It was a great pleasure to attend the 40^th anniversary celebrations of the Sydney Youth Orchestra (SYO), founded by the late and great Peter Seymour.

The program opened with the Greeting Prelude by Stravinsky, a most apt to the occasion. This was followed by a Hayden Sinfonia Concertante in three movements, and then the major work: Mahler’s 6^th Symphony.

The Greeting prelude was brief but fun, having been originally written to celebrate the 80^th birthday of the conductor of the premiere performance of The Rite of Spring.

The Sinfonia Concertante gave the orchestra a chance to show off its technical proficiency and then some. This work is written for a quarter with orchestra; the four members of the quartet being cello, violin, oboe and bassoon. All four players were outstanding, but I must confess to having a real feel for the oboe in this piece. This work is particularly suited to a lazy Sunday afternoon and was performed professionally and with expertise. I really enjoyed it.

The major work was Mahler’s Symphony No 6. This large work in four movements requires a special instrument called, appropriately, a Mahler Drum. It looks like a large tree stump and is played with a wooden mallet. The sound is a great ‘thok’ like an axe felling a large tree. The drum was specifically commissioned for this performance. Consequently, I spent much of the performance waiting for ‘the drum’!

The SYO was augmented for this performance with several alumni. To give some idea of the scale of the augmentation, I counted 10 double basses, 8 French horns, 5 percussionists and 2 harps, not forgetting the celeste!

In the program notes, they mentioned that Richard Strauss thought the work a bit ‘overscored’. I must confess to be on Strauss’s side here and often find that with Mahler.

Nevertheless, the performance was excellent, with the large sweeping themes that Mahler is expert at writing, as well as his inventive and intensive orchestration, using every instrument in the orchestra; even if only twice, as in the case of the Mahler Drum! For Mahler lovers, this would have been a wonderful afternoon.

Congratulations to the SYO on its 40th. They are a really great group with impressive discipline and great technical expertise.

The Sydney Youth Orchestra’s 40^th Anniversary Celebration took place on Sunday 3^rd November within the Verbrugghen Hall at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.