Repetition, chaos and beauty become one in this program of musical extremes, where the greatest contemporary composers examine every aspect of our crazy lives – from love and death to reality TV.

Steve Reich’s New York Counterpoint plucks rhythmic patterns from everyday life, with a transfixing impression of New York’s restless heartbeat. Beauty is found in both chaotic movement and stillness in Missy Mazzoli’s Still Life with Avalanche, and a new work by Australian Samantha Wolf explores our connection with reality TV. The recently passed and sorely missed Kaija Saariaho is remembered with a rendition of her colourful duet Oi Kuu.

To close the program, we’re thrilled to present a world premiere by Paul Dean. His new work the weight we carry was composed especially for the sextet, commissioned by Mark Wakely as the 2023 Steven Alward Memorial Music Commission. Taking inspiration from Allen Ginsberg’s poem Song, Dean’s work expresses the importance, burden and desperation of love.