About Stars of Lyra
Revered Australian jazz musician and double bassist Jonathan Zwartz leads a uniquely intimate series of duo performances with the pianists that have illuminated his musical life: Mike Nock, Barney McAll, Andrea Keller, Novak Manojlovic and Chris Abrahams.

The five stars of the constellation Lyra – which in Greek mythology represents the Lyre of Orpheus — are both title and guiding metaphor.

Five performances, five pianists, each a guiding star of Australian music. 

These are years-long collaborations expressed in new music composed for the performance, each lighting a different side of the musicianship that has led Jonathan Zwartz to the centre of Australian jazz.

Performances will feature The Church’s Fazioli piano, as well as an appearance by one of five guest young artists: Martha Marlow, Leah Berry, Samantha Baxendale, Ruby Jackson and Arlo Sim.

About Jonathan Zwartz
As double bassist, Jonathan has played with Pharoah Sanders, Branford Marsalis, Lionel Loueke, Kurt Elling, Nigel Kennedy, Mark Murphy, Annie Ross, Larry Goldings, Johnny Griffin, Terri-Lynn Carrington, Genesis Owusu, and Katie Noonan.

Jonathan is also a composer, producer, songwriter, and live music advocate. 

He has released three award winning albums as composer and bandleader. His debut Album ‘The Sea’ was released in 2009 and won two Bell awards.

His follow up CD entitled ‘The Remembering and Forgetting of the Air’, won best jazz album in the Australian Recording Industry (AIR) awards.

His third Album ‘Animarum’ (2018) won the ARIA for best jazz album as well as the Bell and Air awards for that year.

In late 2019 recorded with Mike Nock, Julien Wilson and Hamish Stuart a composer’s collaborative album entitled ‘This World’ which was released in 2020 to critical acclaim, sold out a two-week National tour and was nominated for an ARIA award. In 2021 the follow up album ‘Another Dance’ was recorded and released in early 2022. It entered at no 2 on the ARIA Blues and Roots Charts.

In 2021 Jonathan was commissioned by SIMA to compose a concert work for the visiting Finnish Harpist and pianist Iro Haarla. After some delay due to the Covid epidemic, the suite was performed for the Melbourne International Jazz Festival and Sydney International Women’s Jazz Festival in November 2022. The Melbourne concert was recorded and broadcast by the ABC.

He co-produced and wrote the orchestrations for singer/songwriter Martha Marlow’s debut album, Medicine Man released in May 2021. 

He curated a series of free concerts for City of Sydney in 2021 under the working title ‘Music and Architecture’. He is currently pursuing an initiative to reactivate bandstands and rotundas in NSW for Make Music Day.

Jonathan is a Writer Director Board member of APRA.

Jonathan has a Masters Degree in Music from the Australian National University, an Associate Diploma in Jazz Studies from the NSW Conservatorium and a diploma in screen composition at the Australian Film Television and Radio School in 2012.  

He has composed Music for documentaries - ‘To Spring From The Hand’ (2014) ‘Ka-Ching, a Pokies Nation’ (ABC, 2015), ‘Madhattan’, (2016), ‘The Scribe’ (ABC 2017) ‘Backtrack Boys’ (ABC 2018), ‘Richard Leplastrier – Framing the View’ (ABC 2020) and several short films also.

He is co-director of The Starfish Club, a monthly concert series now celebrating its 24th year, featuring artists such as Jon Cleary, Deb Conway and Willy Zygier, Don Walker, Tim Rogers, Amanda Brown and Lindy Morrison, Leah Flannagan, Rai Thistlethwayte, Reg Mombassa and Peter O’Doherty, Diana Rouvas, Steve Kilbey, Jade MacRae, Mahalia Barnes, Lucy Thorne and many more.

About Andrea Keller
Born of Czech parents, Andrea grew up in Sydney, Australia. She studied piano, flute and saxophone at the Sydney Conservatorium High School. Inspired by her older brother, she penned her first compositions at the age of 10 and received her AMusA with distinction on piano at age 14. It was around this time that she was introduced to jazz music and the art of improvisation. Continuing to explore classical, jazz and original musics throughout her teenage years, her musical path became more defined when she moved to Melbourne as a lone teenager in the 1990s to study improvisation at the Victorian College of the Arts.

Committed to creating new music with an emphasis on improvisation and collaboration, she has released twenty-three albums as bandleader since 2000, and has performed on many other albums, including those by the Black Arm Band Company, the Australian Art Orchestra, the Vanessa Perica Orchestra, Sam Anning Septet, and Eddie Perfect. Andrea has also been invited to compose works for a variety of artists and ensembles – most recently for ‘Across Silence’ (the art of music, Auslan and haptics), the Monash Art Ensemble, Genevieve Lacey and Marshall McGuire, and Ensemble Offspring.

Highly lauded for her music, Andrea has received numerous awards over her career. In 2022 she was the HC Coombs Fellow at ANU Canberra and received the Art Music Luminary (Victoria) Award. Previous recognition includes three ARIA awards, multiple Australian Jazz Bell awards, a Music Victoria award, multiple Art Music awards, the Merlyn Myer Composing Women’s Commission, the Melbourne Music Prize – Beleura Emerging Composers Award, an APRA Professional Development, an Australia Council Fellowship, and the inaugural MCA/Freedman Foundation Jazz Fellowship. 

Andrea holds a Bachelor of Music in Improvisation (Honours) from the Victorian College of the Arts, a Master of Arts (Research) from Queensland University of Technology and a PhD from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Sydney University.

A champion of Australian creative music and a nurturer of emerging musicians, Andrea curates Monday nights at the Jazzlab, runs the educational program Gender Defying Jazz and is Head of Jazz & Improvisation at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, University of Melbourne.

About Sam Baxendale
Sam Baxendale, a vocalist and songwriter, refined her musical passion at Southern Lights Vocal Academy under Isabelle Spinelli, exploring R&B, soul, funk and gospel before diving into jazz with Evan Kerr’s guidance. Under the mentorship of Eric Dunan at the Wollongong Conservatorium of Music, Sam quickly integrated into the Con Jazz program, rapidly evolving and contributing to original compositions.

Currently pursuing jazz studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Sam blends traditional jazz with contemporary influences. Thriving in Sydney’s music scene, she has worked as a session musician and as a backing vocalist on Joe Mungovan’s album ‘Sugar, Candy, Lips’.