This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:11] Joshua Broadbent: Hello, you are listening to a brand new episode of Whispers in the Wings, and I'm so excited to be back in your ears for the last episode of 2025.

[0:19] Joshua Broadbent: Thank you so much for joining me on this incredible re-launch season three of the podcast. It's been absolutely incredible connecting with our guests as well as reconnecting with you, the listener.

[0:31] Joshua Broadbent: Now I've always talked about the importance as a stage manager of having an understanding of the other departments that come within theatre. You don't necessarily need to understand the full detail, but having basic knowledge of lighting, sound, automation, uh being able to sew, being able to repair things, build things is always really helpful because you never know what skills you're going to need to bring to different productions.

[0:54] Joshua Broadbent: If you're working in the commercial world, perhaps you're not going to need to use them, but if you move into that indie theater making world, definitely those skills are going to come in hand. And having a basic understanding of as much as you can within the industry makes you a better practitioner, it makes you a better collaborator, and allows you to be part of the problem solving while showing your experience within the industry.

[1:18] Joshua Broadbent: Now, we all know that being multidisciplined within the arts opens more doors, deepens your creative toolkit, and makes you far more adaptable in the industry. And today's guest, Evan J. Lawson, is one of those rare creatives who doesn't sit neatly in one lane. Their practice stretches across opera, theatre, music, and experimental performance. And their career is a brilliant example of what happens when you follow curiosity rather than a job title.

[1:41] Joshua Broadbent: Now, before I welcome Evan to this video, we should learn a little bit more about them, but I am going to be completely honest and reveal a little bit of the backstage magic. I never read out the bio during the recording process. It's something that I pop in post-production just before the episode goes live, and there is a lot of words in Evan's bio that I actually am going to not pronounce correctly. So please bear with me as we work through this. And you know, Evan, if you're listening, I am so sorry.

[2:12] Joshua Broadbent: But here we go. Evan J. Lawson is one of Australia's leading queer artists, working at the forefront of contemporary culture as a composer, writer, curator, singer, and conductor. Evan is a founding member and artistic director of the interdisciplinary company Forest Collective. His work as a composer and conductor has brought on collaborations with a wide range of professional, educational, and community organizations across the globe, such as Volks Opern, Festival Exon Provence, Melbourne and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras, Australian Saxophone Quartet, Australian National Academy of Music, Stonington Symphony, Edra Ensemble, Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, Maury Van Philharmonic Orchestra, Tunkenslau Orchestra, and so many more.

[3:07] Joshua Broadbent: Hi Evan, thank you so much for joining me on another episode today.

[3:10] Evan J. Lawson: No worries, Josh. Good to be here.

[3:13] Joshua Broadbent: I'm really looking forward to our conversation today because reading through your bio, you are a person of many hats.

[3:20] Evan J. Lawson: Uh you have a lot of experience within the industry.

[3:23] Joshua Broadbent: Too many hats, perhaps?

[3:25] Evan J. Lawson: Lots of little tiny, frail falling apart hats everywhere.

[3:29] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah. I struggle myself uh trying to keep a lot of hats on at the same time. As long as you find the balance of when that hat is on, when the hat's off, I think you're fine.

[3:37] Evan J. Lawson: 100%.

[3:38] Joshua Broadbent: A hundred percent, yeah. And I think it's that thing like if you're an artist, you just have to do all the things.

[3:42] Evan J. Lawson: Yes.

[3:43] Joshua Broadbent: Yes. And I think for myself going through uni and into my career early part of my career, I was that person I was like, I'll do anything, I'll do everything, because all of those little bits together create who you're going to become in the industry and really allows you to sort of get a great broad understanding, especially once you sort of move into that producing space as well.

[4:03] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, 100%.

[4:04] Evan J. Lawson: And it's I think like for me, the idea of like in thirty years time, I'd love the idea of looking back and going, I've learned so much, right? I've taken so much out of life from knowing how to do a schedule and a budget through to like the incredible opportunities that have been afforded to me of just like, oh, you know how to use Tessitura or you know how to conduct or whatever.

[4:27] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, it's just cool to kind of know that you're a person who's very good at multiple things and has gotten the most out of the industry rather than perhaps staying in one lane, which is great and plenty of people do it. But yeah, there's just uh it's really rewarding, I guess is what I'm saying.

[4:42] Joshua Broadbent: You are I think the fourth person in the last week that has mentioned Tessitura and the importance of how employable it is having that as a skill. What is Tessitura for the audience that don't know what that is?

[4:56] Evan J. Lawson: Oh, what a wonderfully nerdy and specific thing to start our conversation with. So Tessitura is um kind of like outside of my creative practice has been the thing that's probably gotten me all the work that I've had over, you know, in 15 years plus in the industry. So Tessitura is a CRM software that was developed by the Metropolitan Opera because they found that they had a system for tickets, they had a system for marketing, and they had a system for philanthropy, and then a general, you know, upkeep CRM system.

[5:28] Evan J. Lawson: But they thought what would happen if we put all of these things together and we could see, okay, someone buys a ticket, then they give us a small donation, then they become a large donor. Like it's basically a system that aggregates all of that data into one place, into a CRM. And they created that system, and then they um hopefully they're gonna sponsor me if I give them all this brilliant content. They then open sourced the software.

[5:53] Evan J. Lawson: So it's owned by a foundation in the United States, and it's probably become like one of the leaders, if not the leader, has something like 50% of the market of organizations. So here in Australia, like name an organization there on Tessitura, Sydney Opera House, Arts Center Melbourne, down to you know, the Wheeler Center here in Melbourne, um, small organizations, all the orchestras mostly. Uh yeah.

