Entertainment
9 January, 2026
Classics turn sultry
CELLIST Charlotte Miles will be one of the headline performers at the first Australian Festival of Chamber Music to be staged in Cairns this year.
The internationally acclaimed festival will run from 24 July to 1 August 2026, marking a symbolic chapter after organisers announced last year that the 35-year-old event would relocate from Townsville to Cairns.
At just 23, Charlotte Miles is one of three world-class musicians revealed ahead of the full 2026 program.
Now based in Germany, she made her Australian Festival of Chamber Music debut in 2023, where she stunned audiences with her performances.
Ms Miles has already amassed more than 100 Australian and international competition prizes, including the special prize of the Mozart-Gesellschaft München at the 2024 ARD International Cello Competition.
Reviewer Gillian Wills wrote: “(Charlotte) Miles is so good that every note her cello sings deserves to be heard.”
She will lead the festival’s musician line-up in Cairns, returning for her third Australian Festival of Chamber Music in four years.
“This will be my third AFCM in four years and I’m just as fascinated to see how the festival will adapt to its new spaces in Cairns as I am excited to see all the lovely people in the festival team,” Ms Miles said.
“Most of all, I can’t wait to meet another inevitably fabulous crew of musicians.”
She said the festival was known for the close connections formed between artists over the intensive week-and-a-half program.
“When you spend all day, every day living, eating and making music together, you end up having the kind of great conversations that can continue seamlessly from the dinner table to the stage and back again,” she said.
The Australian Festival of Chamber Music will feature performances across nine days in Cairns, combining chamber music with the city’s tropical setting.
Two other musicians have also been confirmed for the 2026 festival: pianist Piers Lane and French horn soloist Stefan Dohr, with further artists to be announced.
Tickets will go on sale to Festival Friends on Monday 2 February 2026, with general public sales opening on Monday 2 March 2026.
