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The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra ventures into (mostly) Baroque territory with the help of mezzo-soprano Caitlin Hulcup. 

A selection of Baroque works form an unusual concert, providing a showcase for violinist Shaun Lee-Chen and soprano Sara Macliver, highlighting the orchestra's versatility. 

Music from the court of Louis XIV – Lully, Jacquet de la Guerre, Rebel and others – is superbly played. But the attempt to put it in the context of the dances of the day is perhaps over-ambitious.

The organ virtuoso is the undisputed star of an otherwise shaky program of Baroque selections.

Is there any instrument more bittersweet than the viola? The violin does the acrobatics, the cello is more conventionally beautiful, but the viola sits in the middle of the orchestral palette like no other instrument. Neither high nor low, it’s perfectly placed to embody the contradictory and the conflicted, ideal for a sense of desire denied or of fulfilment deferred.

An inspired piece of programming illustrates the continuities in angst-filled works from the Baroque, Romantic and contemporary eras.

The Concertgebouw has been celebrating its 125th anniversary throughout 2013. On the darkest, rainiest Sunday evening in months, the Combattimento Consort Amsterdam defied the oncoming winter with a joyous, exuberant performance, one of a series of special celebratory concerts for this jubilee year.