Julia joins festival

Warragul’s Julia Hastings is one of 26 participants in the inaugural Melbourne International Festival of Lieder and Art Song.

Julia, a successful chamber musician and collaborative pianist, was selected from 63 applications. Only eight pianists and 16 singers are participating from across Australia as well as Germany, UK and Singapore.

The focus for the week-long festival, currently running at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, is the songs of Franz Schubert and Gustav Mahler and on art song in English.

As a little girl from Warragul dreaming of seeing her name up in lights, Julia decided opera would be her path to fame and fortune.

After winning first prize in the 15 years and under song in costume section at the West Gippsland Music and Drama Eisteddfod and completing work experience at Opera Australia in Sydney, Julia waited to be discovered.

The flaw in her plan was that she had never had a singing lesson in her life. She had, however, dedicated countless hours and trips to Melbourne for piano lessons and competitions, so decided to stick to what she knew.

Julia has never forgotten her love of theatre and for the last few years has toured her one-woman show concert theatre piece “Fame, Fortune and Lies: The Life and Music of Eileen Joyce”.

She has also returned to Warragul to perform numerous concerts and recitals.

Julia is currently completing graduate research in theatre at the VCA, investigating the affective nature of classical music performance in multidisciplinary theatre.