Ocean Whisperings: Penelope & Other Songs

Emerging Artist Concert Series present a

A Program of Songs Inspired by the Ocean

Mezzo-soprano Olive Cullen and pianist Ronan Apcar launch our Emerging Concert Artist Series 2025 with songs that capture the ocean's timeless influence from Greek antiquity to modern Australia. Olive, a Melbourne-based performer, calls Wollongong home, and Ronan is from Sydney. The sea is a shared love.

The program is rich with perspectives from different eras, genders, and geographical spaces and features works by Livingston, Weill, Elgar, Rossini, Piaf & Monnot, Holland, Hiscock, Marti and Faure Penelope is a song cycle inspired by Homer's epic poem, the Odyssey, a meditation on memory, identity, and what it means to come home. The New York Times (2015) described Penelope as "a rapturous song cycle...". Janson Green from Pitchfork writes that Penelope is "... a gorgeous piece of music, but it is more — it is also a hauntingly vivid psychological portrait, one that explores a dark scenario with a light, almost quizzical touch, finding poetic resonances everywhere… No matter what perspective you bring to… it bears profound rewards." 

ABOUT THE PERFORMERS 

Now based in Melbourne, OLIVE CULLEN calls Wombarra home and began her training with Karen Cummings. Before heading to Melbourne, she also undertook short courses at NIDA and with the NSW Arts Unit. She has performed in operas, concerts, plays, musicals, pantomimes, films, cabarets, variety shows and private functions. Olive holds a Bachelor of Music Performance from Melbourne Conservatorium, where she studied with Suzanne Johnston. Simultaneously, she completed a diploma in Languages, majoring in German. She has been a Scholar with Opera Scholars Australia since 2022, is a Rising Artist with the Australian Contemporary Opera Company (ACOCo) and is a regular performer with Opera in the Country.

Olive is passionate about promoting the value of singing and music in communities, winning the Union House Theatre's 2021 Community Engagement Award for her work on the UMMTA Chorus. Credits include an ensemble role in Mahagonny Songspiel and Seven Little Australians with Opera Carnivale, featured artist in the Crystal Clear Productions Cabaret, and featured performer in the Club Voltaire Vaudevillian Nights. Recent credits include Moth in A Midsummer Night's Dream (Britten, and Chorus/Third Spirit Cover in the Magic Flute (Mozart) with the University of Melbourne Masters of Opera.

RONAN APCAR is a pianist and composer with a reputation of versatility, edge, and tenacity. His love for music across many styles – jazz to the avant-garde, contemporary art music to alt-rock and pop – translates into his open-minded, exciting, and unique work as a musician. Described as "a talent beyond his age" (Limelight Magazine), Ronan is best known for his bold programming, performances of contemporary repertoire, and advocacy for Australian music. He is Ensemble Offspring's 2025 Hatched Emerging Performer. 

Ronan performs in an eclectic mix of concerts and festivals in both intimate and large-scale venues across Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, and regional NSW and Victoria, and is just at home as a guest soloist with an orchestra as he is improvising as part of a multimedia DJ set. The current recipient of the ANU Love Supreme Fellowship grant and a nominee for the prestigious Freedman Fellowship, Ronan's thoughtful, innovative, and unconventional programming sees his performances range from genre-defying cabaret to experimental new music concerts, free improvisations in art galleries to theatre-music fusion shows in cafés. He also regularly works as an improviser, curator, and collaborator in musical and interdisciplinary settings.

ABOUT THE VENUE 

Outstanding young musicians create memorable musical experiences for the community. Held at the historic St Jude's Church Bowral, these concerts allow the community to experience and share the joy of music-making in one of the town's most beautiful and friendly performance spaces.  Our artists curate exceptional programs, compose new works, and incorporate a mix of much-loved and lesser-known composers into their programs. 

We respect and acknowledge the Traditional Custodians Gundungurra and Tharawal people, Elders past and present, and extend that respect to other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.