Perth Voice Interactive

The young men stride down an inner-city alley, graffiti and attitude giving their promo shot a gritty edginess.

With their hipster facial hair and casual clothes, they could be the latest indi hotshots, except for one thing; in Andrew O’Connor’s case at least he never forgets he was once a school nerd.

Oh, and then there’s the fact their groupies are mostly in their sixties.

Welcome to the suddenly funky world of chorale music.

‘It’s the ‘Glee effect’,” O’Connor tells the Voice.

Since the US TV show about a high school choir became an unlikely global hit, chorale singing has gone from being a refuge for the socially awkward to overtaking The Beatles and Elvis Presley in top-100 hits.

Glee releases have racked up more than 36 million singles sales alone while the genre’s bona fide sex symbol, American composer Eric Whitacre, has broken new ground with his “virtual choir” projects which attract millions of hits on YouTube.

The flow-on has well and truly reached Perth, with O’Connor claiming the local scene is being noticed around the country. Earlier this year Naya Chorale was invited to perform at Carnegie Hall based on a promo video—they hadn’t even performed publicly.

And O’Connor’s choir The Giovanni Consort has recently finished a collaboration with Carl Crossin, whose Adelaide Chamber Singers were, in July in Wales, crowned Choir of the World..

Three of O’Connor’s Consort compadres, Christophe Karas, Tim McNamara and David Penco, also sing with the St George’s Cathedral Choir as well as picking up various other gigs and teaching roles.

O’Connor says the four Northbridge friends will rack up an impressive 42 performances between October and December because of the demand for chorale music.

There’s a huge difference between Glee’s show tunes and the Giovanni Consort’s more traditional fare, but O’Connor says he enjoys the interplay between the young fans demanding new and contemporary compositions and their diehard fans, who he says are very well educated about the music.

The Giovanni Consort has something for everyone coming up; at 7.30pm on Wednesday December 11 they’ll be singing 17th century German composer Heinrich Schutz’s Christmas Story at the Trinity College Chapel in East Perth, while next year they’ll play the Australian premiere of American composer Joby Talbot’s The Path of Miracles. As well as his chorale achievements, Talbot is also renowned for his work with punk band The White Stripes.

Putting on their cathedral choir hats, the four will also perform Mozart’s sublime Requiem (featuring local superstars Sara Macliver and Fiona Campbell) and Great Mass in C Minor on December 3 at 7.30pm at the Perth concert hall.

Log onto http://www.giovanniconsort.com or http://www.perthcathedral.org for more details.

by STEVE GRANT

PERTH’S sister-cities across Asia will be deeply insulted if Perth city council names diminutive lanes and courts after their cities, lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi says.

The PCC has floated a plan to name new roads in the Northbridge Link area after sister cities, with names like Seocho Lane, Nanjing Court, Taipei Lane and Chengdu Place on the cards.

But Ms Scaffidi says it’s culturally inappropriate to name them after smaller lanes and courts. She says the names should only go to “Streets” or “Roads,” not smaller backstreets and service roads.

“Culturally, this is going to go down like a lead balloon,” she warned the planning committee this week.

by DAVID BELL

ONE of the new roads at the Northbridge Link site could be named “Telethon Avenue” at the request of the Seven-West group.

The WA government’s geographic names committee initially rejected Telethon Avenue because it “does not support the use of names of commercial businesses, trade names and non-profit organisations”.

Perth city council staffers agreed, saying “it would set an undesirable precedent… and could give a perceived advantage to Telethon over other registered charitable organisations”.

But Seven Entertainment sent envoy David Read from TPG Town Planning to this week’s planning committee to plead its case.

He argued the GNC’s rule can be set aside if there is a prolonged link to the area—and Seven had long owned the now-demolished entertainment centre, near where Perth Arena now sits (and which opened a year ago this week).

Councillors on the planning committee concurred, saying the name was justified given the historic link and Telethon’s charity work (a cool $130 million donated by viewers for health, research and community projects since 1968).

With the support of lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi, who sat in on the meeting, the committee rejected the staff recommendation and will ask the council to supported the “Telethon Avenue” name.

If the council follows that recommendation, Seven will be able to appeal to the GNC in December.

by DAVID BELL

HIGHGATE photographer Alan Pead has taken photos all around the world but his first exhibition was taken entirely in his local neighbourhood.

“That’s part of my message: We walk past beautiful things every day and we don’t take notice,” he says.

“There’s an infinite possibility when I walk out the door and walk down the street.

“That’s the inspiration that drew me. It’s literally ‘stopping to smell the flowers’.”

Turning 65 in January, he’s been taking photos for decades but this collection of macro images (extreme close-ups) of local flowers will be his first exhibition.

“It’s taken me a long time to get to this point. I’m at a stage in my life where I feel comfortable and confident enough… it’s my first exhibition, but it won’t be my last.”

Having started his career as a photo engraver in his teens, his trade disappeared with the advent of digital and the progress of printing technology, but he’s remained interested in photography as a hobby.

“I’ve had a camera by my side, especially when I travel, for the past 40 years.”

Mr Pead says he doesn’t set out to take pretty pictures—that’s a side-effect. His main goal is to lay bare the dichotomy between the micro and macro, and show how abstract flowers can appear when looked at on a different scale.

And for the past two years that’s all he’s taken photos of: “I don’t take pictures of people, I don’t take landscapes. My burning theme for the past two years has been these images.

“I might go in another direction after this, [but] I’ve got to get it out of my system.”

His first show, Silent Passions, is open for a month at Five Bar on Beaufort Street.

by DAVID BELL

WARREN McGRATH isn’t ruling out a political return.

