We look forward to updating this page regularly and sharing stories as we head out on the road around Victoria and New South Wales before heading to Italy. 

Day 1- 2 

Hello and welcome to the Yarra Trio blog!  This is our first entry….Wednesday morning was beyond hectic, but once 110kmph was signposted on the freeway and the clinkers and liquorice allsorts were broken out the trio breathed a collective sigh of relief!  The tour was underway, the seven hour drive was mildly eventful, and included an exciting stop in Sea Lake for excellent vanilla slice and cups of tea, and much gazing out of windows.  We progressed later in the drive to taking it in turns to be DJ, with some interesting results…I think we managed to cover almost every known form of music with the possible exception of any relaxing music, and certainly not anything that we all unanimously approved of!  We arrived in Mildura at about 10pm, to find that our accommodation was highly acceptable, and then Chris put on his chef’s hat and cooked us a gourmet meal! Our school concert the next morning was a great experience despite the early hour -  the  students were all very enthusiastic, especially when it came to conducting the trio.  We all enjoyed ourselves immensely.  We followed up with a relaxing programme of rigorous practice and rehearsal until 5.30….then a walk along the river, a trip to the Mildura brewery, and right now we are waiting for Chef Howlett to create yet another fantastic dinner…. Look out for our next update! Tomorrow we’ll be giving a masterclass followed by a concert at the Mildura Arts Centre, then we’re on to Swan Hill!

Over and out,

Chris, Jess and Stefan 

Mildura/Swan Hill

Following our masterclass at the Mildura Arts Centre we raced home to put on our performance clothes, and then raced back to present our Mildura Recital. Saturday night’s programme consisted of Brahms, Mendelssohn, Cassomenos and Korngold. We had a great audience, and it was a very exciting recital considering it was our first performance of both the Brahms and the Korngold trios! We had a fantastic time with the new Steinway that is now installed in the Arts Centre - it is a beautiful and powerful instrument, and Stefan produced fantastic results (as always!).We crawled out of bed pretty exhausted (and rather too early!) the next morning and packed the car (courtesy of our pianist and expert packer Stefan) and headed to Swan Hill. We must admit it wasn’t the most thrilling of drives, and we were pretty happy to arrive in Swan Hill, where we went straight to the venue and rehearsed for 2 hours. We gave a 5pm recital in the Swan Hill Regional Art Gallery, which is a lovely venue with a beautiful 1924 New York Steinway. Korngold was given its second airing, along with some Mozart and Beethoven, and we also performed Stuart Greenbaum’s new work ‘Book of Departures’. Once more we had a very appreciative and warm audience, and we look forward to more concerts at this lovely venue. Monday was almost a day off - we gave a Proms for Preps concert for the lovely 5 and 6 year olds from St Mary’s Primary, then we all managed a good slab of personal practice, gave a 5pm masterclass at the gallery, and then settled back at our accommodation for some kangaroo steaks and salad (again courtesy of our talented cellist and chef!). Next stop Shepparton!

Shepparton/Heathcote/Goulburn/Cootamundra

Following our concert in Shepparton, we had a day of travelling - we visited three regional schools, all fairly small, and had a great time playing for the kids.Heathcote was our next stop, where we had a well earned break, visited our wonderful wine sponsors Sanguine Estate - a big thank you to Tony and Lynn for such a fantastic day!Then we headed up the Hume through 125km of road works - you can imagine the fun(?!) - and arrived in Goulburn. We gave a concert at the Goulburn Regional Conservatorium where Chris bravely battled a cold and managed not to fall off the stage! We found a great Thai restaurant where we had dinner 2 nights running. By this stage we were all starting to feel like the repertoire was coming together - Korngold in particular, which has been a more extended journey than some of the other works!Then to Cootamundra, where we had a wonderful couple of days. We gave our best concert yet in their lovely venue, with a very warm and appreciative audience.We’re now staying in Albury, but giving our concert tonight in Wodonga…. up early tomorrow morning for the drive back to Melbourne to wash clothes, re pack suitcases, give a concert in Warragul on Friday night, and then head straight for Tullamarine airport….and Italy!!