Sydney Chamber Opera

Last updated

Sydney Chamber Opera
OriginSydney, Australia
GenresContemporary opera, chamber opera
Years active2011–present
Website sydneychamberopera.com

Sydney Chamber Opera is an opera company based in Sydney, Australia. It is a resident company at Carriageworks. [1] The company was founded in 2010 by Louis Garrick and Jack Symonds. [2] Its first production was in February 2011 and has since produced between two and four twentieth and twenty-first century chamber operas each year. Its repertoire typically consists of world premieres of Australian operas and recent international works receiving their Australian premieres, including stagings of song cycles or non-traditional stage works. [3]

Contents

History and repertoire

Sydney Chamber Opera began with the world premiere of Notes from Underground by Jack Symonds and Pierce Wilcox, an adaptation of Dostoevsky’s novel at the Cellblock Theatre, Darlinghurst. [4] The Cunning Little Vixen , The Lighthouse , Owen Wingrave , Exil , His Music Burns, Mayakovsky, Fly Away Peter , An Index of Metals and O Mensch! were presented at Carriageworks and I Have Had Enough, In the Penal Colony and Climbing Toward Midnight at National Institute of Dramatic Art. [5] Through The Gates was a performance for the 18th Biennale of Sydney at Pier 2/3 Walsh Bay amidst a large-scale installation by Belgian artist Honoré δ'O  [ fr ] [6] and Victory Over the Sun was another site-specific commission by the 20th Biennale of Sydney for performance on Cockatoo Island, reimagining an early-twentieth century Futurist work with Western Sydney artist Justene Williams. [7] His Music Burns, [8] Passion [9] and O Mensch!, [10] and Biographica [11] were presented in the 2014, 2016 & 2017 Sydney Festivals. Passion was a revival of a production by Pierre Audi. Fly Away Peter toured to Arts Centre Melbourne in association with Melbourne Festival in October 2015, [12] and in 2018 the previous year's production of The Rape of Lucretia was co-presented by Victorian Opera and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra at the Dark Mofo Festival. [13]

2011–2015

WP= World premiere; AP= Australian premiere

2016

2017

2018

2019

2020

2021

Key personnel

Jack Symonds is the Artistic Director. [15]

Huw Belling is Principal Artistic Associate. Danielle Maas, Mitchell Riley, Jane Sheldon, James Wannan and Pierce Wilcox are Artistic Associates. [16]

The company has typically engaged stage directors from a theatre background, often making their operatic debut, e.g. Sydney Theatre Company artistic director Kip Williams. [17] The company has also been noted for developing talented young singers. [18]

Related Research Articles

Culture of Sydney Overview of cultures in Sydney, Australia

The cultural life of Sydney, Australia is dynamic and multicultural. Many of the individual cultures that make up the Sydney mosaic are centred on the cultural, artistic, ethnic, linguistic and religious communities formed by waves of immigration. Sydney is a major global city with a vibrant scene of musical, theatrical, visual, literary and other artistic activity.

Glyn Maxwell British writer

Glyn Maxwell is a British poet, playwright, novelist, librettist, and lecturer.

Michael Berkeley

Michael Fitzhardinge Berkeley, Baron Berkeley of Knighton, is an English composer, broadcaster on music and member of the House of Lords.

Jacqueline McKenzie Australian actress

Jacqueline Susan McKenzie is an Australian film and stage actress.

Douglas James Wright was a New Zealand dancer and choreographer in the New Zealand arts establishment from 1980 until his death in 2018. Although he announced his retirement from dance in 2008, on the occasion of the publication of his first book of poetry, Laughing Mirror he subsequently continued to make dance works, including touring The Kiss Inside during April 2015.

Theatre of Australia Overview of theatre in Australia

Theatre of Australia refers to the history of the performing arts in Australia, or produced by Australians. There are theatrical and dramatic aspects to a number of Indigenous Australian ceremonies such as the corroboree. During its colonial period, Australian theatrical arts were generally linked to the broader traditions of English literature and to British and Irish theatre. Australian literature and theatrical artists have over the last two centuries introduced the culture of Australia and the character of a new continent to the world stage.

Susan Gritton is an English operatic soprano. She was the 1994 winner of the Kathleen Ferrier Award and has sung leading roles in a wide-ranging repertoire from Handel and Mozart to Britten, Janáček and Strauss.

Nina Stemme

Nina Maria Stemme is a Swedish dramatic soprano opera singer.

(Albert) Meredith Davies CBE was a British conductor, renowned for his advocacy of English music by composers such as Benjamin Britten, Frederick Delius and Ralph Vaughan Williams.

<i>La Passion de Simone</i>

La Passion de Simone is an oratorio composed by Kaija Saariaho to a libretto in French by Amin Maalouf, first premiered in a staging by Peter Sellars. The work, subtitled "a musical journey in 15 stations", centers on the life and writings of Simone Weil and was conceived in the Passion Play tradition with episodes in her life linked to the Stations of the Cross. It is composed for SATB chorus, soprano soloist, spoken voice, orchestra and electronic instruments.

