He came, he saw, he conquered. And conducted. Now Umberto Clerici is preparing for his long goodbye to helming Queensland Symphony Orchestra. The hard-working and flamboyant maestro, who has served as chief conductor at the QSO these past five years, is set to leave, but not just yet.
He has a year and a bit left. Last weekend Clerici conducted Symphonic Dances in the Concert Hall at QPAC and he has one other appearance this year in late November conducting the season finale, Maestro 10 Concert, Don Juan & Manfred, featuring a bit of Richard Strauss (the signature Don Juan), some Tchaikovsky and the world premiere of a new work by Australian Ukrainian composer Catherine Likhuta.
The program for 2027, his last season with QSO, has just been announced and the centrepiece is Clerici’s programming, including a full cycle of Beethoven symphonies to mark 200 years since the composer’s death.
Clerici is a world-renowned cellist as well as a conductor. He is in demand as a conductor and musician in Europe and Asia as well as Australia. His working life is frenetic, to say the least. His Brisbane stints equate to about 10 weeks per annum, which makes him something of a FIFO worker (Fly-In, Fly-Out).
I nabbed him for a coffee on his recent whirlwind stint and we chatted between rehearsals for the Maestro 7: Symphonic Dances concert at QPAC. (The concert featured music by Dvořák, Australian composer Holly Harrison – featuring classical accordion player James Crabb, a mate of Clerici’s – and John Adams and Rachmaninov.)
It’s always a pleasure watching Clerici conduct with his signature flair, passion and precision. In person, he’s warm and friendly, but he has also been a man on a mission.
“This has been my first post as a conductor, so it has been interesting and useful,” he says. “We have done a lot of repertoire and I have learnt how to push when it is needed and when not to push too hard. The result is that I think it’s a better orchestra. To me the orchestra needed a bit of shock therapy when I arrived, and it certainly needed more adventurous programming.”
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‘There are many ways you could celebrate Beethoven, but the symphonies are pillars of what a symphony orchestra does’
Cross-genre collaborations are something he has championed and in his final year the orchestra is collaborating with Dead Puppet Society as an example of that. But for 2027, Beethoven will be the foundation stone and nobody will be complaining.
“There are many ways you could celebrate Beethoven, but the symphonies are pillars of what a symphony orchestra does,” Clerici says. “And I don’t think the orchestra has ever done the full cycle before. The Beethoven Symphonies will be divided into five different concerts.”
It is a landmark year in 2027 because the QSO celebrates its 80th anniversary with a program of beloved classics, world-leading musicians and works by some of Australia’s most exciting contemporary voices.
The anniversary season highlights several significant cultural milestones, from Clerici’s complete Beethoven cycle to the QSO 80: Season Opener, featuring John Adams’ epic Harmonielehre in honour of the composer’s 80th birthday, another piece of Clerici’s programming.
QSO’s signature Maestro Series anchors the 2027 season with a grand program of major orchestral works, including Wagner/Maazel’s The Ring Without Words, Sibelius’ Finlandia, Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra and Mahler’s Symphony No.2. (Umberto Clerici has championed the symphonies of Mahler during his tenure.)
Audience favourites will return including the light and uplifting Music on Sundays series, intimate performances in Studio Sessions at the QSO Studio and a celebration of local and emerging talent through QSO at the Queensland Conservatorium concerts.
The centrepiece, QSO 80: Anniversary Gala, presents a never-before-seen collaboration between QSO and internationally acclaimed production and design company Dead Puppet Society. Blending live puppetry and orchestral music, the performance will bring together Wagner’s Tannhäuser Overture – one of the first pieces performed by QSO in 1947 – and Stravinsky’s Petrushka (1947 version), alongside a new fanfare by Brisbane-based composer Joseph Twist.
Continuing his longstanding relationship with QSO, didgeridoo superstar and Queenslander William Barton will return to the stage for this milestone event as soloist in Kalkadungu, a work he co-wrote with Matthew Hindson.
QSO chief executive Michael Sterzinger says the anniversary season will honour QSO’s rich legacy while looking boldly into the future.
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“We’re celebrating a remarkable milestone – 80 years of inspiring, connecting and enriching communities through the power of live orchestral music,” says Sterzinger. “The 80th anniversary season will honour not only the great masterpieces of the past but also the music of the future.”
Cinema takes centre stage with the Stage & Screen program bringing some of the world’s most iconic film music to the Brisbane Convention & Entertainment Centre, including Maestro of the Movies: A Tribute to John Williams. QSO at the Movies will also return with live orchestral screenings of Star Wars: A New Hope and How to Train Your Dragon 2, building on the sell-out success in 2026.
QSO will reinstate their artist-in-association role, with soprano and proud Koa, Kuku Yalanji and Wakka Wakka woman Nina Korbe taking on the role in 2027. During the residency, Korbe will perform across a diverse program, from Handel’s Messiah and Holst’s The Mystic Trumpeter to contemporary works in QSO’s staple Cinematic program in October.
QSO director artistic planning Matthew Wood, who has worked with Clerici on the 2027 program, says a highlight of the season is Mana Moana, an uplifting concert that mixes gospel, classical and traditional Pasifika musical styles, in collaboration with New Zealand’s Signature Choir.
“Queensland is home to the largest Pasifika population in Australia, so it’s a very special and important program,” Wood says.
Clerici says his program for 2027 is a culmination of everything he has achieved in his role at QSO.
“In my time as chief conductor, we built up the orchestra and pushed the programming to a more edgy, creative and international level,” he says. “We prepared the ground, planted the seeds, watered the plant, and now we are enjoying watching the trees grow into a beautiful forest.”
In 2027, QSO will continue its commitment to regional touring and will continue its work supporting the next generation of Queensland musicians, providing emerging musicians with opportunities to learn, perform and develop alongside professional members of the orchestra via its QSO Academy, Compose, Young Instrumentalist Prize, and SidebySide program.
We won’t hear Clerici play in 2027, though it would have been nice to hear him again as a kind of swansong.
“I was always aware not to play too much, otherwise you just look like a one-man band,” he says. “I was appointed for a reason.”
And that was to conduct and get the orchestra in shape. Hopefully, when his tenure is over, we might see him play the cello again as a guest artist. That would be … magnifico.
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