Theatre by the pool

By Stanwell Park musical director Daryl Wallis

I am currently rehearsing for an exciting new music theatre work The Sirens’ Return, which will be performed at the stunning outdoor setting of the Port Kembla Pool at dusk in mid-February.

Drawing on oral histories collected from women living across different eras of the steel town, as well as First Nations and western mermaid mythology, The Sirens’ Return honours the diversity of women’s experiences through the emotional power of song.

Local director Anne-Louise Rentell has worked with poets Auntie Barbara Nicholson and Ali Jane Smith to craft the testimony into six character monologues, while I have composed music and collaborated with a cross-generational cast – comprising Alice Ansara, Matilda Brown, Auntie Marlene Cummins, Jeannie Lewis, Billie Rose Prichard and Kerrie Sweeney – to develop a score shifting constantly between a whisper and a roar.

As soon as Anne-Louise and I visited Port Kembla Pool as a possible venue, we fell in love with the feel of the place and all the possibilities for how we might perform and stage the piece.

The backdrop of Port Kembla beach and the escarpment give the pool environment an epic feeling of scale, that the stories being told and sung are playing out on this large stage of history and collective memory.

The Sirens’ Return, Port Kembla Pool, February 14-19, merrigong.com.au