One wintry day in 2013 a call went out to Perth’s indie pop lovers: let’s make a choir! Singers of all shapes, sizes, ages and skill came together to form Menagerie, presenting quirky, captivating choral arrangements of songs from a diverse set of indie artists.

Menagerie commenced with a 10 week season from 29th July – 30th September 2013. Membership sat at around 60 delightful people throughout the season. Some members brought a wealth of musical experience, while others offered different kinds of experience, like mean baking skills, fashion nous, excellent glue-gun technique, or brilliant people skills.

Menagerie performed three concerts in season one; at an exhibition opening on 13th September, a house concert fundraising for Habitat for Humanity on 5th October, and an end-of-season celebration gig at The Bird on 6th October.

In their second season, Menagerie upped the ante and performed four sold out shows at Perth’s Fringe World Festival. This Song Is Mine featured stories from members chronicling the songs that had played an important role in their lives. The tunes ranged from 80s power ballads to underground indie hits, and the accompanying stories described where the songs fitted in love sought, found, lost and won; or enhanced perseverance in times of difficulty; or lifted spirits in times of sadness.

In addition to these formal shows, Menagerie’s 100+ members also did a number of flash mobs around the Festival hub in Northbridge, and smaller groups of volunteers sang on RTRFM and ABC 720, and at RTR’s fundraiser Brainspotting. It was a pretty big deal for a little community choir. They were and are amazing.

Menagerie’s third season ran from April – July 2014 and culminated in the Winter Warmer at The Bakery on 18th July. 80 or so choirlings crammed onto the small and potentially structurally unsound stage to perform some of their favourite classic indi tunes from bands like The Smiths, and some contemporary hits such as Arcade Fire’s anthemic “Wake Up”.

In addition to this epic singfest, season three featured pop-up gigs at the State Theatre for the Australian Institute of Architects National Conference, in the Cultural Centre at PICA’s Hatched opening, in the foyer of Cinema Paradiso as part of Revelation Film Festival, and at Crown Burswood in support of Youth Affairs Council of WA’s annual conference.

Small groups of Menageristas participated in a collaboration project with local apocalyptic surf-rockers SMRTs, and worked with Sticky Institute’s Thomas Blatchford on a project celebrating the 30th anniversary of Prince’s iconic Purple Rain album.

Menagerie’s fourth season was packed with delights, including another sell-out run of shows at the Fringe World Festival, Angove St Festival and Beaufort St Festival. The Fringe show, HEY MUSIC, I [HEART] YOU featured the talent and superbly crafted personal stories of local musicians Timothy Nelson, Ofa Fotu (a.k.a. Odette Mercy) and Josh Fontaine.

This season, which ran between September 2014 and February 2015, was the final season of founder and Zookeeper Claire Coleman as she handed over the reigns to Kate Page.

Menagerie’s fifth season ran between June and August 2015, culminating in a headliner gig at The Rosemount accompanied by Jonathan Brain, Simone and Girlfunkle and RTRFM Drivetime DJ Jas Hughes. It also included a slight foray into the bizarre with a bespoke gig appearance at the Revelation Film Festival, resplendent with large eyeball heads inspired by the absurd American band The Residents.

Menagerie’s sixth season culminated with five performances of their sell-out show, ‘Sounds Like Teen Spirit’ at Fringe World Perth 2016. This show drew together songs and stories that shaped the journeys of seven Menageristas as they embarked on the journey from teen-dom into adulthood.

Menagerie also performed in and around a yurt in the Blue Room in the dark (go figure!) and in the daylight at the inaugural Vic Park Summer Street Party and the Light Up Leederville Carnival.

Season seven for Menagerie climaxed with a headline gig at Perth’s Badlands Bar, with the show Women Who (Indie) Rock, with support and collaboration from Sarah Tout, Rachael Dease, and RTRFM’s Drastic on Plastic DJs Meri Fatin and Kristie Butler.

When we opened up to the choir suggestions for the season a clear theme emerged. The choir has always enjoyed singing the music of bearded indie men like Fleet Foxes and The Shins, and we felt it was time to showcase the extraordinary songs of female artists.

While gender is only one aspect of artistic identity, we felt it was important to provide a showcase event celebrating the unique voice of women in music and their contributions to the genre of indie music.

Our season setlist included Courtney Barnett, Chvrches, Sarah Blasko and Haim, with a collaboration on Rachael Dease on her haunting song ‘All In, All Out’ and a David Bowie medley, arranged for the Revelation Film Festival that was just too much fun not to repeat at our show.

​2017 opened with Menagerie’s eighth season, and fourth consecutive Fringe show, the award-worthy MENAGERIE SINGS CINEMA, hosted by Tristan Fidler from RTRFM’s Movie Squad.