[6:14] Evan J. Lawson: So it's a tool that I learned, you know, as a little box office seller at uni, you know, to pay the bills. And then it's led me to work like major festivals, you know, it's got me all of my more kind of full-time work, all my more sort of permanent work, and it got me through COVID. I knew how to use Tessitura, I knew how to do refunds, and so I got work during COVID to do that.

[6:38] Evan J. Lawson: So, like, you know, if you're if you're a freelance artist or or you know, stage manager or freelance any kind of thing in the arts, just having that any of those systems, you know, whether it's ticketing or otherwise, like invaluable, right? Because you just go, great, that person can do that. I look, I didn't expect this is where the start of the conversation would go either, but it seems to be something that's coming up a lot in my life is about how yeah, valuable you can be if you know Tessitura.

[7:03] Evan J. Lawson: So listen around there, go learn Tessitura.

[7:06] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, and I mean, I'm sure there's a million videos for it and like, you know, easy to access stuff. Um, it is, I will say, incredibly complicated, but like to the point of stupidity.

[7:16] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah.

[7:16] Evan J. Lawson: And you know, another little diss I'll say as a manager who like deals with it at a high level every day. We're living in a world where technology is just like changing constantly, right? Like there's an AI thing for this, there's a automation tool for that, like so much amazing stuff. Tessitura is this like big, huge old school thing, and it's it's yeah, it's taking a while to catch up to the world we've got around us, unfortunately.

[7:43] Evan J. Lawson: I learned how to use um Tessie, as we call it, when I first started working at Opera Australia, and I think my favorite part of it is remote connecting to a computer server somewhere, I'm assuming it's at the opera house for us, uh, that is running, you know, Windows 98 or whatever to to be able to then log into it. And as you said, it's it's very outdated and needs to catch up. But it's used by everyone and and it and it works most of the time, um, smoothly.

[8:14] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, it does what it says on the tin, whether it does it well, but it certainly does what it says on the tin. Now, getting back to away from Tessie and obviously, you know, part parts of your career. Tell us how you first got into, you know, music and the arts and if there was any sort of defining moment that influenced you.

[8:31] Evan J. Lawson: Well, my starting point was as a kid, like most of us, right? You know, I my best friend played an instrument, so I needed to play that instrument and be better than him. So that was really the starting point into music. But then as that, you know, as I as I found a thing, a creative outlet, and got, you know, positive reinforcement that I could do it, that led to experimenting, improvising, writing things down. I always wrote music down, and I always wanted to be a conductor. Like that was something that I just said, you know, that I always wanted to do because I'm like many of people in the arts, was one of those kids that like forced my aunts and uncles to sit through god-awful plays.

[9:09] Evan J. Lawson: I've always been a person that's put things on. So, you know, that's what being a conductor is. That's what being an artistic director or producer is. And so that's kind of in the thread. Like, I'm a musician, I'm a composer, I'm a conductor, but ultimately I love like bringing people together, putting a thing on, being bossy, telling people what to do, but also creating a you know, a safe, warm community for people to create art in and for audiences to enjoy art in. So that's kind of yeah, my my reason for for doing things.

[9:39] Evan J. Lawson: And then second to that, as an artist, it's like, what can I do that's different to anyone else that's anything else that's happening, right? Which isn't necessarily to say that is the most avant-garde weird stuff going, but it's just different, you know, it's just I've got a point of difference. I think that's always my approach.

[9:57] Joshua Broadbent: Was there any mentor or person that inspired you to sort of continue down that career, like around conducting and composing?

[10:05] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, I mean, I've had been fortunate to have like incredible teachers, and I think the thing that, like, you know, anyone who's worked for the orchestras or the opera companies in Australia will know what a precarious path it is. Like, as we know with the orchestras, you know, you get a job in that, people don't leave for 20, 30 years because it's just not opportunities, right? And as a conductor, even less and as a composer, I mean, don't even right, right? It's just rare's hen's teeth.

[10:35] Evan J. Lawson: So, two of my key mentors, one is like a teacher I spent a summer with in Europe, Matthias Pincher, he's a composer conductor, and really working at like the top orchestras around the world, really incredible composer. And so spending a summer with him where you know he said, You've chosen the two hardest things to do. You're like, Yeah, I really have. That was that was over ten years ago, and it's still, if not harder, like you know, it's bloody hard.

[11:01] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah.

[11:01] Evan J. Lawson: Um, and the other mentor that springs to mind a piece of advice that I got was from Richard Mills, who's very well known Australian composer conductor, um, recently finished up as artistic director of Victorian opera. And he said to me once when I was in my early 20s, like you can, you know, if you're an amazing violinist, you can join an orchestra and eventually become a conductor. If you're a pianist, you can join an opera company, be a repetiteur, and you'll get conducting opportunities. But me, with none of those skills, I have to go the third way and figure it out for myself and find my own opportunities.

[11:32] Evan J. Lawson: So a lot of my work has grown from just simply providing myself the chance to conduct. Um, all right, music, um, but predominantly to to conduct something. So it's it's hustle culture at its finest.

[11:47] Joshua Broadbent: And I think that's any part of the industry, right? Like you you have those people that go through university and naturally fall into the right stage management career that just keeps them going. Or you have those that aren't doing it the other way. I guess there's there's no right or wrong way in getting into that, is there?

[12:05] Evan J. Lawson: Absolutely. And like, you know, again, like going back to what I was saying before about the uniqueness of it, right? That gives you the chance to explore so much. Like, I I often am in awe of stage managers because you can bring this incredible skill to everything. Like you can work in the ballet, you can work here. Well, as a conductor, like conducting ballet and conducting opera, like totally different things takes a lot of time to kind of prepare yourself for those different worlds.

