Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 4 March 2022. GRAMMY-nominated saxophonist and composer Melissa Aldana joins Blue Note Records with the release of 12 Stars, her debut album as a leader for the legendary jazz label. At 33, the Brooklyn-based tenor player from Santiago, Chile…
Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 25 February 2022. There’s something almost excruciating about the places in between. The feeling of falling. A reassertion of gravity as one step leads to another but just before the foot lands. The purgatory between borders, before clarity becomes…
Although Cyrano de Bergerac was a real person, most of the works that bear his name stem from Edmond Rostan’s 1897 play. Film versions of the story date back to 1900, but recent efforts include Roxanne (1987) with Steve Martin, and Cyrano de Bergerac (1990) with Gerard Depardieu. But the latest has a more circuitous…
Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 18 February 2022. Through the hazy daze of a smoky folk opus, Modern Studies craft rich soundtracks, stuttering Super-8 sketches from a washed-out world of melancholy, hand-tinted and tantalising. Lullaby couplets blossom into gorgeous chamber pop melodies, the drama…
On her third album, singer/songwriter Erin Rae is making an effort to Lighten Up, with help from her new producer Jonathan Wilson. After establishing herself as a songwriter in the Joni Mitchell school of folk/Americana, Rae works to stretch herself here, bringing that Laurel Canyon touch of psychedelia to give her that cosmic country vibe….
Musical Theatre Australia’s award-winning A Girl’s Guide to World War tells the true story of some amazing women forgotten by our history. If its premise is not made clear by this hint as to its content, its sentiment comes through strongly during the first scene, which sees its narrator (Vix Sheather, lead singer and guitarist…
Adapting work from screen to stage can be tricky, even more so when it is a beloved animated feature. Thankfully, the hit family-friendly Broadway musical Frozen rises to this challenge, with lavish production design, stunning costumes and impressive special effects to astound as much as entertain. The musical, adapted from the Disney film and Hans…
A poignant and amusing slice of life musical, it is not hard to see why Fun Home received five Tony Awards for the original Broadway production. That included Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical and Best Original Score. Now, fortunately, Melbourne Theatre Company and Sydney Theatre Company have picked it up and done a wonderful job…
Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 4 February 2022. The music of saxophonist and composer Immanuel Wilkins is filled with empathy and conviction, bonding arcs of melody and lamentation to pluming gestures of space and breath. Listeners were introduced to this riveting sound with his…
What a thoroughly entertaining showpiece! I last saw The Wedding Singer when it played at the Athenaeum Theatre last May. Now, at the State Theatre, at the Arts Centre, it remains just as fun filled and comedic, but it appears even slicker. The leads are intact among the 20-strong cast and are truly memorable. Collectively, the company sing,…
