Entertainment & Music A Sea Symphony and Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes

Just a plug for a concert I'm performing in...Sunday May 29, 5:00pm at Hamer Hall.


Hear two great masterpieces of twentieth century music performed by over 300 passionate choral and orchestral musicians, outstanding soloists including Antoinette Halloran (soprano), Simon Meadows (baritone) and dynamic conductor Andrew Wailes, widely acknowledged as one of the country’s leading symphonic choral interpreters.

Benjamin Britten’s Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes will be performed alongside Ralph Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony by the Melbourne University Choral Society, Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir and Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestra.

A Sea Symphony, composed by Ralph Vaughan Williams between 1903 and 1909 was that composer’s first and longest symphony, and helped set the stage for a new era of symphonic and choral music in Britain during the first half of the 20th century. The text of A Sea Symphony comes from the great American poet Walt Whitman. Vaughan Williams was attracted to Whitman’s verses for their ability to transcend both metaphysical and humanist perspectives. Vaughan Williams’ masterly handling of the massive orchestral and choral forces, the boldness, energy and stunning orchestration of A Sea Symphony vividly evokes the immensity and primal force of the sea. The work hailed the triumphant arrival of a new and powerful voice in English music.

Benjamin Britten’s orchestral tour de force Four Sea Interludes come from his operatic masterpiece Peter Grimes, about a fisherman on England’s eastern coast, a misanthropic loner who is hounded to self-destruction by the townspeople after the mysterious, but accidental, deaths of two of his apprentices. The opera’s premiere was immediately recognized as a landmark for English opera. In the opera, the Four Sea Interludes not only take the listener from one physical location to another, but also go inside the characters’ minds, which throughout the opera are full of turmoil and doubt. This relentless tragedy evoked from Britten music of overwhelming power with a score that is full of tension, surging with dramatic force and orchestral violence, but also includes passages of sublime beauty and tenderness.

Book now for this unmissable concert performance.

A Sea Symphony | Arts Centre Melbourne

PROGRAM
BRITTEN Four Sea Interludes
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS A Sea Symphony

ARTISTS

Andrew Wailes Conductor
Antoinette Halloran Soprano
Simon Meadows, Baritone
The Melbourne University Choral Society
Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir
Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestra

 

Not in Sydney

What do you play @LibGS ?

 

I really is an incredible work. And not very often performed, I am very privileged to sing big choral works with a symphonic choir.

 

I sing

There will be 210 or so singers and about 90 in the orchestra. When I first started rehearsing this, I was meh. But now as I've gotten to know it, my god its beautiful.

 

Rehearsals are going well. The orchestra is sounding fantastic.

 

There are a limited number of seats in stalls A Reserve for $25. Message me for a promo code. Sunday 29 May, 5pm at Hamer Hall. And yet another rehearsal shot from last night.

 

This is an absolutely beautiful performance of A Sea Symphony. A large choir like this is exactly what is needed to do it justice.

 

What beautiful music. I hope the performance went well.

 

nice, where are you