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Leading Examples
of Inclusion of People with
Disabilities in the Arts

Accessible Arts Conference
26-27th September 2007
Venue: Sydney Conservatorium of Music

 

Key Note Speakers and Presenters

Tabitha Allum STAGETEXT UK

Tabitha Allum is Chief Executive of STAGETEXT, an organisation established in 2000 to promote and provide captioning in theatre across the United Kingdom so that deaf, deafened and hard of hearing people have full access to live performance. Previously, she worked for Arts Council England where, among other things, she had particular responsibility for encouraging greater access to arts venues for disabled audiences and the programming of disability arts companies by mainstream venues. Prior to this Tabitha worked for Northern Stage, a theatre company based in Newcastle upon Tyne, and VODA, an organisation that gives advice to charities and community groups in North Tyneside.

 

Tim McCallum, Singer and Actor

After twenty years of diverse performance experience, Timothy McCallum is one of Geelong’s most celebrated and loved local performers. His career commenced with a long string of successes in eisteddfods, vocal competitions and talent quests around the State. He received a Victorian Music Theatre Guild Award for his portrayal of Rolf in Lyric Theatre Company’s The Sound Of Music, and was a finalist in the Arts Category of the Young Australian of the Year Awards for his contribution to local theatre. His onstage career includes appearances in over 40 stage musicals, and a performance at Melbourne Park in front of 13,000 people in the Victorian Education Department’s ‘Dreamscape’.

In 1999 Tim was one of 18 talented performers who were selected from a pool of over a thousand applicants into the Musical Theatre course at Perth’s prestigious Western Australia Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA). However, only days before he was to commence his music theatre course, a swimming accident left him a quadriplegic. Since then, his resilient character and extraordinary spirit have touched the hearts of the arts community, as they have watched him rehabilitate and return to the stage to continue his performing career.

Since then, Tim has gone on to do guest appearances at The Melbourne Cup Eve Ball, Carols by Candlelight, the Crown Showroom with Peter Sullivan and the Starlight Orchestra, as the official entertainer at the Australia Day functions with the Premier of Victoria, and performing for the Prime Minister at his Centenary of Federation Dinner. Tim has also devised his own one-man cabaret “A Road Less Travelled”, and produced and performed in a highly acclaimed Mothers Day Concert with the Australian Army Band which raised $20,000 for Assistance Dogs Australia. Tim’s biggest fan at these performances is Buster, his own assistance dog, who contributes immeasurably to his personal life and his independence. Tim’s achievements have not gone unnoticed. He was awarded the Centenary Medal by the Governor-General for his outstanding service to the entertainment industry, and has recently received an Australian Humanitarian Award by the Altruism Foundation of Australia. Tim’s life story was featured on ‘Australian Story’ on the ABC November 2006.

Pat Rix : Composer/Lyricist and Artistic Director Tutti Inc.

Founder and Artistic Director of Tutti Inc, SA composer and playwright Pat Rix is internationally recognized for her work in bringing the strengths of community and mainstream music and theatre together for high quality performance. In 1997 she founded Tutti Ensemble, an integrated arts community dedicated to creating work performed by people with a disability. Tutti has now become an internationally acclaimed model of artistic excellence and social inclusion.

Pat Rix recently received the Australian of the Year Local Hero Award for South Australia in recognition of her work with Tutti Ensemble. Her dedication, commitment and ability to reach out to those with disability have seen her transform some of these young people into emerging artists with abilities that had previously gone unrecognised.

As a librettist/composer Ms. Rix has worked with a diverse range of singers and musicians, including Yvonne Kenny & David Hamilton from the Australian Opera, jazz/blues singer Lillian Boutte from New Orleans, the Sal Ferrarez Big Band in Vancouver and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra.

Choral commissions include the opening ceremony for the 2005 Bundaleer Forest Weekend, the 1999 Masters Games, High Beam Festival 1998 - 2004, and the SA Festival of the Coast in 2000. She also composed the opening ceremony chorales for Canada’s KickstART Festivals in 2001 and 2004.

She has written ten plays, three music-theatre works and one opera in her own right and collaborated on many more.

In 2001 Pat won the inaugural Arts SA mid-career Artists Fellowship to develop My Life, My Love with Tutti for the 2002 Adelaide Festival. In 2006 she was awarded a full scholarship to participate in the esteemed Governor’s Leadership Foundation Program which has a commitment to accelerate leadership capability in the wider South Australian community.