Category: ARTS & CULTURE

Summer is getting cold with Opera Australia and the return of Turandot

Turandot

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Posted: 14/11/2018

It’s been a few years since the Chinese princess locked away in her Pagoda tower graced the Sydney stage in Turandot, but she’s back again this summer, and bringing the chill. She’s known for her cold demeanour, ruthlessness and cunning nature – especially toward men – sure to add a bit of frost to Sydney’s revolting humidity right in the thick of the summer months. Opera Australia is bringing back Puccini’s principessa as part of the spring-summer season and it’s sure to be a hit. She’s lauded as one of the ultimate classics in the Opera Australia repertoire. This time around, the production will feature the director’s own famous choreography, sculptural stagecraft and larger than life costumes, this renowned staging of Turandot has transformed this already powerful drama into a spectacular piece of theatre. After stunning audiences with her role debut in Opera Australia’s 2018 digital production of Aida, American powerhouse soprano Amber Wagner makes her triumphant return to Sydney to take on the role of the brutal Turandot. Read more about the last time Opera Australia performed Turandot at the Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour here. Turandot is on in Sydney from January 15-29, February 1-27 and March 1-27. Get tickets for the production from Opera Australia.

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, LIFESTYLE, OPERA, SYDNEY

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Opera Australia has released the new set design for West Side Story in March

West Side Story

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Posted: 04/11/2018

It’s back again in March and in 2019, the Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour by Opera Australia is doing something a little less conventional. They’ll bring the full splendour of New York City to Sydney’s waterfront with a dazzling set design offering a brand new take on one of the 20th century’s most iconic musicals. It’s a far cry from previous years’ Turandot, La Boheme and Carmen, but if it’s by Opera Australia, you know it’ll be great. One of Australia’s most accomplished theatrical designers, Brian Thomson, is shaping a spectacular vision for West Side Story that will invigorate Sydney’s iconic harbour with the spirit of New York, the city that never sleeps. Renowned for creating sets that feature huge iconic objects that encapsulate the story, Thomson’s remarkable set design will be dominated by a giant 15 metre tall highway overpass that will soar 30 metres across the length of the stage, symbolising the gritty underbelly of New York’s urban gang culture. Keep your eyes on the Opera Australia website for more.

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, LIFESTYLE, OPERA, SYDNEY

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What to look forward to this spring from Opera Australia in Melbourne

Opera Rigoletto

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Updated: 08/11/2018

As we move into spring in Melbourne, Opera Australia really starts to fire-up, putting on some of the country’s most astonishing opera productions for everyone – free and not! If it’s not the classics like Turandot or The Magic Flute, then you know Opera Australia will put on any combination of other sensational productions to whet your appetite. These four must-see productions are sure to get you going. METAMORPHOSIS (Howard) Opera Australia offers a rare and exciting opportunity to experience a chamber opera in an intimate setting this October when it presents the Melbourne premiere of a new production of Australian composer Brian Howard’s Metamorphosis in an all new location; The Coopers Malthouse, Merlyn Theatre. This opera, directed by Tama Matheson, tells the tale of a broken man turned insect and how he and his family grapple with the riveting and terrifying transformation. Brian Howard’s score is percussive, inventive, courageous, and truly reflects a story of social alienation in a modern, inhumane world. The Coopers Malthouse Merlyn Theatre, 113 Sturt Street, Southbank 25, 26, 27 October 2018 | Tickets $79 LA BOHEME (Puccini) Known as one of the world’s all-time favourite operas, and the inspiration behind Moulin Rouge and the musical Rent, Puccini’s La Bohe?me continues to delight audiences. With its lush sets and costumes, soaring music and a world-class cast, this glittering production, set in the bohemian streets of 1930s Berlin is the perfect showcase for this heartbreaking love story. Returning to the Melbourne stage in November, this lavish production brings Puccini’s classic to life in a… Read More

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, LIFESTYLE, MELBOURNE, OPERA

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LUMAS Gallery has a new exhibition of photographer Werner Pawlok

