A new play by David Finnigan is setting tongues wagging in Sydney reports HELEN MUSA in her latest “Arts in the City” column. 

THE radio play “44 Sex Acts In One Week” by Canberra playwright David Finnigan has been shocking the socks off theatregoers at the Seymour Centre during the Sydney Festival. Billed as “an apocalyptic rom com”, the production by Sheridan Harbridge features ear-popping sounds involving fruit, a case, she says, of “less talk more nibbling”.

RICHARD Johnson’s fabulous annual SoundOut festival of improvisational and experimental music + film + arts has received Australia Council funding and will go ahead for its 13th year at the ANU Drill Hall Gallery, June 17-19, with the plan to “combine, mix, cross-fertilise and move sound mountains to inspire inquiring ears and eyes”. 

CANBERRA-region crooner and raconteur, Michael Simic (Mikelangelo) is teaming up with star musicians including Canberra’s Jess Green (Pheno) and former Canberra drummer and composer Bree van Reyk for some folk, swing and Balkan flavours in Big hART’s “Acoustic Life of Boatsheds”, a journey on a ferry to boatsheds around the harbour west of the Sydney Harbour Bridge with new music created specifically for each shed. Until January 23, details at sydneyfestival.org.au

CANBERRA Contemporary Art Space director David Broker is soon retiring from his role at CCAS after a long time at the helm, during which he oversaw the organisation’s move from Gorman Arts Centre to its present location by Lake Burley Griffin. CCAS chair Amanda Biggs says they are starting the process of recruiting for a new director, inquiries to info@ccas.com.au

LUMINESCENCE Chamber Singers will perform music from the Renaissance to the 21st century in a summer soiree at Pialligo Estate, Pialligo Fields, on Sunday, January 30, 1.30pm-4pm. Tickets include a glass of sparkling wine on arrival, charcuterie, sandwiches, desserts and tea. Book at luminescence.org.au 

REGIONAL Arts NSW has announced the appointment of Tracey Callinan as its new CEO, replacing Elizabeth Rogers, who has just taken over at Canberra Glassworks. Dr Callinan has spent the past 13 years as executive director for Arts OutWest. Along with a strong career in arts administration comes experiences working for a silversmith in Jerusalem, programming for Wirksworth Festival in rural Derbyshire in the UK and working as a musician in Europe.