Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Event Details

Melbourne’s own Flinders Quartet is instantly recognisable as one of Australia’s most loved chamber music ensembles giving dynamic performances of a full spectrum of repertoire with the Quartet’s gripping interpretations of the string quartet masterpieces described as having an ‘intense clarity’.

Mendelssohn was fascinated by Beethoven as a teenager and his Opus 13 String Quartet draws inspiration from this great master, as well as Mendelssohn’s own song, ‘Frage’. Fast forward to 21st-century Australia and Andrew Ford’s sixth string quartet, one movement of which bears the title Sunrise with Wedding Dresses and depicts refugee, Raghda, sewing wedding dresses, full of desperate hope for her infant daughter.

Pairing Ford and Mendelssohn brings 19th-century Berlin right next to 21st-century Melbourne, reminding us that music represents a time, a place and marks history in the most extraordinarily pertinent way.

Program

Felix Mendelssohn
String Symphony No.3 in E minor

Andrew Ford
String Quartet No.6*

Felix Mendelssohn
String Quartet No.2 in A minor, Op.13

*Jointly commissioned by David and Kaye Birks and Julian Burnside AO QC

**2-concert packages are available for Mendelssohn, Ford and the Flinders Quartet's February 2018 concert: Wings of Song.

Presented by Melbourne Recital Centre and Flinders Quartet

Featured non-Australian music: Mendelssohn

Further information for this event is available online at the event's website or by phone on (03) 9699 3333

Featured Australian Works

String quartet No 6 : string quartet (2018) by Andrew Ford — performed by Flinders Quartet

Featured artists

• Music of John Rotar
• Performer Flinders Quartet