Inhaltsverzeichnis für December 2025 in Limelight

It is early autumn in Europe when I meet director Peter Sellars over Zoom. He is in the thick of rehearsals for the Italian premiere of Kaija Saariaho's Adriana Mater with Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, and his mood is as effervescent as ever, fuelled by a tireless appetite for discovery. A few days later, my screen flickers again, this time to reveal a sunless London, where Grammy Award-winning soprano Julia Bullock is rehearsing The Magic Flute at the Royal Ballet & Opera, Covent Garden (she later withdraws from the production due to ill health). Her voice is resonant and deliberate, hinting at the same mixture of resolve and freshness that has made her one of the most arresting sopranos of her generation. The topic of our conversations? The 2026 Adelaide…

It's not every day that you have a theatre named after you, certainly not while you're still alive. So, Nancye Hayes was completely taken aback when David Campbell rang her in 2013 to say that a consortium of producers and independent companies specialising in musical theatre was taking over the former home of Darlinghurst Theatre Company in Sydney's Potts Point later that year and wanted to rename it the Hayes Theatre Co. “I was stunned, I must say,” recalls Hayes. “I think I said, ‘Are you sure?’ And he said, ‘Yes, we're sure.’” “I spoke to Bob about it,” says Hayes, referring to her late husband, renowned jazz saxophonist Bob Bertles, “and he said, ‘That's wonderful, why don't you say yes?’” “The only bad thing – well, funny thing –…

Have you noticed the display cases in the foyers at Arts Centre Melbourne (ACM)? Usually filled with costumes from productions past, they might also contain other performing arts treasures such as set models or design sketches. Perhaps you have visited the Australian Music Vault, a small permanent exhibition in ACM's Theatres Building that explores the local popular music scene's history, from guitars to posters. If you didn't know that the displayed items are a fraction of the Australian Performing Arts Collection's 850,000-plus objects, you're not alone. “This collection is a big, best-kept secret,” says ACM's Head of Curatorial, Margot Anderson. She admits that's been frustrating since her work on it began as a volunteer in 1999; not only personally frustrating, but also because of her sense of obligation to artists…

It's 1916, and the war with Germany grinds on, claiming thousands of lives every day. The northern English mill town of Ramsden feels it keenly. Most of the town's young men have signed up and headed for the battlefields of France. Many are dead or missing. Their absence is palpable in the diminished ranks of the town's choir, whose annual concert looms. Into this gap steps – somewhat controversially – a new choirmaster, Dr Guthrie (Ralph Fiennes), a musician who, in his glory days, met Brahms and worked with Europe's leading orchestras. These days, though, a CV that includes time in Germany is a red flag. The town's vicar is uneasy too. Guthrie is a known atheist with “peculiarities” – the main one being that he's homosexual. Some think he…

ABC listening highlight The Tallis Scholars - Melbourne Recital Centre 9 December at 1pm The Tallis Scholars, founded in the UK almost 50 years ago by Director Peter Phillips, is a polished vocal ensemble so accustomed to working together that no single voice dominates, yet each line is distinct. The ethereal harmonies of Nicholas Gombert's eight-part Credo open the program, lending the venue a cathedral-like air. For those who listen with eyes closed, the feeling of being in the company of angels carries through to Crequillon's celebrated eight-part motet Andreas Christi famulus. Nico Muhly's A Glorious Creature showcases the ensemble to perfection with its 10-part harmonies and stirring words, taken from Thomas Traherne's 17th-century text Christian Ethicks, or, Divine Morality, in which he writes about the sun as a symbol…

Remember the dark days of the COVID lockdowns in 2020 and 2021? Public gatherings were curtailed and entertainment venues were shuttered, so housebound, out-of-work artists performed together via social media platforms and Zoom. As online activity flourished and new digital arts platforms emerged, nimble arts companies pivoted, offering online talks, webinars, interviews, archival footage and live performances that were socially distanced or eerily audience-free as musicians took their bows to cameras in empty theatres. More than ever, Australians looked to creativity to remain connected through the long, lonely days. Lockdown or not, these platforms were affordable, accessible and flexible. Launched and operated on the back of COVID funding, they were great levellers and opened the doors of live performances to those with limited access. Now, less than a decade after…

West Australian Ballet's new Artistic Director, Leanne Stojmenov, can pinpoint the moment she knew ballet would be her life. “I went to one class and was absolutely sold. It sounds a bit crazy that you have this vision and this clarity at the age of four, but I absolutely knew.” She remained steadfast in her vision. Stojmenov is now 44, so you could say her new appointment at WAB has been 40 years in the making. No wonder she's ready. “It has always been a massive passion that's kept me going; this massive drive in me,” she says. Born in Perth, Stojmenov had another epiphany at 17. She was thinking of heading for Europe to try her luck when she auditioned for WAB “just for experience”. The then Artistic Director,…

