Sydney Festival

Sydney Festival takes place in Sydney, New South Wales

Sydney Festival 2012 dates – 7th to 29th January

SYDNEY FESTIVAL 2012 – LINE UP

PJ Harvey – Wednesday 18th and Thursday 19th January @ State Theatre
Beth Orton – Tuesday 17th and Wednesday 18th @ City Recital Hall
West Side Story – Friday 27th and Saturday 28th @ Sydney Opera House
Taraf de Haïdouks & Koçani Orkestar: Band of Gypsies – Thursday January 12th @ Enmore Theatre
Mike Patton – Monday 16th and Tuesday 17th January @ State Theatre
Lambchop – Saturday 21st January @ City Recital Hall
Kort (Kurt Wagner And Cortney Tidwell) – Friday 20th January @ City Recital Hall
Joshua Redman & Brad Mehldau – Friday 20th January @ Concert Hall
Tubula Bells for Two – Wednesday 18th –Sunday 22nd @ Seymor Centre
iOTA – Tuesday 17th – Sunday 21st @ Sydney Opera House

The History of the Sydney Festival
Sydney Festival was originally conceived by the Sydney Committee, the NSW State Government and the City of Sydney with a view to attracting people into the city centre during the holiday month of January.

The first Festival took place in 1977 and it has since grown to become one of Australia’s largest annual cultural celebrations with an international reputation for modern, popular and intelligent programming. In many ways it is probably still best understood as a celebration of Sydney and its style and energy reflect the confidence, diversity and vigour of one of the world’s most beautiful cities.

For three weeks each January the Festival offers a rich program of around 80 events involving upwards of 500 artists from Australia and abroad covering dance, theatre, music, visual arts, cross media and forums. In any given year, it makes use of most of the main theatres across the city including Sydney Theatre, CarriageWorks, the Seymour Centre, City Recital Hall and venues at the Sydney Opera House.

Sydney Festival also presents a number of quality, free outdoor events such as the long-running Festival in The Domain with two massive free concerts, each attracting up to 100,000 people. In 2008 the Festival introduced a new opening event, Festival First Night, which sees the city streets transformed into a series of free stages and precincts. 300,000 people enjoyed Festival First Night in January 2009.

The Festival has a history of presenting Australian premieres and many of Australia’s most memorable productions such as Cloudstreet have resulted from Sydney Festival’s commitment to nurture local artists. It has brought many of the world’s great artists to Sydney for the first time including: Ariane Mnouchkine and Thèâtre du Soleil (Flood Drummers), Robert Wilson (The Black Rider), Robert Lepage (Far Side of the Moon, The Andersen Project and Lipsynch), George Piper Dances, Netherlands Dance Theatre, James Thiérrée, Philip Glass, Ian McKellen (Dance of Death), the Batsheva Dance Company and the National Theatre of Scotland (Black Watch and Aalst).

Sydney Festival attracts a total audience of approximately 1 million people across all of its events, making it the most attended cultural event in Australia.