House of Maria © Werner Pawlok au.lumas.com

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Updated: 26/03/2022

The culture capital has again turned it on at LUMAS Gallery, putting on a show for photography lovers the city/country-wide. The artist? Photographer Werner Pawlok, of course and it’s not stingy on the colour; if that’s your thing. Pawlok first started photographing his idol Jimi Hendrix way back when, and has now established a strong portfolio of profile and celebrities images including John Malkovich, Jean Paul Gaultier, Juliette Binoche and in a good Australian connection, Leigh Bowery. In 1988, Werner contacted Bowery after seeing him in a magazine and Bowery came to Pawlok’s studio for an exclusive shoot and his images have become some of the most synonymous with the performance artist. This exhibition in October at the gallery in Melbourne features a series of works capturing the homes of Havana across the last decade. So, if the reclusive Communist state that almost sparked the end of the world in the Cold War is your thing, then you need to go. The images offer a fascinating glimpse into life in the Cuban capital as it begins to undergo a process of momentous change and reflects on the former glory of its past. The images are stunning, rich blues and greens with old world chandeliers and antique furniture situated alongside to faded photos of revolutionary director Che Guevara. Pawlok has visited Cuba a number of times including for a Chanel fashion show with Harper’s Bazaar and seeks out less accessible places to shoot, literally driving around town for hours until he sees a building he is drawn too and then knocking on strangers doors… Read More

Category: ART, ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, FEATURES, LIFESTYLE, MELBOURNE

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Paolo Bordogna in The Turk in Italy by Opera Australia will make you actually laugh

Paolo Bordogna in The Turk in Italy

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Posted: 23/08/2018

So, if there’s one thing you notice about operas that some of the world’s best opera companies like Opera Australia produce, is that a lot of them are really sad. Like, really sad. Everyone dies, there’s lots of heartache and you leave wanting more, but feeling sad about it. In an insatiably excellent way. It’s one doozie of an emotional rollercoaster. But from time-to-time, you come across comedic productions that turn all that around for the better part of two hours, transforming the stage of Joan Sutherland Theatre in the Sydney Opera House into a source of laughs, brought-about by a cast lead by – fastly-becoming favourite – singers, Paolo Bordogna and Melburnian diva, Stacey Alleaume. The latest production by Opera Australia, The Turk in Italy (on until 1 September 2018) is just that and so much more. With new import, Bodogna, alongside the likes of Alleaume, Virgilio Marino (who plays Narciso) and Warwick Fyfe (Geronio), the cast, choir and conductor Andrea Molino do a stupendous job in bringing a 50s-themed tale of sexual tension, debauchery and mischievousness to light for the laugh-out-loud enjoyment of the audience. It’s basically a tale of a bored housewife, a sycophantic husband, a sexy Turkish visitor, a nymphomaniacal gypsy and a poet who’s just after a good storyline, all of whom culminate in a comedic explosion that really does wonders to punctuate the winter season for the opera company. We spoke with Bordogna, the Italian tenor, who admits though it’s a funny production, there’s a hell of a lot of finesse… Read More

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, LIFESTYLE, OPERA, SYDNEY

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Looking into the future: How Aida is changing the game for Opera Australia

Opera Australia Aida king

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Updated: 16/11/2022

Going up against the traditionalist lovers of classic opera is no easy thing. You have to be one ballsy creative with a great vision and a lot of grunt. Good thing that the artistic director of Opera Australia, Lyndon Terracini is just that and has taken this month’s production of renowned opera Aida as the first stepping stone on the way to the future for the Australian opera company. Aida is the story of the enslaved Ethiopian princess in Egypt, who’s got a thing for a guy called Ramades. Ramades is sent off to conquer her homeland of Ethiopia and he returns with her Dad – the King – as a slave. Ramades is then given the Egyptian princess’ hand in marriage, but he doesn’t want it, so the two meet-up for one last hurrah on the banks of the Nile before it all comes crashing down. It’s a dramatic love story that, if any other productions of it around the world would indicate – is one hell of an effort by the costume and set design team, let alone the director and singers themselves. Just look at the production on Coolangatta beach by Opera Australia in 2017. But in 2018, Opera Australia is doing something different for now and for the future, working with a unique set, incredible cast and costumes and the world-class, ‘knee-weakeningly’ incredible voices of the singers – as per usual – and a production that is as much appealing to the younger generations of screen-addicted millennials as it is for the… Read More

