Weddings & Parties Over Coffee

Bach Akademie Australia bring Weddings & Parties Over Coffee to the Harold Lobb Concert Hall on Friday 7 August, one stop in a five-city national tour that takes them through Brisbane, Newcastle, Sydney, Canberra and Glenbrook. It's a continuation of the ensemble's 2026 season, and the programme is built around two of J.S. Bach's more lighthearted works: the Wedding Cantata (BWV 202) and the Coffee Cantata (BWV 211). The latter is narrated by Dan Walker, so it's as much a story as a piece of music.

Around those two, they've tucked in a few more Bachs: two arias from Selig ist der Mann (BWV 57) and the Ouverture from Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B Minor. They also bring in W.F. Bach's Sinfonia for chamber orchestra, so you get the father and son in one sitting. The whole thing is directed by Artistic Director Madeleine Easton.

There's a bit of a family story at the centre of this one. Soprano Miriam Allan is a Newcastle native, and she's singing alongside her father, baritone Christopher Allan, who spent years as a Senior Lecturer and Musical Director of the Newcastle University Choir. Miriam's a seasoned soloist who's performed with Les Arts Florissants, the English Baroque Soloists and Concerto Copenhagen, and has played the Lincoln Centre in New York, the Musikverein in Vienna and the Barbican in London. Hearing her on the same stage as her father, back in her hometown, gives the night a personal thread that goes beyond the music.

Tickets run from A$30 to A$80, and the concert is at the Harold Lobb Concert Hall inside the Newcastle Conservatorium of Music, on the corner of Laman and Auckland Streets.