Melbourne Symphony Orchestra

Melbourne Symphony Orchestra — the country’s busiest concert orchestra

The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra runs the densest subscription concert programme of any orchestra in the country. The MSO performs roughly 180 concerts a year, almost all of them at Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne — the Southbank concert hall that was acoustically rebuilt in 2010–2012 and is the city’s main symphonic room. The chief conductor since 2013 has been Sir Andrew Davis, succeeded in 2024 by Jaime Martín, the Spanish conductor previously of the London Symphony Orchestra and the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra. The MSO is the in-residence orchestra for the Australian Boys Choir, the MSO Chorus, the Sidney Myer Music Bowl free summer concerts, and the orchestra-in-the-pit for Victorian Opera and occasional Opera Australia Melbourne productions (alongside Orchestra Victoria).

What they’re known for

The MSO is the country’s most consistent symphonic working orchestra — they play more concerts a year than the SSO does and the breadth of repertoire is correspondingly wider. The Romantic warhorses (Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Dvořák) get their annual outings; the twentieth-century mainstream (Shostakovich, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Sibelius) is programmed regularly; the Russian and French Romantic repertoire is unusually well-represented; and the contemporary programme has been strong for two decades, with Brett Dean, Liza Lim and Carl Vine all on recent commissions lists.

The MSO’s signature event is the Sidney Myer Free Concerts — three free open-air concerts at the Music Bowl in February each year, drawing audiences of 8,000 to 12,000 per concert. The orchestra has been doing these since 1929 and they remain the best entry-point to Australian symphonic music for first-time listeners.

Home venues

• Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne — 2,464 seats, acoustically rebuilt 2010–2012. The principal home. Stalls front-half or circle middle for the best balance.
• Sidney Myer Music Bowl — Kings Domain, Melbourne. The summer venue for the free concerts.
• Robert Blackwood Hall, Monash University — used for the Monash subscription series.
• Costa Hall, Geelong — used for the regional Geelong subscription series.

The season pattern — and how to book

The MSO announces its annual season in mid-September for the following year. Subscriptions open immediately. Single tickets go on sale in mid-November. The Sidney Myer Free Concerts are programmed separately and announced in late November; the concerts themselves are free but seating tickets (chair zone, near the stage) require booking and usually go online in early January.

The Hamer Hall acoustics are best in the front-half of the stalls and the middle of the circle — the rear stalls have a known dryness issue (a leftover from the 1980s build that wasn’t fully fixed in the 2012 redevelopment). The chairs in the choir stalls behind the orchestra are the cheapest reliable seats and give you the conductor’s-perspective view.

Planning a trip

The MSO is the easiest cultural night out in Melbourne. Hamer Hall sits on Southbank, two minutes’ walk from Flinders Street, three from the Arts Centre proper. Pair with a meal at Vue de Monde, MoVida (a 5-minute walk), or the casual canteen-style at Federation Square. Stay in Southbank or Eastern Hill if you want to walk; in Carlton or East Melbourne if you want a more residential trip.

For the music traveller, the MSO Friday-Saturday programme is the typical pair (same programme both nights; Friday tends to attract a slightly older crowd, Saturday a slightly younger one). Pair with the Australian Chamber Orchestra at the Melbourne Recital Centre, two minutes around the corner, on a different night.

Tour reach beyond the capitals

The MSO runs the most consistent regional touring programme of any of the symphonies — the Geelong subscription series is its second-tier residency, and one-off concerts run to Bendigo, Mildura, Mornington, Wodonga and Warrnambool through the year. International tours have included China, Japan and Europe in recent years. The MSO is also the orchestra-of-choice for major regional festival appearances — they’ve played Port Fairy Spring Music Festival, Mildura Wentworth Arts Festival and the Castlemaine State Festival in recent years.

Useful links

• Official: mso.com.au
• Venue: Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
• Where we cover them: Companies, Reviews