Wagnerian flavour of Tchaikovsky’s ballet music

Perhaps in acknowledgement of NAIDOC Week, the customary acknowledgement of country was replaced with the Rhythmic Acknowledgement, based on rhythmic patterns first documented in the early 1800s. Read more

Idomeneo: an opera review by Alex First

Superb staging is a hallmark of Mozart’s dramatic opera Idomeneo, set on the island of Crete shortly after the Trojan War. Read more

Eight Seasons – at the Great Synagogue: a music review by Shirley Politzer

Vladimir Fanshil, conductor, pianist and founder of Live at Yours, promised us “an immersive musical experience in the architectural marvel that is the Great Synagogue” and that’s exactly what we got on Tuesday night for the “Eight Seasons” concert. Read more

Mozart as Wolfgang would have heard his music

In a program titled “MOZART”, Richard Tognetti and his Australian Chamber Orchestra (ACO), augmented with musicians from the Australian National Academy of Music (ANAM) and guest musicians, gave the audience at Sydney’s City Recital Hall a real treat. Read more

Aida – an opera review by Murray Dahm

Verdi’s Aïda (1871) is a remarkable opera for all sorts of reasons. Read more

Broadway Diva at The Butterfly Club – reviewed by Alex First

Olivia Ruggiero is talented. No doubt about it. Read more

Chorus Oz – Mahler’s 8th Symphony – reviewed by Shirley Politzer

Do you like to sing in the shower? Dance around the house singing songs? Have you always wanted to share your love of singing but perhaps have no opportunity, then Chorus Oz is for you. Read more

Rigelotto: Reviewed by Murray Dahm

Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto (1851) was the composer’s sixteenth opera. Read more

Robyn Archer: An Australian Songbook – reviewed by Alex First

The highly entertaining two-hour show could be called the soundtrack of the glorious Robyn Archer’s life. Read more

A mass that pleased the masses

For Mozart fans, last night’s concert by the SSO was a welcome and balanced blend of the master’s work. Read more

Rocky Horror Show – a Melbourne theatre review

Half a century on, the Rocky Horror Show remains a delightful, bizarre and engaging romp that encourages audience participation. Read more

Back in Oz: Mamma Mia!

This show is not for you if you hate ABBA’s music, great singing, great dancing, great production and a custom-built heart-warming story incorporating lyrics sung by the Swedish four. Read more

Catch Me If You Can: The Musical – a Melbourne theatre review by Alex First

Tony Burge, who assumes the role of lead FBI agent Carl Hanratty chasing boyish con man Frank Abagnale Jr. excels in Cloc’s production of Catch Me If You Can. Read more

Verdi’s Requiem: A concert review by Shirley Politzer

Verdi’s Requiem, his largest and most significant choral work, performed recently by the Sydney Philharmonia Festival Chorus and Orchestra, is a musical setting of the Catholic funeral mass for four soloists, a double choir and orchestra. Read more

A blend of the familiar, the unfamiliar and the new: Music review by Fraser Beath McEwing

Having Wolfgang in your name would seem to direct your destiny towards musical composition. It certainly did with Erich Wolfgang Korngold, (1897 – 1957)  whose only symphony was played by the SSO last night. Read more

This middlebrow concert was a sheer delight – a music review by Fraser Beath McEwing

While my reviews usually concentrate on the Emirates Master Series because that’s supposed to attract the most musically sophisticated crowd, last night’s SSO program of the Rach 2 and a Respighi tone poem was a delicious diversion. Read more

Music that imposed itself: a music review by Fraser Beath McEwing

Turley’s Mirage, Elgar’s cello concerto and Shostakovich’s 10^th symphony provided a rich blend of styles at the Opera House last night. Read more

Handel’s Samson: A music review by Shirley Politzer

Cheering, foot stomping, loud clapping, and a standing ovation were how Handel’s Samson oratorio was received at the concert hall of the Sydney Opera House. Read more

Madama Butterfly: An opera review by Murray Dahm

This Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour (HOSH) production of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly was first seen in 2014 and here makes its triumphant return ‘home.’ Read more

Don Quixote (The Australian Ballet):  Reviewed by Alex First

I was mesmerised by the performances of the two leads in an intoxicating production of Don Quixote by The Australian Ballet. Read more

Prodigious pianist brings Roaring Twenties to the 2020s

When Simon Tedeschi plays the nostalgic notes of Rhapsody in Blue, the virtuoso hears the story of his family in the Roaring Twenties. Read more

At the Adelaide Festival with Alan Slade

The Adelaide Festival Theatre is an impressive structure and one of South Australia’s most prestigious venues. Read more

& Juliet: a Melbourne musical review by Alex First

A riotously fun, thoroughly entertaining musical for our new, enlightened times, & Juliet picks up Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet where it ended and kicks it up a gear. Read more

A concert of colour: A music review by Fraser Beath McEwing

Young’s reflected lights, Saint-Saens’ kaleidoscopic second piano concerto and Mussorgsky’s art gallery stroll, resulted in a visually provocative program last night from the SSO under the baton of 39-year-old Estonian Mihhail Gerts. Read more

At the Adelaide Festival with Alan Slade

Most Jewish Australians will have heard of William Cooper (1860? – 1941), the Aboriginal political activist who, in 1938, led a delegation of the Australian Aboriginal League to the German Consulate in Melbourne to deliver a petition condemning the “cruel persecution of the Jewish people by the Nazi government of Germany”. Read more

Taking on the Russian Titans: a music review by Fraser Beath McEwing

Twenty-six-year-old Albanian-born pianist Marie-Ange Nguci might well have bounded onto the Recital Hall stage wearing boxing gear last night because there was no way she could avoid stepping into the ring with four heavy-weight Russian composers all threatening to knock her out. Read more

At the Adelaide Festival

Cédric Tiberghien, the French classical pianist, started learning to play the piano at age 5, which may explain his masterful rendition of Mozart’s Sonata K331 in the concert he gave in the magnificent Adelaide Town Hall as part of the Adelaide Festival. Read more

The Rocky Horror Show: reviews by Henry Benjamin

With a massive musical intro, it was time again to see the Roxy Cinema candy seller part the curtains and send us off on to the wild ride that is The Rocky Horror Show. Read more

Adriana Lecouvreur: An opera review by Victor Grynberg

Francesco Cilea’s ADRIANA LECOUVREUR is a rarely produced opera nowadays, and this critic doesn’t recall ever seeing it before. Read more

One blockbuster and two oddments: a music review by Fraser Beath McEwing

There is no doubt that the SSO wanted to please Mahler fans with last night’s opening Emirates concert of the season. Read more

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