The Wellington Jazz Festival is just weeks away. RNZ Concert’s resident Jazz-man Nick Tipping chooses five faves that you can’t miss at the 2018 festival.

The internationally renowned viol consort Phantasm is in New Zealand for the first time, touring for Chamber Music NZ. Upbeat talks to its founder and musical director Laurence Dreyfus.

Kermit the Frog is in Wellington to perform with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. In this exclusive interview the famed amphibian shares his vocal secrets with RNZ Concert's Zoë George.

“In Memoriam” is a new song-cycle for string quartet and tenor voice by NZ composer Janet Jennings, and forms part of the programme for a three-centre tour by the New Zealand String Quartet. Upbeat talks with Janet Jennings about the new work and its inspiration, and to its soloist, baritone-turned-tenor Jared Holt about switching voice-types.

Jack Gray is the new Artistic Director of Atamira Dance, the country’s leading Maori contemporary dance company. Gray was one the company’s founders fifteen years ago but in the last few years has been working outside Aotearoa. Jack tells Eva Radich about the challenges indigenous groups face in creating work that resonates with the past but still moves the art form forward.

Te Auaha, the New Zealand Institute of Creativity has opened its doors to students in Wellington. Victoria Spackman who is Director of Te Auaha, shines a light on how the first few months have gone and just how creative the new environment is. She chooses five of her favourite pieces with a classical twist.

Salina Fisher’s Tupaia has just had its first performances by the NZSO. The work is the first of four pieces commissioned to mark the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook’s first voyage to the Pacific. Salina talks to Clarissa Dunn about the pressures  of getting a commission like this and the unusual techniques she’s used in creating the work to celebrate Cook’s Pacific navigator.

The world premiere of Salina Fisher’s new piece Tupaia was given by the NZSO and Music Director Edo de Waart last week. Fisher’s piece sat alongside Berlioz’ Les Nuits d'ete sung by top US mezzo-Soprano Sasha Cooke. Debussy and Ravel completed the programme. Elizabeth Kerr was in the crowd.

The Behn Quartet know no fear. The quartet of young women take their name from a trailblazing 17th century female playwright and have been winning international competitions and rave reviews since they formed three years ago. In the middle of their CMNZ tour, New Zealand violinist Kate Oswin and cellist Ghislaine McMullin talk about their feisty approach.  Here they are playing a string quartet version of Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, for a BBC documentary.

Olivier Latry is one of the finest organists in the world today. As well as being organist at Paris’s Notre Dame Cathedral and a professor at the Paris Conservatoire, he has a busy international concert schedule. He’s performing in Auckland’s Holy Trinity Cathedral on Saturday.