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Alexis Weaver is one of four composition students from the invited by the Museum to create and perform original music and interactive sound works inspired by its exhibitions and science projects.

The imaginative, short works composed by Henry Hulme, Nicholas Theodorou, Alexis Weaver and Josh Winestock will be heard across the galleries of the Australian Museum in a series on Wednesday evening performances from 31 January to 28 February.

, Senior Lecturer in Composition at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, who facilitated the collaboration said: 鈥淥ur young composers are increasingly taking their creativity out of the concert hall to animate unique spaces and exhibitions with sound. Projects such as this enable our students think about new ways in which music can be used to engage in a commentary with the world around them.鈥�

Alexis鈥� piece,聽Frog Chorus,聽celebrates the diverse sounds of native frog calls recorded via the Australian Museum鈥檚 new FrogID app, which enables members of the public to help track and save endangered frog species across the country.

鈥淎s an electroacoustic composer, I predominately work with sounds rather than instruments or notes, so I鈥檓 always looking to find interesting sounds to work with, which these frog calls certainly are,鈥� said Alexis Weaver.

鈥淚n my piece you can hear around 20 different frog calls, each with a strikingly individual personality and character. I wanted to create a soundscape that makes the audience feel like they are surrounded by frogs in their natural habitat. I didn鈥檛 manipulate the frog calls themselves too much, but I鈥檝e added recordings of water, crickets chirping, and stylised thunder to create a rainy, forest-like atmosphere,鈥� she said.

As part of Alexis鈥� first Culture Up Late performance on 31 January, 20 people from the audience will form a frog percussion to play alongside the composer鈥檚 Frog Chorus recording.

The percussion group will create its own cacophony of frog chirps and croaks by playing a small, frog-shaped wooden instrument to produce distinctly frog-like sounds by stroking the spine with a stick.

鈥淚鈥檓 not used to having a live element in my work, as I usually compose everything on the computer. Imagining what the audience might do with the percussion instruments and how it might sound with the track, was new for me.

鈥淪o long as the audience makes noise, has fun and becomes aware of the diversity of our native wildlife, that鈥檚 all that matters. I am looking forward to hearing them contribute to this beautiful froggy soundscape in the galleries of the Australian Museum,鈥� she said.

The compositions of Henry Hulme and Nicholas Theodorou are also unique instrumental and vocal works that respond to a 42,000-year-old baby mammoth, currently on show in the Mammoths 鈥� Giants of the Ice Age exhibition. Henry鈥檚 electronic, keyboard and vocal work, Ani/Stuck/Sotropy, reflects on the mammoth, Lyuba, being stuck or frozen in time for 40,000 years. While Nicholas鈥� solo act on trumpet, backed by a virtual recording of 1,000 trumpets, conjures up a herd of mammoths in his work titled Stasis.

For Joshua Winestock鈥檚 piece, Paths, six saxophonists including Joshua, will weave their way across the spaces and balconies of the Museum鈥檚 newly-restored Westpac Long Gallery, the nation鈥檚 first museum gallery, in a live mobile performance.

鈥淲e鈥檙e so excited to present the thoughtful, creative responses these talented Sydney Conservatorium of Music students have developed around the Museum's Mammoths exhibition, FrogID citizen science project, and the dynamic new spaces of the Westpac Long Gallery!鈥� said Sue Saxon, Creative Producer of the collaborative project at the Australian Museum.