full length albums by various artists. Robert Zielinski & Manuela Centanni With fiddle and wooden flute, Robert and Manuela enjoy bringing you on a musical journey from Ireland to Australia, with their unique tone, arrangements, unison playing and harmonies. With only the sound and style of his favourite record, the seminal album All-Ireland Champions with Martin Hayes’ dad P.J. Hayes, Paddy Canny, Peadar O’Loughlin and Bridie Lafferty, as his guide, Robert landed in Martin’s hometown of Feakle in East Clare when he was 17, not knowing anyone there. In Feakle, Robert spent a total of 10 months over two summers, working as a gardener and learning from these masters of the tradition. It was here he met Martin, who was home from the US for the whole summer. In the winter, Martin went back to America and recorded his first album, and the rest is history.
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Lonquich-Clerici- Mehner Trio with Júlia Pusker
Repertoire
Fri 20 Feb 7.30pm ITALY / SPAIN / HUNGARY
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827) Clarinet Trio in B flat, Op. 11 Gassenhauer I. Allegro con brio II. Adagio III. Tema con variazioni (‘Pria ch’io l’impegno’: Allegretto) Francis Poulenc (1899 – 1963) Clarinet Sonata in B flat, FP 184 I. Allegro tristamente (Allegretto – Très calme – Tempo allegretto) II. Romanza (Très calme) III. Allegro con fuoco (Très animé) --- Interval --- Béla Bartók (1881 – 1945) Rhapsody No. 2 for Violin and Piano, Sz. 89 I. Lassú II. Friss
Presented with UKARIA and Hayllar Music Tours
Felix Mendelssohn (1809 – 47) Piano Trio in C minor, Op. 66 I. Allegro energico e con fuoco II. Andante espressivo III. Scherzo: Molto allegro quasi presto IV. Finale: Allegro appassionato
Image: Laura Stanca
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Repertoire Notes
The concert starts with a cheeky and humorous piece featuring, in the last movement, a tune from an opera by an Austrian composer, Jospeh Weigl. This catchy tune, ‘Pria ch’io l’impegno’, translates to ‘Before I go to work I must have something to eat’. It was a widespread hit in Vienna around 1797 and led to the trio’s nickname, the Gassenhauer (street hit), because the melody was so popular it was sung and whistled in the ‘gassen’ (lanes) of Vienna. This light hearted inspiration is very rare for the usually very serious Beethoven who incapsulates this tune in an old style form, the theme and variations, in order to build an extremely smart construction where he ‘hides’ the actual tune for several variations (the entire point should be to present the theme and then to vary it) until he reintroduces it bit by bit rushing toward the end. Poulenc to me is the supreme master of mélodies in the 20th century. He was an extremely eclectic musician who composed widely in other forms and genres – chamber music, symphonic but also for the theatre as well as for the church. What I love about him is that he had little use for the dogmas of his century and instead he accepted other influences, such jazz and neo-Classicism. The clarinet sonata is a late work with a dramatic and sassy opening Allegro tristamente, followed by the gentle lament of the second movement, Romanza. The concluding Allegro con fuoco is bright and brittle with a circus-like energy and one of Poulenc’s wistfully melodies. Like much of Bartók’s music, the two violin rhapsodies are based on the folk music that he spent much of his time travelling through Hungary collecting with note pad and tape recorder. The second one, performed in this concert, is the wildest and features an almost improvisatory feel, with constant variations in the melodies and multiple stops of the sort that would be natural for a player creating his own harmonies as he goes along.
