Sydney Festival Opens to Celebrate its 40th Anniversary

View the full multimedia release: http://www.prnasia.com/mnr/sydfest_201601.shtml

Sydney Festival 2016 is comprised of 157 events, a staggering 89 of which are free. 383 performances will take place across 34 venues, featuring 902 artists from 22 countries with 11 world premieres, 20 Australian premieres and 8 Australian exclusives.

Exclusive performances opened the festival with Germany's famous making their Australian debut with , a stage adaptation by and Sydney Festival also presented a special keynote address by acclaimed playwright, director and visual artist at Sydney Opera House.

A spectacular free performance from kicked off celebrations at the famous Summer Sounds in The Domain concert. The psychedelic band entertained thousands with frequent costume changes, confetti cannons, video projections, balloons, a dazzling lighting show and front-man surfing the crowd in an oversized hamster ball.

People of all ages were invited to help French artist build a temporary city in Darling Harbour and at Sydney's new creative playground, the Cutaway at Barangaroo Reserve, in one of the largest community participation events presented in the festival's history. A gigantic 30m high cardboard building titled was created and demolished in Darling Harbour, whilst construction started for the epic installation

Headline artist returned to Sydney Festival with the world premiere of , which opened to outstanding reviews including a five star review from Limelight magazine. Award-winning actor-singer-author also returned to Sydney with his hit new show

More events are set to come to Sydney Festival including the Grammy Award-winning jazz drummer and composer performing his fervent score live alongside the screening of hit movie and , who will return to launch her new album at the Sydney Opera House.

Jessica Keirle ,
Publicity Manager,
+61-2-8248-6525 / +61-438-805-109
jessica.keirle@sydneyfestival.org.au