50/50: 50 films celebrating 50 iconic years
A new film every day until 22nd October 2023.
Celebrate the Sydney Opera House’s 50th anniversary with 50 consecutive days of rare and unseen recordings from the archive, spanning opera, classical, dance, theatre, contemporary music, documentaries and livestreams from our Birthday Festival. Free and exclusive to Stream.
Iconic artists, unforgettable performances, works that changed the way audiences saw the culture: Across its 50 year history, the Sydney Opera House has played host to an incredible diversity of talent, from musicians, choreographers and dancers to actors, playwrights, filmmakers, contemporary artists and visionary thinkers who challenged and shaped the cultural landscape. To mark our first half century, we’re digging deep into the archive to bring audiences 50 rare and often unseen performances over 50 days, and special livestreamed events from our Birthday Festival.
Each day we’ll take a peek into the archive to reveal a piece of history, going all the way back to 1973 to the very first opera ever performed on our stage, a spectacular rendition of Prokofiev’s adaptation of War and Peace, going all the way up to the present day.
Please note, due to licencing restrictions, availability will vary from film to film, and some titles may not be available outside of Australia.
-
Trailer - 50/50: 50 films celebrating 50 iconic years
Starts Sunday 3rd September 2023.
Celebrate the Sydney Opera House’s 50th anniversary with 50 consecutive days of rare and unseen recordings from the archive, spanning opera, classical, dance, theatre, contemporary music, documentaries and livestreams from our Birthday Festival. Free and exclusiv... -
1/50: Gala Opening Concert with Sydney Symphony Orchestra (1973)
Available worldwide from 3rd Sept until 3rd Oct 2023.
Australia’s musical landscape changed forever on the evening of 29 September 1973, when the brand-new Sydney Opera House opened the doors of its Concert Hall to the public for the first time.In front of a packed, emotion-charged house, the S...
-
02/50: Opera Australia - War & Peace (1973)
Available worldwide from 4th Sept until 4th Oct 2023.
In 1973, the Sydney Opera House opened in spectacular fashion with Prokofiev's epic operatic adaption of War and Peace. The production marked Opera Australia's first performance in the iconic building that they have called home for almost five... -
4/50: Gurrumul and Sydney Symphony Orchestra (2014)
Available worldwide from 6th Sept until 6th Oct 2023.
Following his sold-out performances with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in 2013, Indigenous Australian musician Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu returned to the Opera House in 2014 for two encore performances. The concerts presented the musician and... -
5/50: The Australian Ballet - La Sylphide (2013)
Available worldwide from 7th Sept until 7th Oct 2023.
The Australian Ballet presents La Sylphide, in a production by Erik Bruhn after August Bournonville’s nineteenth-century original. A ballet in two acts, La Sylphide tells the tale of the Scottish dreamer James, who is fascinated by a woodland ... -
8/50: Angela Goh - The Concert (2022)
Available worldwide from 10th Sept until 31st Dec 2023.
Unfolding in nine parts, The Concert depicts a series of worlds and characters that span time and space, woven together by a reoccurring object—a large, mysterious, glass-like ring. These recurring rings are in fact the iconic acoustic refle... -
9/50: Ursula Yovich - From Our House To Yours (2020)
Available worldwide from 11th Sept 2023 until 11th Sept 2024.
Singer, songwriter, actor, playwright and storyteller Ursula Yovich returns to her first love, singing, in this exciting performance for the 2020 Sydney Opera House 'From Our House to Yours' season. Created in response to COVID-19 lock... -
10/50: Australian World Orchestra - Beethoven Symphony No. 9 'Choral' (2011)
Available worldwide from 12th Sept until 12th Oct 2023.
Australian World Orchestra brings to life Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 ‘Choral’ with unique passion, vivacity and skill in this 2011 Concert Hall performance. The Ninth is Beethoven’s last symphony, with all the implications of ‘summit of his... -
11/50: An Evening with Stephen Hawking (2015)
Available worldwide from 13th Sept 2023.
There are few scientists that can be said to have touched the public imagination. Physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking is one such scientist. Appearing as part of the 2015 Ideas at the House program, Professor Hawking joined us from Cambridge, via li... -
12/50: Sydney Dance Company - Dream Lucid (2012)
Available worldwide from 14th Sept to 14th Oct 2023.
Commissioned by Sydney Dance Company, 'Dream Lucid' by Melbournian Stephanie Lake uses form, colour and magnetism to explore the flux between chaos and control. The work was choreographed for the company and premiered in 2012 as part of the ‘C... -
13/50: Yaeji - Vivid LIVE (2023)
Available worldwide from 15th Sept 2023 until 15th March 2024.
