The Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University is launching a blockbuster orchestral season featuring a host of high profile guest conductors, epic repertoire and a dazzling finale at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre.
The first concert will feature the fiendishly difficult Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz, conducted by Queensland Conservatorium Deputy Director Peter Luff.
Associate Professor Luff said it was one of the most famous and challenging pieces in the orchestral canon.
“It is a gigantic piece, with five movements – it takes the players and the audience on a rollercoaster ride,” he said.
“Technically it’s very difficult, and each movement is dramatically different.
“Leonard Bernstein described it as the first musical expedition into psychedelia, and it was said that Berlioz wrote some of it under the influence of opium.”
The piece also features two gigantic church bells, borrowed from the Western Australia Symphony Orchestra and weighing several hundred kilos.
Associate Professor Luff said they helped ensure the performance stayed
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