FRENCH BAROQUE CANTATAS

 

Limestone Consort

St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Manuka, October 25

 

Reviewed by Len Power

 

There may have been a storm raging outside, but the calming program of secular works by Nicolas Bernier and André Campra proved to be the perfect way to spend a rainy afternoon.

Limestone Consort’s program consisted of four baroque era works with love as a dominant theme. Greta Claringbould, soprano, Maartje Sevenster, alto, and Andrew Fysh, bass, were accompanied by Aaron Reichelt, oboe, Lauren Davis, violin, Clara Teniswood, cello, Sean Ng, theorbo, and Ariana Odermatt, harpsichord. The three singers each introduced the works they were about to sing.

The first work, Coffee, showed an unexpectedly lighter side of composer, Nicolas Bernier (born 1664). His cantata extravagantly praised coffee as if it was a divine and seductive potion that even the Gods favoured. Greta Claringbould sang it delightfully with a nicely humorous edge.

Greta Claringbould, Maartje Sevenster and Andrew Fysh

André Campra (born 1660) composed the amusing cantata, The Quarrel Between Cupid and Hymen. Almost a mini-opera, this argument between Cupid, God of Love, and Hymen, God of Marriage, was given a colourful and dramatic performance by alto, Maartje Sevenster.

Maartje Sevenster and the musicians

Andrew Fysh, bass, then presented Campra’s cantata, The Women, which detailed his exasperation with women and the wiles they employ to snare the opposite sex. Fysh gave it a fine, world-weary performance. His reflective singing of the passage, Ah, how wretched is a heart entangled in your chains, was particularly memorable.

The final work on the program was the Chorus of Mariners by Jean-Philippe Rameau (born 1683). Together, the three singers gave this invitation to dance and sing a sparkling performance.

The musical accompaniment throughout was excellent. It was a well-chosen and enjoyable program of cantatas with unexpected looks at love.

 

Photos by Peter Hislop

This review was first published by Canberra CityNews digital edition on 26 October 2026.

Len Power's reviews are also broadcast on Artsound FM 92.7 in the ‘Arts Cafe’ and ‘Arts About’ programs and published in his blog 'Just Power Writing' at https://justpowerwriting.blogspot.com/.

Len Power also presents the weekly Concert Hall program on Artsound FM, playing recordings of some of the best concerts from in and around Canberra. Concert Hall can be heard on Sundays at 8pm and is repeated on Wednesdays at 2pm.

THE SOUNDS OF THE RAT PACK AT THE Q-PAC - Blamey Street Big Band

 

Leisa Keen -Jared Newall - Steve Amosa and the Blamey Street Big Band.

The Q, Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre, October 24. Reviewed by BILL STEPHENS.

The Blamey Street Big Band has rapidly built up a growing audience for its regular concerts at the B in the Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre. A perfect venue for this type of presentation, with excellent sound and lighting, and where every seat is a good one.

Boasting some of the city’s finest jazz musicians, this trim, taut and terrific 19-piece ensemble has become celebrated for Andrew Hackwill’s innovative arrangements of the big band repertoire, performed under the fastidious baton of its affable conductor, Ian McLean.

But for this concert all the arrangements were drawn from the BSBB’s own extensive music library, being published and purchased charts, mostly by staff arrangers for the big bands of the period, such as Quincy Jones and Sammy Cahn, with a few by Australian Ed Wilson, trombone player, leader and arranger of the famed Daly-Wilson Big Band.

This concert concentrated on music associated with The Rat Pack, a legendary group of celebrities, initially Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop, who not only performed on stage together, but also appeared in each other’s films, television shows and recordings.

As its fame spread, female celebrities also became part of The Rat Pack, famously Judy Garland, Liza Minnelli, and Marilyn Monroe. Their contributions were recognised in this concert, as was the influence the music associated with The Rat Pack had on generations of vocalists who followed them, represented by three of the region’s best in Leisa Keen, Steve Amosa and Jared Newall.    

So, after Ian Mclean introduced the band with a cracking arrangement for the Count Basie Orchestra of “Fly Me to the Moon”, Newall got the concert off to a flying start with three songs associated with Frank Sinatra,” Pennies from Heaven”, “The Best is Yet to Come” and “You Make Me Feel So Young”.