The 38-year-old environmental consultant retired from Vincent council in October after one term, wanting to spend more time with family.

Commitments at work—he’s state manager at Eco Logical Australia—were also consuming a lot of time, and he didn’t want to half-heartedly serve on council.

“I was feeling that I wasn’t able to give 100 per cent,” the former deputy mayor says.

Mr McGrath was first elected in 2009. He and other non-party aligned faces at the time like Josh Topelberg and Matt Buckels shook up the traditionally Labor-heavy council.

“I felt council needed some new blood on it,” Mr McGrath says of the time.

His legacy lives on in ongoing environmental projects he was part of: He initiated the plan to increase the number of trees through the city, and his idea to replace water-guzzling lawns with more efficient native plants is being rolled out across 25 areas (the project out front of council HQ is just finishing now).

While he’s enjoying having Tuesday nights free, Mr McGrath says he’s considering another tilt further down the track, running for the merged Perth/Vincent council: “It’s the sort of thing I really enjoyed, and it’s a privilege to be able to serve the community.”

by DAVID BELL

AFTER a first design was rejected by Perth city council, a new plan for the Barrack Square hotel has passed its first hurdle.

The PCC’s planning committee gave the new waterfront design the thumbs up Tuesday night, saying most bulk and height problems from the first draft have been fixed.

“We’ve come a long way from last time,” committee chair Rob Butler said.

This 260-room design will be five storeys along most of the building, with a tower at one end reaching 18 storeys. The land is currently owned by the state government. The project by Old Perth Port Pty Ltd will cost anywhere between $100 million and $200 million.

While generally liking the design, councillors were baffled by the architect’s plan to insert white striping along the sides, covering some windows.

“I would rather wake up in the morning and have one of the best views in Australia, not a slash of white piping,” Cr Butler said.

“For the life of me I don’t know what he’s done with the tower.”

After the full council makes its recommendation, the final decision rests with the WA government.

by DAVID BELL

THE decrepit block at the corner of Newcastle and Charles Street may finally see a development.

The abandoned garden ornaments centre has been empty for years and is a favourite haunt of urban explorers and graffiti artists.

Various plans have been floated for it over the years: In 2008 a seven-storey office and shop development was approved by Vincent council, but it was never built.

Another plan popped up in 2011 but was withdrawn by the applicant. In 2012 that project’s sign was optimistically pasted over with details of a new development. The six-storey plan was approved by the development asssessment panel, but again, the project went nowhere.

Now, owner Mermaid Towers has put forward a bigger plan for a seven-storey project with offices and 77 units, and on Tuesday the $15 million development was approved by the DAP.

The existing structures, initially built as a caryard in the ‘70s, will be demolished with the Vincent council saying it has “little aesthetic, historic, scientific or social heritage significance”.

by DAVID BELL

FORMER councillor Lyndon Rodgers warns Perth city council is losing its independent voice, with a majority of councillors now strongly aligned to lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi.

One of the PCC’s most outspoken councillors, Mr Rodgers was defeated in October after just one term.

He says shortly after his 2009 election to the council he’d repeatedly tried to set up a meeting with Ms Scaffidi “to get on the same page”. It took five months for the meeting to happen.

“She didn’t need me, she had the numbers,” Mr Rodgers says.

“I was disappointed in the petty politics.”

The veteran real estate agent says he was ready to quit midway through his term when all four of the candidates Ms Scaffidi had endorsed were elected in 2011.

“I had my resignation letter written up.”

With so many councillors voting as a bloc, he was worried he’d have little chance of making headway on issues important to him. He felt that if he put up an idea, the Scaffidi faction would reject it simply because he’d raised it.

He’d decided to stay on as he was still able to work with city directors behind the scenes to get things done. He says council staff are top notch and responsive to problems brought to their attention.

Following the 2011 Scaffidi steamroller, then-Cr Rodgers was bumped off most committees. In the first half of his term he’d served on three and he nominated for more. He was elected only to the parking committee, which was this year disbanded and rolled into the finance committee.

He’s critical of what he describes as “Hollywood stuff” and publicity grabbing, like handing out keys to the city to Hillary Clinton rather than to a local philanthropist.

Likewise, he says the PCC’s free wifi plan is a good headline grabber but has been of little practical benefit for local businesses: “Who are you attracting? People who won’t pay $39 a month for a phone plan. They’re not going to buy anything.”

While strongly critical of the echo-chamber effect, Mr Rodgers says overall the city is heading in a positive direction as far as livening up the place.

“The city is in a better place now that it was 10 years ago, I give them credit for that. If you walk through the city it’s become a lot more lively.

“I think the lord mayor’s done a reasonable job.

“I don’t think it’s all bad, but it’s time to get more pragmatic.”

Ms Scaffidi says, “Lyndon is obviously still smarting from a loss at the recent elections”.

“Possibly, if he had been more engaged and interested, [he would] have been re-elected by ratepayers who would have appreciated and enjoyed and loved what he represented and stood for.

“I think that statement well sums up how many of his colleagues probably felt too, which may explain why he was not then on the committees … that he says he was keen to be on.

“I wish him well but think he had many distractions and personal troubles which made it hard for him to undertake the role more fully.”

During much of his time on council Mr Rodgers was involved in litigation with developer Steve de Mol. Earthworks at Mr de Mol’s Beaufort Street development damaged Mr Rodgers’ neighbouring office, making it impossible to run his real estate business and leading to three and a half years of back-and-forth in the courts.

Mr Rodgers says the expense hampered his election campaign this year, and he’d only consider running for council again once his legal complaints are resolved.

 by DAVID BELL