Team of Pianists’ recitals return to Winchelsea’s Barwon Park on November 27 with Sehnsucht: Travellers, Distance and Longing, featuring pianist Robert Chamberlain, vocalist Judith Dodsworth and clarinettist Robert Schubert.
The performance will include a diverse repertoire, presenting classic works from Mozart, Schubert, Schumann and Vaughan Williams alongside pieces from Australian composers Margaret Sutherland, Lawrence Whiffen and Julian Yu.
Chamberlain said while the programme drew on a wide range of contrasting music, the works were united by the theme of sehnsucht, a German word conveying a bittersweet sense of longing – a theme the pianist said was appropriate given the lengthy pandemic period.
“Sehnsucht is about yearning for the unobtainable, it’s a very romantic 19th century German thing,” he said.
“We thought that this concept of distance and longing was relevant after the pandemic, where we were yearning to play live instead of just playing in front of cameras in our houses.
“Now that we’re back playing together again at Barwon Park it fulfils that yearning to play to a live audience again.”
The trio has only performed together once back in 2019 when all three were part of the music faculty at Monash University, after which their plans to continue their musical collaboration were disrupted, as many plans were, by COVID-19.
“There was a chamber music festival at Monash, and Judith was head of vocal, I was piano coordinator and Robert was teaching clarinet,” Chamberlain said.
“People were casting around to see who would play what, and with whom. So we got together, actually we played a couple of the things we’re playing at Barwon Park, and it was really fun, there were really good vibes there and it really clicked.
“But then, of course, the pandemic happened. Team of Pianists had a whole series planned for 2020, including a concert at Barwon Park, which didn’t happen. We’ve tried to be there every year in the 15 or so years our recitals have been going on because it’s such a unique venue.”
Chamberlain said audiences could expect a fun and contrasting presentation.
“It’ll be a very expressive and communicative programme with lots of emotional and stylistic contrast,” he said.
“I think the audience will see us having an awful lot of fun. And I suspect we’ll be using the space and being in that really unique venue in an imaginative way.”