Leisa Keen and the Blamey Street Big Band

Keen continued with superb renditions of songs associated with Judy Garland, “Over the Rainbow” and “Zing Went the Strings of My Heart”, which Amosa followed with more Sinatra repertoire, “Come Fly with Me”, “I Get A Kick Out of You”, and “New York, New York”.

Then it was song after song in a generous program of 28 such classics, interrupted only by an interval or an interesting tidbit about a song or Rat Pack member, offered by Mclean or one of the vocalists.

Among many highlights were Keen’s delightful renditions of “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend”, and “I Wanna be Loved by You”, both associated with Marilyn Monroe, Amosa’s red-hot version of “It Had to be You”, a song associated with Harry Connick Jr, and Newall’s laid-back rendition of “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head”, forever associated with Dean Martin.

Kofi Amosa - Steve Amosa and the Blamey Street Big Band.

A highlight for everyone was the surprise appearance of 16-year-old, Kofi Amosa, who joined his dad, Steve, for a swinging rendition of song associated with Michael Buble, “Feeling Good”. Living proof of the adage, “an apple never falls far from the tree”.

But in the end, it is the polished performances and superb presentation of the outstanding musicians who make up the BSBB, demonstrated in feature solos by masters of their instruments such as trumpeter Mark Du Rieu and drummer Noddy Brassington, that define the Blamey Street Big Band and keep audiences coming back for more. The BSBB’s next concert at the B is scheduled for May 2027.

Leisa Keen - Jared Newall - Kofi Amosa - Steve Amosa - Ian Mclean take a bow with
The Blamey Street Big Band.



Photos by Stephen McGrory.


This review first published in CITY NEWS on 25.10.26. Link Here

 

AROUND THE WORLD IN EIGHTY DAYS

 

Adapted by Mark Brown from the novel by Jules Verne

Directed by James Scott

Honest Puck production at the Perform Australia Theatre, Tuggeranong to October 31

 

Reviewed by Len Power 24 October 2026

 

Jules Verne’s, Around the World in Eighty Days, is a novel teeming with many colourful characters from around the world. In Mark Brown’s 2001 adaptation for the stage, a cast of only five play them all.

To win a bet, English aristocrat, Phileas Fogg, with his newly employed French valet, Jean Passepartout, attempts to prove that you can go around the world in eighty days in 1872. Mistaken for a bank robber, Fogg is followed by the wily Detective Fix who wants to arrest him at the first opportunity.

In this Honest Puck production, Brendan Kelly is Phileas Fogg, the still-upper-lip English gentleman who remains calm no matter what happens. His hapless French servant, Jean Passepartout, is played by Jack Morton. Both actors give skilful performances, deftly giving their characters a strong human touch that endears them to the audience.

Brendan Kelly (Phileas Fogg), Pema Yogini Yuphel (Aouda) and Jack Morton (Jean Passepartout)

James Scott is a delight as the plodding but determined Detective Fix. He also plays other characters encountered as the play progresses. Pema Yogini Yuphel is a charming Aouda, rescued from a ritual burning in India.

James Scott (Detective Fix) and Jack Morton (Jean Passepartout)

Leo Amadeus busily plays most of the other characters. Each swift character sketch is well done with minimal costuming and a sly knowing wink to the audience. He must be exhausted by the end of the show.

The fact that the show is done on a miniscule budget works in its favour. Ange Fewtrell has provided the many bits of period costumes, hats and even wigs that add colour to the show. With a multitude of simple props and some deft shadow puppeteering by Deni Dominguez, this journey around the world is highly enjoyable theatre.

Director, James Scott, ensures that the show moves at a cracking pace and it’s often very funny. The cast are working hard but you sense they’re enjoying it all as much as the audience. They even have an elephant!

 

Photos by James Scott

This review was first published by Canberra CityNews digital edition on 25 October 2026.

Len Power's reviews are also broadcast on Artsound FM 92.7 in the ‘Arts Cafe’ and ‘Arts About’ programs and published in his blog 'Just Power Writing' at https://justpowerwriting.blogspot.com/.

 

PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK

 

Adapted by Tom Wright

From the book by Joan Lindsay

Directed by Caitlin Baker

Chaika Theatre Production

ACT Hub Theatre to 7 November

 

Reviewed by Len Power 23 October 2026

 

Since Joan Lindsay wrote her novel ‘Picnic At Hanging Rock’ in 1967 and the popular 1975 film was released, this story became a part of Australian folklore. Now it’s adapted as a play by Tom Wright.