[12:29] Evan J. Lawson: So there, yeah, there's that ability to kind of adapt and and jump in and go, okay, I'm working on this big budget, you know, major national tour musical, and then I'm gonna go do a fringe show where there's two dollars fifty and I have to operate and sweep the floor and blah blah blah, you know. Like that's like to me, that's amazing. That's that's just great that you get the chance, and in any in any field, but that you get the chance to see art be created at different levels. Like, what more do you want?

[12:58] Joshua Broadbent: Obviously, having all of those different parts of your hats. We I keep calling them hats because I don't know how else to refer to them because you you do so many things: composer, writer, creator, singer, conductor, all of that helps you to be a better creative. And as you said, you those all those experiences that you've learned have come together to build on that.

[13:17] Evan J. Lawson: How do you find in the role that you're in with the Forest Collective? How do you feel all of those things have led you to being the artistic director? Well, yeah, Forest Collective was formed as a university project. So I studied an undergraduate as a composer at the Victorian College of the Arts, and part of that every semester, we had to work with a different art form, a different department. And so Forest Collective was born from a collaboration with the visual artist where we created improvised sculpture, sound, and visual sculpture, and we just created this sort of series of improvised weird things, and then eventually it grew into like a more formal thing. And so, again, like the skills that I've picked up of like, well, I've had to market those things with, you know, once we started doing them when we had money, we're like, what are we gonna do with this money?

You know, we've made we've sold tickets. Oh, what do we what should we do? And so at the beginning, we just went to the pub and bought everyone beers, and that was great. And then we thought, well, no, actually, we can build something with this, right? Like we can do something with this. So 2013, we formed ourselves as a not-for-profit, and I've always had an interdisciplinary interest, which permeates primarily in opera, like opera is interdisciplinary, musical theatre is interdisciplinary, but also cross-genre as well. So we were doing projects that brought in theatre makers, film, like you name it, Forest has done it or tried to do it at some point. We are now a charity, so that's about a year or two into that, which was an incredibly huge process.

So, again, like how amazing to have figured that out in the world, figured out the tax system, woo-hoo, you know, to figure out how to operate a charity, and then to what does that mean for us as Forest? We're this collective of artists, but it also means that we can, you know, refine our purpose, ask people to support us and contribute beyond just buying tickets or turning up as a community. So I guess it's like adding different levels of obligation, and then within that, it's like, how can we make it as diverse as possible? Can we make sure we have young artists working with established and older career artists? Can we make sure that we've got a diversity? Classical music, as we know, has a massive diversity issue.

How can we rectify that in our way? Or not, like sometimes you program a thing, oh, it's all dead white men, whoopsies. Like, let's just make sure that we acknowledge that and figure that out and you know, talk about that. So I guess to answer your question, it's just like, you know, a chance to craft my own career. Now, the money doesn't flow from there, let me tell you, but the opportunity to refine your own vision to create your own work, I think every creative person in whatever field they are should attempt it at some point. It's a really hard slog. Like at the moment we've taken six months off because the funding opportunities are difficult, the economy's down the toilet. Like we just all said, why bother?

Let's just go into a bit of a hibernation and plan for next year. And I think that's also a really important thing to talk about. And that's something that unfortunately our friends and colleagues in the major organizations can't do. They can't just turn the lights off for six months and rethink what their purpose is and what they want to create. So it's it is also to our benefit to be able to go, well, we're gonna put work on when we want to put it on with the people that we want to put it on with. So again, no money in it, but it is really fun. I get to employ my friends and work with people that I want to work with. And if I don't like the opportunity, if it hasn't worked out, I don't have to re-employ them again.

Run them off. So it's always 50-50 of like what the ensemble wants to do and the company and what I want to do. And I should say that Forest Collective is interdisciplinary with dance company or also like a kind of a theatre troupe, how I think about it, in addition to sort of a chamber orchestra.

[17:05] Joshua Broadbent: You touched on something just before about you're in a position at the moment where you kind of just gone, let's pause it for a couple months while we figure it out. How do you keep everyone motivated? How do you keep everyone sort of focused, even though you're not working at the moment on anything? What's happening behind the scenes to make sure that the group of you are still being creative?

[17:26] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, that's a great question because it again, you know, if by creating a diverse group of people, you've got a diverse group of issues as well, right? And we're a large group, so you know, we've got two choreographers, a committee of about I always lose track, about 10 of us on the administrative committee, and then the actual group of musicians is about 25. So it's a large group of people to constantly be in touch with from a leadership perspective. It's I think about transparency. So often Forest operates within a profit share scenario, as many of us have to in order to put any work on. And so for me, what's really important about that, it's like, okay, well, the least I can do is make sure that the schedule is done, that you know, the venues covered by the company, that like all the admin is taken care of, and that all they need to do is turn up and play, turn up and create, whatever.

And also contracting, you know, oh my god, we're talking about all the really exciting things like tax and Tessitura, contracting artists, having schedules on time, like all just kind of basic stuff, which you know, the most well-funded organizations in the world don't necessarily get right. So, you know, I joke with a good mate of mine who's on the committee who's done a you know stuff all over the world, amazing singer, and he's always like, Forest is the most well-run arts organization I've ever been involved in because we make sure the schedule is out in six months ahead of time. Because if I'm asking you to do it for $2.50, the least I can do is tell you when it's gonna be, you know. Yeah, so and then also it's fun.

