Hanson Dyer Hall: Melbourne, AUSTRALIA

A bit of a new experience in a different small hall in Melbourne. Thankfully, I'm still discovering all the places and venues to play in Australia... some of which didn't exist when I was living here last! Most have been really pleasant surprises!

Recently, I had the chance to perform at the Hanson Dyer Hall in Melbourne, which is just next door to the Melbourne Recital Hall. The Recital Hall is also a new discovery for me, and it is a pretty awesome acoustic and hall to play in.

The Hanson Dyer Hall is on a higher level in what seems to house part of the School of Music or Conservatorium... I'm not entirely sure which University it is attached to, or if it is the Victorian Collage of the Arts... or if I'm hopelessly out of date, and maybe the whole thing is completely different...

... in any case, when I arrived, there appeared to be quite a few secondary age school students that seemed to have had an event in the building somewhere.

Going upstairs into the reception area, past security doors and elevators with restricted access (something that seems to have become an unwelcome thing in Australian music schools...), revealed a seating area that seemed actually to be quite nice!

Heading further in and onto stage saw us in an interesting little auditorium. For some reason, it reminded me more of a lecture hall rather than a small recital venue.. but no matter.

Playing on the somewhat smallish stage was an interesting experience... the difference of a metre towards the front or back of the stage made a gigantic difference in how we could hear each other on the stage. I'm glad that we figured that out before the performance!... our initial placement was incredibly difficult to play in, as it always seemed like we all thought we were the only person playing... and that the other players were quite soft in comparison!

This does happen on some stages... and that is quite an disconcerting feeling... as it minimises the audio cues that you would ordinarily get from the other performers. Anyway, after moving back to away from the front a bit... it made all the difference.

With a large audience, I was a bit lukewarm about this performance stage though. I never really felt that comfortable on it... perhaps it is something that I will have to have a second attempt at sometime in the future.