On a sweltering Valentine’s Day in 1900, a group of schoolgirls have a picnic at mysterious Hanging Rock. Several girls and a teacher climb the rock, although forbidden to do so, and vanish without a trace.

This intriguing mystery is part ghost story as well as a study in repression, desire, twisted and faulty memories and an inability of a society to adapt to Australian conditions.

Tom Wright’s stage adaptation has five actors playing all of the roles in the story. As the cast rapidly move from character to character, we are quickly disorientated and drawn into the mystery that is told in possibly unreliable memories and fantasies.

Foreground: Jessi Gooding, Breanna Kelly. Background: Karina Hudson, Thea Jade

Caitlin Baker’s set evokes a schoolroom with the blackboard and its chalk writings as well as the dusty, dirty Australian bush underfoot. The clever sound, designed by Paris Scharkie, and the lighting, designed by Disa Swifte, add to the enveloping atmosphere.

Paris Scharkie, Thea Jade

The cast of five – Jessi Gooding, Karina Hudson, Thea Jade, Breanna Kelly and Paris Scharkie – capture the claustrophobic world of a group of boarding schoolgirls very well. With the style of the play, there’s little opportunity for deep character studies and this keeps us at a distance as the story unfolds. Only Karina Hudson has an opportunity to provide a strong character study when she appears as Miss Appleyard, the school’s harsh Principal.

Karina Hudson, Jessi Gooding, Breanna Kelly

The mystery of this story, and the conditions that enabled it to happen, are presented in a kaleidoscopic fashion so that it is difficult to know what is real or imagined. The result is a dream-like production full of unresolved mystery.

Played without a break for 70 minutes, the edginess of the story, the depiction of life in a private school in 1900 and the all-encompassing mystery of the disappearance are very well presented by director, Caitlin Baker, and her cast.

 

Photo by Jane Duong

Len Power's reviews are also broadcast on Artsound FM 92.7 in the ‘Arts Cafe’ and ‘Arts About’ programs and published in his blog 'Just Power Writing' at https://justpowerwriting.blogspot.com/.

 

PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK

 

Picnic at Hanging Rock. 

Adapted from the novel by Joan Lindsay by Tom Wright. Directed by Caitlin Baker. Stage Manager Carmen King. Set design. Caitlin Baker. Lighting Design Disa Swifte. Composer and Sound Designer Paris Sharkie. Costume Designer Helen Fojtas. Producer Karen Vickery for chaika Theatre. Production Photography Jane Duong. Chaika Theatre. ACT HUB October 23 – November 7 Bookings: ACTHUB.COM.AU

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

There is an immediate sense of mystery in Chaika Theatre’s haunting production of Tom Wright’s stage adaptation of Picnic at Hanging Rock. A schoolgirl is writing in chalk capital letters on a blackboard. THE ROCK IS A NIGHTMARE AND NIGHTMARES BELONG IN THE PAST. The sentence is repeated over and over until at one stage it becomes distorted before being resumed. There is mystery in its meaning as the rock looms large as a symbol of an ancient geological past rising from the volcanic sediment of a violent and eruptive past. Tom Wright paints a raw poetic portrait of an untamed landscape, ancient and powerful, inhabited by venomous snakes, spiders and crawling insects. It is a landscape, familiar to its indigenous inhabitants and yet alien to author Joan Lindsay’s characters in her classic novel Picnic At Hanging Rock. Lindsay’s plot made popular by Peter Weir’s 1975 film of the same name centres on a visit to Victoria’s Hanging Rock by schoolgirls on St Valentine’s Day in 1900 and the unexplained disappearance within the dangerous rock. 

Tom Wright’s adaptation focuses on the four girls who enter the rock and their French schoolmistress.  Director Caitlin Baker has cast five outstanding actors who also take on other roles including the school headmistress Mrs Appleyard, the coach driver Albert, Sarah a junior student ridiculed by Appleyard and young  Englishman Michael, visiting his wealthy relatives and becoming embroiled in the drama. At the beginning of the play, the actors work as a Greek Chorus, explaining the events against the background of Wright’s vivid descriptions of the environment. The aura is palpable, conjuring images that paint the portrait of a wild landscape perilous to the unwary and unINitiated members and descendants of British colonization. As Sarah defiantly cries out to her authoritarian headmistress, what good is your British education. It is not reality. 

