In the Valley of Love and Delight: Antipodal Adventures with the Boston Camerata

Being asked to sum up my trip Down Under, touring Borrowed Light with the Boston Camerata and the Tero Saarinen Dance Company—60+ total hours of travel time, 24 days of escape from the wintry Northern Hemisphere, 16 performers, 10 shows, 7 kangaroos, 2 koalas, and one very unique first touring experience—is a rather daunting task.  To account for such a trip by the numbers alone is a good start, but what of the sun and the sand, the dance and the dancers, the Shakers and the songs? 

Let me briefly mention that if you are not particularly well suited to the cruelties of a New England winter—as I am certainly not—32 hours of travel is but a small price to pay for the feeling of emerging from darkness and snow drifts and your airplane seat into the Southern Hemisphere and its baking sun, high in an endless sky—in the month of February.

Hazy view of Perth, returning by boat after a long, sweltering day out in    Freemantle.

Temporarily saved from our native climes, it was time to get to work, and work was, simply, a pleasure.  Borrowed Light is a deeply affecting and beautiful hour of dance and song; to contribute to the show’s fabric of Shaker song while taking in the swirls and stomps of the dancers is an experience I will not soon forget.  The flora and fauna of Western Australia, the day trips out to Fremantle, the amazing wines, and wonderful reviews from the Perth press all formed a beautiful backdrop to my first four performances of Borrowed Light.

New Zealand, while a relief from the stunning heat of Australia, was no less warm in its reception of the Camerata or Borrowed Light.  In a first jaunt through Wellington, I see the city papered with promotional posters for our show; we are greeted formally in a Maori ceremony; the Camerata performs American Vocalist to an enthusiastic, packed house in Wellington.  Again, the pleasures of a new and beautiful city, of Sauvignon Blanc, of the Te Papa museum, all became a hazy, sunny backdrop to the work and song itself.

Posing with a very adorable, 12-month-old koala!

There are, of course, many other things to say of this tour: of close encounters with quokkas and koalas, of dressing rooms and restaurants, of Tero Saarinen and his massively talented company, of the show itself, its movements and sounds.  But what more I will say here is just this: when the curtain came up at the start of the show on Sini and a dark, obscured stage, and when it closed again in clear, bright lights and applause, I was reminded of the powerful meaning of the songs we sang—of what Simple Gifts truly are—and I was, indeed, tremendously thankful.

-Lydia Brotherton, June 2008

Let me briefly mention that if you are not particularly well suited to the cruelties of a New England winter—as I am certainly not—32 hours of travel is but a small price to pay for the feeling of emerging from darkness and snow drifts and your airplane seat into the Southern Hemisphere and its baking sun, high in an endless sky—in the month of February.

Temporarily saved from our native climes, it was time to get to work, and work was, simply, a pleasure.  Borrowed Light is a deeply affecting and beautiful hour of dance and song; to contribute to the show’s fabric of Shaker song while taking in the swirls and stomps of the dancers is an experience I will not soon forget.  The flora and fauna of Western Australia, the day trips out to Fremantle, the amazing wines, and wonderful reviews from the Perth press all formed a beautiful backdrop to my first four performances of Borrowed Light.

New Zealand, while a relief from the stunning heat of Australia, was no less warm in its reception of the Camerata or Borrowed Light.  In a first jaunt through Wellington, I see the city papered with promotional posters for our show; we are greeted formally in a Maori ceremony; the Camerata performs American Vocalist to an enthusiastic, packed house in Wellington.  Again, the pleasures of a new and beautiful city, of Sauvignon Blanc, of the Te Papa museum, all became a hazy, sunny backdrop to the work and song itself.

There are, of course, many other things to say of this tour: of close encounters with quokkas and koalas, of dressing rooms and restaurants, of Tero Saarinen and his massively talented company, of the show itself, its movements and sounds.  But what more I will say here is just this: when the curtain came up at the start of the show on Sini and a dark, obscured stage, and when it closed again in clear, bright lights and applause, I was reminded of the powerful meaning of the songs we sang—of what Simple Gifts truly are—and I was, indeed, tremendously thankful.

-Lydia Brotherton, June 2008