A FIST FULL OF WITS

A FIST FULL OF WITS is a new and exciting vocal ensemble bringing a different and stimulating approach to the presentation of contemporary choral music in Tasmania.

Led by Creative Director June Tyzack, A Fist Full of Wits is an ensemble of no more than 20 singers that promises to engage its audience through innovative manipulation of the five inner wits of Common Sense, Imagination, Fantasy, Instinct, and Memory, along with the five outer senses of Sight, Touch, Taste, Smell, and Hearing.

Sung from memory and driven by text, A Fist Full of Wits Happenings will invariably confront and comfort, be interactive or detached experiences, always have a twist that will stay long in your memory. All music is respected, everything is real, challenging to perform, and stimulating to hear.

June Tyzack, Creative Director

Born in Burnie, Tasmania, June started piano lessons at age 10 and later moved to Hobart to study with Beryl Sedivka at the Hobart Conservatorium of Music. Following her graduation in 1975, she moved to London to take up a scholarship to study with Joseph Weingarten at Trinity College of Music. Despite a huge trove of chamber music under her fingers, in London June developed a love of Opera and the human voice.

She returned to Australia in 1980 and took up a position as Chief Vocal Coach, accompanist and repetiteur, for the Opera Studio of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music under the mentorship of Myer Fredman. Not restricted to only working with students, these decades included freelance work with Opera Australia and in the Sydney Music Theatre scene, as well as harpsichordist with the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, and pit orchestra keyboardist.

In 1999, June came back to Tasmania with her husband Gary and daughter Emma to take up residence at The Grange in Campbell Town, essentially to grow a hedge maze. In 2001 however, the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra invited her to be Guest Chorus Master for an Opera Gala. From that event, and until she resigned as Chorus Master in 2023, the TSO Chorus developed into the cohesive, reliable, travelling, and spirited chorus we now know. She crafted a group of casual singers, not only into a symphonic chorus respected both nationally and internationally, but also one that embraced the weird and wonderful world of Mona, Mona Foma, Ballet Lab, Dark Mofo, Spiegeltent and others.

As Creative Director of the TSO’s Obscura series, she created some of the best contemporary music concerts ever presented in Hobart.

She now brings all that knowledge and experience into the next chapter:

A FIST FULL OF WITS.

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