LA PHILHARMONIC WIND QUINTET in the Utzon Room at Sydney Opera House

The LA Philharmonic Wind Quintet’s performance at the Sydney Opera House was a masterclass in the diverse range of compositional styles and approaches to wind instrumentation. The ensemble — Denis Bouriakov (Flute), Ricardo Barbosa Pereira (Oboe), Boris Allakhverdyan (Clarinet), Whitney Crockett (Bassoon), and Andrew Bain (French Horn) — delivered a program that spanned neoclassicism, contemporary Australian music, Broadway, folk-inspired works, and cornerstone pieces of the wind quintet repertoire. The quintet form has been part of classical music for over 200 years and this evening highlighted its enduring appeal.

Andrew Bain playing the French horn, who hails from Australia, introduced the pieces throughout the evening. Bain, a former member of the Australian Opera Orchestra some 20 years ago, has since made a name for himself playing with Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. Bain expressed his continued enjoyment of the intimate setting a wind quintet offers, where interaction between players is instinctive and immediate. The group returned to Australia after a highly acclaimed tour in 2019, and their Sydney performance did not disappoint.

The evening began with Jean Françaix’s Wind Quintet No. 1, a piece that epitomises the French composer’s neoclassical style, filled with humour and playful interactions between instruments. The musicians brought a lightness and wit to the performance, underscoring the charm for which Françaix is known. Ross Edwards’ Incantations followed; a work deeply connected to the Australian landscape. The composition’s title suggests spirituality, while its sound conjures the vastness of the Australian outback.

From there, the program transitioned to the West Side Story selections by Leonard Bernstein, blending jazz, Latin rhythms, and American musical theatre. The quintet brought a fresh emotional directness to these iconic tunes, making them feel both nostalgic and immediate, and eliciting a heartfelt response from the audience.

Valerie Coleman’s Tzigane shifted the energy once again, drawing on the fiery tradition of gypsy music. Full of rhythmic vitality and virtuosic flourishes, the quintet showcased their technical brilliance, capturing the spirit of improvisation embedded in folk music with dance-like passages that electrified the room.

The evening concluded with Carl Nielsen’s Wind Quintet, a work that has long been part of the standard wind quintet repertory. Nielsen, known for blending classical forms with his distinctive harmonic language, created a work that is by turns lyrical and intense. Originally written with specific players in mind, the quintet brought out the individual personalities of each instrument, weaving their lines together with both sensitivity and strength.


As the sun set on a beautiful spring afternoon in the Utzon Room, the performance closed with an encore — Maria’s Song from West Side Story — leaving the audience humming as they exited.

I reviewed the performance that took place on the 22nd September 2024.

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