Opera Australia
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Opera Australia is Australia's major opera company, formed by the merger of the Australian Opera and the Victorian State Opera companies in 1996, following a major review of the (government-supported) performing arts companies in Australia commissioned by the Howard government.
Its performance season at the Sydney Opera House runs for approximately eight months of the year, with the remainder of its time spent in the Victorian Arts Centre in Melbourne, Victoria.
Like most opera companies, it is funded by a combination of government funding, corporate sponsorship, private philanthropy, and ticket sales. The proportion of its revenue from ticket sales is considerably higher than that of most companies.
As well as the traditional classical repertoire, a number of Australian operas have been premiered by the company, including the recent "Lindy," by Moya Henderson, which is based on the Lindy_Chamberlain case (familiar in popular culture through the film A Cry in the Dark.
The company is perhaps best known internationally for its association with Joan Sutherland, one of the best-known sopranos of the 1980s, and Baz Luhrmann's attention-grabbing production of La bohème in the early 1990s.
The company has a second arm, OzOpera, which tours smaller centres and performs in non-traditional settings (for instance, for school groups). Its music director is Richard Gill, and it is administered from Opera Australia's Melbourne office.
External Link
Opera Australia (http://www.opera-australia.org.au/)