Sydney Singing

Score and part on special sale from the Hire Library

Peter Sculthorpe Sydney Singing This work lovingly describes my feelings about certain well-known places in Sydney. It makes references to popular music and its five movements, all very straightforward, are motivically related. The movements are: Prelude, From Bondi Beach, At Circular Quay, From Kings Cross, and Postlude. Following the Prelude, the second movement, the longest, is concerned with lazy days spent at Bondi Beach. The third movement begins and ends with night sounds on water, its central section suggesting an operatic aria floating across from the Opera House. In the fourth movement, I recall a time in my youth, when I lived in Kings Cross writing music for the theatre. Bringing the work to a close, the Postlude refers to earlier material. Sydney Singing is a joint commission from the festivals of Cheltenham and Sydney. It was written especially for Nicholas Daniel and Julius Drake, for first performance in the Pittville Pump Room, Cheltenham, on 6 July 2002. Peter Sculthorpe