Nothing warms the heart at Christmas like putting your feet up with a glass of wine (mulled perhaps, or more likely laced with ice) and listening to some favourite carols. If, like me, you enjoy gussying up the trusty festive playlist each year with something new, here are seven recent releases you might consider taking for a yuletide spin. Something splashy to start. All the Stars Looked Down is a celebration of modern-day carol-meister John Rutter (Kings College KGS0075-D). Recorded in the iconic King's College Chapel, the famous Choir of King's College, Cambridge and the Britten Sinfonia are put through their paces by Daniel Hyde in orchestral arrangements of Christmas carols by Rutter himself alongside music by composers who have influenced him, including Philip Ledger and David Willcocks. It might…

I grew up in a family where music was everywhere. My mother was the youngest of five or six siblings, and everybody played a musical instrument. I remember my aunts played a lot of Schumann, and in my grandparents’ three-storey walk-up flat in Double Bay, someone was always playing the violin, cello or piano. We lived a peripatetic life. I was born in Sydney and spent time in London in the early Fifties, followed by six years in Washington, DC, before returning to Australia as a teenager. The 1950s and 1960s were revolutionary for music. I was part of the rock-and-roll generation and a quintessential bobby-soxer in white loafers. When we watched The Ed Sullivan Show, my father would often ask, “Is that any good?” to which I'd confidently reply,…

Newsworthy A round-up of our recent news reports The Sydney Conservatorium of Music is to open a new state-of-the-art teaching and research facility in Parramatta in the second half of 2026, marking the first expansion in its 110-year history. The University of Sydney is investing $30 million in the project, which will focus on 21st-century music technologies and contemporary music education. The facility will serve Bachelor of Music students specialising in digital production, songwriting and composition for creative industries, with capacity for up to 180 students by its fourth year. The project includes a $2 million strategic grant from Sound NSW and forms part of the NSW Government's Contemporary Music Strategy. A new 60-seat performance auditorium equipped with a Meyer Constellation immersive audio system will host concerts and community events,…

Our annual Recording of the Year Awards saw Limelight critics scrutinising a shortlist of 50 outstanding albums reviewed during the past 12 months. This year, four of the five categories were particularly hotly contested with just one featuring a runaway winner. In the end, it was a British in-house label that carried the day. The Hallé, based in Manchester, has a long and distinguished history – think Sir John Barbirolli and Sir Mark Elder – and its in-house label has an equally impressive track record winning our top award two years ago with Roderick Williams’ inspired disc of orchestrated English song. Its dynamic new Principal Conductor is Singapore-born Kahchun Wong, and it is his label debut – a vibrant account of Benjamin Britten's ballet The Prince of the Pagodas –…

The Beauty Awakes The Australian Ballet is currently performing David McAllister's lavish production of The Sleeping Beauty in Sydney, where it will be livestreamed. David McAllister's production of The Sleeping Beauty for The Australian Ballet first took the stage in 2015 and promptly sold out. Audiences were dazzled by its sumptuous beauty, while the Limelight review described it as “an irresistible and opulent extravaganza that inspires a sense of childlike wonder”. Ten years after its spectacular premiere, McAllister's production has returned, whisking audiences into its magical world of fairies and spells, where good fights evil and a royal wedding seals the happy ending. Set to Tchaikovsky's famous score, McAllister's production is based on Petipa's original choreography and retains iconic moments such as the Rose Adagio and the Bluebird pas de…

There is just way too much noise in the world these days, and much of it is in our homes with increasingly vocal appliances. If the fridge stays open a few seconds longer than it deems appropriate, it starts chirruping. The microwave and the air fryer sing a little duet together when they have finished cooking, and the washing machine bursts into song when the cycle is finished. All these appliances talk in different keys, so it is like listening to an early work by Pierre Boulez when they go off together. Rather than random electronic tones, why not use some quotations from suitable musical works? The fridge could play Winter (or maybe Spring) from Vivaldi's Four Seasons when the door is open for too long. I'm not sure what…

Could you give us a brief description of your new play Carol? Carol is a play that takes our most familiar season and turns it on its head. Equal parts heart and humour, it's a story of survival, shame and the search for connection at a time when expectations run sky-high. How do you yourself feel about Christmas? For me, Christmas is equal parts joy and headache. I love seeing the lights around the suburbs, swimming in the dam on the farm and Dad's giant waterslide that he makes out of black plastic. And, of course, demolishing Mum's pavlova – which, sorry to everyone else's mum, really is the best (#farmfresheggs). Me hosting though? Forget it. I've never had to do that. Being the youngest, I just get ferried around…