Midsummer Night’s Dream

Mendelssohn, unbelievably, was just 17 when he wrote his magical Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Years later, he recaptured the fairy land in his gossamer music for the entire play.

Auckland’s own Sylvia Jiang joins our Principal Trumpet Huw Dann for Shostakovich’s gleefully crazy concerto. It’s uproarious music from a high-spirited young man.

And to open, with undercurrents of darkness, Brigid Ursula Bisley’s music is an illumination of distant stars and far horizons.