After making her Australian debut with a euphoric, sold-out show in the Studio in 2018, Korean-American dance-pop icon Yaeji returned to the Opera House in 2023 for her very first Vivid LIVE appearance with an immersive multimedia liv... -
15/50: Opera Australia - Les Huguenots (1990)
Available worldwide from 17th Sept to 17th Oct 2023.
On 2 October 1990, one of the greatest opera singers of all time bid farewell to the stage. Dame Joan Sutherland enjoyed a long and enormously prosperous career, which drew to a conclusion with this glorious performance of Meyerbeer’s Les Hugu... -
16/50: Erth’s Prehistoric World (2022)
Available worldwide from 18th Sept 2023 until 16th Apr 2027.
Come closer than you dare to predators! Bringing ancient creatures from land and sea together in one show, Erth's enthralling puppetry-based childrens' show is the perfect combination of theatrical magic and charm. Travel to the bottom ... -
17/50: Sampa The Great - Vivid LIVE (2022)
Available worldwide from 19th Sept until 27th May 2027.
In an Australian exclusive performance for Vivid LIVE 2022, Sampa Tembo – better known as Sampa The Great – debuted her long-awaited show 'An Afro Future', performing the four-time ARIA award-winning debut album 'The Return' with her epic ba... -
18/50: Stepping Out (1980)
Available worldwide from 20th Sept 2023 until 20th March 2024.
Winner of the 1981 AFI Award for Best Documentary, 'Stepping Out' explores the lives of a theatre group of people with disability as they prepare for their first public performance, to be held at the Sydney Opera House.The film foll...
-
19/50: The Australian Ballet - Dyad 1929 (2013)
Available worldwide from 21st Sept to 21st Oct 2023.
Wayne McGregor’s Dyad 1929, made for The Australian Ballet and performed to Steve Reich's 'Double Sextet', tests the limits of classical movement in a laboratory-white set. “It’s a total work of art in which every element is equally weighted an... -
20/50: Sydney Philharmonia Choirs - Handel: Messiah (Auslan Performance) (2015)
Available worldwide from 22nd Sept to 22nd Oct 2023.
Brett Weymark conducts the Sydney Philharmonia Choirs in Handel's greatest and most loved choral masterpiece, sung by more than 500 voices at the Sydney Opera House. In a world first, and in collaboration with Accessible Arts and Sydney Opera ... -
21/50: Iggy Pop - Live at Sydney Opera House (2019)
Available worldwide from 23rd Sept to 23rd Oct 2023.
Hailed as the ‘Godfather of Punk’, The Stooges’ former frontman Iggy Pop made make his long-awaited Sydney Opera House debut in 2019 in the Concert Hall, performing his genre-defining back-catalogue of hits, including songs from seminal albums... -
22/50: Green Room Music - Three Marys (2023)
Available worldwide from 24th Sept 2023 to 24th Sept 2028.
Staged in the Playhouse for Unwrapped 2023, Three Marys melds music, myth and imagination to create a moving story of exile, survival and hope. An international collaboration by award-winning artists composer Andrée Greenwell and libretti... -
23/50: A Man and An Organ (1981)
Available Australia and New Zealand only, from 25 Sep 2023.
This 1981 short documentary gives an insight into Ronald Sharp, the self-taught builder of the Grand Organ in the Concert Hall of Sydney Opera House. Ronald and others worked painstakingly for ten years to build the Grand Organ, which c... -
24/50: Khruangbin - Live at Sydney Opera House (2022)
Available worldwide from 26th Sept 2023 until 27th November 2026.
Inspired by ’60s Thai funk, Tarantino soundtracks and surf-rock cool, the Texan three-piece Khruangbinhave summoned forth a sound quite unlike anything on the musical landscape: a hypnotic mix of funk, soul and psychedelic rock tha... -
25/50: DeRay Mckesson - The Case For Hope (2019)
Available worldwide from 27th Sept 2023.
In the face of violence and racism, how do we keep believing in change? A leader in the Black Lives Matter movement, co-founder of the Campaign Zero police reform campaign and host of podcast Pod Save the People, DeRay Mckesson places the idea of shared ho... -
26/50: Australian Chamber Orchestra - Goldberg Variations (2018)
Available worldwide from 28th Sept to 29th Oct 2023.
Monumental. Iconic. Enigmatic. Transcendent. Bach’s Goldberg Variations are the stuff of legend, and one of the greatest pieces of music ever written. Richard Tognetti and the ACO bring Bach’s virtuosic masterpiece to life in the Australian pr... -
27/50: The National - Live at Sydney Opera House (2018)
Available worldwide from 29th Sept to 29th Oct 2023.
Indie rock luminaries The National returned to the Sydney Opera House Forecourt in 2018, to play in front of a 5,000-strong crowd, following two sold-out performances on the same spot four years earlier. The 2014 performance was live-streamed ...