Music & Tea at WAG: ECA SERIES 2025

Emerging Concert Artists at Music & Tea at the Gallery 

Outstanding young musicians create memorable musical experiences for the community. Held at the Wollongong Art Gallery, on the first Thursday of the month,  these concerts allow the community to experience and share the joy of music-making in one of the town's most beautiful performance spaces.  Entry Free -  donation to contribute to artists fees are appreciated. 

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

Olive Cullen, mezzo-soprano | Ronan Apcar, piano | Sarah Collins soprano present

Ocean Whisperings: Penelope & Other Stories

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

Penelope is a song cycle inspired by Homer's epic poem, the Odyssey. It is a meditation on memory, identity, and what it means to come home. The New York Times (2015) described Penelope as "a rapturous song cycle..." 

The program is rich with perspectives from different eras, genders and geographical spaces. It includes The Lotus Eaters, from Penelope -  Sarah Kirkland Snider | Penelope - Cecilia Livingston | Dead Friend, from Penelope|Youkali, by Weill | The Land Where Corals Lie, from Sea Pictures -  Elgar | Cruda Sorte, from l'Italiana in Algeri   -  Rossini | Hymne a l'amour - Piaf & Monnot | At the edge of the sea, by Holland | Home, from Penelope | Lake Illawarra Wendy Hiscock | The Mermaid's Lament - Martin | Les Berceaux, by Faure .

ABOUT THE PERFORMERS 

Melbourne based performer OLIVE CULLEN calls Wombarra home. 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.

Sarah Collins is a classical singer from Jamberoo NSW, in her fourth year of studying for a Bachelor of Music (Performance) in classical voice at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music under the tutelage of Dr Narelle Yeo. Sarah has been the recipient of numerous scholarshipsand awards throughout her university studies, including; The Peter Davidson Music Scholarship, the Myron Kantor Bequest Scholarship, The Women's College Music Scholarship, and the Margot Anthony (Budd) Music Grant. In 2024, Sarah was awarded 2nd place in the annual Sydney Eisteddfod for both French Art Song and English Art Song.

Emerging Concert Artists 2025 Program:

March 6: ROMANIC DIALOGUES: CLARINET TRIO  with Dan Thomas, clarinet | Elizabeth Ring, cello |  Maria Stadnik, piano

Johannes Brahms Clarinet Trio in A minor, Op. 114 (1891) & Max Bruch 8 Pieces for Clarinet Trio

April 3:  FANTASIES FOR CELLO & PIANO Alexandra Boyling, cello | Rio Xiang piano

May 8: THE CHAMELEON Anna Chung, clarinet | Katherine Shin, piano

June 5: ARCANE Benjamine Lam, violin | Dono Ng, piano

July 3: Horizons Sydney Conservatorium String

August 7: Wind in the Reeds Gahyun Lee, oboe | TBA piano

September 3:Horizons: Sydney Conservatorium String Ensemble. 

 Expanding experience and inspiring enthusiasm, the Sydney Conservatorium String Ensemble, directed by Goetz Richter, brings masterworks to life in entirely unheard conceptions. These musicians perform with transformative intuition. Their program includes Schubert's captivating Quartet D minor in its compelling string orchestra conception.

October 1:  PIANO MUSIC FROM THE HEART Elsa Li, piano

November 5: TIME LINES  Matthew Zengoski guitar with Nigel Jones guitar

December 3: JAZZ STORIES: TOM HAINS QUARTET Tom Hains, saxophone | TBA