Expect fireworks in Opera Australia’s West Side Story

SEE / Tonight, tonight . . .

The musical takes place on an overwater harbour stage framed by Sydney’s glittering high-rises.

Sydney Harbour has provided a spectacular backdrop for Opera Australia’s annual outdoor extravaganza since 2012. This year features the return of the dazzling 1957 Bernstein-Sondheim epic West Side Story. With trademark ingenuity, director Francesca Zambello has masterfully re-created the mean streets of New York’s decaying Upper West Side on an overwater stage framed by the city’s own glittering high-rises, the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. Enter one boy (Billy Bourchier as Tony), one girl (Nina Korbe as Maria), two warring gangs that’ll do anything to keep them apart – and what follows is one vibrant, unmissably explosive (literally!) spectacle of song and dance (tickets $79‑$349; until April 21). Fret not, Melburnians, there’s a show for you, too: Puccini’s Tosca is winging her way to Margaret Court Arena for one week on May 24 (tickets from $59). Watch this space. Sharon Bradley

SPOTLIGHT / Who’s that girl?

Ngaiire’s new release is a recording of her show with the Sydney Symphony at the Opera House.

If you want proof of how far being knocked out of an Australian Idol semi-final can take you, the career of Ngaiire would make a compelling starting point. Often referred to as the high priestess of this country’s now-enviable R&B and neo-soul movement, the Melanesian vocalist has been putting in the work for years. The culture has finally caught on and she finds herself in a creative purple patch in which she can front up an orchestra, belt it out at an AFL grand final and indulge her love of avant-garde fashion (she frequently wears eye-popping Akira and Romance Was Born gear on stage). Ngaiire’s next release, Live at The Sydney Opera House, is a recording of her sold-out, rave-reviewed show with the Sydney Symphony, with a dazzling cover of Tame Impala’s The Less I Know the Better featuring a Ken Done-esque cover hand-drawn by her five-year-old son. It’s something of a retrospective for an artist many are just beginning to discover, taking in songs from two decades. It’s a truism that most musical trends tend to come and go. But Ngaiire has always been in style. Jonathan Seidler

WEAR / Let’s talk about specs

The Spex device offers a solution to errant sunnies or specs.

Why are we here? That query is likely to remain unanswered, but as for another eternal question – “Where are my glasses?” – the universe has served up a response. Attach the magnets of the Spex device to either side of a piece of clothing, slide into its loop an arm of your sunnies or specs, and … there they are. This Australian-made device (two for $25), from the creators of Klipsta hat clips, works like a brooch except that the companion high-strength magnets, both smaller than a five-cent piece, are far kinder to clothing. No more scratched lenses from glasses falling from shirt pockets, nor plucked hair from using the top of your head as an ersatz storage unit. Glasses don’t even fall out when you bend over: the (magnetic) force is with you. Tip: keep on fridge when not in use. Sally Rawlings

READ / Death becomes her

Is there such thing as a meaningful death? Kaveh Akbar ponders the question in his debut novel, Martyr.

Cyrus, the protagonist in Iranian-American poet Kaveh Akbar’s debut novel Martyr!, is a 29-year-old Iranian writer recovering from addiction who’s obsessed with the idea of martyrdom. Traumatised by his mother’s death when he was a baby, he’s planning a book about people “whose deaths matter” (such as Joan of Arc) when he has a life-changing encounter with a terminally ill performance artist in a museum. Told from different perspectives and referencing poetry, philosophy, history and politics, Martyr! (Pan Macmillan, $35) is a deeply engaging (if, at times, slightly implausible) exploration of grief, betrayal, love and what gives a life meaning. Nicole Abadee

LISTEN / Good cop, bad cops

Season two of Bondi Badlands podcast, which investigates the 1988 death of Scott Johnson, is about to drop.

As someone who lived in Manly in the 1980s, I took a special interest in three new episodes of Bondi Badlands, the podcast from Good Weekend deputy editor Greg Callaghan, to be dropped on March 30. The first season investigated the cliffside murders of gay men in Bondi in the late 1980s and the police officer who never gave up on the case. Now, Callaghan turns his attention to the 1988 death of Scott Johnson, a young, gifted mathematician whose body was found naked and battered on the rocks at Sydney’s North Head – which local police dismissed as a suicide for decades – and the equally brutal demise of Stephen Dempsey at the hands of crossbow killer Richard Leonard in North Narrabeen in 1994. As Callaghan finds again and again, it takes the persistence of family, a dogged media and just one good cop to get justice. Barry Divola

SHOP / Small wonders

The Office Collection’s handcrafted leather goods can bring a pop of colour to the working week.

God, as we know, is in the details, which is why we’re giving thanks to Maison de Sabre, the local fashion label making a name for itself for its immaculately handcrafted, monogrammed leather goods. Now it has launched its Office Collection, a constellation of small but perfectly formed accessories to bring a dash of glamour to our working week. The mirror compact ($59) and lipstick case ($69) – both in the house’s signature two-tone colourways – are giving serious Grace Kelly on the commute, but the collection also includes an ID lanyard ($89), water-bottle holder ($149) and a pocket notebook ($55). Divine. Sharon Bradley

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