Victorian Opera reaches for the stars with Galileo

This wrap of shows around Melbourne includes a new opera written by Richard Mills, TikTok star Nessa Barrett at the Forum, a lively Christmas show by the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, a winning return to the stage by comedian Hannah Gadsby, and a colourful and fun pocket-sized version of Cinderella by The Australian Ballet.

OPERA
Galileo ★★★
Victorian Opera, Palais Theatre, December 20

There really was no other way for the masterly Richard Mills to end his profound tenure as Victorian Opera’s Artistic Director than with a work of his own making. Conceived, composed and conducted by Mills, Galileo is his magnum opus. An utterly mammoth piece – almost three hours long – with a through-composed score that calls for more than 60 orchestral musicians, 14 principal singers, 10 ensemble and a further chorus of 24. Mills might be going, but he’s not going quietly.

Baritone Samuel Dundas deserves to be heard on the most prestigious stages of the world.Credit: Charlie Kinross

The story of Galileo and the political and environmental context surrounding it, is one that Mills sees as having parallels to modern life. The Renaissance polymath’s discoveries and search for the truth in the face of persecution by religious figures – amid an outbreak of devastating disease and an increasingly hostile broader community – might ring a bell. Malcolm Angelucci’s libretto highlights important moments from Galileo’s life through a series of vignettes.

Galileo reflects the pillars of Mills’ VO directorship more broadly. He has championed new Australian opera and Australian voices – to those elements Galileo is an admirable showpiece.

We, the audience, are lucky he hasn’t flown the Australian coop, but baritone Samuel Dundas deserves to be heard on the most prestigious stages of the world. In the title role, Dundas’s impeccable command of voice and charisma is on show, his Italian diction faultless, his tone mellifluous. Of the large cast of supporting actors, soprano Stacey Alleaume is immensely powerful as the voice of the Plague, and Shanul Sharma does a praiseworthy job of some of the most difficult tenor writing you might ever hear.

As much as this marked the end for Mills, the piece itself felt unfinished. Or perhaps so newly finished it was not finessed. There were just so many voices. The impact of each character might be felt more if there were fewer of them. At times, it got loud, busy and messy. And it was only a concert version! The orchestral soundscape is made up of period instruments Galileo would have heard in his day, melted in with more familiar compositional language. The result is a score with stunning writing for strings,but also some overwhelming moments of multifarious texture.

Refined and rehearsed, Galileo could take its place as a shining example of what new opera can be. With its Italian libretto, it is perhaps more likely to migrate to European opera houses than an Australian opera sung in English. It’s an incredible feat of creation, and no less than Mills deserves for the decade of joy he’s given Victorian opera lovers.
Reviewed by Bridget Davies

MUSIC
Nessa Barrett | Church Club for the Lonely Tour ★★
The Forum, December 16

Young fans chant her name, “Nessa! Nessa! Nessa!” As the stage lights flicker and electric guitar soars, the TikTok sensation arrives to thunderous applause and raucous cheers.

Nessa Barrett performs at the Forum on Saturday.Credit: Richard Clifford

Nessa Barrett has joined the ranks of social media personalities such as Dixie D’Amelio who are leveraging their online presence into musical stardom. The 21-year-old New Jersey-born performer of Puerto Rican descent has more than 19 million followers on TikTok eagerly waiting to witness her live. In the lead-up to her debut Australian and New Zealand tour – her second Melbourne show is sold out – many of her fans shared their concert outfits and encouraged other attendees to join an Instagram group chat. Some came dressed in cowboy boots and hats, a nod to her Instagram bio, “baby cowboy”.

Barrett cites Lana Del Rey as an inspiration, and a large screen plays classic Americana-style footage that mirrors the latter’s signature aesthetic. The concert opens with a black and white cartoon montage of Betty Boop entering the flames of hell, followed by other visuals emphasising the retro motif – a motel, the New York cityscape and a James Dean lookalike riding a motorbike.

