Peninsula Summer Music Festival 2018

PMSF Cyrens Amanda Harrison, Melissa Langton and Chelsea Renton-GibbFrom fiery flamenco and French baroque opera, to the majesty of Grieg and gregarious Gypsy-Balkan swing, the 11th Peninsula Summer Music Festival presents a cornucopia of musical delights for eight days across Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula from 1 January 2018.

In her 11th and final year as Artistic Director, Julia Fredersdorff has gathered more than 50 Australian and international artists for 16 performances that will fill the region’s wineries and churches with music spanning centuries and continents.

The Festival opens on New Year’s Day with its much-loved Hair of the Dog concert. With a glorious backdrop of grapevines, the intoxicating rhythms of Southern Spain will ring out from the widely acclaimed trio Arte Kanela, the unsurpassed and most exciting force in Australia’s Flamenco music scene. Arte Kanela features Richard Tedesco and Nathan Sinclair on guitar and percussionist Johnny Tedesco.

Highlights of the 11th Peninsula Summer Music Festival include: exuberant young chamber ensemble Arcadia Winds – whose performance credits include Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth Festivals as well as the Musica Viva Festival, shine the spotlight on the oboe, clarinet and bassoon with a joyous repertoire ranging from Bach, Mozart and Jean Francaix.

Emotions blaze in a recital of tumultuous passion, drama and legend when PSMF Academy 2017 alumni and early music exponent, Soprano Bethany Hill and Andrew Byrne, specialist in ancient European lutes, perform works by Caccini, Strozzi, Carissimi, Merula and Australian composer Jodie O’Regan.

Making their festival debut, founding member of Flinders Quartet, cellist Zoë Knighton and one Australia’s most distinguished and awarded musicians, pianist Ian Munro perform a selection of beautiful northern European melodies including Sibelius, Väsks and Grieg’s Cello Sonata in A minor, Op.36.

The spectacular architecture and sweeping coastal views of Port Phillip Estate’s cellar door proves the perfect pairing for a program of beautiful arias from Coloratura Soprano Hannah Dahlenburg and virtuosic guitar solos from guest Italian guitarist Massimo Scattolin.

South African born musician, storyteller and entertainer, Valanga Khoza invites the whole family on a musical escapade of dynamic and interactive rhythms in African Adventure. Traditional instruments such as the kalimba, marimba and shijoro (jaw harp), and irresistible rhythms from the guitar and percussion will accompany Valanga’s stories, with the finale of this joyous performance a massed choir of local children.

A feast of French baroque music performed under the stars features internationally acclaimed mezzo-soprano Lotte Betts-Dean and Melbourne’s vibrant baroque orchestra, Genesis Baroque, directed by guest French conductor and harpsichordist, Martin Gester, while one of the world’s leading baroque performers, Australian violinist Lucinda Moon (Australian Brandenburg Orchestra and Pacific Baroque Orchestra, Vancouver and Elysium Ensemble) makes her festival debut performing an all-Bach program.

Australian music theatre stars Amanda Harrison (Wicked), Chelsea Renton-Gibb (Chicago) and Melissa Langton (The Fabulous Singlettes) pay homage to multi-Tony Award winner, Cy Coleman; composer of mega-hit musicals Sweet Charity, Barnum and City of Angels and classic standards The Best Is Yet To Come, Witchcraft and Big Spender amongst others. Set amidst the vines of Montalto Vineyard, this concert under the stars will close the 2018 Peninsula Summer Music Festival.

The 2018 Peninsula Summer Music Festival runs 1 – 8 January. For more information and full line-up, visit: www.peninsulafestival.com.au for details.

Image: Amanda Harrison, Melissa Langton and Chelsea Renton-Gibb (supplied)