Perth Festival 2024: A bonus for, and from, Artistic Director Iain Grandage
Arts festivals are one of the few things that can generate culture. Perth now has many festivals, all of which, to varying degrees, have helped shape this city’s cultural life, but none more so than Perth Festival—it is woven into the fabric of this town.
Into its eighth decade, Perth Festival has brought many of the world’s most important artists to this most isolated of cities. Over the past seventy years, the world’s great orchestras, theatre, dance, and street performance companies have appeared in festival programs allowing the audience here to gain a rich cultural education.
On the flip side, key WA-based artists and companies have been provided with a high-profile showcase through which they can pit their work against their international counterparts. Robert Juniper, Chrissie Parrott, Miriam Stannage, Cathie Travers, Cat Hope, and Richard Walley, as well as Black Swan State Theatre Company, the Nova Ensemble, Barking Gecko, the Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, and Yirra Yaakin, among many others, have presented work at past festivals. The WA Ballet and Symphony, the state’s oldest performing arts companies, have been engaged with the Festival since its beginnings in the 1950s. Even the city’s arts infrastructure has benefitted with many of Perth’s principal venues—notably the Concert Hall and State Theatre Centre—initiated in part to house Festival events.
Under the guidance of the Festival’s ninth Artistic Director, Iain Grandage, who presents his fifth and final festival between Friday, February 9, and Sunday, March 3, next year, Perth Festival has become even more tightly woven into West Australia’s creative culture.
As AD, Grandage stands apart from his predecessors. He is not only the first West Australian-raised person to hold the position, but significantly, before taking on the role, he was primarily known as a composer and musician.
As a thumbnail bio: after studying composition and cello at the UWA School of Music, Grandage became prominent in the WA arts scene. In the 1990s, he worked with many WA artists across a range of artforms. He played in the new music ensembles Magnetic Pig and Alea as well as writing scores for Black Swan’s visionary founder Andrew Ross, culminating in the legendary Cloudstreet (1998). Grandage credits Ross for enabling him to work on major productions early in his career.
From here, his career spread across the country. Having been awarded a Sidney Myer Performing Arts Award (2012) and seven Helpmann Awards for his compositions in theatre, dance, opera (with Kate Miller-Heidke), film (with Rahayu Suppangah), as well as musical direction, Grandage is now regarded as one of Australia’s most prominent collaborative artists.
So he not only knows the Perth creative scene from the inside as an artist, not the outside as a producer, but has great experience working creatively and collaboratively with national and international artists across a range of artforms. Crucial skills for an AD, they have enabled Grandage to transform Perth Festival.
This transformation is reflected in the thematic journey of his suite of festivals, all of which, thanks to input from Indigene artist and linguist Kylie Bracknell, fly under Noongar names.
Beginning close to home in 2020 with Karla (fire), a campfire for sharing local stories and inviting belonging, his festival vision spread steadily wider. In 2021, it was to travel down a river, Bilya, to celebrate river cultures around the world, onto the ‘one ocean that connects us all’, Wardan in 2021, then out into the stars, Djinda in 2023.
Early in this journey, the borders closed, and Grandage had to recalibrate. The river theme in 2021 became specifically the Derbarl Yerrigan (the Swan), the ocean festival in 2022, our stretch of the Indian Ocean. Propitiously, this turned the Festival’s focus inward and forged deeper connections with the Perth arts community.
To tie these themes to specific shows, the fire festival presented Hecate, the world’s first Noongar language Shakespeare play, remounted the WA classics Cloudstreet and Bran Nue Dae, and closed with the legendary Highway to Hell, a celebration of one of Perth’s most prominent arteries and perhaps its most colourful musician, AC/DC’s Bon Scott.
For the river festival, Witness Stand, BESIDE, and The Cherry Orchard were all held on the banks of the Derbarl Yerrigan, while WA-based Indigenous singer/songwriter Gina Williams told the story of her life in Koort (Heart).
The Ninth Wave in the ocean festival was held on the sands at City Beach while, in a neat reversal of common perception, And the Earth Will Swallow them Whole set Perth on the world’s horizon.
