The Sydney Opera House’s largest and most revered performance space, the Concert Hall, will reopen next week, revealing a $150 million makeover that took over two years and a team of 2500 workers to complete. The Concert Hall upgrade is the final and largest project in the Opera House’s Decade of Renewal, a $300 million program that has been completed in time for the beloved building’s 50-year anniversary in 2023.

Enhanced acoustics for artists and audiences, better access for people with mobility needs, and a safer working environment behind the scenes are among the upgrade’s immediate benefits. The works also allow for more ambitious performances to be staged in the Concert Hall, which, in addition to its symphonic performances, hosts a wide range of other contemporary acts.

“I didn’t realise how much I would miss it,” says Ben Marshall, who, as head of contemporary music at Sydney Opera House, stages around 40 performances a year in the venue. “There really is nothing else like it. Going back in has been electrifying.

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“We are going from a room in which we had to work really hard to get it to standard – which we consistently did – to a room that makes it much more straightforward for us to achieve the standard of excellence and the consistency that we demand of ourselves, and to live up to Jørn Utzon’s vision.”

The 21 “doughnuts” that once floated above the stage have been replaced by 18 magenta petal-shaped acoustic reflectors. The “petals” can be set in a range of different positions, depending on the music being played, and they mirror the colour of the Concert Hall seats.

“The amount of weight you could hang in the ceiling had been a huge constraint in the past,” says Marshall. “Artists who had giant LED screens couldn’t play in the hall, unless they were prepared to rest them on the stage, like Underworld did. The Chemical Brothers were really interested in playing the Concert Hall but their show demanded that their screens be hung from the roof, and we just couldn’t handle it. But we can handle it now.

“As shows get more spectacular and more technical, these upgrades have futureproofed us to make sure that we are the go-to space for electronic artists as much as symphonic orchestras.
We will be going into a room that is a whole lot more fit for purpose and requires a lot less effort to get to that immaculate level people have come to expect.”

But it wasn’t smooth sailing to get to this point. The upgrades were affected by shortages of material and staff, border closures and supply chain disruptions due to Covid-19. Even the world’s most-memed cargo ship, the Ever Given, which blocked the Suez Canal in 2021, played a part in the five-month delay to the project.

“We had a whole lot of theatre machinery in containers in the ship behind it,” says head of major projects Ziggy Napier. “A decision was made to turn it around and go the long way back to Sydney. Within 24 hours that blockage had cleared, but by that point we were committed and had to keep going.”

The first performance in the revamped Concert Hall is Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s opening concert on July 20 with Aboriginal composer and didgeridoo performer William Barton. Texan R’n’B artist Leon Bridges will be the first contemporary act to perform in the space at sold-out shows in October. Khruangbin play in the Concert Hall on November 27 and 28, and ​​jazz virtuoso Kamasi Washington will perform there on December 4.

“Some artists say the most incredible things when they play in there,” says Marshall, recalling the time Kings of Convenience guitarist Eirik Glambek Bøe stepped up to the microphone and said: “I regard architecture and buildings as theft. They steal light, they steal views, they steal space. And what is remarkable about the Opera House is that it gives back even more than it has stolen. It is a generous building through its beauty and its position and its artistic effect and the uplift on the soul.”

sydneyoperahouse.com