Over the past 20 years, James Campbell and the New Zealand String Quartet have performed together around the world. Enjoy their warm collaboration as they return to a perennial favourite, Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet. Shostakovich’s stirring second quartet, with its searing Klezmer Adagio and ghostly third movement waltz, will provide the perfect contrast. Mozart – Clarinet Quintet in A major – […]

For their final performance at the Festival, the Takács Quartet have chosen some of their favourite works to share. Wolf’s light-hearted pictorial Italian Serenade forms a perfect foil for Bartók’s deeply felt and powerfully compelling final quartet. In the second half, Gillian Ansell and Rolf Gjelsten join the stage for Brahms’ luminous sextet. Wolf – […]

Hear Justin DeHart chat with Co-Artistic Director Helene Pohl about his epic solo percussion projects and the works he will perform in his recital. Originally from California, and now based in Christchurch, Justin is a Grammy-nominated performer of contemporary musical styles from classical to pop, and from world music to electronic.   Adam Chamber Music […]

Percussionist extraordinaire Justin DeHart will surprise, delight and entertain in his varied programme featuring all New Zealand music. Originally from California, and now based in Christchurch, Justin is a Grammy-nominated performer of contemporary musical styles from classical to pop, and from world music to electronic.   Gareth Farr – Construction for multi percussion Celeste Oram […]

An impressive line-up of Festival artists will gather for a sumptuous evening of Bach in various instrumentations and guises, including a rendition of a Gamba sonata with violin, cello and double bass, lively soprano arias, a noble organ prelude and fugue, cello suites on both the double bass and violoncello da spalla, and finishing with […]

In Monique Lapin's specially curated programme, she has invited the two violinists of the 2024 Troubadours, Lucas Baker and Peter Gjelsten, both prize-winning former students of New Zealand School of Music Te Kōkī, to join her in Leonie Holmes' quirky violin trio, originally commissioned by the Festival in 2019. Next, You will never hear Mozart […]

Featuring our wonderful 2024 Adam Troubadour Quartet, performing the first concert of selected works. The Adam Troubadours is a career development experience offered to four of New Zealand’s most promising young string players. The Programme includes learning and performance opportunities provided by Adam Chamber Music Festival and Adam Summer School. The members of the Quartet […]

The joyful, light-hearted and communicative spirits of clarinettist James Campbell, cellist Rolf Gjelsten and pianist Izabella Simon find their perfect expression in the uplifting Beethoven trio, and provide a beautiful contrast to the deeply moving late work of Richard Strauss, written as a sort of requiem for himself and European culture after World War II. […]

Hungarian pianist Dénes Várjon and New Zealand String Quartet present Bartók’s early Piano Quintet is a dramatic and powerful work super-charged with expressivity, showing the influences of Brahms, Debussy, Liszt and Strauss and the beginnings of Bartók’s fascination with folk music. To the best of our knowledge this is a New Zealand premiere. But first […]

Come and hear Sergey Malov work with young violinists/violists to get behind the notes and help lift the music off the page.   Adam Chamber Music Festival

Featuring our wonderful 2024 Adam Troubadour Quartet, performing the first concert of selected works. The Adam Troubadours is a career development experience offered to four of New Zealand’s most promising young string players. The Programme includes learning and performance opportunities provided by Adam Chamber Music Festival and Adam Summer School. The members of the Quartet […]

The Festival’s final concert opens with a family affair – pianists Dénes Várjon and Izabella Simon perform Ravel's ‘Mother Goose Suite’, narrated by their daughter Liána Izabella Várjon. We experience Paganini fireworks in the hands of virtuoso Sergey Malov and Armenian Khachaturian's rhapsodic trio, filled with striking East Eurasian folk elements. French composer and pianist […]