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, FEATURES, LIFESTYLE, OPERA, SYDNEY

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Death, music and an ugly clown: Rigoletto by Opera Australia is a must-see

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Updated: 08/11/2018

If there’s one thing you learn fast about any opera, is that a lot of them are sad and most of the time, people – if not everyone – die. So it’s no surprise that the tale of Rigoletto, brought to life this winter season in Sydney by Opera Australia – on until 24 August – tells the tale as old as time, but this time, with all the spit ‘n’ polish, the likes only the Australian opera company can produce. Though, stunning oscillating set and world-class costumery aside, it doesn’t detract from the fact that the loss for Rigoletto in the climax is the saddest of many deaths in reproduced operas of late; because it’s all his fault. With director, Elijah Moshinsky behind the wheel of this season’s production, the production by Opera Australia is every bit as unique as the hit aria of the libretto, La Donna e Mobile, which you’d’ve heard before… Dalibor Jenis takes-on the role of the hideous, clowny, much disliked Rigoletto, turning his renowned performances as the likes of Figaro into an award-winning on-stage display. As he encapsulates the role of the overprotective father who pisses a few people off as he goes through life, little does he realise the fate that awaits him – disproportionately driven by his own hand, by today’s standards – with the death of his daughter. The whole thing is really idyllically represented through the music of Verdi, who even at the time, knew he had a hit on his hands. First fury, then despair, then… Read More

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, LIFESTYLE, OPERA, SYDNEY

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Pinchgut Opera is doing two operas and two performances in two cities in 2019

Pinchgut Opera singer

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Updated: 10/08/2018

Sydney and Melbourne are set to host the Pinchgut Opera’s 2019 season between them, from a program comprising of internationally celebrated artists. Pinchgut Opera rediscovers operatic masterpieces from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and next year, the company will stage four seasons: in April, Pinchgut performs a concert of Bach’s Easter Oratorio together with Telemann’s Thunder Ode; in June, Monteverdi’s final opera The Return of Ulysses; in August, the multi-award-winning counter-tenor Valder Sabadus will perform in Australia for the first time for one night only; and in December Pinchgut will stage Vivaldi’s favourite opera, Farnace. It’s an exciting time for the production company who’ve made the baroque era of opera and the striking days of the countertenor their ‘bread and butter’ since launching in 2002 in Sydney. What are the opera about? Based on the final chapters of Homer’s Odyssey, Monteverdi’s late masterpiece, The Return of Ulysses, is an epic yet intimate story of love, constancy and sacrifice. This production will be directed by Chas Rader-Shieber, designed by Melanie Liertz, and features Portuguese tenor Fernando Guimarães, last seen in Australia in the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra’s Handel: Heaven, as Ulysses, a role he has sung to international acclaim. Australian mezzo-soprano Catherine Carby, whose performances have earned her rave reviews around the world, joins him as Penelope. Widely acclaimed as Monteverdi’s crowning achievement,The Return of Ulysses was his first opera for the city of Venice, with its humming network of thriving and competing opera houses. Gramophone has described Monteverdi as illuminating ‘almost every aspect of human experience in a way that was without precedent’ in this, his final opera. Vivaldi’s Farnace is a passionate drama of political and dynastic intrigue. In… Read More

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, LIFESTYLE, MELBOURNE, OPERA, SYDNEY

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STOMP is back at the Capitol Theatre Sydney for one week

Stomp trollies

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Posted: 02/08/2018

Percussion is alive and well! In fact, STOMP – the internationally acclaimed on-stage homage to it – is back in Sydney for a week-long production of an on-stage celebration of all things noise. Following sell-out world tours, STOMP is serving-up unstoppable energy and pure stage magic, according to some, in an array of music that comes from the most unexpected of ‘instruments’. Wordless, witty and fun, STOMP has become a global phenomenon. Eight performers use non-traditional instruments – everything from supermarket trolleys to Zippo lighters, plastic bags to garbage can lids, and even the kitchen sink – to hammer out an explosively feel-good rhythm. It’s pretty clever stuff. Catch the show from 31 July – 5 August 2018 at the Capitol Theatre, Sydney. See more at the STOMP website. 

Category: ARTS & CULTURE, CITIES, SYDNEY, THEATRE

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