Christchurch Arts Festival Brings Entertainment For Eight Weeks

Christchurch audiences will have some much needed entertainment for eight weekends in August and September during the 2011 Christchurch Arts Festival.

The biennial multi-genre Festival was today launched and will stage a programme of music, dance, theatre, visual arts, and ideas from August 12 to October 2 Staging the Festival in 2011 has been a major challenge since the February 22 earthquake and Christchurch Arts Festival director Philip Tremewan says there’s been plenty of creative thinking to find suitable venues and stage a festival which will “warm the heart”.

Rather than running across an intense 17 days, Christchurch Arts Festival 2011 takes place on eight consecutive weekends and ticket prices have been kept low, thanks to funding from Creative New Zealand, with tickets to most shows available for $20 or even less!

“We are delighted to deliver a festival for Christchurch that sparkles over eight weekends. We’ve sub-titled the programme ‘Our Heart Beats – Ka Paatukituki te Manawa’ to describe our goal of bringing the warmth of live entertainment to Christchurch this spring – the music will warm your heart, the theatre will inspire your spirit, the dance will put a spring in your step.”

Mr Tremewan adds that making Christchurch Arts Festival possible for 2011 has meant working with a large family of partners and gaining strong commitment and support from sponsors.

“We’ve been working very closely with City Council and the REAL New Zealand Festival to make Christchurch Arts Festival a reality for 2011. This included changing the timing of the Festival to run during the first three weeks of Rugby World Cup 2011 as part of the REAL New Zealand Festival.

“We’ve scheduled shows around the games in the Fanzone so you can come down, watch a game, see a show and stay on for entertainment.” International acts in the Festival include MacHomer – an astonishing one-man show melding Macbeth with The Simpsons, the hilarious award-winning show Spontaneous Broadway, Brazil’s Ná Ozzetti, Australian musicians Jeff Lang and Linsey Pollak with his family show Passing Wind and, exclusive to Christchurch Arts Festival, Scottish Opera’s Baby O.

Special events recognise the challenges Christchurch has faced with the September and February earthquakes: – Tilt explores how people maintain strength, balance and control in a changing environment and features leading New Zealand contemporary dancers and a set with a moving floor; Christchurch Sings brings together more than 500 Christchurch choristers for a spcial concert marking the anniversary of the September 4 earthquake and featuring Fauré’s Requiem; and Christchurch Memorial featuring a new commission by New Zealand composer Gareth Farr.

Well-known Christchurch cook Richard Till hosts Kiwi Kitchen Table Banquets – a three course meal using recipes from classic New Zealand cookbooks and featuring kitchen crew drawn from the city’s community cooks.

New Zealand theatre features in the Festival with plays Rita and Douglas, He Reo Aroha and SALON, while musical play Raising The Titanics recalls the heyday of the Maori showbands, and C’Mon Black brings the Rugby into the theatre.

The dance programme in the Festival includes Footnote Dance’s Made in New Zealand; Random Acts of God – a contemporary cabaret piece from Christchurch’s Corrupt Productions as well as performances from the Body Festival of Dance and Physical Theatre and the Royal New Zealand Ballet’s Tower Tutus on Tour.

A fantastic line-up of New Zealand musicians will be playing during the Festival including Liam Finn, The Phoenix Foundation, Lawrence Arabia, Electric Wire Hustle, Island Summer, Richard Nunns, Mike Nock Trio and The Bellbirds. Two very special collaborations have come together for Christchurch Arts Festival – Fathers and Sons, a concert featuring well known New Zealand musicians performing with their fathers; and Songs To Leave Behind which has Don McGlashan, Julia Deans and Anna Coddington teaming up to perform the songs which first turned them on to music, a song from a favourite songwriter, the song they wish they had written, a song or two of their own and finishing with the song they wish to be remembered by.

Michael Houstoun features in two classical music concerts – a recital, Houstoun Plays Schubert; and teaming up with NZTrio pianist Sarah Watkins for a special Maurice Till Memorial Concert. The Saguaro Trio, Latitude 37 and the Jubilate Singers all have concerts during the Festival, along with two concerts from the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra (Leningrad and Odes To Joy) and two concerts by the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra – one with Whirimako Black, L.A. Mitchell and others, and the other with Dave Dobbyn.

Two major visual arts projects provide a visible presence of the Festival – the stunning Earth From Above exhibition comes to Christchurch and the specially-commissioned Pouwhenua asks leading Ngāi Tahu artists to create billboards in response to the theme Te Haka a Rūaumoko – The Earthquake’s Dance. Ideas are highlighted in a festival within a festival – The Press Festival of Ideas – designed to provoke discussion about a range of topics and featuring well-known speakers and panellists.

Christchurch Arts Festival runs from 12 August to 2 October at a variety of venues in Christchurch. Tickets are on sale from Monday 11 July. For the full programme and details, visit www.artsfestival.co.nz

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