Starburst

The Omega Ensemble is a group of classical musicians committed to delivering programs of fine classical music and new musical expression, along with commissioning of new works and championing contemporary performers and composers through their Living Music Project and their Composer Accelerator Program.

Recognised as one of Australia’s most “dynamic classical music groups”, their first offering for 2026, is a perfect example of the group’s raison d’être.

The program begins with the piece which gives the program its title, Jessie Montgomery’s short, bright 3-minute, one-movement piece Starburst. Composed for string orchestra, it conjures “in rapidly changing musical colours” the effect of the formation of large numbers of new stars in a galaxy. It is a beautiful introduction to a program that is as varied as the musical poetry in Montgomery’s composition.

The strings are joined by the clarinet in Gerald Finzi’s “Clarinet Concerto”. Composed in the late 1940s, the concerto reflects Finzi’s “deep love of poetry and the English countryside” as well as the loss of loved ones in both World Wars. The “shifting keys and unsettled rhythms” of the strings in first movement are calmed by the gentle, beguiling voice of the clarinet., leading to the more peaceful second movement that is empowered by the resonating notes of the cellos and double bass.

The final movement opens brightly with almost a folksong lightness, augmented with the rhythm of plucked strings. The timbre is summery, brightly hopeful, a fitting lead into the second item …

Dimitri Shostakovich’s 1933 “Concerto No.1 for Piano, Trumpet and Strings” which “blends and parodies classical traditions” with the popular music of the 1930s. As such it is a kaleidoscope over four movements with the piano a powerful presence at times, then brooding quietly before rising to prominence again.

The first movement begins with “rapid piano flourishes and bright trumpet calls”, one calling, the other almost seeming to obey. The second movement is slower, led by the strings with the piano coming in gently at first then rising to a thundering crescendo before being called back by the strings in soft, almost ghostly notes, and the trumpet calling like a gentle lull in the aftermath of a storm. It then erupts into the third movement that the program fittingly describes as “humorous, tempestuous and delightfully flighty”.

Composer Lachlan Skipworth was in the audience to hear the World Premiere of his new work “A Turning Sky”. Hailed as “the most immediately attractive composing voice in Australian music”, Skipworth’s work is lyrically evocative. This piece based on the description of an ocean view in Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse puts into music “the movements of colour and light; drifting clouds, shifting hues, and a quiet sense of unfolding” that Skipworth found Woolf’s words.

Lyrical and highly textured, the composition invokes the restlessness of an incoming tide, of wild life settling gently into rest and the hues of a changing sunset on wispy cloud. A beautifully evocative conclusion of this interesting and diverse program.

Carol Wimmer

Members of the Omega Ensemble are …

David Rowden: Clarinet solo and Artistic Director

Vatche Jambazian: Piano Solo and

Strings: Emma McGrath and Monique Irik (Violin 1); Mark Ingwersen and Dominic Azzi (Violin 2); Nell Thompson and Andrew Jezek (Viola); Paul Stender and MeeNa Lojewski (Cello) and Harry Young (Double Bass) … with …

David Elton: Trumpet solo.

For information about the Ensemble’s exciting 2026 line up and their Living Music Project and their Composer Accelerator Program go to …

contact@omegaensemble.com.au

Photographer: Amelia Kain