Media release – Van Diemen’s Band, 25 October 2023

From Italy – With Love

Internationally acclaimed Australian guitarist Claire Angel Bonner makes her first return visit in eleven years for four-state concert tour.

Recently described as ‘pure talent’ in French newspaper L’indépendant, Tasmanian-born guitarist Claire Angel Bonner returns to Australia this October/November for a solo concert tour across four states and five cities: Sydney, Hobart, Launceston, Adelaide and Perth.

Since leaving her homeland in 2012 to undertake post-graduate study on her instrument in Italy, Claire has made her base there and become one of the world’s most acclaimed performers of late-18th and early-19th century guitar music: a time of the Napoleonic wars, when the six-string version of the instrument had only just been introduced and was still making its way as a concert instrument.

Bonner is one of the most conspicuous members of the small army of successful Australian musicians to make a career overseas and be recognised as pre-eminent in her field. While her performance schedule for 2023 has included Italy, France, Switzerland and the UK, it is the trip back to the country of her birth to which she is looking forward the most.

“It’s been eleven years since I’ve seen friends here. Of course I’m excited!” she says. “I want people to hear how I’ve developed as a musician during that time, and I also want to introduce them to the sound of the 19th century guitar. It’s quite different to that of the modern versions of the instrument; smaller, more mellow, more delicate. It was surprisingly popular back then, too. Don’t forget it was (violin virtuoso) Paganini’s other performance instrument, as well as that of the non-piano playing French composer Hector Berlioz. Then as now, it’s always been the supreme instrument for the love song, the ultimate musical vehicle for romance!”

Bonner points out that the music in the two different recital programs she’ll be presenting on tour – From Italy with Love and A Tale of Three Cities – reflect the repertoire of the time’s Italian origins. “So much of it was either influenced by or directly sourced from the bel canto opera of the period,” she says. “This is some time before the peninsula’s unification, becoming the Italy we have today, and even longer before the Spanish got their fingers on those strings.”

Italian opera is at the heart of the From Italy with Love program, featuring fantasias (almost like a ‘greatest hits’ medley) based on the favourites of the time including Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni’ and Rossini’s ‘The Barber of Seville’ (Il barbiere di Siviglia). A Tale of Three Cities, described by Bonner as “…a musical journey through Napoleon’s Europe”, brings together the historical events and political figures of the first half of the 19th century with the great musical centres of London, Paris and Vienna, where the new instrument flourished in the hands of composer-virtuosi such as Mauro Giuliani, Giulio Regondi and Napoleon Coste.

For Bonner, this is supremely beautiful music that should be better known. “My aim is to give historical context to the composers and their music in these programs”, she says. “I want to show the development of the guitar repertoire from the turmoil of the French Revolution through to the Crimean war”.

The Australian musician will be making her debut in Sydney on this tour, while the concerts in Perth (she graduated from the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts there in 2011) and her home state of Tasmania will be more sentimental.

“I grew up in a little place just outside Hobart called Fern Tree, high up on kunanyi/Mount Wellington, so I’m absolutely thrilled to be coming both to my hometown and to Launceston,” she says. ”I think audiences everywhere are going to fall in love with this special sound. If you’re a guitar fan, this will be a revelation.”

Performances dates/venues

Oct 29 – Sydney, Glebe Town Hall, 3pm (From Italy with Love) hosted by the Sydney Bach Society
Oct 30 – Hobart, MONA. 2-4pm
Nov 2 – Hobart, Battery Point Community Hall, 8pm (A Tale of Three Cities)
Nov 3 – Hobart (private concert), 6pm (From Italy with Love)
Nov 5 – Spreyton, Hans Vonk Music House, 2pm (From Italy with Love)
Nov 6 – Launceston, Holy Trinity Church, 7.30pm (A Tale of Three Cities)
Nov 10 – Adelaide, North Adelaide Baroque Hall, 7pm (A Tale of Three Cities)
Nov 12 – Adelaide, place and time tbc (fundraiser) (From Italy with Love)
Nov 15 – Perth, place and time to be confirmed (fundraiser for CARAD asylum seeker and refugee support) (From Italy with Love)
Nov 16 – Perth, UWA Callaway Auditorium, 7pm (A Tale of Three Cities)

For more info please visit: www.claireangelbonner.com.