Barrett’s battles with mental health and experiences of grief inspire her alt-pop musicality. Her 2023 single club heaven, about losing her best friend Cooper Noriega, captures this sentiment. She asks the crowd, “Who’s ready to cry?” before she performs the song seated on a bar stool with visuals of clouds playing behind her. She exudes vulnerability through melancholy, telling fans this is an opportunity to “heal and grieve together”.

The TikTok sensation often kneels on stage, which removes her from the sight of many audience members.Credit: Richard Clifford

Across the night Barrett demonstrates her range, performing singles from her 2022 debut album young forever and 2023’s hell is a teenage girl EP. Tired of california expresses the dashed hopes of artists in LA while dying on the inside and gaslight introduce a rockier sound to her set. Die first elevates gothic themes of mortality as the crowd raises white flowers in the air, while lie explores heartbreak, encouraging audience members to stick their middle finger up towards the stage as a way of claiming back power from past partners who have treated them badly.

She engages fans in the front row, embracing them as they cry to her, but struggles to maintain that intimacy with the remainder of the crowd. Though she clearly has singing talent, it is also hard at times to determine if she is singing live, particularly in moments when she turns things over to the crowd to sing but her own vocals remain at a consistent volume.

Translating the charisma of an online personality into a stage show is one of the major shortfalls of the gig. Barrett often kneels on stage and drops down into the front row, which removes her from the sight of audience members further behind. It takes time to master a live performance in a way that captures a packed room, particularly when online content is often created solo and, in Barrett’s case, is proliferated to millions.
Reviewed by Vyshnavee Wijekumar

MUSIC
Noel! Noel! ★★★★
Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, Melbourne Recital Centre, December 16

Animated by the effervescent enthusiasm of Paul Dyer, this year’s selection of Christmas bonbons from the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra was a lively mixed assortment, most coming with the ABO’s hearty yet elegant early music style while others were tinged with a hint of new-aged mysticism.

Australian Brandenburg Orchestra at an earlier performance of Noel! Noel! Credit: Keith Saunders

Full of baroque sparkle, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing and O Come, All Ye Faithful provided seasonal context at opposite ends of the program, while two excerpts from Handel’s Messiah allowed the always excellent Brandenburg Choir to display its inviting cheerfulness and characterful clarity. O thou that tellest featured the supple vocal agility of countertenor Michael Burden and a stirring account of the celebrated Hallelujah reinforced the festive mood.

A motet by Portuguese composer Aires Fernandes, Alma redemptoris Mater, and Chacona: A la vida bona by his Spanish contemporary Juan Aranes showcased different aspects of the baroque: the first work full of intense awe and the second a mad-cap secular scene in which choir members sported fans, to some amusement.

The concert struck an ebullient festive note with its eclectic but effective programming.Credit: Keith Saunders

A more contemporary, ruminative element was provided by saxophonist Christina Leonard in Tristan Coelho’s arrangements of O come, O come Emmanuel and The Little Drummer Boy. Sydney composer Sophie Hutchings’ By Night, arranged for wordless eight-voice choir with prominent harp accompaniment, provided another moment of stasis.

Further highlights included the majestic program opener, James MacMillan’s O Radiant Dawn, the perfectly pitched humour of Alex Palmer’s instrumental arrangement of God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen and a sensitive arrangement of Gruber’s Stille Nacht by the ABO’s own Tommie Andersson that preserved its original lilting form.

Even if this year’s edition of Noel! Noel! might have seemed a little routine in comparison to other years, given the lack of a major guest artist, the concert still struck an ebullient festive note with its eclectic but effective programming.
Reviewed by Tony Way

COMEDY
Banana Palace | Hannah Gadsby ★★★★
Arts Centre Melbourne, until December 22

Hannah Gadsby claims in Banana Palace to want to make their comedy weirder, not bigger. After the global streaming success of Nanette (2017) and Douglas (2019), its bigness can be assumed, and one of the intriguing things about Banana Palace is the way Gadsby shrinks in discomfort from celebrity. Luckily, the comedian has a knack for turning discomfort into a comfort zone.

