... St Ignatius Church, Richmond...Photograph: St Ignatius Church, Richmond...The enormous 19th-century St Ignatius church, visible from many kilometres on all sides high on the Richmond Hill, was the site for a large new Australian composition by Graham Hair - Lament For Santa Sophia.
In this program performed by the Astra... Renaissance compositions. The Astra Choir, 16 soloists and electronics conducted by John McCaughey.
From the St Ignatius Church, Richmond concert on Sunday December 2003.
For 30 years, the concerts of Astra Chamber Music Society have ranged around Melbourne’s ...
Music always interacts with the architecture in which it is heard.
Melbourne has some wonderful acoustic environments. Often, these spaces were built for other purposes – for example the splendid public and ecclesiastical buildings from the first 100 years of the city’s history, and more recent industrial constructions.
Exploiting ‘non-customized’ spaces for musical performance celebrates and explores our architectural heritage.
For 30 years, the concerts of Astra Chamber Music Society have ranged around Melbourne’s architectural environment. Each concert has had a site-specific design that takes advantage of the marvellous visual qualities, spatial possibilities, and acoustic personality of each building.
The music, in turn, contributes a new quality to the perception of the buildings, now experienced by audiences as a sounding space - an area where cultural issues from music’s history are traversed, and new ideas in Australian composition are explored.
In this story take a tour of some of Melbourne’s intimate, hidden spaces and listen to the music that has filled their walls.
For further information about Astra Chamber Music Society click here.
