Saint-Saëns, Mendelssohn and Montgomery from the Metropolitan Orchestra

Cellist Patrick Murphy joins the Metropolitan Orchestra (TMO), conducted by Sarah-Grace Williams, for its September MET series concerts in North Sydney and Balmain, performing Camille Saint-Saëns’ much loved Cello Concerto No 1 in A minor, opus 33.

Although his first concerto for cello, Saint-Saëns was already an experienced composer of the larger orchestral form, having already written four of his five symphonies, two of three violin concertos, and one piano concerto. The first cello concerto was written in 1872, the same year in which Saint-Saëns wrote his first sonata for the cello.

Patrick Murphy was a founding member of the Tankstream Quartet (now Australian String Quartet), is a regular performer with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and holds the position of Cello Performance Fellow at the University of Queensland’s School of Music.

Alongside  Saint-Saëns’ cello concerto, the orchestra will play and early opus by Felix Mendelssohn – his Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 11, written when he was just 15 years old.

The orchestra will also premiere an original Australian composition Air and the Void by David Montgomery, composer and Principal Percussionist of Queensland Symphony Orchestra, who will also present the concert. Air and the Void takes as its point of departure the final chapters in Miyamoto Musashi’s book Go Rin No Sho, translated as The Book of Five Rings, and is a comment on the idea of moving towards separation from one’s body. Montogomery has had works commissioned by Opera Queensland, the Queensland Theatre Company, La Boite Theatre, the Queensland Symphony, Isorhythmos and ABC Radio.

Programme:

Mongomery D Air and the Void Premiere
Saint-Saëns C Cello Concerto no 1 in A minor, opus 33, Patrick Murphy, cello.
Mendelssohn F Symphony no 1 in C minor, opus 11.

Tickets: $35 / $30 concession / $15 children under 12
Bookings: www.metorchestra.com.au/tickets  or call 1300 150 465
Further information: www.metorchestra.com.au    General phone inquiries: 02 80077131