QPAC

Ensemble Q is pleased to announce its 2024 Concert Season at Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC) featuring three captivating and quirky thematic based concerts.  

 A QPAC Company in Residence since 2022, Ensemble Q will leap into the New Year on Sunday 14 April with The Trout. Showcasing five quintets by Schubert, Reicha, Beach, Skipworth and Glazunov, and featuring varied instrumentation, this number five-themed concert will culminate in one of the most loved chamber music pieces of all time, Schubert’s Trout Quintet. 

Ensemble Q’s second concert on Sunday 4 August 2024 invites audiences to explore Boots & All the folk influence in classical music that has stretched across centuries of writing and many nations. The atmospheric and earthy concert will offer a folksong-inspired journey around the world highlighting music from countries including Ireland, America, Japan, Italy, Sardinia and Norway.   

Ensemble Q’s QPAC Concert Season will have a fairy tale ending with Frankenstein!! & The Goose’s Mum on Sunday 3 November 2024. Get set for a fun and fast paced ride as the Ensemble takes on the delightful piece for the whole family, HK Gruber’s Frankenstein!!

The musicians will don party hats, blow whistles and kazoos to bring this fantastic children’s rhyme-inspired work for baritone, chansonnier and ensemble to life. Frankenstein!! will be complemented by Ravel’s exquisitely beautiful tribute to fairy tales, the Mother Goose Suite, along with the spine-tingling Camille Saint-Saëns’ Danse Macabre and William Bolcome’s jazzy Poltergeist for String Quartet. 

Ensemble Q Co Artistic Directors Paul and Trish Dean said they were delighted to present this varied and dynamic concert program to audiences in 2024. 

“Following on from our visually based series in 2023, we have curated three concerts that explore different aspects of thematic programming,” said Trish Dean. 

“Our first concert embraces the concept of simply having five performers on stage in quintet formation and illustrates the incredibly diverse soundscapes that can be created by combining a single wind instrument with string quartet.  

“The program will be beautiful and entertaining – from Reicha’s virtuosic work for the bassoon, American composer Amy Beach’s deeply reflective and pictorial work for flute and strings, Glazunov’s dreamy Idyll for horn and strings, and Australian composer Lachlan Skipworth’s fantastically atmospheric Clarinet Quintet. Of course, it’s all tied together by the piece that was voted Australia’s favourite chamber work on the ABC Classic hit list just a couple of years ago, Schubert’s Trout Quintet,” said Ms Dean. 

“In Boots & All we welcome back UK based soprano Lotte Betts-Dean for a performance of Berio’s Folksongs. Lotte has the perfect voice and energy for these songs, and the fascinating instrumentation of viola, cello, harp, flute, clarinet and percussion really creates a global sound world that allows the songs to shine.   We’re also delighted to showcase the music of incredible Australian composer, Melody Eötvös.  

 “HK Gruber’s Frankenstein!! takes centre stage in the final concert of the year and we can’t imagine anyone better than Jason Barry-Smith for the role of the chansonnier.  In this fun but furiously virtuosic work we are required to play kazoos, slide whistles, harmonicas and whirly instruments that are something like tuned pool cleaner tubing. Jason is absolutely brilliant in this role dressed up like a scientist, singing about little mice and running around the stage doing Superman impersonations – it will be a load of fun. This will be a concert for people who simply love being entertained by brilliant music played by the best musicians,” Ms Dean said. 

 Paul Dean said Ensemble Q had gone from strength to strength, with 2024 set to be no exception. 

“We are excited to be presenting our three-part QPAC series in reverse mode again. It’s become one of the highlights of my year to be able to talk directly to everyone in the audience and feel such a powerfully positive response,” he said. 

“We’re absolutely thrilled to welcome three new musicians into the fold - Sophie Rowell and Christopher Moore, both from Melbourne, and Emily Granger who moved to Brisbane this year. Sophie is an incredible violinist, Artistic Director of the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra and a former leader of the Australian String Quartet. Christopher is Principal viola of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and for ten years toured the world as Principal viola in the ACO and Emily is an American harpist who has played all over the world including with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and has just accepted the role of Principal harp with the QSO. 

“We can’t wait to share our exciting 2024 QPAC concerts with new and current audiences,” said Mr Dean.  

Ensemble Q has also been selected to tour nationally with William Barton for Musica Viva in September/October and has been invited to tour Portugal and Spain at the end of the year speaking volumes about the high esteem in which the Ensemble is held. 

Tickets for Ensemble Q’s 2024 QPAC Concerts are on sale now at qpac.com.au or phone 136-246. 

Ensemble Q 2024 Concert Series
Season Information

Ensemble Q and QPAC Present:
CONCERT 1
The Trout 
Five Quintets by Schubert, Reicha, Beach, Skipworth and Glazunov

WHEN: Sunday, 14 April 2024 at 3pm 
WHERE: Concert Hall, Reverse Mode
QPAC DURATION:  2 hours including interval  

Full program here

Ensemble Q and QPAC Present: 
CONCERT 2 
Boots & All

WHEN: Sunday, 4 August 2024 at 3pm 
WHERE: Concert Hall, Reverse Mode, 
QPAC DURATION: 2 hours including interval

Full program here

Ensemble Q and QPAC Present: 
CONCERT 3 
Frankenstein!! & The Goose’s Mum

WHEN: Sunday, 3 November 2024 at 3pm 
WHERE: Concert Hall, Reverse Mode
QPAC DURATION: 2 hours including interval 

Full program here