Concert

A rich journey of world music, from the silk road through eastern Europe and Asia, this concert takes us into the wilderness of the natural world: the canyons, bamboo forests, misty mountain tops, temples and rivers. Quietness is discovered to have always been there - we just had to stop and listen to it. This quietude has been the secret of the saints and mystics throughout time, who through years of seclusion and meditation practice could attain a deep stillness. An opportunity to re-set your own inner compass to your heart, and dial down your inner volume levels to quiet.

International violinist Rupert Guenther presents Marcus Aurelius as part of a series of world premiere performances of his fascinating new original works for violin based on the life and work of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius (102-180 AD) drawing particularly from his book of writings “Meditations” in the highly atmospheric Hackett Hall at WA Museum Boola Bardip.

The Marcus Aurelius work illustrates through music the great contrast in psychological maturity which a statesman of Aurelius’ integrity and humanitarian vision would bring to the world stage if suddenly appearing now, as a leader in the modern world, standing in stark contrast among our current rather psychologically unbalanced world leadership. 

The music is a series of 7 extended improvisations as meditations on Aurelius’ philosophy of “good-spiritedness” (the Greek eudaimonia), the path of a life spent practicing virtue and living in accordance with nature, and to be in self-control enough to live free from anger, envy, and jealousy, and how a world leader like this would help us achieve a future of security through wisdom, collaboration and cooperation, instead of seeking security through perpetual suppression, domination and wars.

This performance takes place on a specially designed electric baroque violin custom made for the work, created in discussion with Australian master luthier Paul Davies in country Victoria.

The Middle-East and North Africa of antiquity was a place of science, scholarship, astronomy, art, education, architecture and culture, way more advanced than its European counterparts for thousands of years. The Damascus concert using musical flavours typical of the plainsong and chant styles in Eleusinian, Gregorian, Byzantine and Arabic music, traces the journey of humanity in melismatic improvisation-style musical reflections, and offers a window into the heightened atmosphere and illumination in the high cultures of that time.

"Echoes In The Thomaskirche" with violinist-composer Rupert Guenther

Thomaskirche (or the Church of St Thomas) in Leipzig has been a sanctuary for the soul through its music for nearly a thousand years. Be transported through the ages of European history in a concert of gorgeous sounds alluding to the travelling minnesingers, bards and minstrels, and the musical influences of the great composer JS Bach himself who resided as Cantor for 27 years in the 18th century at Thomaskirche. Close your eyes and be in the old world of Leipzig for a few centuries.