Reconciliation

A Chorus of Women has been commenting on issues at the heart of the community since 18 March 2003, when 150 Canberra women gathered in Parliament House to sing a lament for the people of Iraq as the Prime Minister announced that Australia was going to war. They have given over 120 public performances in Australia and Europe. Their music is written by composers and poets in the group, and many of their presentations incorporate original story, drama, dance and visual arts as well as song.

Wayfarers Australia

Wayfarers Australia was founded in 1997 by Judith Clingan AM. While choral singing is the main activity, instrumental music, drama, dance and puppetry are also included. Repertoire ranges from early European music, through the accepted masterpieces of choral music, to folk songs and contemporary choral music and music theatre.

Performed by A Chorus of Women and Wayfarers Australia, ‘Reconciliation’ is an excerpt from Glenda Cloughley’s story song, The Gifts of the Furies. This new epic performance work speaks into the social and ethical crisis of climate change through a retelling of The Oresteia by the Athenian master poet Aeschylus. The terrifying consequences of people raising the law of civilisation above the law of Earth and Sky are redressed when Ethos, the young divinity of Civilised Wisdom, listens and responds properly to The Furies, who represent the awesome divinity of Nature.