“I am feeling very lucky to have this opportunity as an Upbeat Artist and I intend to work hard, build on my current skill set and perform beautiful music.”

Meet Helena Burns, one of Camerata’s 2023 Upbeat artists!

Helena was born in Brisbane and has lived and studied here ever since. She started learning viola at primary school and sixteen years later, she is still working on her craft every day.

Her decision to pursue music as a career started from a pivotal moment in grade 10 when she was sitting in the top string orchestra, and realised she wanted to take it more seriously. After that, she began to audition for youth orchestras and went on to study music at University.

Helena applied to the Upbeat Program after some of her peers recommended it after participating. She mentions that “[She] was inspired by the wonderful things they had to say about the program and [she] was impressed by the high quality of the performances [she] attended which led [her] to apply for the program.”

Helena is extremely excited to join Camerata, a completely unconducted and self-reliant orchestra that empowers musicians to contribute to the music-making process. She says, “to be able to work in this musical context requires enormous responsibility which I find very exciting at this point in my career”.