Composing Women
Four new operas from the 2018-19 group premiered as films produced by Sydney Chamber Opera and four fascinating dance-film scores from the new 2020 cohort of composers kicked off an exciting collaboration with the Sydney Dance Company.
Sydney Chamber Opera 'Breaking Glass' season, April 2020
Peggy Polias: Commute (2020), Jessica O’Donoghue, soprano © Daniel Boud
April 2020 saw the premiere of films of the fully staged productions of new chamber operas composed by Bree van Reyk, Josephine Macken, Peggy Polias and Georgia Scott performed by Sydney Chamber Opera, directed by Danielle Maas and Clemence Williams at Carriageworks. The live performance season was cancelled due to COVD-19 shutdowns of venues in NSW in March, but the films were made in a heroic pivot and were launched with online events.
The films can be viewed on the Sydney Chamber Opera website.
Breaking Glass is a testament to the importance of professional development programs like Composing Women. It is vital, new and ambitious artistic work and has the opportunity to be presented. In this case, the result was spectacular. While the four operas were very different from each other, they were equally engaging, relevant and thought-provoking.
International prize, Classical: NEXT Innovation Award, May 2020
The Conservatorium's work and achievements with Composing Women were recognised internationally by the 2020 Classical: NEXT Innovation award at their annual event on 20 May 2020.
Watch Liza Lim's acceptance speech on Facebook.
'Habituate', dance-film collaboration with Sydney Dance Company, June-July 2020
Habituate is a film in four parts by Charmene Yap featuring Sydney Dance Company's Pre-Professional Year 2020 dancers, with four new scores composed by Fiona Hill, May Lyon, Jane Sheldon and Brenda Gifford from Sydney Conservatorium of Music's Composing Women 2020-2021 cohort. The short film was captured on phone cameras, in isolation during COVID-19 as a creative exploration of music, film and dance and launched at a special virtual event in July.
Habituate #1
Habituate #2
This is the first of several projects to be made in collaboration with Sydney Dance Company with other premieres scheduled for Nov-Dec 2020. Stay tuned for more exciting Composing Women projects with our partners the Sydney Philharmonia Choirs, the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra Fellows to be launched in the second half of 2020.
For further enquiries, please contact Liza Lim: liza.lim@sydney.edu.au
