Southland Arts Festival
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Southland Festival of the ARTS29 April — 15 May 2011 www.southlandnz.com 1 CONTENTS Welcome to the Southland Festival Contents of the ARTS 4 Music Welcome to 2011’s Festival which we hope is one that will excite and 8 Theatre impress! A special welcome to the forty or so artists who are bringing 11 Dance their talents to Southland. We hope you enjoy your time here. Literature Building on last year’s festival, which you told us you loved, the 12 festival again aims to showcase outstanding artists from national and 14 Visual Arts international standing, along with many who live in our own back yard. Special Events We have tried to keep the ticket costs as low as we can to enable you 18 to get to many shows over 17 days. This is only possible due to the 22 Event Planner generous support of the funders whose logos appear on the back page. Their resources subsidise shows, contribute to the marketing and pay for some of the infrastructural costs of the festival. We’re conscious of this being a region-wide festival so have featured some events outside of the city. Please support them if they’re in your town. Thank you to all the local artists and arts organisations and willing volunteers who are contributing to the festival’s success. We look forward to seeing you…everywhere! Angela Newell SPEND AND WIN AT Festival Director Venture Southland THE FESTIVAL! Planning on lots of festival events? BOOKING INFORMATION Then you could be a winner! Invercargill i-SITE: Six lucky festival patrons will each receive a $100 meal Southland Museum building, Gala St, Invercargill voucher at a selected ILT restaurant. Opening hours: daily 8:00am – 5:00pm Simply spend $90 on tickets, fill in the Friends of the Festival card TicketDirect: and go in the draw. Invercargill City Council, 101 Esk St, Invercargill Opening hours: 8:30am – 5:00pm, Monday to Friday Friends of the Festival cards are available at all ticket outlets. CUE TV, Don Street, Invercargill Opening hours: 9:00am - 5:00pm www.ticketdirect.co.nz Booking fees apply for tickets booked through these outlets. TIP: Purchase all your festival tickets at the same time and pay only one booking fee. Information in this programme was correct at the time of printing. Venture Southland Design by Market South Ltd assumes no responsibility for unforeseen changes, omissions or errors. 2 3 MUSIC MUSIC Opera Bluff in association with Venture Southland presents Chamber Music New Zealand presents Hansel and Gretel New Zealand String Quartet with Jenny Wollerman The timeless German folk story, With a sound that manifests fluidity and energy, the New Zealand String retold here by Quartet have forged a major career in the busy international chamber song and with music field, earning the acclaim of critics and the delighted response of orchestra, was audiences. Likewise, soprano Jenny Wollerman has established herself written by Engelbert here and abroad, with unforgettable performances as a recitalist and Humperdinck and with orchestras. first performed in 1893. The New Zealand String Quartet and Jenny Wollerman join forces to perform The Abiding Tides by NZ composer Ross Harris. The Abiding Two children who Tides comprises eight poems by Vincent O'Sullivan which explore the become lost in the effect of the sea on our lives. Premiered during the 2010 New Zealand wood after searching International Arts Festival, the performance by the New Zealand String for food to feed their Quartet and Jenny Wollerman was described as "riveting" by Rod Biss family are caught in the New Zealand Listener with music that "instantly enriched our by an evil witch heritage of New Zealand music". and must do what they can to free The quartet will also perform works by Mozart and Dvořák. themselves. Programme: This debut opera Mozart: String Quartet in D K575 ‘Prussian No 1’ from newly-formed Bluff Opera will Ross Harris: The Abiding Tides be conducted and Dvořák: String Quartet No 14 in A flat Opus 105 directed by rising star Ravil Atlas, an American-trained tenor, conductor and director whose credits include a five year season as Jean Valjean in This tour has received funding from The Lion Foundation Les Miserables. With over thirty operatic roles in the UK, Europe, Central America and Australasia and thirty years as a voice teacher, Atlas will Civic Theatre, Tay Street, Invercargill bring new levels of excellence to the Southland performance scene. Wednesday, 11 May, 7:30pm Internationally-acclaimed opera performers Amanda Winfield and Duration: 1 hour 50 minutes $45 (phone/counter), $40 (on-line), Rebecca Ryan will be joined by local singers and a live chamber Book: Ticketdirect $10 (child), $15 (student rush on the day) orchestra ensuring the magical fairytale that is Hansel and Gretel comes to life. Both Ryan and Winfield are two of Southland’s most outstanding success stories, garnering international