Dreams & Stories | Queensland Symphony Orchestra with William Barton
All images: Darren Thomas
The QPAC Concert Hall really has great acoustics and it was such a treat to see Queensland Symphony Orchestra play a variety of scores from the early 1800’s to now in Dreams and Stories from Vienna, Austria, Australia and more. What I loved about the package for this performance is that the programme booklet and website had a complete listing of who plays what, where they sit as well as a lot of background information on the set choice including a pre-recorded Spotify list on the website.
Listening to the Spotify tracks and hearing the programme live, comparing both, live was much better in terms of immersion and changes to the arrangements. The programme included Mendelssohn, Sculthorpe, William Barton, Strauss and John Williams. Austrian Conductor Katharina Wincor, her first time in Australia, segmented the orchestral parts and instrumentation with clarity and colour.
The show opened with what I would call a pretty safe choice with A Mid Summer Night’s Dream by Mendelssohn. It was performed well, but for me personally, it did not transport me. It wasn’t until Host Ashleigh Denning invited soloist William Barton that I really connected to the music of the event.
Amongst the grandiosity of some of the other pieces, perhaps very consumable and popular in their day, Barton stood out from the moment he took the stage. He began by singing a deeply moving song he had penned at 15 that paid homage to inter-generational knowledge passed through delicious campfires and his journey of being introduced to classical music at a young age.
All images: Darren Thomas
Sculthorpe’s Kakadu followed, which was a standout in terms of William Barton’s additions through didgeridoo noting that this was not part of the original score and something Sculthorpe included after hearing Barton play. In part a beautiful homage between musos. I loved the harmonic shifts of the different instruments mimicking birds, trees, nature and the sometimes flight, fright, freeze and fawn. Think didge being gently tapped with percussion and strings. I was in the wilderness with horns long drawn, a flurry of birds being spooked and the string bows tapping alongst their curvaceous wooden bodies created unsynchronised rustling sounds, with long cymbal clashes, taking flight gliding through the sun.
Possibly Barton’s Sky Song could have had more clarity for the score, it wasn’t clear who orchestrated this, sometimes less is more with competing melodies and rhythmic shifts and untried additions. Strauss’ Tales from the Vienna Woods, had written hundreds of waltzes over his career brought familiarity to the performance.
Next up was Harry’s Wondrous World by John Williams. This piece is easily recognisable for the motifs and ending with a Harry Potter exploration of the first initial glimpses we see of Hogwarts. Williams definitely borrows some of his signature melodic motifs from Star Wars for that one. The show ended with Igor Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. I loved the second movement in this the most, ending in a heroic victory of defeat and love.
Overall, the performance covered a broad range of genres, but for me, the more modern work like Kakadu and the songs of Barton were the standouts. I look forward to more contemporary takes and commissions of new work from Queensland Symphony Orchestra.