2023 saw the return of a stronger international program, including Björk’s Cornucopia, while the stars theme saw Djoondal, Seven Sisters, Between Us, and Bon Iver presented outdoors at night.
In acknowledgment that his original vision had been displaced, the Festival’s board decided to extend Grandage’s tenure by an extra year. This has allowed him to bring to fruition some of the longer-term projects delayed by COVID. It also meant that, having reached the stars, he had to refigure his theme. Taking a step back from the universe, the 2024 festival orbits around our own star, the sun, Ngaangk.
This is the festival we are about to see.
Grandage is quick to point out that an overarching theme does not limit what the artists can do. Rather, it provides them with a generative impulse, the first line on what can otherwise be a daunting blank page. A common resonant idea or issue triggers a diverse response. Not everything will fit; that would be too dull and didactic, but all the works do orbit more or less around a central poetic, philosophical, and cultural motif.
Once the broad framework is set, it’s time to connect the dots. This is achieved through commissioning new work and, in Grandage’s case, initiating cross-cultural collaborations between international and West Australian artists.
Not all of the program is generated this way. Some extant international and Australian productions are imported more or less intact, while others are initiated by the artists and presented to the festival for consideration. A key part of the AD’s art is to eke out the connections and accommodate these works within the framework. Flexibility and an eclectic imagination are required.
Commissioning is a long-term process, with the generative period varying by artform. As Grandage notes, musical projects and individual visual artworks (a painting or piece of sculpture) have the shortest generative span, as little as six months. Theatre and dance projects can take up to 18 months; opera can take up to two years; while large-scale public spectacles and visual art installations can stretch beyond that. An incoming AD has to hit the ground running and usually begins their tenure a good year before they take over the reins, up to two full years before their first festival opens.
Again, lockdown disrupted this cycle for Grandage. Some commissions had to be abandoned, and some conversations that began in 2019—Akram Khan and Brooklyn Rider, for example—were restarted once international touring again became viable. Other displaced works were reprogrammed into the ‘23 and ‘24 festivals while he had to pass others onto the incoming director, Anna Reece, for her consideration.
Akram Khan and Brooklyn Rider are presented in the Ngaangk program. With Khan, the original work has been replaced by a new one, Jungle Book Reimagined (Heath Ledger Theatre, 9–17 February). The world-renowned Brooklyn Rider are performing two new works alongside two of Grandage’s all-time favourite pieces: Golijov’s Tenebra and Shostakovich’s 8th String Quartet (Concert Hall, Friday, March 1).
The other commissions that have come to fruition in 2024 include WA Opera’s production Wundig Wer Wilura by WA indigene singer/songwriter Gina Williams and her musical collaborator Guy Ghouse (The Maj, Feb 9 to 15), Broome-based Marrugeku’s dance show Mutiara, which explores the bond between seafaring Malays and the Kimberley’s First Peoples within the pearling industry (Studio Underground, Feb 9 to 12), Gold Coast dance collective The Farm’s wild satire of the film industry Stunt Double (Studio Underground, Feb 15 to 18), and Perth multi-media artist Rebecca Bauman’s immersive installation Light Event (Carillon City, Feb 9 to Mar 3).
Even so, cross-cultural collaborations may well be Grandage’s most significant legacy.
Festivals and collaboration are no strangers. Indeed, one of the reasons fringe festivals run alongside mainstream ones is to engender the cross-fertilisation of ideas between local and emerging artists and their international contemporaries. In the case of the Perth Festival, which was established some thirty years before the Perth Fringe, initially local creatives would use the festival to come up to speed on world practice.
These historic collaborations extended to sometimes casting international stars in local productions and, conversely, engaging international directors and choreographers to develop shows with local performers. Hence, at the turn of the century, Phillipe Genty developed a work with Australian performers, the first time he had developed a show outside Europe. Taking that show back to France launched the international careers of a few Australian artists. Similarly, the production Three G in the teens engaged a French choreographer with three generations of WA-based dancers, initiating some young dancers into the professional world and bringing some older performers out of retirement.
