Dubbo Photo News & Dubbo Weekender

Arts & Entertainment

Mark Seymour: Just for the record

Mark Seymour: Just for the record

MARK SEYMOUR knows his way around a song like a sculptor knows clay, shaping words and emotions into melodies and chorus lines to find homes in the hearts, minds and memories of Aussies since the 1980s. By his own admission there is pure intent in every stroke of the pen…
Some ecstasy along with the agony

Some ecstasy along with the agony

I was surprised to read recently that “agony aunts” originated in the 17th century and as such have existed for a smidgen more than 300 years. For those defining their family as dysfunctional and thinking a lamb roast dinner with miserable Aunty Beatrice every Sunday is the most torturous day…
Steve Smith conducts school bands at Macquarie Conservatorium’s Open Day. Photo: Supplied

In tune with the top brass

For the past seven years, Steve Smith has traversed Dubbo and the region, teaching brass and wind instruments to hundreds of school students, and conducting school bands. Steve has taught for Macquarie Conservatorium in public schools, including a weekly trip to Wellington Public School, and is also a familiar face…
Edward Gibbon, writer of racy history. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The past as opera, soap optional

Historians, you might be surprised to learn, study history. And it’s not an easy gig, as the kids say, what with all the remembering of dates and names and places and treaties and castles and kings and wars and famines and battles and random acts of butchery. On top of…
Can’t say no to a dying man

Can’t say no to a dying man

It’s been another huge year for the Cowley Literary Award, with pre-selectors inundated with short stories from all across Australia and around the world for the two categories – fiction and non-fiction. But the judges, after a gruelling process given the quality and diversity of the entries, selected a winner…
Regional Arts NSW CEO Elizabeth Rogers: "I was very keen to showcase one of our regional cities, and in Dubbo, there was a vibrant arts community we felt could help build on this event and would have the capacity to leave a legacy." Photo: Dubbo Weekender/Kaitlyn Rennie

Artland's heartland

With the announcement that Dubbo is set to host an arts festival bigger than Ben Hur, Regional Arts NSW CEO Elizabeth Rogers popped into town to discuss art, audience and our Aboriginal heritage.
Photo: Alexandra Meyer/Firefly Pictures

Shake things up!

If you listen carefully you can possibly hear the collective sigh of relief emanating from Dubbo Regional Theatre and Convention Centre (DRTCC) staff as we approach the end of 2014 and say goodbye to another busy year. The “silly season” is upon us, we have decorated our Christmas tree, made…
Songrites performance. Photo: Daniel Boud

Spotlight on Aboriginal story telling

The performance of contemporary Aboriginal stories on the stages of regional theatres and performance spaces is not yet part of mainstream cultural programming. Yet, the expression of Aboriginal culture through storytelling has a history that far outdates Western culture, which makes its absence from the mainstream public arena noticeable and…
Robert Salt. Photo: Kim V. Goldsmith

Robert Salt: a write of passage

Robert Salt is a Dubbo-based writer and visual artist excited at the opportunity and prospects offered by the Staging Stories. Growing up at Brewarrina, he says he had few creative opportunities. “I’ve always been an avid reader. I remember in high school I was always wanting to read, and jotting…
Sarah, Robin and Jessica Hall. PHOTOS: Greg Marginson

Keeping it in the family

Music is a part of most people’s daily life today, with everyone listening to the radio or their favourite play-lists, but for many it’s a fairly passive presence; just always there in the background. However, for three Dubbo families, music is definitely front and centre. The Hall, Clark and Newby…
Photo: Emily Carroll

Season launch shows good form

Hands up those who like being contacted by telemarketers? Anyone? No one? I for one sit on the fence when it comes to what some people would classify as a nuisance call. When at 3.00pm on a weekend it may rudely interrupt that well deserved ‘nana-nap’, or at 7.15pm on…
Opening of RAA Summit, Kalgoorlie, WA. Below, Greg Pritchard. Photos: Kim V. Goldsmith

Dubbo’s Artlands coup

Last weekend, there was a range of emotions at play when it was announced at the Regional Arts Australia (RAA) conference and arts festival in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, that Dubbo would host the next event in October 2016. For those in the know, it was relief that the long-held secret…
String making and weaving workshop. Photo: Orana Arts

Art from the golden heart

When I arrived in Kalgoorlie-Boulder, in the heart of the Western Australian goldfields region, to attend the Regional Arts Australia (RAA) Summit, I didn’t know what to expect from an event billing itself as “part conference, part festival and all art”, particularly as I sometimes feel like an outsider in…