The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Page 156

Jl The best of what's on this week Edited by Jane Hampson C. fhw if, jp fni if im I ws is. IT" rt 1 IF, 'CI r. rtr nil Do Is this a concert where everybody falls asleep and nobody minds? Nah, this is relaxation music, you're supposed to dance on your chair. TONY O'CONNOR, composer, has made 12 albums combining natural and synthesised sounds all at the same tempo as the human heartbeat (hence the relaxation effect) including Uluru and Rainforest Magic, and he's sold 2 million copies of them.

The Sydney Opera House Concert Hall is the Sydney stop on his EXPERIENCE THE MAGIC TOUR. Start time 8pm. Price: $49.90, $39.90 cone. Phone: 02 9250 7777. It's an Oriental summer at The Art Gallery of NSW.

The exotic visions of artists such as Moreau, Renoir and Matisse are included in ORIENTALISM: DELACROIX TO KLEE, which is open to the public from today. It shows a 19th century European fascination for the harems, desert skies, kasbahs and spicss of the Islamic world of northern Africa and the Middle East -Egypt, Turkey, Morocco, Algeria. Until February 22, 10am to 5pm daily. Price: $12 full; $7 cone; $30 family. Phone: 02 9225 1744.

DAVID LARWILL exhibits at Olsen Carr Galleries. Larwill was one of the founders of Roar in the early 80s a co-operative studio and gallery in Melbourne, whose opening night parties became legend. This laconic art school drop-out paints for what must be the best reason in the world the joy of it. Larwill's work reflects his love of tribal art, and his distinctive style is described as "figurative 76 Paddington Street, Paddington. Until December 6.

Tuesday to Saturday, llam-6pm. Free. Phone: 02 9360 9854. In the Queen Victoria Building, cast your eyes upward to the gracious centre dome and you will see them hanging, like so many swords of Damacles over the multitudes of furtive Christmas shoppers. It's a A SYMPHONY OF CHRISTMAS TREES and it's all for a good cause, of course -the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

The trees have been decorated and donated by the likes of LOUIS VUITTON, CHANEL, DAVID JONES and NUTRI-METICS. Close up.looks at the exhibit are free. The trees will be auctioned by Sotheby's head honcho JUSTIN MILLER on December at Quadrivium Gallery. Price: Free to view trees; tickets to auction, $45. Phone: 02 9334 4695.

Heading into the main stretch of the silly season and ABROAD WITH TWO MEN, starring JONATHAN BIGGINS, LINDA NAGLE and PHILLIP SCOTT sets the pace. This satire on Australian arts festivals has travelled the length and breadth of the country and arrives tonight at the Sydney Opera House Playhouse. (I I One of life's little ironies muses Colin Lane, is that the things that get you chucked Start time 8 o'clock. Show runs Tuesdays to Saturdays, with weekend matinees at 4pm throughout December. Price: $28.90 groups and cones.

Phone: 02 9250 7777; Firstcall 02 9320 9000. out of class in Year 9 can make you a television star a decade later. Lane is one ilil i 1 1 half of the comedy duo of the moment LANO WOODLEY. Their hilarious CURTAINS is the show that stole the show at the 1996 Melbourne i r.w rrTf.il i.TT7v Kirsti Harms: Leader of the choral pack. KIRSTI HARMS, JOANNA COLE, ADRIAN McHENRY, and WARWICK FYFE lead 600 singers, including the Sydney Philharmonia Symphonic Choir, in the annual singing of Handel's MESSIAH.

David Hill, master of music at Winchester Cathedral, England, conducts. Tonight and tomorrow night, 8pm. Sunday at 2.30pm. Price: Phone: 02 9334 4600. SHAKESPEARE: THE MUSICAL like it or not, it had to happen sooner or later.

OFF-BROADWAY BARD, starring Warwick Allsopp (pictured), opens at Cafe Basilica tonight. Yep, some of the Bard's best soliloquies and sonnets, Broadway style; to wit item number eight on this cabaret Outback partners in loneliness. A young mum stifled by Outback summer heat and a carefree city barmaid meet, in Sturt, North Queensland, 1966. At first, these two women appear complete opposites, but underneath there's a common bond loneliness and its expression, through pining, whining country music. LONG GONE, LONESOME COWGIRLS, a comedy by Philip Dean, has moved north from Woollongong's Theatre South via Parramatta's Riverside Theatre and is now playing in the centre of town at The Stables Theatre, Nimrod Street, Kings Cross.