The concert ends with the second piano trio by Mendelssohn, unjustly less famous than his first in D minor. The work is dark and starts with a turbulent motion in the piano that recalls his orchestral works, the Hebrides overture and his Scottish Symphony. The second movement is a dreamy song without words on a gently rocky rhythm of a barcarola (Venetian boat songs). The third movement is one of those quick and spirited scherzos that are the trademark of Mendelssohn’s light yet devilish aesthetic. Described by Mendelssohn himself as ‘a trifle nasty to play’, its high energy has been likened to that of the scherzo of his A Midsummer Night’s Dream . The last movement is probably the most known of the trio where the composer quotes the choral Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ , (used also by Bach) and then expands to also include a 16-century Genevan psalter tune, known in English as Old Hundredth from its association with the Psalm 100 ( William Kethe ), as the culminating melody. Umberto Clerici
Credits
Clarinet Tommaso Lonquich Cello Umberto Clerici Piano Claudio Martinez Mehner Violin Júlia Pusker
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Biographies
Tommaso Lonquich A musician, psychoanalyst and pedagogue, Tommaso has been acclaimed by reviewers as a ‘formidable clarinetist’ and praised for his ‘passion, sumptuous tone, magical finesse and dazzling virtuosity’. He is an Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York and has served as solo clarinetist with Denmark-based Ensemble MidtVest for 13 years. He has appeared on the most renowned stages and at major festivals and has partnered, among others, with Christian Tetzlaff, Ilya Gringolts, Pekka Kuusisto, David Finckel and Wu Han, as well as with the Danish, Vertavo, Van Kuijk, Noûs, Indaco and Zaïde string quartets. Tommaso is the founder and Artistic Director of Schackenborg Musikfest, one of Scandinavia’s most prestigious festivals. Previously he served as Artistic Director of KantorAtelier, a vibrant Florentine cultural space based dedicated to music, theatre, art and psychoanalysis. Particularly active in the field of improvisation, he has led workshops at the Juilliard School and has collaborated with prominent visual artists, dancers and theatre companies. He performs regularly as a soloist and solo clarinetist with orchestras such as the Haydn Philharmonie (Austria), the Orchestra Leonore (Italy), the Chamber Orchestra of Mantua (Italy) and the Slovenian Radio Orchestra. He can be heard on 25 CD releases and his recordings have been nominated for a Gramophone Award and for the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik.
Umberto Clerici After a career spanning more than 20 years as a gifted cello soloist and orchestral musician, Umberto has consolidated his diverse artist achievements to rapid acclaim as a conductor and is now the Chief Conductor of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra. Umberto began his career as a virtuoso cellist making his solo debut at the age of 17 performing Haydn’s D Major cello concerto in Japan. After years of performing on the stages of the world’s most prestigious concert halls, he took up the position as principal cello of the Teatro Regio di Torino following which he was principal cello of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra 2014 – 21. He made his conducting debut with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra at the Sydney Opera House in 2018 and following a swift trajectory of prestigious conducting engagements, he is now in high demand across Australia, New Zealand and Europe. As a cellist, Umberto remains beloved by audiences worldwide, having performed internationally as a soloist at New York’s Carnegie Hall, Vienna’s Musicverein, the great Shostakovich Hall of St Petersburg, Auditorium Parco della Musica in Rome, the Salzburg Festival and is one of only two Italians to have ever won a prize for cello in the prestigious International Tchaikovsky Competition.
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Claudio Martinez Mehner Born in Bremen, Germany in 1970, Claudio began piano studies at the Royal Conservatory in Madrid with Amparo Fuster, Pedro Lerma and Joaquín Soriano, while also playing viola, violin and harpsichord in various ensembles. He continued his training at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, Reina Sofía School of Music, Hochschule für Musik Freiburg, Fondazione per il Pianoforte in Como and Peabody Conservatory, studying with Dmitri Bashkirov, Vitali Margulis and Leon Fleisher, and attending masterclasses with leading musicians. He was a finalist at the Santander International Piano Competition and won first prizes at Chimay, Pilar Bayona and Dino Ciani competitions. In 1992, he received a diploma from Queen Sofía as the most outstanding student. As a soloist Claudio has performed worldwide with orchestras including Munich Philharmonic, Moscow Philharmonic, Teatro Alla Scala Philharmonic, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Prague Philharmonic and most major Spanish orchestras. He has taught at the Reina Sofía School, conservatories in Salamanca and Aragón and currently teaches at the Hochschule für Musik Basel and Cologne, while leading courses internationally.
