When you see it from the air, it’s a lot smaller than you expect. More cratery and corroded. More mound than monolith. But when I finally make it to the foot of Ayers Rock, I feel like one of those gorillas in 2001: A Space Odyssey, staring up in dumb simian wonder at a phenomenon far beyond my understanding. Whoa… So that’s why Ayers Rock is one of Australia’s icons – because it’s really, really big and impressive.
 
I’m in Australia’s red centre on a junket kindly arranged by Northern Territory Tourism. And a very nice junket it is so far, with shuttle buses, chilled water, indigenous dancing and handicrafts, hors-d’oeuvres sculpted from local flora and fauna, and lots of smiley people wearing lanyards.

But I must admit to feeling like something of a fraud in their midst. I’m not really here for the touristy stuff – but for the music. Tonight at 7pm will be the first symphony concert ever held at Ayers Rock. The band: the Darwin Symphony; the music: a Verdi gala conducted by Matthew Wood; the soloists: soprano Emma Matthews and tenor James Egglestone.
 
It’s an evening of firsts for me as well. It’s not only my first ever trip to the NT, but also my first taste of the Darwin Symphony, an ensemble I’ve been trying to keep track of from Sydney, without much success. The DSO, I learn today, are a semi-professional outfit (well, there are five professionals), who give eight concerts a year, many of them outdoors. It’s also very young-looking orchestra, which is fitting for a very young town; the average age in Darwin is 31, says the orchestra’s general manager Guy Ross.
 
Last time I checked, the DSO’s conductor was Martin Jarvis, an academic perhaps best known for claiming that Bach’s Cello Suites were written by his second wife Anna Magdalena. But, as of May this year, the orchestra has a new maestro at the helm. Matthew Wood is a career conductor who studied with the legendary Jorma Panula, has earned his stripes with a bunch of European orchestras and seems like a dream appointment for the ensemble.

I’m looking forward to what should be a compelling contrast: a youthful symphony orchestra playing against the backdrop of one of the world’s oldest natural landmarks – a rock thrust up from the earth 600 million years ago during an episode known as the Petermann Orogeny (which sounds vaguely erotic to me, but perhaps I’ve been out in the desert too long).
 
While we’re on the subject of geology, it turns out Ayers Rock is made out of arkose, a type of sandstone characterized by an abundance of feldspar. So now you know.
 
Trumpeter James Morrison and didjeridu virtuoso William Barton are also here for the second-ever concert at Ayers Rock on Saturday night. I spoke to James earlier today, who expressed his amusement at the address for tonight’s concert: Fire Trail 37. Forget Covent Garden!
 
Verdi suspected in his lifetime that his operas had made a bit of splash, but I say you’re no one until your music’s been played on Fire Trail 37. So how does old Giuseppe sound out in the desert? (Strictly speaking, it’s a semi-arid zone, but whatever). Read the review here.