To complement our popular ‘Books of the Year’ feature, to highlight ABR’s fast-expanding arts coverage, and to celebrate some excellent music, theatre, and film, we invited a group of critics and arts professionals to nominate some of their favourite productions of the year.

Robyn Archer

Dawn Upshaw’s concerts with the Australian Chamber Orchestra were staggeringly beautiful. Conceived with an elegant and intelligent touch, they featured the Australian première of Maria Schneider’s song cycle Winter Morning Walks. Dawn Upshaw’s subtly nuanced and warmly generous performance made Australia’s finest ensemble even finer in that moment. It’s not just the best for the year, but the best in decades.

Dawn Upshaw (photograph by Patrick Ryan)From the accomplished to the emerging. Grace Clifford’s performance of the Beethoven Violin Concerto with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra made me understand that, while I love the skill of AFL footballers, I have to admit that, at this level, the arts win hands down. So young, so gifted, so much hard-won skill, and delivered with such humility and real grace.

My next selection is Crossing Roper Bar, at the Australian National Museum. I first saw this collaboration between the Australian Art Orchestra and Wagilak-speaking songmen of South East Arnhem Land in 2005. Nine years later it had evolved into a moving partnership between tradition and contemporary improvisation. Few performances could better express the rare essence of Australian optimism than this.