Júlia Pusker Praised by the Strad Magazine for her ‘magical simplicity’ and described as a true ‘aristocrat’ of the violin by La Libre , Júlia came to international prominence for her prize-winning performances at the prestigious 2019 Queen Elisabeth Violin Competition in Brussels. Born into a family of musicians in Hungary, Júlia began her musical education at the Liszt Academy in Budapest before moving to England to study with György Pauk at the Royal Academy of Music in London, where she received her Master of Music degree with distinction in 2016. Between 2016 and 2021, she was Artist-in-Residence at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Brussels, working with Augustin Dumay. Júlia’s recent highlights include her Wigmore Hall recital debut with Christia Hudziy in February 2025 and her performance of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège under Gergely Madaras. She also made her concerto debut with Basel Chamber Orchestra playing Bartók Violin Concerto No. 1 at Bartók Spring Festival in Budapest and Basel Stadtcasino conducted by Izabelė Jankauskaitė. As a soloist, Júlia has appeared with some of Europe’s leading orchestras and has performed solo recitals in some of Europe’s most prestigious concert halls, including Casa da Música Porto, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and Wiener Konzerthaus. As a chamber musician, she has shared the stage and collaborated with artists such as Kristóf Baráti, Frank Braley, Tommaso Lonquich and Jean- Yves Thibaudet. Her most recent recordings include Eric Tanguy’s 2nd Violin Concerto with Jyväskylä Sinfonia under the baton of Ville Matvejeff for the Ondine label, and her solo album with Zoltán Fejérvári entitled Schubert on Violin for Hungaroton.
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Åkervinda Thu 26 Feb 7.30pm SWEDEN
Repertoire & Notes
Spellbound is a concert built around three spells. A journey through nature, love, tradition, womanhood & witchcraft. The program features traditional songs arranged by Åkervinda except where indicated. 1. L är mig du skog Teach me o’ forest, how to wither with grace, like the yellow leaves of autumn, a better spring will soon arrive A psalm about nature and the change of seasons – both in nature but also in life. 2. Gullesol – Spell No. 1 Golden sun, golden sun, come back again This phrase is repeated over and over, to call back the sun at the darkest time of year. This spell can also be used on a rainy day, before an important event, when it is absolutely crucial for the sun to shine brightly. 3. Vatten* When the sun returns, the snow and ice in the mountains melt. Water runs down in little streams, waking everything, bringing it to life. This is where spring begins.
Image: Benjamin Tarp
Image: Angelica Hvass
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Four Songs About Love 4. Hälleberget
9. Blågeta A young goat wanders off into the world, only to realise that it is full of dangers. His horns are too soft and weak to protect him when he encounters a big scary wolf. In this song, we use traditional herd-calling to search for the poor little goat who gets lost – and eaten – in the mountains. Womanhood Now follow four songs that each, in their own way, tell stories of womanhood. The first two are about difficult choices, when women are denied the right to control their own bodies. The first is a recipe for a certain tea, should ‘something happen’. The second is told by an old woman who lost her little friend one Midsummer’s Eve long ago – she can still hear his scream in the river. The final two pieces in this section are songs about mothers. One is about a stepmother and how folklore has made her into a villain. In this story, the dead mother returns from the grave and warns the stepmother: Be kind to my children – or I’ll place you on a chair in hell . The last song is sung by a young girl trying to explain to her mother why she’s so late coming home ... All the boys wanted to dance with me! Maybe the mother understands and remembers her own youth? 10. Uti vår hage 11. En midsommarafton 12. Styvmodern 13. Kära mor
A poetic love song where nature becomes an image of desire. The mountain will crack like ice, the sun will lose its shine and the forest will transform itself into a dove, before I abandon you, my dear friend. 5. Lars Persson A song about a charlatan named Lars Persson. Girls are standing in line, wanting his attention. If he wishes, he can have whoever he chooses! Apparently, he chooses them all – something that becomes apparent to the girls in the group. As each of them sings the line, Lars Persson has asked me to marry him! , they realize that they are not the only one he has proposed to … 6. Å h längtat haver jag A song about longing for someone who is out of reach. I have longed for you, my little friend, like the sun as the days grow brighter. But perhaps I am not good enough for you. Perhaps I am too poor, and you will have to choose someone richer than me. 7. E n gång blir du av med mig# As all the girls realise that Lars Persson has been proposing to them all, they band together and threaten him: One day you will lose us – maybe you will regret it bitterly! Animals & Tradition 8. Geting – Spell No. 2 From one threat to another. This time we are in need of a spell to whisk away one of the most annoying things in existence – wasps!
