Music / Harp and Flute, Alice Giles and Laura Chislett. Wesley Music Centre. June 7. Reviewed by ALANNA MACLEAN.

You might be lucky to encounter one world premiere in a music concert, but Harp and Flute, with Alice Giles (the harpist who famously played in Antarctica at Mawson Station in 2011) and flautist Laura Chislett sported no less than three.

And there were a few composers there taking their bows as well.

The music was introduced in necessary detail by Giles as a knowledgeable and relaxed narrator. First came Timothy Geller’s Breath Dance, which combined the harp with recorded aeolian harp and prepared the audience for what was to become a series of less than conventional approaches to playing.

Then Edward Cowie’s Harlequin Dances premiered, full of the skips and tensions and jumps and fun of the old commedia character.

Next was Mary Doumany’s Harp Body Her Body, where the relationship between harpist and harp was explored in unconventional ways. Sitting behind a harp resting it on one shoulder is not enough. Like a piano it can be approached from different angles, modified and augmented electronically. You can add your voice. Why not indeed.

After interval Giles was joined by flautist Chislett for the premiere of Cowie’s Australian Water Music, which evoked swans and whales wonderfully but also, to my delight, the behaviour of the Kiama Blowhole.

The evening wrapped up with the third world premiere, Gerard Brophy’s Bubuk Nocturne, a playful mood piece of night music where the bubuk owl was only a fleeting presence.

This concert required audience concentration and open mindedness, but was a great change from one where the repertoire is known. There are more conventional programs in the Harmonic Curves series but Harp and Flute refreshingly was about where music can go and the need for an element of play.