Deborah Cheetham Fraillon

A black-and-white portrait of a person with glasses and curly hair is framed by purple curtains and colorful stars on a green background.
  • Talks and Ideas
  • all about women
  • Run time: 60 minutes Subject to change

A career-spanning conversation with an Australian arts trailblazer

Deborah Cheetham Fraillon is used to the spotlight, but a career in music was not something her family had imagined for her. Growing up in Sydney, Deborah always loved music, but when she experienced Opera for the first time — everything changed. 

Deborah went on to have an expansive global career as a soprano across the globe, and as a writer and composer of countless new works premiered all around Australia. She takes her artforms and uses them as vehicles for radical truth-telling about untold Indigenous stories. She went on to become the founder of Short Black Opera Company, with a mission to develop First Nations opera singers.

An unmissable opportunity to have an intimate chat with one of Australia’s most accomplished arts leaders, looking at her formidable career that took her from Stolen Generation to opera star, to writer and composer of the first Australian Indigenous opera, Pecan Summer.

Sydney Opera House Presents

Event details

Yorta Yorta by birth. Stolen Generation by government policy. Soprano by diligence. Composer by necessity. And lesbian by practice.

Deborah Cheetham Fraillon

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