Canberra - the White Hat guide

Out of the West - Art of Western Australia from the national collection

Handwritten

From Dante’s Divine Comedy and a manuscript by Einstein, to Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to explore some of the most significant moments in thought and human endeavour.

The exhibition is being shown only in Canberra. Open daily 10am to 5pm plus additional late openings as follows:

• Open until 9 pm on Thursdays from 19 January to 15 March 2012
• Open Fridays and Saturdays until 11 pm, 2 , 3, 9, 10 March 2012

Our rating - 5 Hats

Renaissance - 15th & 16th Century Italian Paintings from the Accademia Carrara, Bergamo

Chopin & Mendelssohn's Octet

The Australian Chamber Orchestra with Richard Tognetti (Artistic Director and Lead Violin) and Polina Leschenko (piano).  The orchestras three wonderful heritage violins – a Stradivari, a Guarneri and a Guadagnini - will display their wares in the Paganini caprices. Chopin's first piano concerto is a much loved work full of romantic lyricism and although Górecki is best known for his haunting and heartfelt Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, his Piano Concerto bristles with driving rhythms and energy. The concert ends with one of the glories of chamber music - Mendelssohn's Octet. In White Hat's experience ACO's performance of this work is the equal of any performance you are likely to hear anywhere else in the world.

• Paganini (arr. Tognetti) Caprice on Caprices
• Morricone Exercises I: Adagio
• Chopin (arr. Tognetti) Piano Concerto No.1
• Górecki Piano Concerto
• Mendelssohn Octet (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)

Tafelmusik - The Galileo Project Music of the Spheres

Canadian ensemble Tafelmusik will take you on an epic space odyssey, performing period music before stunning images from the Hubble deep space telescope. Combining music, photography and story-telling, The Galileo Project brings to life the brilliant minds of the early astronomers and the music that inspired them, as a large-scale, ever-changing backdrop of stars and planets unfolds.

The publicity states "Using the best of Bach, Handel, Monteverdi and Vivaldi, come and hear the tunes that were probably stuck in Galileo’s head when he discovered the moons of Jupiter." Now you are probably thinking, like White Hat how could tunes of composers who hadn't been born yet be stuck in his head. However we are sure that this program has been meticulously researched so all will be revealed. The program will also feature works by Lully, Purcell, Rameau, Telemann & Michelangelo Galilei brother of the astronomer). From the reputation of the group and the reviews of this concert, White Hat suggests you go out of your way to attend.

[For those wanting a little background to the history of the concept that over the centuries was known as The Music of the Spheres, White Hat suggests that you consult the program notes of Music of the Spheres - given by Ars Nova of Melbourne. This concert is unrelated to the one above but was also based on the relationship composers, mathematicians and scientists long saw between music, mathematics and the heavenly bodies.]

Australian Chamber Orchestra & The Hilliard Ensemble

• Elgar Serenade for strings
• Sheryngham Ah, gentle Jesu
• Raskatov Obikhod (Australian Premiere)
• Pärt Most Holy Mother of God
• Gregorian Chant Veni Creator Spiritus
• Anon (French Medieval) Veni Creator Spiritus
• Edwards Veni Creator Spiritus
• Arensky Variations on a theme by Tchaikovsky

Chooks in the City

If you are even vaguely contemplating introducing chooks into your life, this is the event for you. Bookings are essential for this event as places are very limited. Tickets $60 includes morning tea. You can book online on Australia's Open Garden Scheme secure site here. Further enquiries: phone (02) 6260 8002 during business hours.

Plant Fair at Lanyon

Trio Dali

The young and glamorous French trio are named after a Chinese marble, rather than the Spanish artist. With two of the great works from the piano trio repertoire, White Hat suspects this may turn out to be a memorable concert.

• Gordon Kerry Im Winde (2000)
• Maurice Ravel Piano Trio in A minor (1914) (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)
• Franz Schubert Piano Trio no 2 in E flat major, op 100 (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)

Takács Quartet

Two of the finest string quartets of the 20th century performed by one of the world's most respected chamber groups. White Hat suggests that you attend both of the Takács Quartet concerts if you can. That way you can hear the pair pair of  Janáček quartets and the Ravel & Debussy Quartets (often regarded as a 'pair') both separated across tow nights - in our opinion the best way to hear them.

• Leoš Janáček String Quartet no 2, ‘Intimate Letters’ (1928) (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)
• Benjamin Britten String Quartet no 3, op 94
• Gordon Kerry Variations for string quartet (2006)
• Maurice Ravel String Quartet in F major, op 34 (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)

Trout Quintet & Quartet for the End of Time

A rare treat. Two of what White Hat regards as the finest works in the chamber music repetoire presented in the one concert. The Schubert Trout Quintet is full of sunshine and youthful optimism while Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time is, in White Hat's opinion, one of the great works of the 20th century. A prisoner of war, Messiaen wrote the Quartet for the End of Time for the musicians he found in the camp, premiering it to an audience of inmates and guards. “Never” he said, "was I listened to with such rapt attention and comprehension."

Australian Chamber Orchestra Principals are joined by clarinettist Paul Dean and dynamic young pianist Saleem Abboud Ashkar, making his Australian debut.The performers are Helena Rathbone (violin), Christopher Moore (viola), Timo-Veikko Valve (cello), Maxime Bibeau (double bass), Paul Dean (clarinet) and Saleem Abboud Ashkar (piano).

