Reception to Celebrate the 25th Year of the 4MBS Festival of Classics

Member for Greenslopes Mr Joe Kelly MP; Chairman of the 4MBS Classic FM Board of Directors, Mr Matthew Farrell; Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,

I am delighted to welcome you to Government House this evening for a celebration that has glorious music at its core.

Though Kaye cannot be with us, she joins me in this welcome. Music is deeply embedded in every culture on earth.  It is the bringer of great enjoyment to hundreds of millions of people. It is a wonderful gift that we all share.

If music is a precious gift, then 4MBS Classic FM is a prominent and extremely generous gift-giver to our Queensland community.

As a community radio station, 4MBS achieves this every day through its three radio services broadcasting light music, Silver Memories and classical music.

But 4MBS takes this to a new level through its annual Festival of Classics, which celebrates its twenty-fifth year in 2018.

The Festival, which in 1994 comprised six concerts over a single weekend, now features 27 concerts, held over four weeks, in a total of twelve venues.

This feast of live music has provided multiple performance opportunities, year after year, for our excellent Queensland musicians at all stages of their careers.

It has proved a wonderful launching pad for scores of Queensland artists including internationally-acclaimed soprano Jessica Pratt, Tahu Matheson, now Head of Music at Opera Australia, and his brother Tama Matheson, now an acclaimed actor/director.  

Since 1994, the Festival has brought live classical music and great joy to many thousands of people in audiences in Southeast Queensland – this year in Brisbane, Toowoomba, the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast.

The Festival does not quite require a cast of thousands – yet – but a 27-concert series is a serious undertaking in anyone’s language.

In contrast, the resources 4MBS has at hand to bring each festival to fruition is about as far from a cast of thousands as it is possible to get – a tiny number of permanent staff, supported by a corps of marvellous volunteers.

That is all the more reason for me, as Governor, on behalf of the people of Queensland, to thank and congratulate all those who have made the Festival possible since 1994. 

To the Chair and other Board members, the General Manager and his team, the splendid volunteers, and of course the wonderful musicians and their supportive audiences, I extend our gratitude and our very best wishes for the continuing success of the Festival.  

Thank you.