First CONCERT for 2008

SUONARE is presenting their first concert for 2008 on SATURDAY 26th APRIL at 8pm, St Stephen's Church, 189 Church St., Newtown. Please scroll down to earlier postings for more information.

CHRIS BERENSEN

Chris Berensen is a freelance performer of early keyboard instruments and is currently completing a Research Masters degree at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. Notable ensembles he has performed with include the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Salut! Baroque, Sydney Philharmonia Choirs, and the New Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra of Cologne. His teachers include Dr. Neal Peres da Costa, Philip Swanton, and the composers Damien Ricketson and Simone East. He has also participated in masterclasses with such celebrated early music personalities as Wieland Kuijken, Eduardo Eguez, Lars Ulrik Mortensen, and Genevieve Lacey.

Chris enjoys having broader musical tastes. As a composer, he has explored contemporary and baroque sounds, winning a Musica Viva competition at age 15, and in 2005 he performed his own concerto as part of his Bachelor degree - a first in the history of the Sydney Conservatorium. Chris has performed in over fifty Bach cantatas and both passions with the Sydneian Bach Choir and other ensembles. Chris also has a keen interest in jazz and contemporary popular music, and plays the electric bass with his newly formed trio Lucid3, and the vibrant music ministry of St. Barnabas Anglican Church in Sydney.

2008 has seen the premiere performance of Chris’s new work ‘Huygens’ at the Easter Viol School, as well as performances with Lucid3, the Marais Project, the Sydneian Bach Choir, and with the counter-tenor Tobias Cole as part of Musica Viva’s ‘Menage’ concert series. Chris is also heavily involved with the Musica Viva in Schools programme, and tutoring chamber music in the Sydney Conservatorium's Open Learning Academy.