acclaim in the demanding and highly competitive world of Opera. Join us in welcoming them home to share their talents with Southland audiences in a show for the whole family. Centrestage Theatre, Don Street, Invercargill Friday, 29 April, 7:00pm Saturday, 30 April, 4:00pm Duration: 70 minutes Book: Ticketdirect $32/$28/$10 4 5 MUSIC MUSIC Venture Southlland In association with the NZ International Jazz & Blues Venture Southland and Arts on Tour presents Festival Presents Naomi Ferguson: Mary Coughlan Songs My Mother Taught Me Featuring Tom Rainey, Richie Pickard, Dan Kennedy and Harry Harrison If you love the music of the 60’s and 70’s you’ll Mary Coughlan is a rare talent, and without doubt, Ireland’s premier jazz love Naomi’s show. & blues singer. It’s 1972 - a teenage girl leaves home to During a career spanning 20 years, she has been likened to legends study, determined to escape her sheltered such as Billy Holiday, Peggy Lee and Marianne Faithful; and has upbringing and let her hair down. What collaborated with music greats such as Tom Waits, Jimmy McCarthy and follows is a year of free-thinking, hippies, Elvis Costello. experiments, and the excesses of the 70’s: Mary Coughlan sings from experience, with her performance conveying drugs, protest songs, motorbikes and music her struggle with drink, drugs, and bad management. Through it all she festivals. Her journey of love and heartbreak shows the resilience of the human spirit, bringing an intensity and raw, is peppered with some of the best songs of honest emotion to her shows. the 60’s & 70’s, including Ruby Tuesday, Rainy Audiences may have heard her on the popular recording, A Woman’s Day Women, Make It with You, Suzanne and It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue. Heart, which has become one of the best-selling Celtic music albums Accompanied by stellar musicians, Graham Wardrop and Alex van den ever. Broek, Naomi Ferguson’s original show is an entertaining retrospective Coughlan has gathered a large fan base since her recent successful of music and mores from turbulent and exciting times. tours to Australia and NZ and now makes her way further south to our An honours degree in performance music and a Masters in creative festival. writing, complement her many credits for stage roles, including Gloria For this concert she is joined by acclaimed NZ musicians, guaranteeing (Brassed Off!) and Grizabella (CATS). She has appeared at festivals a night out that will resonate with you long after the last note has and events all over New Zealand and first performed Songs My Mother sounded. Taught Me to sell-out audiences at Christchurch’s Arts Festival in 2009. "Mary Coughlan sings with a hard intelligence which binds spells." “Ferguson is a superb musician with a gorgeous, golden voice.” Q Magazine Vicki Thorpe, Theatreview Civic Theatre, Tay Street, Invercargill Centrestage Theatre, Don Street, Invercargill Wednesday, 4 May, 8:00pm Saturday, 14 May, 8:00pm Duration: 90 minutes, plus interval Duration: 2 hours, including interval Book: Ticketdirect $32/$28 Book: Ticketdirect $28/$22 6 7 MTHEATREUSIC / CABARET THEATRE The Loons Circus Theatre Company presents Venture Southland presents The Butler Pick of the Fringe Written by Joe Bennett, The Southland Festival of the Arts is Directed by Mike Friend delighted to present its pick from the The Butler is sexy, spectacular and Dunedin Fringe Festival, 2011. very, very funny. There's never been a Flaxworks Productions presents dinner party quite like it! This feast of Drowning In Veronica Lake circus theatre has delighted audiences and critics around New Zealand and in Revisit the Golden Age of Hollywood London with its colourful and satirical via the sordid underbelly of the film poke at civilised behaviour. Performed industry in this darkly comic tribute to by a multitalented cast of eight singers, actors and circus professionals the eponymous 1940s screen siren. (who between them hold five world records) The Butler is raunchy, Brilliant and beautiful, in 1942 raucous, thought-provoking and, above all, very, very entertaining. Veronica Lake was the hottest discovery in Hollywood. Now, dead for "For once, a standing ovation was not just appropriate; in this case it forty years and trapped somewhere was necessary," Tom Hunt, Nelson Mail, 2008. between Paramount and Purgatory, she wrestles with stardom, booze, the wrong men and her spectacular decline into obscurity. Centrestage Theatre, Don Street, Invercargill Now in glorious living colour - Veronica Lake created, designed and Thursday, Friday, Saturday, 5-7 May, 8:00pm manufactured by Hollywood. Duration: 2 hours, including interval This is a bravura performance from Alex Ellis; playful, provocative and Book: CUE TV, or Ticketdirect $43/$37 poignant. John Smythe, Theatreview Highly recommended on all levels - for the acting, directing, Family Edition! The Butler's Party: dramatic costume and script.