Grandage has taken this process one step further by initiating artistic collaborations between international and WA-based artists. This is a win-win for all concerned. The international artist can extend their practice to include Australian themes, while the Australians benefit from working with a profiled international practitioner.
In 2024, such collaborations include the concert Mother Nature, Angélique Kidjo performing with Noongar band Maatakitj; the exhibitions Jintula, which brings Martu, Persian/South-African, and Walmajarra artists together (Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, Feb 17 to March 2); and Polarity: Fire and Ice, an immersive film and photographic exhibition by artists living in Australia, Canada, and the Arctic that considers the climate catastrophe.
The relative late notice of Grandage’s extra festival means that there is a predominance of music in the 2024 program, most notably the commission of Jonathan Mills and Meredith Oakes’ opera Eucalyptus (The Maj, Feb 22) and Sophia Brous’ intriguing The Invisible Opera (Scarborough Beach Auditorium, Feb 22 to 25).
This is rounded out by strong contemporary and fine music programs, including Sampa the Great, Ludivico Einaudi, and the ACO, and an exciting eight-act season at The Rechabite, the home of WA’s contemporary experimental music.
This rich and diverse program will leave many music fans bleary-eyed and very happy.
The perennially popular Lotterywest Film Festival (Somerville Auditorium until March 31) and the Writers Weekend (State Library, Feb 23 to 25), with special guests musician Deborah Conway and Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Jane Smiley, complete the culturally rich and exciting Ngaangk festival.
At an early stage in his career, Grandage thought he might follow in his father’s footsteps and become an academic. Although he began a master’s degree, he never completed it; the call of the stage took him away. In an ironic twist, Grandage fulfilled his abandoned academic ambition when UWA awarded him an honorary doctorate in Arts.
Grandage’s performer’s sensibility has helped to shape the promotion of these last five festivals. This comes to the fore in the festival launches.
In David Blenkinsop’s era (1976–1999), the festival launch was a closed affair for the media and selected members of the arts community. Although one year he did swing down the Maj’s fly tower in a basket, his launches were usually held in discrete, stylish venues such as Matilda Bay Restaurant or the grounds of the Festival’s own offices in UWA’s charming Tuart House.
Like everything during his tenure, Sean Doran (2000–2003) took it up a notch and launched his festivals with multi-media presentations at the Perth Concert Hall. The four directors that followed him stuck to this format.
Grandage has taken it a step further by not only talking the invariably full auditorium through the festival highlights but, sitting at the piano or cello, performing with some of the Festival’s key artists. This year he accompanied Gina Williams, guitarist Guy Ghouse, and organist Alessandro Pittorino with the aria from Wundig Wer Wilura, as well as Dr. Roma Winmar, who, after a piano-scored Welcome to Country, sang a moving Noongar version of We Are Australian. Promotion as a performance, put Grandage on a stage and he will play music.
As you can see, Perth Festival is not just about high art. Dating back to the second director, John Birman (1954–1975), the program has always included a very strong component of popular art. In the early years, this extended to include cricket matches and regattas, something future directors may want to resurrect.
In 1972, Birman hosted Led Zeppelin’s legendary concert at Subiaco Oval, a formula he repeated the following year with the triple bill of Slade, Lindisfarne, and Status Quo. That was a golden era of touring bands playing at outdoor venues; the Stones and Frank Zappa played at the WACA, but these two concerts stand out.
Grandage continued this tradition with Highway to Hell and Björk. His 2024 festival closer, Under the Same Sun (Saturday, March 2), again sits in this tradition. A free concert in Supreme Court Gardens, it features, among many others, Paul Kelly, Angelique Kidjo, Sampa the Great, and Stephen Pigram. But, with an appropriate twist, the show will be underpinned by some high art: the music will be accompanied by the WA Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Grandage himself. This will make a fitting finale for not only the Ngaangk festival but also Grandage’s tenure as AD.
Tickets for all Perth Festival shows are now on sale at perthfestival.com
IAN LILBURNE
Ian Lilburne was the founding director of the Perth Artrage Festival, a former manifestation of the Perth Fringe, now Fringe World.