Cultural Elsewhere
Keep up to date with new articles on Elsewhere as they're added 
with Rss or subscribe to receive a weekly e-newsletter with updates, giveaways
Essays and interviews in the world of the arts, architecture, design, journalism, politics and culture. And more, which appeal to the curious spirit of Elsewhere . . .
NZ OPERA'S BUNGA-BUNGA VERDI: Rigoletto in Berlusconi's Rome
Ten days out from Christmas and little more than a fortnight before the 2012 Sydney Festival opening night and director Lindy Hume seems almost unnaturally relaxed. Might have been the massage, she laughs. At this point, aside from the usual crises which hit at the last minute, she admits there isn't a lot she can do but let things play out for this – her third and final... more >>
Added: 13 Apr 2012
BALI: Island of art, music and entrancing dance
Music seems inescapable in Bali. Not that you want to flee from it. In the more discreet bars and restaurants, around the hotel pool or in shops and village temples, somewhere in the background is a low and unobtrusive sound which sits between the hypnotic sound of the traditional Indonesian gamelan and the vacuous ambient trickle of New Age music. It almost requires you to slow... more >>
Added: 18 Feb 2012
A WALK OF ART IN SYDNEY: Art and about in Australia
We know Sydney is for shopping. But it's also a city where you can take a walk of art and come away excited, impressed, perhaps bewildered and always stimulated. So here are some suggestions for an arty but leisurely day out in Sydney (during which you will pass other galleries and points of interest), with some dining suggestions added. MORNING After breakfast somewhere down by... more >>
Added: 18 Feb 2012
PABLO PICASSO, A RETROSPECTIVE (2012): Macho minotaur and old goat
In his final few years, Picasso painted over 400 canvases. Few people however would argue all these works were the equal of his early provocative masterpieces in the three decades after 1907. Many were crass, scribbled daubs filled with self-referential jokes, and his etchings of time -- while remarkably assured in execution -- were filled with earthy sensuality bordering on the rude.... more >>
Added: 10 Feb 2012
SYDNEY FESTIVAL 2012: Director Lindy Hume interviewed
The Sydney Festival – which opens on January 7 2012 and runs for three weeks – just gets bigger and more ambitious every year. Aside from the international artists winging their way over for this one (from PJ Harvey and Lambchop through four Egyptian muezzins from mosques in Cairo to hard-hitting drama and world music acts such as Fatoumata Diawara) there is a powerful local... more >>
Added: 22 Dec 2011
JOHN WILLIAMS INTERVIEWED (2001): Has guitar, will travel
Consider these snapshots from his remarkable career: at the age of 17 he was announced to the world by his teacher, classical guitarist Andres Segovia, as "a prince of the guitar [on whom] God has laid a finger"; a decade later he was touring with Julian Bream; in '69 he was playing at Ronnie Scott's jazz club in London; there were rock gigs with his group Sky in the early... more >>
Added: 30 Nov 2011
RICHARD NUNNS INTERVIEWED (2003): The questions are blowing in the wind
The late Hirini Melbourne, who died of cancer in January '03 aged 53, opened a window on the past which has allowed others to see a future. Through his work with fellow musicologist Richard Nunns, Melbourne -- of Tuhoe and Ngati Kahungunu descent -- brought traditional Maori instruments back into the spotlight through performance, teaching and recording. His legacy is too vast to... more >>
Added: 27 Aug 2011
THE CHANGING CULTURE OF CLASSICAL MUSIC: Real world murder in the house
When the recording of Robert Moran’s new opera was released in '94 there was an almost predictable ripple of controversy in the more staid sections of the classical world. And not because this dark, disconcerting piece offered no conventional narrative structure, that one of the performers was proto-punk Iggy Pop (who spoke his part anyway), or that substantial sections of the music were... more >>
Added: 12 Aug 2011
THE PENINSULA, HONG KONG: A building through space and time
Only a fool would try to suggest that a single building – in this instance, worse, a luxurious hotel – could refract the story of city. But let's be foolish, because the history of the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong, and the way we see it today, contains bright flashes of that unique city's history. The first time I saw the Peninsula was more than four decades ago when Hong... more >>
Added: 19 Jun 2011
JOHN PSATHAS, 21st CENTURY MAN: The helix of creativity
It seems entirely fitting that the final piece on New Zealand composer John Psathas' new album Helix should be dedicated to Jack Body, a composer like Psathas who has always looked outward as much as inward for his inspiration. Body has found source material in Indonesia and in his tribute Waiting:Still, Psathas pairs the spare piano figures of Donald Nicolson with himself on gently... more >>
