This morning concert, featuring the Flinders Quartet and other musicians, was part of Kim Williams’ 12-part cycle, Incredible Floridas, this year’s Chamber Landscapes series, held over three days at the uniquely set concert hall UKARIA, located in the Adelaide Hills.

The Flinders Quartet. Photo © Pia Johnson

The concert commenced with actor John Gaden’s recitation of the late Judith Wright’s poem, The Birds. This proved an ideal introduction to a selection of Margaret Sutherland’s songs, which set a selection of the Queensland poet’s groundbreaking texts. And they are set with a sense of complete identification and understanding, stemming from the fact, no doubt, that Sutherland and Wright were close friends. Written in a style which suggests Richard Strauss at his most adventurous (Elektra and the Ophelia Lieder, it is music that is fin de siècle or from the edge of the precipice. They were ideally suited to the soprano Jessica Aszodi who has already sung two performances of Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire during this Festival. The long The Child and the World saw her accompanied by string trio, whilst the Six Songs, composed between the late 40s and the early 60s, covered...