• Schubert Piano Quintet, “Trout” (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)
• Messiaen Quartet for the End of Time (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)

Our rating: Five Hats

Amarcord

White Hat suggests that if you want to become a world class a capella ensemble, a good tsarting point is growing up singing Bach as boy sopranos in the Leipzig church where Bach himself presided. Since that time Amacord have gone on to be regarded as one of the finest male vocal ensembles in the world.

The Singing Club – Four Centuries of Song Renaissance madrigals, part-songs by Schubert, Schumann, Elgar, Dvorák, Grieg and others, alongside folk songs from around the world.

Beethoven 9 - Ode to Joy

The Australian Chamber Orchestra with Richard Tognetti (Artistic Director and Lead Violin), Choir of Clare College, Cambridge (Graham Ross Director), Lucy Crowe (soprano), Fiona Campbell (mezzo soprano), Allan Clayton (tenor) Matthew Brook (bass)

White Hat has long believed that many modern performance of Beethoven symphonies by large symphony orchestras lack the vitality and drive of a performance by a first rate chamber orchestra - supplemented where necessary - of the proportions that Beethoven was writing for For those who share this view we suggest you look no further. Critics called the ACO's recent Beethoven concert in London “the finest concert of the summer” and spoke of “thrilling playing”, “vibrant drive” and “total involvement”, concluding, “this compact chamber orchestra matches anything Europe can offer in energy, precision and interpretative rigour.”

Joined by one of the finest British choirs this concert promises to be something special where every note Beethoven wrote can be heard rather than lost in a sea of overblown orchestral 'atmosphere'.

• Messiaen Prayer of Christ ascending towards his Father, from L’Ascension
• Brahms Geistliches Lied
• Beethoven Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage
• Beethoven Symphony No.9 (one of White Hat's Top 100 Symphonies)

Kuss Quartet & Naoko Smizu

The Kuss Quartet is a regular at Carnegie and Wigmore Halls and Shimizu was the first female Principal Viola of the Berlin Philharmonic so this concert promises to deliver string quintet playing of the highest level.

• Gordon Kerry String Quintet (2012)
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart String Quartet no 21 in D major, KV575
• György Kurtag Officium Breve in Memoriam Andreae Szervánszky, op 28
• Johannes Brahms String Quintet no 2 in G major, op 111

Mozart, Handel & Vivaldi Concertos

The Australian Chamber Orchestra with Richard Egarr (Guest Director, Harpsichord, Fortepiano) and Satu Vänskä (Lead Violin)

Keyboard players, conductor, historian, and director of the Academy of Ancient Music, Richard Egarr directs this concert from the harpsichord and performs Mozart's delightful Piano Concerto No.12 on the fortepiano. White Hat suggests you take the opportunity to hear the difference it make to have a Mozart concerto played on the fortepiano rather than an overblown concert grand. Satu Vänskä is soloist in a Vivaldi concerto on the ACO's Stradivarius violin.

• Corelli Concerto Grosso, Op.6 No.1
• Castello Two Sonatas, “per stromenti d’arco”
• Biber Battalia
• Vivaldi Violin Concerto, RV190
• Mozart Piano Concerto No.12
• Handel Concerto Grosso, Op.6 No.1

Anthony Marwood and Aleksandar Madžar

Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata is justifiably well-known and loved as one of the great works of the violin sonata repertoire. However White Hat believes that Debussy's Violin Sonata, the last work he completed and the last that he performed in public, is yet to be afforded the status it deserves by the public. This fine pair of instrumentalists are sure to do them both justice.

• Gordon Kerry Martian Snow (2008)
• Ludwig van Beethoven Violin Sonata no 9 in A major, ‘Kreutzer’, op 47 (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)
• Claude Debussy Violin Sonata in G minor (c 1916-17)
• Franz Schubert Fantasie in C major, D934

Anthony Marwood and Aleksandar Madžar

Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata is justifiably well-known and loved as one of the great works of the violin sonata repertoire. However White Hat believes that Debussy's Violin Sonata, the last work he completed and the last that he performed in public, is yet to be afforded the status it deserves by the public. This fine pair of instrumentalists are sure to do them both justice.

• Gordon Kerry Martian Snow (2008)
• Ludwig van Beethoven Violin Sonata no 9 in A major, ‘Kreutzer’, op 47 (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)
• Claude Debussy Violin Sonata in G minor (c 1916-17)
• Franz Schubert Fantasie in C major, D934

Anthony Marwood and Aleksandar Madžar

Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata is justifiably well-known and loved as one of the great works of the violin sonata repertoire. However White Hat believes that Debussy's Violin Sonata, the last work he completed and the last that he performed in public, is yet to be afforded the status it deserves by the public. This fine pair of instrumentalists are sure to do them both justice.

• Gordon Kerry Martian Snow (2008)
• Ludwig van Beethoven Violin Sonata no 9 in A major, ‘Kreutzer’, op 47 (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)
• Claude Debussy Violin Sonata in G minor (c 1916-17)
• Franz Schubert Fantasie in C major, D934

Russian Visions

Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir is one of his sunniest and most exuberant works and Shostakovich's first piano concerto is full of pyrotechnics for the pianist and accompanying trumpet. What is sometimes less recognised is that this work calls for first rate string playing from the orchestra. For that reason, White Hat suggests you take the opportunity to get along and hear it with one of the best string ensembles in Australia - or any other country for that matter.

• Prokofiev (arr. Barshai/Tognetti) Visions fugitives
• Shotakovich Piano Concerto No.1
• Shotakovich Octet
• Tchaikovsky Souvenir de Florence (one of White Hat's Top 100 Chamber Works)