In this time of disruption to live orchestral performances across the world, let’s spare a thought also for the composers of music for ballet, opera, theatre and symphony orchestras around the globe.

With his first symphony being performed by the Queensland Symphony Orchestra in 2013, and a Chamber Symphony premiered in 2015, renowned Australian pianist and composer Mark Isaacs has released a digital world premiere of his Symphony No 2 for the first time on the YouTube streaming music platform. Even with a high quality digital realisation, however, the sonorities are a shadow of the real orchestral sound, but a virtual audience now has the opportunity to fully explore this new music with repeated hearings of this exciting and complex new work, performed here by NotePerformer Virtual Orchestra directed by Isaacs himself.

Isaacs’ orchestration demands virtuosic playing from every section of orchestral strings, 12 woodwind, 11 brass, timpani and 3 versatile percussionists, harp, celeste, harpsichord, and piano. His three-movement symphony has an intelligently designed architectural structure, encompassing inner sub-sections of contrasting mood, style and orchestration.

The first movement, Largo maestoso ma agitato, opens with a rising flourish...