Adelaide Festival Centre announces 2016 program
A collaboration between The Brodsky Quartet and Katie Noonan (pictured); tributes to the songs of The Beatles, David Bowie and Simon & Garfunkel; a Paul Kelly headlined tribute to Australian Irish songs, and another year of the Adelaide International Guitar Festival.
These are some of the more contemporary musical highlights of the Adelaide Festival Centre’s 2016 program.
The Adelaide premiere collaboration between the UK’s Brodsky Quartet and Noonan, inspired by the verse of Australian poet Judith Wright, sees the acclaimed jazz-blues singer performing specially commissioned works by Australian composers including Carl Vine, David Hirschfelder, Paul Grabowsky, Paul Dean, John Rodgers, Andrew Ford and Elena Kats Chernin.
Singer songwriter Shane Howard curates Exile: Songs of Irish Australia, headlined by Paul Kelly. On the bill performing songs of “convicts, rebels, refugees, scholars & politicians, poets & musicians” are Howard, Leah Flanagan and Steve Cooney and Ireland’s Pauline Scanlon, Declan O’Rourke, Sean Tyrrell and John Spillane.
All You Need Is Love, a 39-song tribute to The Beatles features singers Jack Jones, Ciarin Gribbin, Darren Percival and Jackson Thomas fronting a rock band and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.
Sven Ratzke presents new rock show Starman, inspired by the songs and costumes of David Bowie.
The Simon & Garfunkel Story, the Adelaide premiere of the UK production, follows their careers to hit stardom, the infamous split and a recreation of the legendary 1981 Central Park reunion concert.
The Adelaide Guitar Festival, in August, will feature Karin Schaupp in Don Juan, the Wolfgang Muthspiel Trio and a symphony gala with guitar soloists and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.
Others include the acrobatic cabaret show Club Swizzle, the Australian premiere of Ghost The Musical, Zephyr Quartet’s Exquisite Corpse which brings a musical version of the Surrealist game to the stage, Tom Burlinson performing Frank Sinatra to the sounds of a big band, The Sound of Music, The Graduate with Jerry Hall, and a return of the Adelaide Cabaret Festival (with new co-Artistic Directors Ali McGregor and Eddie Perfect) and the 10th OzAsia Festival.
Full program at adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au