You get a drink, we have we throw parties, you know, like it's also a space for putting an event on, you know, it isn't just another gig, we really try and make intervention. So yeah, it's about tending that ethos throughout the organization, and that when the people come to us with ideas, either external or the internal artists, it's about going, yeah, let's do it. You want to do a six-hour version of the Ring Cycle with a cardboard box on a roof during fringe while the audience arrives on a bus? Let's see what we can do. Like, there's you know, please tell me that's something that's in the work.

[19:33] Joshua Broadbent: For me, now that I've said it, but yeah, not at this stage, but you know, we have like one year was like, let's put a festival on, never gonna do that again. But we did, and we saw it through, and you know, we had an incredible, incredible experience throughout that. But yeah, maintaining motivation for people is really hard, and then COVID, of course. Inevitably these conversations go back to COVID because that was like the moment where you go, well, now what do you do with it? You know, and we managed to produce shows here in Melbourne during all the weird breaks between the lockdowns and managed to do stuff somehow, and we got the most money we ever got. So, you know, we're one of those situations where COVID was quite good to Forest.

But seeing people, you know, we had members who had to go into like mental health, you know, emergency care and all sorts of stuff, and it a huge challenge for someone who is the voluntary chair of the board, you know. I voluntarily run this organization. It's a huge responsibility because you care you care about your friends and your colleagues, but you care about the art that they make and the artists that you know, we pride ourselves on we say this cool thing in our manifesto of like the artistically vulnerable, which I think is something that's kind of interesting. Of like, how do you give people that space to take risks?

[20:50] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah. There are very few opportunities for those, you know, as you said, artistically vulnerable people. And I think it's really great that that opportunity exists and is also can be sort of free-flowing. Like obviously going through COVID has set you up for this period now where you've gone, well, we've done it before, let's come back and figure out how we do it. What are you as a, you know, collective putting in place? We know when people we know when creative people get a little bit too stuck in that creative brain that they need to be able to get out. What are the things that you've got in place to take care of them?

[21:30] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah. I guess from a business perspective, it's sort of macro and micro decisions, right? So it is about that again, it's just about being organized, setting time aside, saying to people, hey, we're gonna do this opera on $2.50, it's gonna be two really intense weeks. We're gonna plan ahead, that's gonna be a year from now, you know, you're gonna get the schedule. Just those little things and just little boring things of like building in days off into those schedules. You know, we recently did a return season of a show, and we wanted it was really successful, so we're like, great, let's do a longer run, but that longer run obviously has financial implications, blah blah blah. We decided to do it across ten days, which for opera is really hard.

Like it's hard for singers, it was also a dance workers in the middle of the summer, like people are working full-time. So just building in rest days was really important. We actually have to cancel a show because of sickness, and we're all like, thank goodness, you know. So being pragmatic, right? Being pragmatic about this stuff of going, you know, at the end of the day, really does it matter if we do seven or six, just you know. So transparency around that, and that at a micro level, again, it's that thing of like it's a profit share, you're not gonna get much money. What sort of position are you in now? It's totally fine if you are unable to commit.

[22:44] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah. And of course that can put a spanner in the works, but somehow we always manage to make it work, and like occasionally we'll get people who, you know, dep in for us, but on the whole, I just have to count my blessings at how fortunate I am that I have this crew around me that just seems to go with it all the time because there's like I really like we've done it for over ten years and I've only really just started to realize how good it is on a stupid thing to say. But my partner's like, you do realize it's like everyone in the group, it's the thing they look forward to. You know, it's like it's the I just there's we're all friends, we're all, you know, colleagues, we're all so I don't know how I actually can't answer your question. I managed to build this thing where it also kind of does it itself.

[23:29] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah. And it is also about delegating, right? Which any good stage manager producer knows that you are only as good as your time and your ability. So huge shout out to like our company manager Kim, my two IC Jasmine who does a lot of our admin now philanthropy, like and the rest of our steering committee, like where it just be like, I someone needs to write this marketing newsletter because like, no, not this week, thanks. So delegation is also again really boring, but really important for that that I guess loading of mental health.

[24:02] Evan J. Lawson: Well, it's about looking after the people you work with as well as looking after yourself. You know, I feel like we as humans put ourselves last ever all the time. We always want to help others, but I think something I've realized coming into producing something I knew that was was there in stage management, but I don't think I ever really got to the level of stage management where I was managing a lot of people. So it was always smaller bits as a stage manager. And as I've learned in producing, looking after 37, 38 people on our national tour, like I'm constantly checking in on if they're okay, but then I realize, oh, I haven't actually had a break today. Like, yeah, it's it's important to look after you as much as it looking after everyone.

You mentioned a moment ago about you know how you've realized just how good what you're doing is, and I think it comes from that sense of in the industry, if you don't love it, you don't do it because if you don't love it, you can't do it. You're constantly finding those battles of like, why am I doing these long hours? Why am I doing all of this work? So I think it's actually quite nice that not that you haven't realized until now that it's good what you're doing, but it's because you've just really letting it take you in and exploring with it and allowing yourself to grow from it rather than constantly feeling that is this is this good, is this what we're doing good? Rather than feeling that you've you've now just gone, yeah, it's great.

[25:28] Evan J. Lawson: Absolutely, and I will say that I am a double Aries with a Leo Rising. I am confident and clear, exactly know what I'm doing, boom, it's gonna happen. So I don't really have a lot of space for for I'm not the best at like reflecting and stopping. So thankfully the people around me are good at that. But um, it's burnout territory, like it is just classic burnout territory of just like I have this thing, I love the thing, we've got to do it. Oh, it's a success, it's sold out, let's just add another five more shows on la la. And it's just like come on, take that six months off, you know. Yeah, an opportunity came up for us to do a thing in December this year, and I was like, here's the thing, and I've written a budget, and da da da.

