6 COVER STORY

March 26-27, 2016 theaustralian.com.au/reviewAUSE01Z01AR - V1

Achilly afternoon in Wood Green,suburban north London, and in anold church hall with blacked-outwindows Katie Noonan is standingon tiptoe, reaching for a high note.

Four musicians on string instruments — twoviolins, a viola and a cello — sit behind clearglass in an adjoining room, their chords mistingand swelling; in front of them all, behind moreglass, a recording engineer at a mixing deskslides the occasional control knob.

“The dark preludes of the drums begin / andround us round the company of lovers,” singsNoonan, one hand on her headphones, the heelof her other hand straining towards the ceiling.Featuring words by Australian poet JudithWright and music by Melbourne composerPaul Grabowsky, the composition both high-lights Noonan’s pristine, opera-trained voiceand challenges her technical mastery.

“Ooh, what a bitch of a song,” she grins whenshe’s finished. “My C sharp was too sharp. Canwe do it again?”

The players nod good-naturedly. “The har-monics sounded better last time,” offers cellistJacqueline Thomas of the Brodsky Quartet, thefamous chamber music outfit with which Noo-nan is collaborating. “Let’s give it anotherchance,” agrees Thomas’s husband, viola playerPaul Cassidy, as violinists Ian Belton and DanielRowland reposition their instruments undertheir chins.

Noonan and the Brodskys have come to-gether to record With Love and Fury, a songcycle in which poems by Wright (1915-2000)have been set to compositions by 10 of Noo-nan’s favourite Australian composers.

The album’s release will precede a seven-cityAustralian tour that begins with a world pre-miere in Brisbane on April 28. Which seemsonly fitting; the Armidale, NSW-born Wrightwas a Queensland resident for more than 30years. Noonan grew up in Brisbane, lives on theSunshine Coast and has just been appointed ar-tistic director of the Queensland Music Festival.

Wearing knee-length red boots and indigen-ous pointillist-design leggings, her peroxidedhair shorn into a quiff, Noonan pauses beforeburping unselfconsciously. “There you go,” shedeclares and, airways duly cleared, nails thesong on the second take.

With three out of 10 songs still to be record-ed, they move on to To a Child, a song withmusic by film composer David Hirschfelder(Shine, Elizabeth, Australia) that pulses withinnocence and experience.

“When I was a child / I saw a burning bird ina tree.” Noonan’s voice has the handful of peo-ple in the mixing room (engineer, intern, studiomanager, me) transfixed. “I see became I am / Iam became I see.”

“Lovely,” mutters the engineer, sitting back,as the rest of us break into applause.

Noonan’s easy professionalism belies thefact she flew into London just a few days earlier,and with an airline that briefly misplaced herluggage. For 24 hours, acclimatising at thehome of Thomas and Cassidy, she wore thesame pyjamas and slippers she was wearingwhen she walked off the plane. The mother oftwo boys, the author of a successful and resol-utely independent 20-year musical career, Noo-nan has learned to take things in her stride.

“I knew my suitcase would turn up,” she saysin her confident, good-natured way. “I’m notsupposed to be separated from these tights, orthese boots.”

The notion that things are meant to be per-vades With Love and Fury, a project named aftera book by Wright and the phrase with which thepoet signed off her letters. Noonan came late toWright’s poetry but is a long-time fan of theBrodskys, a British group that has worked withvocalists such as Elvis Costello, Bjork and PaulMcCartney, and released more than 50 record-ings, including the works of Britten and Shos-takovich. The Brodskys have toured the world,playing its great concert halls, usually standingup instead of sitting down. They’ve diversifiedwithout ever selling out.

“I remember hearing The Juliet Letters [theBrodskys’ 1993 collaboration with Costello] andjust going ‘wow’,” says Noonan, when we meetin a cafe next to a mixing studio in Shoreditch,east London, the following day. “It was thisgenuine combination of pop and classical,

THE WRIGHT MOMENT

Katie Noonan tells Jane Cornwell how she was drawn into her project with the Brodsky Quartet

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