Melbourne Symphony Orchestra: Strauss’ Alpine Symphony, Debussy and Sutherland

One of Australia’s most rebellious composers, Margaret Sutherland was ahead of her time and excelled in a male-dominated field at home and abroad. Her powerful work Haunted Hills is both a lush picture of the Dandenong Ranges and a reflection on the horrific mistreatment of the area’s traditional owners – the Bunurong and Woiworung people of the Kulin Nation – upon colonisation.

The impressionistic Ariettes Oubliées or Forgotten Songs are the musical equivalent of a Renoir or a Monet – inspired by subtlety and nuance, and capturing snapshots in music through shifting harmony, tone, and musical colour. Musically eclectic yet recognisably ‘French’, these songs demonstrate Debussy’s part in the development of an iconic French musical style, recognisable today in the likes of Amélie’s Yann Tiersen. Hear Siobhan Stagg’s glorious interpretation.

Strauss’s Alpine Symphony is often described as a ‘tone poem’ – a musical illustration of a story, novel, painting, landscape, or other non-musical source. Strauss loved rambling through the alps, and this glorious work takes us on a musical hike over the course of a single day from sunrise to sunset. Sometimes easy with breath-taking views and glorious sunshine, and sometimes difficult with dangerous terrain and weather, it’s possibly the most spectacular (and easiest) way to get your step count up.