And the committee just went, we decided not to do anything. You're like, Oh, oh yeah, okay, sure. You know, it's it's okay to say no. No is a full sentence, you know. I think that's something that we all need to learn a little bit better. As much as jumping in an upgrade opportunity, hopefully that same opportunity will still be there in a couple months once you guys are back.

[26:24] Joshua Broadbent: Um, scheduling things. What goes into obviously you do so many different projects, but just take one project.

[26:32] Evan J. Lawson: What goes into it? Like how is it the artist coming to you with an idea, or is it you going to the artist with an idea? How does that sort of collaboration work? Uh within the Forest context, it's kind of 50-50 me and the ensemble. So we often have projects that are curated by members of the ensemble. One thing we've often done is we've picked a theme and we've given that theme over the ensemble. Everyone's picked a solo piece, and we just sort of curate this funny thing that might end up with, you know, Philip Glass, Lisa Lim, and uh PJ Harvey song. Like, and then it's just this kind of interesting program. So sometimes there's that, sometimes it's detailed curation from my end of a, you know, really specific thing.

Um obviously, you know, this is without even talking about funding applications, venue considerations, various partnerships, you know, etc. and so forth. And then our large scale, more kind of larger footprint events, you know, the operas, theater work, the dance work. Uh we have so Ashley Dugan is our associate artist for dance, so a lot of that's driven by him either him coming with ideas or me, you know, saying I'm writing this work and I want to include dance in some way. And a lot of the opera work has been my work. Uh there's a few other pieces in there that are not there, but yeah, a lot of it is is my pieces. And so it then it's about okay, well, how does Forest sit in that and what is what is the Forest flavour to it that is more than just uh proscenium arch theatre orchestras kind of things.

We always try and use unusual spaces, immersive work, that sort of thing. So it's it's kind of every project's sort of different. And then when we've had guests come in, it's very much like here you go you've got this palette of 20 musicians it's it's mostly been music but sometimes with theatre go do something see what you can do and and that can end up in tatters on the ground or it uh can work really well yeah depending depending on the on the piece but again you've got to take those risks like we're so we're getting to be so risk averse at the moment in the industry that if the smaller companies lose that quality well we're done for really are I think it's a a really great collaboration and yeah what you give these artists is obviously yeah be a bit risky make some bold choices because if you're not going to do it here then where else is there really for you to do so exactly right and and that's that's a really challenging line to walk as a producer because like I obviously want to give the work life right like I want to pitch it to companies I want it to have and a composer you know I want my work to live outside of Forest and you know I pitched a thing to quite a high level artistic director recently and they said well why should I take it you're already doing it you're like well because I can offer you an audience that has never been to the opera before but anyway that's fine you know like that's the perspective you've got like we're this engine room of new work that is bringing audiences that have never been to an opera never been to an orchestra before that's the holy grail as far as I'm concerned by all means if you don't want it sure that's fine but that you know there's a there's also a business imperative there for the organization to to be stepping up to be to hold the rest of the industry to account of like, well, this is what people do want to see.

[29:47] Evan J. Lawson: So unless there's some kind of acceptance or change in the air, it can sometimes feel a bit conflicting if if you're just we can be fobbed off a lot because it's, you know, it's very much a a group of volunteers, like we do when we have funding, it's great. We pay everyone a properly, of course, but it can look on paper like it's volunteers. So it's it's tricky, it's a tricky line to walk. Do you feel like obviously knowing that the industry is sitting in a bit of a rough place across the board, musicals, operas, dance, all of that, that of we keep talking about being risk-averse. Obviously, they know that funding can be quite tough at the minute. So people are less wanting to look at new work, commissioning new work because it's safer, quote unquote, to just keep doing things that they know are going sell rather than things that they, you know, would be completely, you know, taking a risk on.

Well, I'm not 100% sure how to kind of answer that, but I guess for my experience, and I'll put on my my marketing manager hat where I work at the Australian National Academy of Music, where it's a different thing because we're a training institution that our funding is a very different model. But still, we put on concerts, people need to come, we need to do a thing. And we've really worked hard at making an accessible ticketing structure, right? So the Philadelphia opera, if this is a thing you're interested in out there about like accessibility pricing, you know, and you're in a more kind of a legacy art form, even like what we do at Forest, it's still essentially a legacy art form. People think of it as an orchestra.

We we get people who've never been before, so they don't know the difference between us and the Melbourne Symphony, right? To them, it's just chalk and cheese. We just happen to do it with a DJ and a bar, you know, like so it's all the same, I think it's all the same ticket, right? So the Philadelphia Opera have done this thing recently where everything is a choose what you wish pricing from $11 and in increments of $10 up to $300 per ticket. And they have like tripled their attendance, they've like doubled their budget. Now, of course, we're talking about an American opera company that probably gets $50 bajillion dollars a year from Microsoft or some you know Looney Tunes thing, but still it's like it is a case in point that if you build in some flexibility, you build in price concerns, you know.

[32:20] Evan J. Lawson: What we've noticed at Annam, we've got a sort of a structure where it's like a 20, a 40 or a $60 ticket for our main concerts. What we've noticed is that in the buying behavior, some people will buy three concerts for 20 bucks and then one concert for 40. Or they might be a donor and they're happy to give a little bit more and they've bought all the $60 tickets and then something's released later and they'll just buy the $20 ticket. So people kind of making these these buying habits that have actually lifted the income and have lifted the attendance rate because a lot of new buyers will buy the $20 ticket, see the product, know it's good, come back and buy a $40 ticket. And I think as marketers, producers, we go, oh, they're gonna, oh, we're not gonna do it, they're not gonna do this, and they're not gonna we couldn't possibly end it.

