Tabla de contenidos para August 2024 en Limelight

Albert Ehrnrooth Born in Finland, Albert Ehrnrooth grew up in Holland and lives in the UK. After training at Guildhall School of Music and Drama, he worked as an actor, singer and director before becoming a reporter/broadcaster for Sveriges Radio, Yleisradio Oy (Yle), ABC Radio, De Telegraaf, The Guardian and other publications. Deborah Jones Deborah Jones is a writer specialising in dance. A former long-serving Arts Editor of The Australian, she is currently the newspaper's national dance critic and also reviews musical theatre and theatre. She is the Sydney correspondent for London-based Opera magazine and Vancouver-based Dance International. Jane Albert Jane Albert is a Sydney-based arts writer who has spent two decades covering theatre, dance, the visual arts, music and film for publications including The Weekend Australian, the Australian Financial…

Anton Bruckner wrote in his will that he wanted to be a “Leiche erster Klasse” – a first-class corpse. He had a penchant for hanging around cemeteries and witnessing executions, and was rumoured to have kissed the skulls of two of his favourite composers, Beethoven and Schubert. On top of his ghoulish obsession, he suffered from a compulsive urge to count his actions and objects, from his daily prayers to the leaves on a tree to the sequins on his sister's dress. At times, his obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) was off the scale. Even more disturbing were his marriage proposals to teenaged girls – the last one when he was 56. (As a devout Catholic, it was important to him that his prospective young bride was a virgin.) Time and again,…

Black Inc. launched its Shortest History series in 2012 with The Shortest History of Europe. Since then, it has published 14 titles in the collection including The Shortest History of the World, The Shortest History of Democracy, The Shortest History of War and The Shortest History of Italy to name but a few, with The Shortest History of Ancient Rome to be released in November. The series has now sold over half a million copies worldwide. Each book offers a clear, concise, illuminating account of the chosen topic by a leading expert. When it came to The Shortest History of Music, who better to write it than award-winning composer, broadcaster and writer Andrew Ford? Ford's music has been performed and recorded around the world by ensembles including the Australian Chamber…

Sydney Dance Company last collaborated with the Australian Chamber Orchestra in 2015. Were you keen to join forces again? Our last collaboration with the Australian Chamber Orchestra was Illuminated, a stunning showcase of dance and music [by Britten and Rameau, as well as some JS Bach and Vivaldi] which toured internationally after a sold-out one-night show in Melbourne. The audience reception was amazing and a testament to the immense power of music and movement live onstage, which is something I've always loved. Ever since that incredible collaboration in 2015, Richard [Tognetti, the ACO's Artistic Director] and I have been looking for the next project to work on together. When Richard proposed Silence & Rapture, I immediately said, “YES!” It is an incredibly exciting opportunity to reunite with the ACO and…

Choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa has a guiding principle that perhaps wouldn't work for everyone. She simply says ‘yes’ to requests and sees where that takes her. Soon that will be Brisbane, where her ballet Coco Chanel: the Life of a Fashion Icon will be staged by Queensland Ballet, one of 80 companies around the world where Lopez Ochoa's dances have been seen. True, Lopez Ochoa did knock back an invitation to make an Alice in Wonderland adaptation because, she says, “Dramaturgically it's not a good story; she ends the way she starts which makes it to me not that interesting.” The choreographer is otherwise ready and willing to do something new, restage existing repertoire or revise something to suit a different company. “I don't decide where I go. I get…

By the time Beethoven premiered his Ninth Symphony, he had purportedly been deaf for seven years. Deaf! We hear this over and over, like a repeated motif. But 200 years ago, what was the message he was trying to project in this Symphony? What is the message still falling on deaf ears - ours not his? I will not attempt to add here to the multitude of voices that speculate on the pretext of his Symphony No. 9, with interpretations that range from the spiritual and transcendent to the work's historical context and the biographical mythmaking of a ‘hero’. What is writ large, literally, is the theme of universal brotherhood – an idea that famously pervades the anthemic choral finale with a setting of Friedrich Schiller's An die Freude (Ode…

Newsworthy A round-up of our recent news reports The Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC) celebrates its 40th anniversary in 2025 – and will do so with a new Chief Executive at the helm. Rachel Healy will begin her five-year term in December, following the departure of John Kotzas, who has spent 15 years in the position. “I could not be more delighted about the prospect of a move to Brisbane and the opportunity to serve the wider Queensland and visitor community at QPAC,” said Healy. “The sheer number of extraordinary artists and cultural leaders Queensland produces is remarkable and it feels that the city's ambition, civic pride and sense of purpose has accelerated.” Healy served as Joint Artistic Director of the Adelaide Festival with Neil Armfield between 2015–2022. Under their…

The first time I ever saw a heckelphone was when I was in a youth orchestra in Queensland, and we gave a performance of Richard Strauss's Alpine Symphony. I was a weird child, so anything weird and wonderful was definitely up my alley, and I was immediately interested. I now have 14 different types of bassoon at home, so the heckelphone was a natural progression, I think! Pretty much no one starts on the bassoon. I played the violin when I was eight, but I quickly decided that was far too boring as everyone played it, so I moved to double bass and viola. When I got to high school, I picked up the bassoon because no one else wanted to play it, and it seemed like the perfect fit…