- Brisbane Times today launches Bristix, an exciting new concept in collaboration with Brisbane Festival organisers. It allows festival-goers the chance to grab discounted tickets to most performances throughout September.
- It's very similar to buying a discounted ticket on the day of the show on Broadway. Most days throughout Brisbane Festival, we'll be offering a limited amount of last-minute, discounted tickets. They could be anywhere between 10-50 per cent off. We can't tell you how many tickets will be released at the special price, but we'll always tell you how much they'll cost.
- To launch this innovative service, today we're offering 2 for 1 tickets to DESH at QPAC on Sunday September 7, and 2 for 1 tickets to The Shadow King at the Brisbane Powerhouse on Tuesday September 9. Yes, that's 50 per cent off.
- All you need to do is CLICK HERE between 12noon and 2pm on Friday August 22 to score your seats. But remember, numbers are extremely limited.
Meanwhile, a unique opera based on the 2011 Queensland floods is one of the world premieres in this year's Brisbane Festival.
Floods features four separate operas, each 20 minutes long, with the composers responding to the devastating events from a traditional to an abstract perspective.
Director Gregory Massingham said the operas use the 2011 inundation as both a dramatic narrative and as a metaphor for the sometimes overwhelming aspects of modern life.
"In such times we often resort to flood metaphors: we 'try to keep our heads above water', 'weather a storm' or 'tread water'; we can feel 'adrift' and welcome the offer of a 'life line'," he said.
"We hope that our performance of these works will provide the community with a variety of insights into this common experience - not only the physical and psychological effects of its impact, but also of the spirit that rises above such misfortunes."
A cast of young vocalists and musicians from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music will bring the operas to life, along with digital and interactive media.
Floods will be performed on September 18 and 20 at the Queensland Conservatorium at South Bank, before travelling to Sunshine Coast, Bundaberg, Toowoomba and Ipswich.
"We invite people of all ages across the state to witness this new piece of Queensland culture as we come together to celebrate such remarkable strength and resilience," Mr Massingham said.
Floods is not the only work in the festival inspired by water.
Brisbane-based collective Motherboard Productions will debut Deluge, an experimental dance project about rituals that summon myths of waterlogged gods.
The work, at the Brisbane Powerhouse, is the result of a long-term collaboration between artists from Brisbane and Seoul.
The Perfect American is the other big ticket opera event. Philip Glass' work about Walt Disney's final months is making its Australian debut, and has only been performed in Madrid and London before.
Other highlights include a reimagining of Ibsen's A Doll's House at La Boite, the premiere of Black Diggers by the Queensland Theatre, the return of 2012 bathtub smash Soap, and The Shadow King, which reworks Shakespeare's King Lear from the perspective of warring indigenous families.
A major coup for the festival was attracting Bangladeshi-British dancer and choreographer Akram Khan to perform his critically acclaimed work DESH, about a man trying to find balance in his world.
Regulars to South Bank cultural forecourt will notice preparation is already underway, with a bamboo forest taking shape for the Brisbane Airport Light Garden.
The precinct will also host Exxopolis, an inflatable labyrinth featuring awe-inspiring light, colour and architecture, and the Telstra Spiegeltent, which will be home to Limbo, a mix of circus skills, live music and raunchy humour.
