Kiwi opera star Madeleine Pierard was studying to be a doctor when composer Jack Body inspired her to sing instead.

Auckland Arts Festival chief executive David Inns sees up to 150 shows a year around the world and does the deals to bring them to New Zealand.

William Dart previews the concert highlights of 2017.

Ballet's former bad boy has turned his life around. Sergei Polunin talks to Helen Barlow

An exclusive first look at what's on at the 2017 Auckland Arts Festival.

Auckland Arts Festival 2017 promises spectacle.

Rufus Wainwright admits opera can be both daunting and dull. But he's determined to prove it doesn't have to be.

One of the largest cultural hubs to be developed in the world could be influenced by one of Auckland's smallest theatres, The Basement.

In less than a fortnight, Edo de Waart presides over his first concert as the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra's new Music Director.

After the release last year of its ninth album, The Untied Knot, Shooglenifty is in town to play two nights at the Auckland Arts Festival this weekend.

The curtains lift, revealing a dancer seated solemnly to one side. All is quiet barring the sound of audience members settling into their seats.

An extraordinary international event, John Adams’ Nixon in China is one of the most celebrated operas of our generation. It's an ambitious work on a grand scale.

La Cucina dell’Arte beckons us to peep through a keyhole into the world’s worst restaurant and open the doors to a topsy-turvy, pizza-flipped joint where servants become masters, candles and crockery take on lives of their own and spoons play a tarantella on wine bottles.

If one of the roles of an arts festival is to present genre-blurring work, then the Auckland festival is doing its job with a show that opens this week.

A good part of the excitement at Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra's latest dance project was experiencing our city's favourite orchestra in the faux-Egyptian temple of The Civic.

The Black Quartet combined with Lawrence Arabia, Tiny Ruins, and Rob Ruha for a charming evening of musical diversity.

Among the razzle-dazzle of the big shows, the Auckland Arts Festival always throws up some hidden gems like Waves.

In this fantastical Kiwi detective story, Carl Bland's musings on truth and loss are framed as "three men in search of a playwright," writes Janet.

They're singing songs they've never performed live before from a playlist they didn't choose, but Don McGlashan and Shayne Carter sound relaxed about it.

Funny, sexy and feminist all at the same time, Australian cabaret star Meow Meow (Melissa Madden Gray) delivers wonderful frivolity.

Emily King music is described as existing "where the cafe meets the dancefloor" - understated pop and soul.

Laughton Kora is one of four brothers in the band Kora, he sang on Dotcom's album, acted in Coverband, and this week is in the Auckland Arts Festival

The National Theatre of Scotland offers both history lessons and captivating drama in its trilogy of plays about the country's early kings being staged at the Auckland Arts Festival.

France's Compagnie Carabosse has transformed an under-utilised part of the domain - aptly incorporating the Three Witches statue - into an otherworldly fire garden.

A post-postmodern diva is about to take over the Auckland Arts Festival's Spiegeltent with her take on a Hans Christian Andersen folk tale.

Auckland Arts Festival is providing a trifecta opportunity for Wellington composer Gareth Farr.

The focus is on people's casual attitudes and everyday interactions, and Burch re-enacts several of her own experiences with angry humour and audience help.