The opening prologue of events then evolves into a number of scenes, atmospherically captured by Disa Swifte’s lighting design and Paris Scharkie’s composition and sound design into the events that follow the disappearance of Miranda, Marion, Irma and Edith. It becomes apparent through the interrogation, the privileged class’s tea party, Appleyard’s rigid approach to learning and Michael’s confusion that the rock stands high as a symbol of Nature’s power over humanity to be respected and shared by a population who had occupied the land for thousands of years and had learnt and earned a respect, the lack of which held deadly consequences for those who ignored the land’s laws. 

Ultimately, Chaika’s thought-provoking and superbly staged production of Tom Wright’s adaptation becomes a beacon of light to expose the cracks in the rock of our societal fabric. What is our relationship to and responsibility for the land? There was no Welcome To Country in 1967 when Lindsay wrote her novel, so some progress has been made, but Chaika’s production reminds us all that we continue to owe respect to those who inhabited and learned to respect the land before an alien and ignorant culture imposed its custom, its education and its laws.

The programme handout out says that Chaika’s production of Picnic At Hanging Rock is an amateur production by arrangement with Origen Theatrical on behalf of Nick Hern books. Chaika Theatre’s production is highly professional in every sense of the word. Baker’s vision and direction is powerfully engrossing in ACT HUB’s intimate space. Her casting is exemplary and performed by a cast who excel in every role. This is ensemble work of its very best. Karina Hudson, Jessi Gooding, Thea Jade, Breanna Kelly and Paris Sharkie give performances equal to any on a professional mainstage. For seventy minutes without an interval the cast take us on a fascinating journey into the mysteries and conundrums of our relationship with the land and people of our nation. Whether it is based on fact or fictitious imagination, the lessons are there to be learned and Chaika’s production of Picnic At Hanging Rock proves to be the best teacher.

Do not miss this excellent production’s short season.

 

 

MOUNTAIN - Canberra Theatre Centre Playhouse

Choreographed by Melanie Lane – Music composed by Clark.

Costume Design by Akira Isogawa – Lighting Design by Bosco Shaw & Nick Moloney

Produced by Freya Waterson, Visions – Assoc.Producer: Chelsea Byrne, Visions

Performed by dancers: Sara Black – Max Burgess – Tyrel Dulvarie -Madeleine Bowman – Yolanda Lowatta.

Musicians – Canberra Symphony Orchestra Chamber Ensemble with Clark – Doreen Cumming (violin) – Bianca Porcheddu (Violin) – Tor Fromyhr (viola)– Samuel Payne (cello) – Susanne Powell (piano)

Canberra Theatre Centre Playhouse – October 17^th, 2026 – Reviewed by BILL STEPHENS.

"Mountain" by Melanie Lane

There was a great deal of local interest in this work, given Melanie Lane’s strong connections with the local dance community majorly through her work with QL2 Dance, as well as the news that next year she will take over the Artistic Directorship of Lucy Guerin Inc.

But also because the cast of Mountain contained dancers well-known to Canberra audiences in Sara Black, Yolanda Lowatta and Tyrel Dulvarie, that the work had been inspired by the Brindabella mountains, familiar to all Canberrans, and would be danced in costumes designed by Akira Isogawa.  

The highly anticipated work began in a familiar place for Lane, known for her use of sculptural imagery, with the lights slowly revealing what at first appeared to be a silhouette of mountains.

As the lighting level rose however, the shape was revealed as an artful arrangement of the bodies of five tightly grouped dancers, flanked by musicians seated around the perimeter of one corner of the dance area.

Yolanda Lowatta and musicians performing "Mountain"

Bosco Shaw and Nick Moloney’s tightly focussed lighting design allowed the dancers to be isolated when necessary, and the orchestra to be revealed strategically. It worked brilliantly with Akira Isogawa’s extraordinary multi-layered costumes, and Chris Clark’s haunting score performed live on stage, inspiring the five highly skilled dancers to give themselves over completely to Lane’s ever-inventive choreography.

Isogawa’s ingenious costumes, fashioned from found elements, including deconstructed blue denim jeans and discarded ballet skirts, suggesting simultaneously, both the blue haze surrounding the mountains and their ruggedness.  

As the work progressed, various elements of the costumes were discarded until the dancers were left in form-fitting bodysuits painted with rock-art and indigenous motives subtly referencing the mountain’s First Nation heritage.

