AVANT GARDENS AUTUMN
Three iconic female composers at the heart of an intimate trio program. It’s Mother’s Day, Offspring style, with music we love in the Avant Gardens.
DETAILS
Saturday 9 May 4pm, WOOLLAHRA, SYDNEYSunday 10 May 4pm, HURLSTONE PARK, SYDNEY
PROGRAM
SOFIA GUBAIDULINA Eight Etudes for Double Bass (2007)
NIKI JOHNSON Under Ocean’s Skin from Shimmer Suite (2024)
ANTHONY BRAXTON Composition No.152 (1991)
JANE STANLEY Desert Rose from Four Desert Flowers (2010)
KAIJA SAARIAHO Ciel étoilé (Starry Sky) (1999)
JACK SYMONDS New Work*† (2026)
PAULINE OLIVEROS Outline - An Improvisation Chart (1963)
* World Premiere
† Ensemble Offspring Commission
Concert Duration: 60 minutes followed by complimentary drinks and canapes
PERFORMERS
Lamorna Nightingale (flutes)
Benjamin Ward (double bass)
Niki Johnson (percussion)
DESCRIPTION
This is a program founded on love and affection, with new friends and old. We’ve played music by Kaija Saariaho nearly every season, and this year it’s her vision of a ‘starry sky’ – mining the normally earthbound voice of the double bass for shimmering jewel-like sounds and placing them in the gleaming setting of metallic percussion. Sofia Gubaidulina and Pauline Oliveros are two more international icons but, surprisingly, women who are new to our repertoire. They take us from solo virtuosity to jamming for the whole trio.
Anthony Braxton’s experimental music was a discovery from Ensemble Offspring’s 2025 visit to New York, when Lamorna heard his Composition No.19 for 100 tubas! Equally fascinating is his ‘garden-scaled’ Composition No.152. From closer to home, we’ve commissioned something new from Jack Symonds, and we’re delighted to reprise Jane Stanley’s gorgeous Desert Rose. And Niki herself will perform a movement from her Shimmer Suite – vibrant and sensuous music dedicated to the memory of her mother.
Join us in the Avant Gardens and find beauty in polarities: sound and silence, wood and metal, strict and free, earthy and celestial.
What can you expect from an Avant Gardens concert experience?
These social salon concerts take place in the lovely private homes of generous Ensemble Offspring supporters, so we only share the exact address with concert-goers the week of the event in our pre-concert information email. When you arrive you will be warmly welcomed by the Ensemble Offspring team. Throughout the concert you’ll learn more about the music as the musicians and composers share stories and background on the works. After the concert, we invite you to join the musicians, composers and our wonderful hosts for a chat, a glass or two of wine and a selection of delectables.
“... beautifully intimate house concert… accompanied by friends catching up, and discussions of the delightfully eclectic program.”
“Anthony Braxton’s pieces can be complex, but they’re often practical. He writes complications your ear can follow.”
“One of Gubaidulina’s great strengths: with her music you sense that she seems always to have had what you hear in mind from the start.”
“Jane Stanley’s piece was full of complex and endearing timbres.”
DOWNLOAD THE PROGRAM
Accessibility Information
The Avant Gardens concerts take place in the private homes of some of Ensemble Offspring’s generous supporters. Some homes may have steps, limiting wheelchair access, but ambulant or mobility-restricted attendees can enter with extra time and assistance. If you have accessibility requirements, please reach out to the friendly Ensemble Offspring team by emailing admin@ensembleoffspring.com.
SUPPORTED BY
Ensemble Offspring is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW and is assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.
Thank you to our Avant Gardens hosts for their generous support of Ensemble Offspring.
Photo: Niki Johnson by Keith Saunders
