New World order for 2010 Festival

Published on Monday 14 December 2009 20:43

ACTS from the Americas and Australia are set to dominate next year's Edinburgh International Festival to mark the discovery of the "New World" 500 years ago.

EIF director Jonathan Mills's latest concept for the event follows the storm of controversy over many of his Homecoming-themed productions this year, when he stood accused of both "tartanising" the festival and snubbing Robert Burns for including hardly any of the Bard's work.

Mr Mills, himself an Australian, is promising a "carnival" for in 2010 the wake of this year's EIF scoring a string of sell-out hits and seeing increased ticket sales on the previous year.

Early promotional material for next year's festival, released yesterday, promises an "explosion of sound and colour" from world-class orchestras, ensembles, singers and musicians. Cutting-edge theatre from some of America's leading companies, Australia's top opera producers and spectacular dance from countries around the Pacific Rim are all expected to feature.

An EIF spokeswoman said: "As Europe explored its remote horizons, the pioneers called their discoveries the New World.

"Scotland's finest performers will join artists and companies from the Americas and Australasia to bring a unique flavour to the 2010 festival."

The 2008 festival was built around the concept of "Artists Without Borders", while Mr Mills's 2007 debut programme was partly inspired by the 400th anniversary of Claudio Monteverdi's opera L'Orfeo.

Last year's contentious Homecoming theme proved hugely successful thanks to major home-grown productions shows such as Last Witch and St Kilda.

Mr Mills, a former director of the Melbourne Festival, signalled last spring that the EIF was set to broaden its global reach by featuring more acts from the likes of South America and Asia. The 2009 festival provided a major showcase for Singaporean culture.

Joyce McMillan, theatre critic at The Scotsman, said: "I am in two minds about the idea of having themes. I'm not sure it works if you have one every year, as there is a danger that you have to knock back things that don't quite fit in or that some themes are so vague that everything seems to fit.

"It sounds like next year's programme will be very lively, but I hope the heavy emphasis on American and Australasian work does not mean the festival will lean towards the English-speaking world too much. That is the danger with a theme like this."

SNP MSP Ian McKee, vice-chairman of Holyrood's cross-party group on culture, was one of Mr Mills's fiercest critics over the Homecoming theme.

Mr McKee said yesterday: "The problem this year was that there was a huge opportunity to mark the anniversary of the birth of Burns, and Jonathan Mills seemed to revel in the controversy. He was quite pugnacious about it all.

"However, I am not one of these people that wants to see the festival tartanised or have a strong emphasis on Scottish culture every year and next year's theme sounds very interesting indeed."

The 2010 EIF programme will be published on 17 March, with public booking for tickets due to open on 27 March.