DATE: Thursday 4 September, 2025
TIME: 6 – 7pm, Bar open from 5pm
COST: $38/$32
Details
Join CSO concertmaster Kirsten Williams and pianist Edward Neeman when Rachmaninoff’s Red Riding Hood meets Franck’s violin sonata in a musical journey where myth meets melody. The performance opens with Elgar’s Chanson de Matin (Morning Song) and its contemplative companion, Chanson de Nuit (Song of the Night) for violin and piano. Debussy’s haunting The Sunken Cathedral rises from the depths of the Breton legend of an underwater cathedral off the coast of the Island of Ys. It rises at the composer’s instruction until the music swells to fortissimo. Rachmaninoff’s Études-Tableaux tells the tale of folk heroine Little Red Riding Hood meeting the growling wolf in the piano’s low register. Cesar Franck’s Sonata in A Major concludes the program: a chamber music favourite bursting with lyricism and playful spontaneity
Repertoire
Henryk Wieniawski – Légende, Op. 17
Claude Debussy – La cathédrale engloutie (The Sunken Cathedral)
Sergei Rachmaninoff – Etudes-tableaux, Op. 39: ‘The Sea and the Seagulls’ and ‘Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf’
Cesar Franck – Sonata in A major for Violin and Piano
About the Artists
Kirsten Williams – Violin
One of Australia’s leading violinists, Kirsten Williams has performed widely as a soloist, recitalist and chamber musician, in concert and on ABC radio. In 2019, she was appointed Concertmaster of the Canberra Symphony Orchestra (CSO).
In 2021, she led the Australian National University’s (ANU) Women in Music program. Kirsten studied with Alice Waten at the Sydney Conservatorium and with Igor Ozim in Switzerland. She then joined the Royal Opera House Orchestra at Covent Garden and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, touring and recording widely. On returning to Australia, Kirsten was appointed Associate Leader of the Australian Chamber Orchestra. She has also appeared as guest Concertmaster of the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, the Sydney Philharmonia and the Queensland Symphony Orchestra.
From 2000 to 2019, Kirsten was Associate Concertmaster with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. A dedicated teacher, Kirsten has a central role in the CSO’s Kingsland Pathways Program, leading the Canberra Symphony Youth Chamber Orchestra for advanced players aged 11 to 19, and working with the Kingsland Fellows. She has also worked with the Sydney and Australian youth orchestras and has joined the teaching staff at the ANU School of Music. Kirsten has a passion for music for healing: she has recorded two CDs for the Australian Bush Flower Essences and, in 2014, was named Volunteer of the Year for her work playing in the Intensive Care Unit at Westmead Children’s Hospital. That same year, she became patron of the Goulburn Strings Project, designed to bring music education to children in low-socioeconomic, regional contexts.
Edward Neeman – Piano
Australian-American pianist Edward Neeman has performed across five continents. Critics have lauded him as a ‘true artist’ who ‘isn’t afraid to put a distinctive stamp on whatever he touches’.
A prize-winner of numerous international competitions, Edward has appeared as a soloist with the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra; the Symphony of Northwest Arkansas; the American West Symphony; and the Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra, and Kentucky Symphony Orchestras, among others.
An enthusiastic collaborator, he has performed with musicians including Itamar Zorman, Kristian Winther, the New Zealand String Quartet, and members of the JACK Quartet. Edward also performs with his wife, Indonesian pianist Stephanie Neeman, as the Neeman Piano Duo.
Edward holds a Bachelor of Music from the Australian National University (ANU), a Master of Music from the Manhattan School of Music, and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The Juilliard School. He is on the piano faculty at the ANU in Canberra.