Join Us Sunday, 10 May To Watch and Chat: Die Walkure, Act One. 5 PM (British Summer Time)

Join us over at Twitch for video "watch party" of act one of Walkure. Meet some new friends, chat with some old ones and most importantly, watch act one of Die Walkure, (English subs). Preshow, mini-documentaries included. Click here to register, watch or view brief highlights of last weeks Tristan,

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Opera Australia launches free online streaming platform with Joan Sutherland in the starring role

Unable to perform live while the country is in COVID-19 lock-down, Opera Australia has created another way to share their performances with opera fans, today launching OA | TV: Opera Australia on Demand, a free online streaming service.

OA | TV will feature exclusive content from its back catalogue that includes the world’s most comprehensive collection of Dame Joan Sutherland performances on video and Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour, plus a series of chat show style interviews called In Conversation with Lyndon Terracini and unique ‘behind the scenes’ footage.

Each week OA will add new content to the platform. The launch will feature one of Dame Joan Sutherland’s most celebrated performances, that of Hannah Glawari in the 1988 production of Franz Lehar’s The Merry Widow, performed at the Sydney Opera House, directed by Lofti Mansouri and conducted by Richard Bonynge.

Also available on the platform from today, the full length production of Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour’s inaugural 2012 season of La Traviata, that was due to be revived in 2020 before being cancelled due to the coronavirus.

The first instalment of the In Conversation with Lyndon Terracini series with OA’s Concert Master Jun Yi Ma, reveals his fascinating journey from being handpicked for specialist coaching at age five in China, performing for President Reagan at the White House aged 12 years, to landing the role of Concert Master for the Tasmanian Symphony before being enticed to join OA by Artistic Director Lyndon Terracini.

"Opera Australia is renowned for defying international trends of declining audience numbers and is constantly evolving its programming in an endeavour to broaden its audience but the coronavirus was not part of the plan" says Mr Terracini. “Understandably it’s been devastating for everyone at the Company not being able to perform through this crisis, and we know our fans are missing us as much as we’re missing being on stage. We’ve actually been wanting to launch OA | TV for some time, and now we have the right digital platform and the time to develop it, so we can share not only our rich history with our fans, but also it’s an opportunity for them to meet some of our incredibly talented artists as well as some of the key people working behind the scenes, with a series of interviews we’re going to do. “OA has an extensive archive of legendary operatic performances. We’ve got the largest collection of Joan Sutherland videos in the world, and it’s such a great honour to be able to share these gems with her fans,” he said.

OA | TV will launch with four program categories; In Conversation with Lyndon Terracini, Opera in the Sydney

Opera House, Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour and The Best of Dame Joan Sutherland, a collection of her most famous arias that transformed her into Australia’s most loved opera singer and a world-wide operatic sensation.

tv.opera.org.au

Note: OA | TV will not be live until midnight Sunday 3 May 2020

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Join Us Sunday, 3 May For A Free One Day "Live" Online Little Bayreuth

Bayreuth, as you know is cancelled, as are all other performances. The world is in a temporary turmoil. People are locked in or if they go to work are separated from those places where they may meet people to discuss their passions. 

And yet, we believe that it may be possible to use technology to go, a little bit at least, towards capturing the social, - and thus emotional and intellectual -  experience of a visiting a live performance - in some way, perhaps more so.   

With that in mind, we would like to do something online: interactive, social, recorded video performances of Wagner's work.  A mini online Bayreuth if you like. Indeed, we did a little mini-trial a few weeks ago with a small few people to test the technical capabilities of the platform we wish to use - with some success. We then asked on twitter if people would be interested and more importantly take part by joining in and chatting, a108 voted yes.

So, with that in mind, we would like to do a full trial, broadcasting a famous performance of one of Wagner's works - Tristan und Isolde - in full this Sunday. We will be rebroadcasting live from youtube, a performance made available there, by the copyright holders. The reason we will be broadcasting live from youtube is that although we have good technical equipment and band weight to broadcast ourselves should we encounter any technical difficulties,, you should at least still be able to watch and chat. 

We will be using a video/social broadcasting platform called Twitch. Normally considered a platform for gamers to broadcast gameplay, but in truth, it is used for other forms of the arts also - more so during this pandemic.  To watch the broadcast, you simply need to visit the channel at the time given below. However, we are hoping that you will join us in the chat that will run live at the side of the performance - especially during the intervals. We think that this experience can only be raised from simply watching a youtube video by your considered thoughts and insights. To do this, you will need to register an account with Twitch. This is free,  quick, simple, only requires an email address - any will do if you wish to make one just for this - and is unobtrusive. 

There may be teething problems, although hopefully few.  if any. You will need to bring your own ice cream and cushion.

An Online Mini Bayreuth (Test)

Work: Tristian und Isolde (Sadly, at this stage, not a Bayreuth performance)

Time: Join us at 3.00 PM BST on Sunday 3 May (Bring your own cushion)

Place:  Twitch Click this link (might be a good idea to register in advance if you want to chat but will only take a few minutes on the day)

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