Starring Sara-Grenfell and Amelia Longhurst, as well as a slew of great country and western songs. Tuesdays to Saturdays at 8pm, Saturday matinees at 2pm, and Sundays at 5pm. Price: $28; cone $19. Phone: 02 9361 3817. Pipe dreams in Orientalism: Delacroix to Klee.

More exotic offerings, though aural this time, on THE CELTIC HARP at Quadrivium Gallery in the Queen Victoria Building, George Street. Young Dutch woman Anouk Van Dobben, a former soloist with her home country's youth orchestra, will perform Saturday lunchtimes (12pm-3pm) until Christmas. Phone: 02 9264 8222. David Larwill's figurative expressionism. And another who painted for painting's sake was the late IAN FAIRWEATHER.

Although it's Fairweather's sketches, watercolours and gouache works that are on show at The Art Gallery of NSW, they show the same influence as his paintings -brush and ink techniques picked up during his extensive travels through Asia. This week is your last chance to view THE DRAWINGS OF IAN FAIRWEATHER, a National Gallery of Australia travelling exhibition. 10am-5pm daily. Free. Phone: 02 9225 1744.

Comedy festival. Tonight is your last chance to catch Curtains at The Seymour Centre, at 7pm. Price: From $21. Phone: 02 9364 9400. New work by RUSSELL DUMAS at The Performance Space's DANCE EXCHANGE.

Among those making the moves are Cath Stewart, Jaap Flier, Nick Sabel, Keith March and Trevor Patrick. Opens tonight, until December 14, with no shows on December 8 or 9. Call the box office for show times. 199 Cleveland Street, Redfern. Price: $20; $12 cone.

Phone: 02 9319 5091. Hart and soul: Pro Hart exhibiting in Sydney. Before he made a mean mess on a carpet for a television commercial, artist PRO HART was best known as a painter who stoked the fire of the Bushie legend. The blokes for they are blokes out there who catch yabbies, split logs, take their smoko under shady gums are Hart's subjects. Life amid the flies, heat, dust and isolation of the Outback.

Hart arrives in Sydney this week for the opening of -his exhibition at Wagner Art Gallery, 39 Gurner Street, Paddington. MY COUNTRY AUSTRALIA opens tomorrow night, and runs until January 9. Gallery hours: Monday to Saturday, 10.30am-6pm. All works are for sale. Free.

Phone: 02 9360 6069. menu, in which Dorothy meets the Prince of Denmark. Hamlet's "To be or not to be" speech is followed by a rendition of SOMEWHERE OVER THE RAINBOW. But will the speech be sung to an upbeat tempo and the song spouted in rhyming couplets? Can't wait to see the cozzies (red shoes take Hamlet Opens today and runs Tuesdays to Saturdays until December 20. Dinner at 6.30pm, show time, 8.30pm.

Cafe Basilica is at 101 Cleveland Street, Chippendale. Price: $20 show only; $30 with dinner. Phone: 02 9319 1222. SUNDAY NIGHT JAZZ at Christmas is a great time to give people things they would love but never buy themselves. Find inspiration for Chrissie gift giving at Quadrlvium's Christmas exhibition FOUR WAYS II a collection of jewellery, glass, ceramics, painting and printmaking all for sale.

Gallery hours: Monday to Saturday 10am-6pm, Thursdays till 9pm, Sunday llam-5pm. Meanwhile, at Star City, the music is more folk than cowpoke, with PETER, PAUL AND MARY. The folk trio began 36 years ago humbly, as befits their folk strains, in a Greenwich Village coffee house. They have finally made it to Star City with their message of peace, love and brown rice. In the Lyric Theatre tonight and tomorrow night at 8 o'clock.

Price: Phone: Ticketek 02 9266 4800. The Woollahra Hotel and it's a groovy thing when some of Sydney's top musos Sean Wayland (piano), Hamish Stuart (drums) and Lily Dior (vocals) included combine their styles. 6pm-9pm. 116 Queen Street, Woollahra. Free.

Phone: 02 9363 2782. For kids, at AUSTRALIA'S WONDERLAND, Dinosaur superstars descend. Barney, nimiru It's back! MOONLIGHT CINEMA in Centennial Park, last summer's must-do, with a more classic collection of films, it appears, this time around. Screening today is THE GODFATHER, tomorrow, the enchanting CINEMA PARADISO (which features an mitHnnr rinpmal and nn Satnrriav For those in their screaming teens, you might prefer the higher-voltage, less sophisticated all-ages gig at The Metro. Appearing will be REGURGITATOR, SCREAMFEEDER and THE AVALANCHES.

3pm 624 George Street. Tickets available at the door. Price: $17. Phone: 02 9264 2666. It's Vivaldi's turn in the moonlight in the Royal Botanic Gardens.