Marshall McGuire is an Australian harpist, teacher, conductor and musical administrator. He has been described as the world's greatest champion of new music for the harp. Tristram Cary has written "A new school of harp music is emerging from the enterprise of this innovative master performer".

Mary Finsterer is an Australian composer and academic.

Roderick Gregory Coleman Williams OBE is a British baritone and composer.

(Andrew) Alexander Briger AO is an Australian classical conductor. He is the nephew of the conductor Sir Charles Mackerras, and both are descended from the composer Isaac Nathan.

Anita Louise Combe Australian actress, singer, dancer

Anita Louise Combe is an Australian actress, singer, dancer who has worked extensively in the entertainment industry all around the world. Combe attended the Gwen Mackay School of Dancing and trained in the Cechetti method of ballet with Jennifer Pollard in Adelaide, South Australia before making her first professional appearance on stage as Sillabub in the Australian Premiere Production of Cats at the Theatre Royal in Sydney. She is one of the few people in the world to date who has played both roles of Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly in the production of Chicago in the West End. Anita created the role of Stephanie Mangano in the World Premiere Production of Saturday Night Fever opposite fellow Australian, Adam Garcia and produced by Adelaide born, Robert Stigwood.


Kip Williams is an Australian theatre and opera director. Williams is the Artistic Director of Sydney Theatre Company. His appointment at age 30 made him the youngest Artistic Director in the company's history.

<i>In the Penal Colony</i> (opera) Opera by Philip Glass

In the Penal Colony is a chamber opera in one act and 16 scenes composed by Philip Glass to an English-language libretto by Rudy Wurlitzer. The opera is based on Franz Kafka's German-language short story In the Penal Colony. It was commissioned by ACT Theatre in Seattle, Washington, where it premiered on August 31, 2000. It has a running time of approximately 80 minutes and is scored for two singers and a string quintet.

Carriageworks Multi-purpose arts venue in Sydney

Carriageworks is a multi-arts urban cultural precinct located at the former Eveleigh Railway Workshops in Redfern, Sydney, Australia. Carriageworks showcases contemporary art and performing arts, as well as being used for filming, festivals, fairs and commercial exhibitions. The largest such venue in Australia, it is a cultural facility of the NSW Government, and receives support from Create NSW and the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts. The centre has commissioned new work by Australian and international artists, and has been home to eight theatre, dance and film companies, including Performance Space, Sydney Chamber Opera and Moogahlin Performing Arts, and a weekly farmers' market has operated there for many years.

Tom Wright is an Australian theatre writer, mostly known for his adaptations and translations.

Joseph Phibbs is an English composer of orchestral, choral and chamber music. He has also composed for theatre, both in the UK and Japan. Since 1998 he has written regularly to commissions for Festivals, for private sponsors, and for the BBC, which has broadcast premieres of his orchestral and chamber works from the Proms and elsewhere. His works have been given premieres in Europe, the United States and the Far East, and he has received prestigious awards, including most recently a British Composer Award, and a Library of Congress Serge Koussevitzky Music Foundation Award. Many of his works have been premiered by leading international musicians, including Dame Evelyn Glennie, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Leonard Slatkin, Sakari Oramo, Vasily Petrenko, Gianandrea Noseda, and the Belcea Quartet.

References

  1. ↑ "Residents – Carriageworks". Carriageworks. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  2. ↑ "The wide-eyed impresarios taking on a proud tradition".
  3. ↑ "About". sydneychamberopera.com. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  4. ↑ "Auspicious launch of an impressive production". The Sydney Morning Herald. 21 February 2011. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  5. 1 2 "Past Productions". sydneychamberopera.com. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  6. ↑ "Through the Gates". sydneychamberopera.com. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  7. ↑ "Sorry you missed the best thing at the Biennale". Time Out Sydney. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  8. ↑ "Outstanding performances by Sydney Chamber Opera at Sydney Festival | by Bachtrack for classical music, opera, ballet and dance event reviews". bachtrack.com. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  9. ↑ "Passion: Sydney Festival".
  10. ↑ "O Mensch!: Sydney Festival".
  11. ↑ McCallum, Peter (8 January 2017). "Biographica review: Mary Finsterer and Tom Wright's story of Gerolamo Cardano". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 22 September 2018.
  12. ↑ "Fly Away Peter | Melbourne Festival". Melbourne Festival. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  13. ↑ "★★★★½ The Rape of Lucretia (VO & TSO for Dark Mofo)". Limelight. Retrieved 22 September 2018.
  14. ↑ "Finland's premier composer" by Andrew Ford, The Music Show, Radio National, 16 December 2018
  15. ↑ "Louis Garrick Steps down as Sydney Chamber Opera".
  16. ↑ "About". sydneychamberopera.com. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  17. ↑ "Kip Williams leaps from STC to Sydney Chamber Opera and Back".
  18. ↑ "Live review: The Lighthouse (Sydney Chamber Opera)". www.limelightmagazine.com.au. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.