It's like, no, they will. If they want to come back, they'll come back. And if they want to pay more, people will generally, you know, they know that it's most people know that it's we're basically charities, they'll want to contribute as much as they can contribute. So also giving people an opportunity to engage with the company in an accessible way, if that makes sense. It's like, here's $20 ticket. It's really not that risky. Yeah. Come back again and pay more if you want, or pay $20 again. That's fine. Yeah, so it's it's tricky. Discounting is the other thing that's kind of like tricky at the moment because we're seeing such last minute spikes in everything. So, you know, all the CEOs panic and go, well, nothing's filled, but it fill them, so then you discount, and then all those people that probably would have bought a full price ticket come on a discounted ticket that they buy a week before.

So my theory is just hold steady, just hold steady, and you've just got to be like, you know, again, I work at a company where I'm probably not gonna get fired if the show doesn't sell out as much, you know. So it is a different, particularly in the contemporary musical theatre space at the moment. But um, yeah, it's it's bloody weird at the moment, and I think the problem is people are kind of behaving as if it's this oddity, and I'm like, I kind of think that this is what it's gonna be for the next ever, maybe, you know. So we've got to learn how to advertise like that, yeah.

[34:19] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah, I think I think obviously there's a whole conversation we could dive into around accessibility for theatre in all of the ways, but yes, obviously, you know, ticketing price points as we've seen have from when I first started seeing theatre have skyrocketed, and and you look and you go, sure, I see everything else around it has as well, but how can we still make it accessible for those people that do sit in that lower, you know, socioeconomical position? I'm gonna do that. To still encourage them to be dreamers and be creatives, and you and I have both fallen in love with what we've done because we experienced it as as kids, so you know, it's still making it accessible to that next generation, I think is what's really important.

[35:01] Evan J. Lawson: Absolutely, and it's like, can you also just sometimes let people buy the best seat in the house for t 50 bucks? Like, this is one of my bugbears at the moment. It's like, God, I mean, I'm again, I'm glad I'm not dealing with some of the the budgets of the major organizations, but it's just like I have worked in places where we go, oh we'll give one row of D reserve and that'll be the accessible price and it'll be the last row of the thing. It's like, well if someone is coming for the first time to the symphony as this was an example of a particular orchestra and that's their thing and they have this terrible experience sitting at the back I can't see anything or hear anything how are you expecting them to then and then you're gonna market to them again and say buy a subscription.

Well exactly exactly and I think this is something that musicals do a lot better than the classical music world like because you've got that kind of culture of of people just want to see the product you know and they'll they'll buy not necessarily based on the the people who are in it or you know that of course there's some that do but a lot of people go oh you know Brett I I know Book of Mormon I know you know Hades Town whatever it is I'm gonna book that that thing but uh still it's like we you know we need to be making sure that mum and two kids who can't afford to come or whatever gets the chance to access it you know like it just oh just gives me the the creeps to think that you know in 30 years time might be in a position where only certain people of a certain socioeconomic situation can access tickets and can access education for for art in a particular way and that's the path that we seem to be walking down at the moment.

[36:32] Evan J. Lawson: Sort of going back to what it was you know who were the people that actually sat and and watched Opera sat the and watched these performances were people that had money we're we're sort of going back that way and it's it's terrifying and it's conversations like this and conversations continue to be had. Nothing's gonna change overnight. Yeah. People have to take risks, but hopefully, hopefully we see uh see a change of that in the next couple of years.

[37:01] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah, and it's it's like as we've said umpty do times already, it's new work, right, is a huge part of that, right? It's it's seeing specific stories on stage, it's you know, engaging certain types of community, and that's across the board of any theatre, any concert, like any performing arts at the moment because you know, it's just Netflix that you're up against at the at the end of the day. But people do genuinely like in Melbourne, it's just, you know that people are hungry for stuff. That's there's no lack of of new audiences and you know, like the the don't even open the can of worms about immigration, but Melbourne's had an extra two hundred and fifty thousand people in the city in the past th three, four years.

If you can't sell it, you know what I mean? Like there's plenty of people out there to sell to. So that's that's you know, I'm always I'm trying to be always an optimistic person. I'll I'll gladly throw plenty of stones at the glass ceilings, but um ultimately always i it's in the it's in the cause of the art form of going, you know, absolutely there should be, you know, a full season of Annie at the Princess Theatre that sells out every night, and absolutely there should be a season of Marriage of Figaro at the opera house. Do you know what I mean? That and then absolutely there should be a weird wacky thing that, you know, has some funding behind it that gets produced by a major company. Because that's I think the thing that artists wanna see is that they wanna see, okay, if the companies are gonna go with risk averse, comfortable, you know, bums on seat stuff, where is that money then gonna go in terms of the art form and the longevity of the art form and audiences as well? I think it's it's people like you and the Forest Collective that are continuing to drive artist creativity in many ways and And I I'm really excited to see where you guys go as a group.

[38:45] Evan J. Lawson: Again, anyone out there with a spare 50 grand, let me know.

[38:49] Joshua Broadbent: Now we touched briefly on your sort of work as a composer. Um and in your bio you talk about immersive electro acousmatic works.

[39:03] Evan J. Lawson: Yes. What what is that? Oh who knows? I don't really know myself. So I guess like you gotta think acousmatic music, so acoustic instruments, a violin, a cello, etc. Acousmatic is this kind of catch-all term for electronic work that's made that could be, you know, you've got to kind of put like it could be a sound sculpture. It could be, you know, static sound for a theatre work, you know, like a a lot of that could be described as acousmatic work. So sound work that is probably generated electronically but is presented through speakers like in a theatre or that that's kind of my understanding of acousmatic. There's probably something out there as well yeah so kind of electronic electronic music um for me my practice in that space is very relatively new.