Added: 11 Apr 2011
U-THEATRE OF TAIWAN: The sound of one drop dripping
On Laochuan Mountain just 20 minutes drive from the motorcycle-clogged and fume-filled streets of Taipei is a remarkable series of open-sided wooden buildings. Part meditation retreat, part cultural centre and part performance space, this is home base for the country's acclaimed U-Theatre. It houses around 20 members who live communally and have daily exercises in gymnastics and... more >>
Added: 15 Mar 2011
THE MANGANIYAR SEDUCTION: From religion and red light
Inspiration doesn't always come in the proverbial flash. It may emerge over a period from a number of disparate sources, as it did for Roysten Abel and his theatrical staging of The Manganiyar Seduction. The 43 performers from a caste of Rajasthani musicians from Northern India are housed in four tiers of 36 separately illuminated cubicles. They sing and play a contemporary extension... more >>
Added: 7 Mar 2011
LA MONTE YOUNG: The master of minimalism, and more
When John Cale went to New York from Wales in the early 60s it wasn’t with the intention of meeting up with Lou Reed to form the Velvet Underground, but to study under a pianist/composer who had literally been “born in a log cabin” in the small community of Bern, Idaho. By the late Sixties that composer, La Monte Young, was in the vanguard of the minimalist movement and... more >>
Added: 3 Mar 2011
THE ROLE AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE CRITIC (Essay)
Since I first seriously reviewed an album about 40 years ago (the George Harrison triple set All Things Must Pass) I guess I have written in excess of maybe 6000 records/CDs/tapes etc -- and of course I have heard many, many more than that. Some people are well-read, I am well . . . Hmmm, there must be a word for it. In that time I have also reviewed hundreds of books, maybe a few... more >>
Added: 2 Mar 2011
POINT MUSIC (1992-2002): A decade of delivering new music
In many ways Rory Johnston looked exactly what he was, the vice-president of A&R (artists and repertoire) of a contemporary classical music label. It was there in the high, broad forehead and clear eyes, in the modulated speech and the vocabulary which didn't shy from a polysyllable or two. When I met him in the mid Nineties in Auckland – he came there to see the world... more >>
Added: 7 Feb 2011
AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL ART (2011): The state of the art
If only the moment could have been frozen in the lens. It resonated with meanings. The heavily bearded Aboriginal man -- unsteady on his feet and the cuffs of his worn jeans caked red with dust -- stands outside a gallery of Aboriginal art in Alice Springs. Through glazed, yellowed eyes he stares silently into the air-conditioned room where conspicuously wealthy tourists assess the... more >>
Added: 31 Jan 2011
JONATHAN JONES INTERVIEWED (2010): Illuminating the past and present, the beyond and between
Bathed in the light from his wall-filling sculpture of fluorescent tubes, the Australian artist Jonathan Jones tells an insightful story. When Governor Arthur Phillip was establishing Sydney in the late 18th century, the survey measure of a town was the number of its brick buildings. But because Sydney lacked a natural source of lime to mix with mortar it had none. “So they were... more >>
Added: 31 Jan 2011
LOST AND FOUND IN SPACE: To boldly split an infinitive
Some time in the mid-Seventies the late Alistair Cooke – in one of his patrician but always fascinating Letter From America programmes – spoke about an old editor he worked under. On a slow news day the editor would haul out a book of important events in history and scour the pages. He’d usually return with a wonderful idea for a story and would be triumphant when the... more >>
Added: 24 Jan 2011
THE ART OF THE ALBUM COVER: CD or not CD?
Paul McCartney perhaps spoke for his generation when he recalled the thrill of buying a new record as a teenager and, while taking it home, sitting in the bus pouring over the cover photo and liner notes, scanning them for clues. The covers of subsequent Beatle albums also had that effect on another generation, and their covers were emblematic of the era: their debut album Please... more >>
Added: 17 Jan 2011 
2 Comments
HENRYK GORECKI, THE SORROWFUL SYMPHONY: Capturing the spirit of the age, and marketing
When Billboard magazine – the bible of the international music industry – put classical music on its cover in September '92 with the heading “It’s Cool Again!” there was only one mention of Polish composer Henryk Gorecki in the 18-page insert supplement. And that reference was only to say that despite a stagnant market (unit sales in Britain down 20 per cent... more >>
Added: 14 Jan 2011
