SIEV X Memorial Ceremony

“His encyclopaedic understanding of performing and visual arts and his theatrical instinct place him in constant demand as a musician of flair and imagination.” – Antony Jeffrey, Many Faces of Inspiration.

At the helm of the Festival since 2015 is Artistic Director Roland Peelman, an acclaimed musician of great versatility who has established a reputation as one of Australia’s most innovative musical directors.

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William Barton is Australia’s leading didgeridoo player as well as composer, instrumentalist and vocalist. William started learning the instrument from his first learnt the uncle, Arthur Peterson, an elder of the Wannyi, Lardil and Kalkadunga people and was working from an early age with traditional dance groups and fusion/rock jazz bands, orchestras, string quartets, and mixed ensembles. Throughout his diverse career he has forged a path in the classical musical world, from the London and Berlin Philharmonic Orchestras to historic events at Westminster Abbey for Commonwealth Day 2019, at Anzac Cove in Gallipoli and for the Beijing Olympics. His awards include Winner of Best Original Score for a Mainstage Production at the 2018 Sydney Theatre Awards and Winner of Best Classical Album with an ARIA for Birdsong At Dusk in 2012. In 2021 he was the recipient of the prestigious Don Banks Music Award from the Australia Council and in 2022 he was announced as Australian of the Year for Queensland for 2023. With his prodigious musicality and building on his Kalkadunga heritage, William has vastly expanded the horizons of the didgeridoo.

Dudok Quartet Amsterdam is forging a reputation as one of the most creative and versatile quartets of its generation. With its ethos of “sharing the heart of music”, the quartet is committed to crafting unique and eclectic programmes in order to engage with its audiences in new and imaginative ways. In repertoire ranging from Ligeti, Shostakovich and Bacewicz through to Mendelssohn, Mozart and Beethoven, the Dudok Quartet constantly strives to forge new pathways and connections in music. Their intelligent approach and flair for programming also sees them regularly perform their own arrangements of pieces and they have so far produced arrangements of composers including Gesualdo, Desprez, Shostakovich, Brahms and Messiaen. The Quartet is also committed to commissioning new works and have collaborated with composers including Joey Roukens, Peter Vigh and Theo Loevendie . Future commissioning projects include a new piece from British-Lebanese composer Bushra El-Turk.

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Belgian pianist Bram De Looze is one of those musicians who is always on the lookout for new options, detours and possibilities to expand his art. His solo career began in a surprising way with ‘Piano e forte‘ (2016), a project for which he approached historical instruments from a contemporary perspective. The switch to Chris Maene’s Straight Strung Grand Piano (created by Daniel Barenboim) for ‘Switch The Stream‘ (2018) indicated a renewed search for movement, evolution and introspection. With ‘Colour Talk‘ (2020), he continued this solo trajectory on an already revolutionary piano model, again seeking innovation from within.

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Florian has played the violin since the age of five, and after absorbing the sound of gamelan in Indonesia, started formal training in Helsinki. At the age of 14 he continued his studies at Chethams School of Music in Manchester. Returning to his Belgian roots at the age of 18, he enrolled at the Antwerp Conservatorium and switched to the viola. He completed his Masters under Walter Küssner at the world leading ‘Hans Eisler’ Hochschule für Musik Berlin achieving the highest distinction and has since continued to work there as Assistant Professor.

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