The White Hat Guide to the Sydney Opera House

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)

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

Danielle de Niese with the Australian Chamber Orchestra

Danielle de Niese (soprano) has long been on White Hat's list of Significant Melbourne People. She was born in Melbourne and won Young Talent Time aged 9, then moved to Los Angeles, won an Emmy and made her debut with the LA Opera aged 15. She has blossomed into one of the hottest properties in opera, enrapturing audiences in roles like Cleopatra, Euridice and Susanna at Glyndebourne, the Metropolitan Opera and on screen.

To celebrate her professional debut in her home country, De Niese sings a specially commissioned Australian work, which also marks the centenary of Australia’s Nobel laureate Patrick White. The fireworks of Mozart's Exsultate jubilatee is contrasted Schubert's haunting song, Death and the Maiden. The Australian Chamber Orchestra (Richard Tognetti Artistic Director and Lead Violin) will then perform Schubert's masterly quartet (arranged for string orchestra) which uses that same song as an inspiration.

• Mozart Symphony K196/121, “La finta giardiniera”
• Vine New work (text by Patrick White)
• Meale Cantilena Pacifica
• Mozart Exsultate jubilate
• Schubert (arr. Tognetti) Death and the Maiden
• Schubert (arr. Tognetti) String Quartet No.14, “Death and the Maiden” (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

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)

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

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)