MSO strapped in for season lift-off
THE Melbourne Symphony Orchestra will take local music lovers on a journey into the stratosphere during its 2018 Geelong Season.
Gustav Holst’s masterpiece The Planets will be one of the highlights of the world-renowned MSO’s fiveconcert series, to be performed at Deakin’s Costa Hall.
Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, works by Strauss, Dvorak and Benjamin Britten, as well as a world premiere will also feature in the 2018 season.
The Geelong season kicks off with a journey into purgatory with the staging of The Dream of Gerontius on March 9. Conducted by Sir Andrew Davis, the concert will see Gerontius, sung by Stuart Skelton, led from his death bed by guardian angel Catherine Wyn-Rogers on a journey through angels, demons, death and eternal peace.
Italian conductor Andrea Molino will guide the MSO and celebrated US baritone Thomas Hampson through a program of Mahler, Messiaen and Richard Strauss when the concert Thomas Hampson Sings Mahler comes to Geelong on June 8.
After her recent triumph with Bruckner’s Ninth Symphony, Simone Young, one of Australia’s most distinguished conductors, brings her extraordinary insights to the composer’s Sixth on July 6, while Kolja Blacher returns with his 1730 Stradivari to perform Britten’s early Violin Concerto.
One of the most popular works of all time, Holst’s masterpiece The Planets comes to Geelong on August 31, with Sir Andrew Davis conducting the astrological work for the first time in Australia, while the world premiere of the latest symphony by composer in residence Carl Vine will begin the night.
The season will conclude on November 16, with US conductor Karina Canellakis making her MSO debut with a rich program of Beethoven’s Fifth, Dvorak’s The Noon Witch and Japanese violinist Mayu Kishima performing Shostakovich’s first Violin Concerto.
Subscriptions to the MSO’s 2018 Geelong Season are now available. Details at mso.com.au