Bravo Ensemble Vivace

Your arts and entertainment piece, ‘Youth ensemble to make debut’ (Gaz 23/1), alerted me to an exceptional event I would’ve otherwise missed – thank you.

Ensemble Vivace’s chamber music concert at Wesley of Warragul was excellent, and especially remarkable for the outstanding talent of its young members.

Having heard three of the ensemble – Ernest Tay and Jacob & Taylah Evans – perform two trios in last year’s Evans Family concert at Wesley, I had an inkling of what might be expected of a group enlarged with Zhang family siblings Joshua, Samuel and Rebekah, and Josiah Gillam from Drouin.

In just the few months since then, Ensemble Vivace has brought to concert pitch a demanding program of three string quartets, a piano quintet, and three orchestral works played by the whole ensemble.

It’s a truly astonishing achievement for seven young musicians aged from just 10 to 19!

On a hot and humid January afternoon, they performed with disciplined assurance and sensitivity for two hours. Every item played was applauded enthusiastically by the attentive and delighted audience.

All members of Ensemble Vivace play at least two instruments. Their versatility was on display as several alternated between violin and viola, and, as well, Samuel Zhang played the piano part in the single movement excerpted from Dvorak’s Quintet No 2 – aptly, the Scherzo, marked molto vivace!

Then there was Samuel the 14-years-old composer. His String Quartet in A major is in the classical tradition, with touches of cheek that give it a signature of youthful modernity. It stood well among the works of Corelli, Vivaldi, Mozart, Borodin and Dvorak.

Violinists Ernest Tay or Joshua Zhang led most of the items, while Jacob Evans anchored all the ensembles with the sole cello, and thrilled in the moment, memorably so in Borodin’s nocturne alongside Joshua’s viola.

One could have only the greatest admiration for the unselfconscious aplomb with which 10years-old Rebekah Zhang played her violin in the orchestral works, including a solo passage in the Vivaldi concerto.

Bravo, Ensemble Vivace! May there be more to follow your wonderful debut.

John Hart, Warragul A truck load of bricks to the Baw Baw Shire Council for their lack of Australia Day entertainment for families and children at Civic Park, Warragul. It has downgraded over the years from an enjoyable day outing to a sausage sizzle. A big bouquet to Woolworths Drouin, their store manager and floor manager, and other staff, who were so generous when our family received a whole trolley of groceries free, as part of a give away! We were very blessed, thank you so much.

Bricks to the two drivers who use the walking path at McNeilly Park as a driveway.

Time for the Baw Baw Shire to erect bollards before a child in adjacent playground or an off-lead dog on the path gets hit.