The casting of Yolanda Lowatta and Tyrel Dulvarie supported this reference, as did a sequence involving Max Burgess manipulating long bamboo sticks.

Sara Black - Tyrel Dulvarie in "Mountain"

Throughout, Lane’s choreography engrossed with its inventiveness, at times rhapsodic and always captivating, with her dancers performing her intricate sequences with effortless skill, as though transported by the music and the mood.

However, it was not only the dancers who responded in that way. Because by the time they appeared for the final sequence, their bodysuits replaced with ghostly diaphanous veils, the musicians, and indeed the audience, all seemed so enraptured by the gorgeous sounds created by Clark’s clever interweaving of electronics and live music, and the ecstatic performances by the dancers, nobody wanted the work to end. 

                                                        Photos by Jackson Loria    

          This review also published in AUSTRALIAN ARTS REVIEW. Link Here

AURORA, Oriana Chorale

 Larry Sitsky Recital Room, ANU School of Music. October 18. Reviewed by DAVID WHITBREAD

Aurora captured the awe and beauty of voices and composers inspired by the dancing lights of both hemispheres. Truly music of the spheres!

Oriana Chorale performing Aurora

Director Dan Walker crafted a program of choral delights with the responsive 38-strong Oriana Chorale in its 49th year. And what a fine instrument it is.

The excellence of their preparation showed in solid parts, mostly well upwards from the traditional four parts, presumably eight and often more in the contemporary works performed here.

Finely rehearsed details included patterned rhythmic chanting, or swooping to notes at different speeds, and against other lines. Rock solid semitones. Fine dynamics, swelling when required to impressive louds and fading to whispering softs. Beautifully controlled long notes. Good diction in a staggering range of languages.

Estonian Veljo Tormis’s Autumn Landscapes was a set of seven charming folk-like songs. Humming created the beginning of the evening’s soundscape to come. At times dance-like, but always evocative, this was a tour de force vocal achievement with crisp group staccato, oohing, whispering… the swoops in Wind over the Barrens building momentum leading to the lovely cool bleak stillness of Cold Autumn Night, punctuated sharply by glittering soprano lines.

Icelander Anna Þorvaldsdóttir’s Hear Us in Heaven had an ancient plainsong base with beautiful rich bass lines and a very peaceful effect.

An Australian work in English and Latin, Alice Chance’s And the Lord Said Fiat Lux for women’s choir had some lovely effects where, for example, wordless rhythms in the altos accompanied the melody in the sopranos.

Winter was written by Oriana member Patrick Baker. It was perhaps the epitome of soundscape in this concert.

Surrounding the audience in one long line, the chorale started very softly with sustained notes which subtly split into semitones, with some percussive tongue technique, all under numbered instructions from the conductor. Choir members timed their lines to fill the space between directions. The mellow chiming of bells. Quite affecting.

For the first time I noticed the ceiling projections of gently rippling images of the northern lights by Scandinavian based Quan Choi.

Two works were titled Northern Lights. Ēriks Ešenvalds featured a Latvian folk solo from David Faraker while the choir sang a story in English with chiming bells that created a magic effect. The second by Norwegian Ola Gjeilo was given a great full choir rendition with a tremendous sustained note held to the end.

Harmonically rich, undulating lines in Norwegian Kjell Flem’s Natten (The Night), also featured an otherworldly bass line intoning “requiem”. Such colours.

After a wonderful wandering vocal opening, Icelander Björk’s Cosmogony indeed “whirled around us and made us wonder” right to its incredible ending with a stunning slowmotion glissando from up high.

A nice Icelandic folk song setting by Scottish John Hearne It is Beautiful in the Fjords led to the finale.

The world premiere of Oriana Composer in Residence Sebastian ‘Bas’ Allen’s Aurora Aurealis. A delightful work, symphonic in scope, and realising effects of “shimmering in a carnival spectacle” from the words by Zoe Withington. Glorious melodies, subtle percussion from a shaker, it featured vocals from whispers to full-bodied singing.

As almost a benediction, the Oriana Chorale again surrounded the audience to sing the moving Underneath the Stars by English composer Kate Rusby. It featured individual voices, including the soloists from throughout the recital, as well as the whole choir intoning “Go gently.”

Photo by Leanne Davidson

This review originally published in Canberra City News Link here