An awe-inspiring music festival

As seen in Style Magazine: Director of AWE and well-known New Zealand violinist Justine Cormack shares some highlights from this year’s AWE experience.

A chamber music festival in the heart of the Southern Alps, At the World’s Edge Festival is for one, and for all - whether lifelong enthusiasts or curious adventurers new to classical music.  

With six intertwined festival programmes involving strings, piano and voice, this year’s festival presents thirty-one musical works charting an exploration of the roles that solitude and togetherness play in the creative process.

Firstly, what exactly is chamber music?

Chamber music is a type of classical music that involves a small ensemble of classical musicians, with one instrument to a part. This year’s AWE festival includes both solo and duo performances, right through to groups of six to eight musicians playing together.

Designed for smaller spaces, the audience experiences the musicians ‘up close’: being drawn into the most delicate of sounds yet blown away by the power of it all. It’s a wonderfully visceral experience.

Where does AWE take place?

We perform in three acoustically stunning spaces across the Central Lakes – Rippon Hall in Wānaka, the Cloudy Bay Shed in Cromwell, and Te Atamira, a new Arts and Culture space in Queenstown. All three venues give our performers a dramatic backdrop of Central Otago landscapes: an awe-inspiring experience, to say the least.

What are some of the highlights in this year’s festival?

We have an incredible line up of international Festival Artists coming from all over the globe. In addition to some of the best musicians from NZ and Australia, award-winning Polish cellist Maciej Kulakowski is performing in NZ for the first time. We are also bringing back London-based, Kiwi singer Julien Van Mellaerts to perform in the first three programmes.

I’m excited to have Gareth Farr as this year’s Composer in Residence. We’ll be performing seven of his works through the festival, featuring the full gamut of his musical imagination, with his trademark toe-tapping and driving rhythms, to his soaring and breath-taking melodies.

All six festival programmes weave together the most stunning and moving music, culminating in Schoenberg’s glorious string sextet, Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night). Simply put, it’s unearthly beautiful. I predict there won’t be a dry eye in the house.

Our six festival programmes across Wānaka, Cromwell and Queenstown run from October 8-16, as well as multiple free events in the area until October 21.