[39:55] Evan J. Lawson: So my work Labyrinth, which uh it was a multi-room immersive dance opera piano concerto, also had a large um acousmatic part of it. So it had electronics throughout the space. So basically, it's the story of the Minotaur, Theseus and the Minotaur, and the audience is playing the role of the Athenians who have been sent to be sacrificed to the Minotaur. And Theseus is taking you through the labyrinth through multiple rooms where we meet dancers, musicians, and in order to create a cohesive sound world, I had to generate electronic music, um, which was sort of a new thing for me. So it's sort of electronically generated sounds, but also like recording things, um, me singing, me sort of recording body percussion or weird sounds on synths and that sort of stuff.

So it's kind of a bit of a catch-all thing of just electronic music, but not like, you know, it's not techno, you know what I mean? I think people play electronic music, and some people think, oh, cool, you know, you make beats or sort of pop music. It's like, no, it's kind of like ambient music, I guess, is a good describer.

[41:03] Joshua Broadbent: How do you find audiences' response to taking sort of classical parts of instruments within to that, you know, synthesis sort of pulsing experience?

[41:15] Evan J. Lawson: Well, with Labyrinth, which is sort of as the large-scale kind of canvas I've experimented that on. So we had acoustic flute, viola, and then the crux of the work is that a piano is the Minotaur. So you can hear this like monster big crashy piano concerto thing, but it's in the distance, it's in the last room. So there's also, uh, you know, you've got the electronics kind of being manipulated and creating a sound world, but then you've got the piano in like an old school 17th century uh sound design is over in a couple of rooms away, and you can hear it as we get closer and closer. So, kind of interacting all those elements together was really fascinating because I was operating the desk for it, and I'm not like a sound person at all, and my the way that I wrote this music was very rudimentary, very idiosyncratic.

But it was just great to be able to experiment just with a very simple mixer, like okay, I want these climaxes, how can I bring that up in the electronics? You know, just really simple things that any kind of sound technician would be like, well, yeah. But like as a composer and a conductor, it was kind of like it was the orchestra that I didn't have. Do you know what I mean?

[42:25] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah.

[42:25] Evan J. Lawson: Because we could only afford the three instruments and three singers. So it just gave me that chance to kind of have also be in a part of the performance and manipulate the sound and, yeah, like experiment with the climaxes in the sound was really cool to do. Because the first time we did it was in a really, really tiny space, and then the second time we did it was in a really massive space. So I was able to just like crank it, which was really cool.

[42:51] Joshua Broadbent: You became the composer, the conductor, the audio engineer, you were just continuing to add to the list of things that you can do.

[43:00] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, pretty much. I just say composer. I mean, that's really the catch-all of all of that, really. Obviously, in the world of composing and conducting, you're working with, you know, that live orchestra, you're working with them to balance the sound, how where things sit, all of that. But taking that and then adding that extra level of being able to drive it in the room and tweak it that further bit from what's already been created. Um, I think it's a very unique experience for people.

[43:29] Evan J. Lawson: Oh, absolutely. And from a compositional perspective, like I said, like most of my work up until really this piece had been acoustic notated music. And so to then craft a work that had to, from a notation perspective, for all the notation composer nerds out there, like I obviously it's taking a place over multiple rooms where the pianist isn't in the same room. It was literally like a nearly a hundred meters difference between where the audience started and where the pianist was. So I have to write it in a way where the pianist could hear a cue from a singer, play the thing, you know, that sparked the next cue. So that the notation had to be flexible enough that still worked for the storytelling, and then the electronics sort of had to be the glue that melded all those elements together.

So it was, um, again like how hard do I want to make it? I'll make it as hard as possible. But then through that, I've now crafted a whole almost whole new genre to kind of work with both within my music but just in sort of music theatre in general. I don't know of many immersive operas or multi-room operas. So yeah, it sort of was a really excellent challenge, a really, really exciting challenge.

[44:44] Joshua Broadbent: Are you looking at exploring it further within this or another piece and sort of allowing more audiences to experience it?

[44:52] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, absolutely. We want to tour the work, it's so space-dependent, so it needs kind of like a creepy, weird, you know, labyrinthine space that we can get a grand piano in and speakers and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. So it is, um, a complicated one. So we're looking at, you know, um, weird warehouses, power stations, it's kind of that vibe. So if you if anyone knows anything, please write in because we're just keen to get the work out there. So yeah, it's two dancers, three singers, three musicians, plus a bloody grand piano. Um, but aside from that, it's reasonably doable. Conceiving at the moment a follow-up work which will actually be a kind of um prequel. So Daedalus is this figure in mythology who was the designer of the labyrinth, and he was also the designer.

If you know the myth, the Minotaur and Ariadne's mother had a curse by Zeus to she fell in love with a bull and he created a contraption so that she could consummate her relationship with the bull. And Daedalus designed those things. He also designed Icarus's wings. So Icarus was his son. So I'm going to write a work for myself because I'm also a singer. Uh, and it's going to be not so much a it's not gonna be multi-room, but it's gonna be an immersive one-person opera about Icarus. It's kind of kind of be the origin story of Daedalus. So the idea is that that work can kind of sit in conjunction with Labyrinth in some way. So that's kind of the next major theatre work I'm coming up. So I've gone gone very intimate.