This weekend, flautist JANE RUTTER with orchestra and the Amadeus players perform under the stars. On the program is Vivaldi's famous FOUR SEASONS and Handel's equally well known (you'll know it when you hear it) WATER MUSIC. Until Sunday, at 8pm. BYO food, wine and rug. Price: $34.90, cone available.

Phone: Ticketek 02 9266 4118. IPHIS, A COMIC OPERA by Elena Kats-Chernin: This is the 90s, it is a love story, you know what to expect. Iphis, a girl raised by a control freak father and a new age mother, as a boy. falls in love with a girl. They plan to marry but then she (Iphis) gets the guilts about not revealing her true sex to the world and thus asks the gods for a sex change.

They (the gods, that is) are only too obliging, really foo obliging, for they end up switching the sex of everyone in sight. I RICHARD STUBBS is tonight's Joker at Jokers, the comedy club that was once a part of the old Sydney Harbour Casino. You'll now find Jokers in the Showroom at Star City. Your host will be Signor Vincenzo Sorrenti. Start time: 9pm.

Tomorrow night RUSSELL GILBERT takes the stage, with Eric Bana on Wednesday night and Steady Eddy Thursday. Price: From $18. Phone: Ticketek 9266 4800. live in concert from today for one week with friends Baby Bop and J. Concerts are twice daily in the Gold Nugget Theatre, 11am and 2.30pm.

For those wishing to V. '-A f. Ian Fairweather's Girls With Fish. Joker: Russell Gilbert. if you can bear Mickey Rooney's Japanese turn and the happy Hollywood ending to the whole thing -BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S, starring the gamine AUDREY HEPBURN.

Enter via the Woollahra Gate, from 7.30pm. Movie starts at 8.45pm. Tickets are available at the gate. Price: $12.50, $9 student, $8 head off tantrums, you can book ahead. Australia's Wonderland is at Wallgrove Rd, Eastern Creek.

Price: $5 after entry ystrX." ft A Flautist Jane Rutter. think Shakespeare might have done this one once. The award-winning Ingrid Silveus plays the lead role of Iphis. Tonight at 8 o'clock, then- again on Friday and Saturday. At Bangarra's swank new studio, Pier 4, 5 Hickson Road, Walsh Bay.

Price: $30. Concessions available. Phone: Firstcall (02) 9320 9000. ($34.95 for 13-54-year-olds, others Phone: 02 9830 9100. They may not be high JUNKS, The Australian Theatre for Young People's show about the price of progress, plays in Martin Place Amphitheatre at 8.45pm.

Directed Adam Kronenberg and big on imagery. Daily until Saturday. Free. BRAD PITT does the Buddhist thing a religion almost as popular in Hollywood as Scientology. So now we, lucky people, get the movie version SEVEN YEARS IN TIBET.

It's pretty schmaltzy, as you'd expect, but Brad's a looker and the scenery's great. At cinemas everywhere. Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud. In 1284, so the story goes, 130 children left the town of Hamelin with a piper and were never seen again. A myth was born THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN and the questions remain.

Was it a children's crusade to the holy land? Was it a metaphor for the black plague? Today at the State Library, Robert Holden, author of a new version of The Pied Piper, suggests some tantalising possibilities that may be hidden behind the fairytale. 10.45am in the Jean Garling Room. Price: $15. Phone: 02 9273 1603. profile, but for flamenco fans in the know, they are hot.

ANA MARIA CAMPOS and her Flamenco Company present MOSAICO FLAMENCO, a journey through Spain, through dance, at The Tom Mann Theatre in Surry Hills. Today and tomorrow, 136 Chalmers Street. Price: $25; $20 cone. Phone: 02 956 3484. Marlon by moonlight.

PS: Next week (Dec 8-10) there will be special "Meet and Greet" lunches with the Dinostars at Wonderland. The lunches are exclusive to Barney fan club members memberships are $12.95 for 12 months; call (02) 9648 3944. children. Phone: Firstcall 02 9320 9000; 0055 33899 for weather and screening details. Regurgitator: Same old stuff, different texture.

Ingrid Silveus plays Iphis. Beware! Funnel-webs can't swim but they can float and survive in your pool for days tm" up A Mow Showing Open 7 dags 9.30am to 5pm. Tab the whole familg for onlg t20. Call 9320 6000 or visit our website wwwjuctmut.fov.au 14 THE SUN-HERALD TIMEOUT November 30, 1997 15 THE SUN-HERALD TIMEOUT November 30, 1997.