Comedian Hannah Gadsby has returned to Australia with their new show, Banana Palace.Credit: Ben King

The show that put Gadsby in the international spotlight, Nanette, was famously uncomfortable. It layered anecdotes about growing up in regional Tassie as a genderqueer lesbian (later diagnosed with ADHD and autism) into a sharp critique of how the structure and culture of stand-up comedy serves the powerful, how it can encourage complicity from the marginalised against their own interests.

Here, Gadsby muses uncertainly on the vast audience a televised show can reach, versus the intimacy and responsiveness of performing live. In my view, there really is no contest.

Gadsby’s restless critical wit needs to be seen live to be fully appreciated. Watching the comic’s brain whirring over the craft in real time can feel like the verbal equivalent of a no-filter selfie session. It’s a compelling and kinetic experience: Gadsby might be on the record as stand-up’s most fearless critic, but they’re also a master technician of the form.

That said, Banana Palace is more radical in structure than material, unapologetically leaning into its interests, and proudly incorporating a whimsical neurodiversion into its comedic structure… It won’t spoil anything to reveal that celebrity hijacks Gadsby’s attention, or that the show’s second half careens into a series of rambling, awkwardly overfamiliar letters the comedian has written to Barbra Streisand.

So far as I know, Gadsby is yet to send (and Babs is yet to reply to) these eccentric missives, but the potshots taken at the contradictions of celebrity – at one stage, Gadsby even worries their new dog is becoming too privileged – remain a quirk-filled source of provocation and entertainment.

Given the critics were savage about Gadsby’s curation of It’s Pablo-Matic: Picasso According to Hannah Gadsby, at the Brooklyn Museum a few months ago, it’s good to see a winning return to the stage. Not that the art historian in Gadsby is ever quite absent – they can’t resist slipping in a Monet gag into this one. Still, Banana Palace charts a new course – an hour of affable, unpretentious, and quick-witted stand-up, its rudder steadied by the nuts and bolts of the comedian’s craft.
Reviewed by Cameron Woodhead

DANCE
Storytime Ballet: Cinderella ★★★★
The Australian Ballet, Arts Centre Melbourne, until 17 December

It’s an early Christmas treat for teeny-tiny bunheads. The Australian Ballet has torn the wrappings off a colourful new hour-long version of Cinderella with excerpts from Prokofiev’s ravishing score.

Put together by David McAllister, this is a rather winsome fairy-tale fantasy that nimbly balances classical choreography, over-the-top clowning, stage magic and the usual pantomime business.

Kit Thompson, who will be sharing the role of Cinderella in The Australian Ballet’s Storytime Ballet.Credit: Kate Longley

Nicole Moshidis was Cinders – or Ella, as she’s dubbed here – on Wednesday evening and danced with attractive sincerity. Jeremy Hargreaves was her prince. Their pas de deux is brief but very dreamy and slow.

The jesters of the piece, the mean-spirited stepsisters, were performed by Chantelle van der Hoek and Sophie Wormald. They pout and flounce and tumble about to the delight of all. Kit Thompson was more poised as the scheming stepmother.

Elena Salerno was the Fairy Godmother and Corey Gavan the dancing master. Sean McGrath reprises his role as Storytime narrator. Four courtiers make up the rest of the fine ensemble.

Elena Salerno, Sophie Donald and Myah Gadd in a performance of Cinderella.Credit: Kate Longley

There are some pretty nifty bits of theatrical hocus-pocus. The moment when Cinderella’s rags are turned into a sparkling blue gown is particularly impressive. How do they do it? Blink and you’ll miss the whole thing.

As with the holiday version of Sleeping Beauty in January of this year, there are ticky-tacky battery-powered wands for sale in the foyer, which McGrath spruiks during the performance. These junk items are now all but ubiquitous at events for kids.

The opening-night audience was vocal in its admiration of the set and its transformations. Ishan Vivekanantham’s designs, particularly for the ballroom, are simple but splendid. It’s amazing what you can do with fairy lights.

Overall, this is a charming – albeit very traditional – pocket-sized version of the story. The show has a short season but with three shows a day. there are plenty of times to choose from.
Reviewed by Andrew Fuhrmann

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