I've got one voice, electronics, and one instrument. It'll I'm sort of getting smaller and smaller because I've just discovered electronics. I can do all these cool stuff, and I don't have to get a 70-piece orchestra together. And I think it's all it's all more skill building. It's just continuing on what you know within composing and just building on top of that to layer it. And I'm excited for both of these things, so I can't wait to keep following so I um can know when they're gonna land and where they will be and experience it for myself.

[46:48] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah, please, please. Everyone is welcome. Come in here, you know, contemporary classical music like you've never heard it before, right?

[46:55] Evan J. Lawson: That's the idea.

[46:56] Joshua Broadbent: Exactly. So obviously, we've touched on all of the things that you've done in your career. What are some tools or tricks that keep you organized, keep you on top of the many projects that you're doing, or just things that you know you find really helpful that the listener might enjoy as well?

[47:12] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, I mean, again, they're all thrillingly exciting stuff, like you know, make sure you've got a really clear schedule that everyone can read and understand. Make sure you organize your production meetings and that you know everyone knows that they're happening, and you know, contracts are really important, I think, for any, obviously, any company, but particularly the small ones where money is so tight, and making sure that things are super transparent around um who's doing what and when building a group of people you can delegate to because you can't possibly do it all on your own, even as a even if you're just a just a producer, you can't do it all on your own. You need to make sure that there's a really clear crew around you, and that you trust those people to do their jobs.

You can say that about any workplace, anywhere, just trust people to do the job and letting them make their own mistakes, um, whether they're an artist or a stage manager or whatever, yeah, and a diversity of opinions. So I really make sure that with like the steering committee of Forest Collective that we've got um artists of the group involved, we've got external people, and that we have, you know, a diversity of people in their professional experience so that they can learn, but also you know, is there this amazing app that all us, you know, millennial boomers don't know anything about that, you know, can save us time or whatever. So that and then in just the small org kind of stuff of like you're always building new relationships, so it's that without hustling too much, you've got to kind of think that every relationship that you're going into is a new opportunity for the company to grow in some way, just to sell a ticket or to get that CEO to come or whatever.

So, you know, there's a just a level of amicableness as if that's a word that I try and instill, and it's just like, God forbid, we have fun. We're putting on shows. Like, this is how they do all these conversations test shows. We're putting on shows. Like, like it should be enjoyable for everybody, from the janitor through to the leading lady, right? So that's my my number one thing as well of like just be a good fun person, you know, like don't take it all too seriously and find work that keeps you empowered and interested and engaged, right? That's what anyone in any field would want, but particularly in the arts, you've got to care about it. If you care about the tickets more than you care about the art, well, you might be in the wrong place.

And I think it all comes back to if you don't love it, you don't do it because it demands so much from us, and yeah, if you're not enjoying it, if you're not having fun, step back for a second and just go, is this where I want to be?

[49:59] Joshua Broadbent: Totally.

[50:00] Evan J. Lawson: And also, you can also just turn up for your nine to five, and that's fine as well. Do you know what I mean?

[50:04] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah.

[50:08] Evan J. Lawson: Um, but yeah, like it's it's I think that's there's also some hangovers of that of the kind of old culture of the arts of like do everything all the time and you know you've got to care and you've got to marry it's like no, it's five o'clock, you don't pay me anymore. Bye.

[50:21] Joshua Broadbent: Yeah, sorry, like setting boundaries.

[50:24] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, exactly. But what a boundary, what a revolutionary boundary, you know. It's five o'clock and yeah.

[50:31] Joshua Broadbent: Thank you so much for the chat. It's been so fascinating um to find out more about you and the work that you do, the work that Forest Collective does. Where can people follow you and Forest Collective if they want to learn more and obviously, stay up to date with some of the amazing work that you're doing?

[50:47] Evan J. Lawson: Yeah, absolutely. So, forestcollective.com.au, um, we're on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube. Uh, we have a monthly newsletter, action-packed full of lots of fun things. We're about to launch a big season of activity um in January. So we've got a lot of things on the go next year. Um, we do also have uh some digital work that we created during COVID, which you can explore on our website as well. A digital reimagining of the seminal um 20th century piece, Pierre Lunaire. I'd encourage people to go and check out on our website. Uh and for me, I'm Evan J. Lawson.com. I'm at Evan J. Lawson, I'm on the gram, I'm on the Facebook, I'm all over the internet. I often post really stupid videos about me complaining about, you know, certain companies' branding, for instance, is a fun series I have on Instagram.

I'll probably get myself in trouble one day, but no one seems to pay any attention. So I'm gonna go check that out and I'll pop all those links uh in the show notes as well for the listener to check out.

[51:44] Joshua Broadbent: You've already shared so many words of wisdom, but is there any last minute thought that you want to share?

[51:51] Evan J. Lawson: I'm gonna be like super like Boomer Dad and be like, just enjoy the ride.

[51:57] Joshua Broadbent: Oh, that is perfect. Thank you so much.

[51:59] Evan J. Lawson: My pleasure, thanks, Josh.

[52:03] Joshua Broadbent: I loved diving into Evan's world today from the unexpected Tessitura. If you're planning on going and learning more about it, please let me know. Reach out on Instagram or TikTok at Whispers in the Wings. From there to the labyrinth operas to the realities of running an indie theatre company. It's conversations like this that remind me that the arts thrive on curiosity, collaboration, and of course, supporting each other through the good, the bad, and the ugly. It's exciting parts that all come together to make work happen. I hope you've had a wonderful 2025 exploring the incredible world of theatre with me and these wonderful theatre makers. I cannot wait to share more episodes with you in the new year. But until then, as Evan said, just enjoy the ride. See you later.