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About Åkervinda
Förgänglighet (Impermanence – the passing of time) We’re nearing the end, with two songs that lean into the existential and melancholic. The first is a hymn that reminds us everything here on earth is only borrowed – we’re here for a short while and then we return to the soil. The second is a Danish folk song that praises nature and the birds in the forest – but it also speaks to a deeper theme. In a world with millions of people fleeing their homes, we part from the ones we love. It hurts. But there’s joy too in finding one another again. 14. Allt vad vi 15. Jeg gik mig ud en sommerdag 16. J ag står upp en morgon – Spell No. 3 ^ A song to wash all dark thoughts away – something we may need after the last two songs: This is how hate and envy will melt away, as the salt washes away in water. * Composed by Karin Ohlsson, arranged by Åkervinda # Traditional, with composition by Agnes Åhlund, arranged by Åkervinda ^ Composed by Susanna Rosenberg, arranged by Åkervinda
At the heart of Åkervinda are four jazz singers, united by a deep love for folk music. With their fresh, modern interpretations, they breathe new life into traditional Scandinavian folk tunes. The group’s second album, Förgänglighet , earned a Swedish Grammis nomination for Folk Music of the Year, setting the stage for their continued success. In 2023 Åkervinda released their third album, Så Skall Hat och Avund Smältas ( This is how hate and envy will melt away ). Like its predecessors, the album is rich with Nordic folk traditions, reimagined through the group’s distinctive arrangements. It balances light and dark, joy and sorrow, humour and solemnity. From the energetic dance rhythms to the contemplative mysticism of ‘Uti Vår Hage’ (‘In Our Garden’), the album takes listeners on an emotional journey. It captures the meditative spirit of ‘Allt vad vi på jorden äge’ (‘All we have on this earth’), reflects the chaos of our world in ‘Jeg gik mig ud en sommerdag’ (‘I went out one summer day’) and culminates in the uplifting ‘Jag står upp en morgon’ (‘I got up one morning’), which offers a powerful message: hate and envy will dissolve, like salt in water. ‘Blågeta’, a single from this album won the prestigious DMA Roots prize for Song of the Year, further cementing the group’s impact on the folk music scene. Recorded in Germany, Så Skall Hat och Avund Smältas is a departure from the group’s previous work, with production by Morten Vinther Sørensen (former member of the renowned vocal quintet The Real Group) alongside Åkervinda. The album was released by Ladybird/Naxos. Åkervinda has performed at prominent vocal festivals and folk venues across Europe, Canada and the US. They’ve shared the stage with esteemed ensembles such as the Malmö Symphony Orchestra, Beethoven Orchestra Bonn and The Swingles, to name just a few. In July 2019, they made their TV debut on Sweden’s beloved Allsång på Skansen .
Credits
Åkervinda members Iris Bergcrantz, Agnes Åhlund, Linda Bergström, Lise Kroner
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Acknowledgements
Thanks to our Partners
Thanks to our Donors We thank our community of donors for helping us achieve our bold artistic vision and for making an impact on the cultural narrative of our State.
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Principal Partner
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Chair’s Circle $20,000+ John & Linda Bond* Margrete Chaney & Michael Chaney AO Jock & Kathryn Clough Marco D’Orsogna & Terry Scott* Paul & Didi Downie Adrian & Michela Fini
Greg Lewis & Sue Robertson* Ben Lisle James Litis The Mack Family The McClements Foundation Paula Rogers & Phil Thick Tim & Chris Ungar*
Festival Partners Alex Hotel | Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions | Heritage Council of WA Paramount Security Services | RTRFM 92.1 | The Backlot Perth | The Embassy of France in Australia
To review Perth Festival’s complete donor acknowledgement please visit our website . Find out more about how you too can join our community of donors and support Perth Festival.
With thanks to St Mary’s Cathedral staff and management
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