The Queensland Performing Arts Centre Announces New QPAC International Series

The Queensland Performing Arts Centre has announced a new QPAC International Series. Tagged 'Bringing the World to Brisbane', the program, initially planned to run over the next five years and beyond, will see some of the world's performing arts companies travelling to Brisbane for exclusive appearances in that city.

In a sense the scheme has already been trialled with the Paris Opera Ballet's Brisbane debut in 2009 and the subsequent visit to Australia for the first time of the National Ballet of Cuba. 

The QPAC International Series will be expanded in 2012.  While once again the central attraction will be a world-renowned ballet company, The Hamburg Ballet, the offering will also include associated visits by the splendid Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra and artists of the Hamburg State Opera. 

The Hamburg Ballet is led by choreographer John Neumeier, the man who has shaped its repertoire and style and who has kept it at the forefront of world dance for four decades.  During that time, a number of Australians have danced within the company, but the company has never visited Australia.

Audiences will experience two major examples of Neumeier's work.  Nijinsky, an intense, dramatic and at times confronting work based on the life, meteoric career and descent into madness of one of Neumeier's heroes, the legendary Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky.  This is choreographed to music by Chopin, Schumann, Rimsky-Korsakov and Shostakovich. 

Neumeier's second work is his three-act version of Shakespeare's A Midsummer's Night Dream.  Set to music by Mendelssohn and Ligeti, and based on Shakespeare's great comedy, Neumeier's ballet is a version of this great classic tale of magic, mistaken identity and lovers' quarrels. 

The orchestra for the performances of A Midsummer Night's Dream will be the Queensland Symphony Orchestra under the direction of young Brisbane-raised conductor Simon Hewett who is Hamburg Ballet's resident ballet conductor and who has recently been appointed Musical Director of Stuttgart Opera. 

Like the ballet company, the Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra and the Hamburg State Opera have never performed in this country.  The impetus for the visit was the appointment of the Australian conductor Simone Young to the dual posts of Musical Director and Principal Conductor of the Orchestra and General Manager of the opera company.  Over the past four years Simone Young has been leading a new production to Wagner's mighty Ring Cycle.  It has been seen several times in Hamburg, most recently in February of 2012, and Australian Wagnerites will get a taste of her interpretation in two concert performances of Das Rheingold, the opera that opens the Ring Cycle.  Members of the permanent ensemble at the Hamburg State Opera will be joined by guests artists including the great bass, Falk Struckmann, mezzo soprano Anna Larssons and baritone Eike Wilm Schlute, all seasoned Wagnerians who have sung their roles at the Bayreuth Festival and in most of the great opera houses of the world.  In 2000 in Vienna, Ms Young made musical history when she became the first woman ever to conduct a complete Ring Cycle.  

In addition Ms Young and the Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra will give a single performance of Mahler's mighty Symphony No. 2, known as Resurrection.  The acclaimed Swedish mezzo Anna Larssons will be joined by Korean coloratura HAng Lee Young from the Hamburg State Opera as soloists.  Mahler lived in Hamburg for six years, during which time he was First Conductor of the Hamburg Opera, and it was during his sojourn there that he composed the Second Symphony. 

QPAC Chief Executive John Kotzas said "QPAC has grown its international standing as a performing arts centre.  The QPAC International Series builds on our recent successes and continues the relationship with producers Leo Schofield AM and Ian McRae AO and Events Queensland." 

Mr Kotzas said that the QPAC International Series would not only feature nationally exclusive main stage performance seasons from the world's best performing artists, but also will include a curated program of special events, classes, talks and related activities. 

Mr Kotzas added that the 2012 presentation of the Hamburg's state performance companies was timely as Australia and Germany celebrate 60 years of diplomatic relations. 

Of the three Hamburg companies Leo Schofield said "The Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra is one of Germany's oldest and most distinguished orchestras, as befits a great city with a unique musical history." 

"Few ballet companies in the world have performed so extensively, toured so widely or premiered so many significant contemporary works as the Hamburg Ballet has under three decades of inspired leadership of the great choreographer John Neumeier.  And Neumeier's major ballets have been added to the repertoire of most of the leading dance companies around the world."

"The Hamburg State Opera is one of the most important opera houses in Germany.  Many of the greatest singers past and present have performed there and the roll call of great conductors have included Gluck, Telemann and Hasse in the 18th century, Hans von Bulow and Gustav Mahler, Tchaikovsky and Brahms in the 19th and in more recent times Wolfgang Sawallisch and the formidable Otto Klemperer.  Hamburg has twice been awarded the coveted "Opera House of the Year" Award by the German magazine Opernwelt, in 1997 and in 2005. In addition to the great masterpieces of the past, the Hamburg company consistently presents contemporary work, often premieres."

The QPAC International Series is supported by Events Queensland as part of a continuing partnership with the Queensland Performing Arts Centre.

For more information, visit http://www.qpac.com.au/.