On the set list was ‘Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)’ by Sonny Bono from the film Kill Bill, ‘Man of Constant Sorrow’, the traditional folk song made famous by the film O Brother Where Art Thou‘s Soggy Bottom Boys, Big Time Sensuality by Björk from 1995’ s comic book action comedy classic Tank Girl — a song criminally left off the official soundtrack.

Also chosen and performed by the choir were indie composer Job Brion’s melancholy ‘Strings That Tie To You’ from Michel Gondry’s Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, the haunting ‘Moonchild’ by prog rock legends King Crimson, taken from a surreal dream sequence in Buffalo 66 and from the Iranian vampire film A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night the song Death by White Lies.

Closing the show a mini-Menagerie, led by conductor Sal Banyard dressed as a jaguar shark from Wes Anderson’s The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. Sal and the choir performed in its traditional Icelandic ‘Starálfur’ by Sigur Rós, this was followed in sharp contrast by ‘Where Is My Mind’, the Pixies song taken from Fight Club‘s closing credits, and in true Menagerie style the show concluded with a big crowd participation number, ‘Don’t You (Forget About Me)’ the Simple Minds anthem from John Hughes’s coming of age movie The Breakfast Club.

The winter of 2017 saw Kate Page pass the Zookeeper mantle to Sal Banyard, and a new winter warmer show for season 9.  The choir performed Forever Song, by Josh Pyke, Heart’s a Mess by Gotye, Liliiput by Beth Jeans Houghton and the Hooves of Destiny, and Wings of a Dove by Madness. Menagerie also collaborated with Perth band Salary to perform a unique arrangement of their song ’40 in the Shade’.

Season 10 (October 2017-February 2018) was Menagerie’s fifth consecutive Fringe season. Selling out 3 of its 4 shows at the festival, the choir performed Menagerie Choir Presents: Keeping Secrets. Choir members and Menagerie fans submitted secrets anonymously, as well as songs, and the show was built around these enigmatic submissions.  This show sold more tickets than ever before for Menagerie, with 3/4 nights sold out to a huge Teatro audience.

In August of 2018, we returned to Perth Town Hall with our traditional Winter Warmer show to close our eleventh season.  This ‘Best of Menagerie Choir’ show revisited the choir’s favourite songs from our earliest days in Paper Mountain in season 1, to the more recent 9th season.

Menagerie’s 12th season ran from October 2018 to February 2019, and culminated in a super 5-night run of shows exploring little things of great significance.  Menagerie’s Odes to the (In)significant also saw the debut of two new guest conductors from within the choir, with Alex Hill and Tiffany Ha stepping onto the conductor’s stool for one song each!  While it wasn’t Menagerie’s best-attended Fringe run, the show was highly acclaimed by audience members and critics, gaining a 4-star review from Out In Perth and a 9/10 from X-Press!

The winter of 2019 saw Menagerie heat things up a little with their ‘Hot Winter Nights’ show at The Rosemount.  A language warning was needed as we got a little sexy, performing Janelle Monae’s ‘Make Me Feel’ which went on to become a classic Menagerie number.  For this show, Menagerie managed to convince Perth indie darlings The Bank Holidays to dust off some of their songs and perform with us – both separately and together.  Menagerie and The Bank Holidays collaborated on two songs – ‘Like A Piano’ and ‘The Voice I Hear When I’m Alone’ which featured some exhilarating cacophonous sounds!

Season 14 (September 2019 – February 2020) was Menagerie’s stellar seventh Fringe season – Songs From A Distant Sun.  Menagerie changed tack with this unusual choir show, featuring dancers, soundscapes, and some less typical choir formats.  (Though they ended up being a bit more normal than initially planned due to restrictions with the venue!)  Our audiences were (mostly…) blown away by the experience and after a 4-night run to open Fringe at the Girls School, we were invited back to close out the festival there as well!  In all this was a hugely successful season and though challenging, a really rewarding experience for our choirlings.

Season 15 (April – August 2020 – the iso-season) was small, relatively quiet, and somewhat digital.  Menagerists met online from April to June, revisiting old repertoire by singing along with videos and audio, plus working on musicianship and generally tossing around a bit of much-needed frivolity.  In June we started tentatively meeting again in a spaced out and symptom-free physical context, with rehearsals ‘zoomed’ out to those stuck at home.  We finished this season off with a sunny walk-and-sing around Highgate, featuring cute dancing to our rendition of Muse’s Supermassive Black Hole by the children in Hyde Park!  A few new arrangements were also created for this season, which we hope to take again to larger crowds in the future.

Season 16 (September 2020-January 2021) was another ambitious Fringe season for Menagerie. We were very lucky to be selected for the State Theatre Centre of WA’s State of Play Fringe program.  We designed our show for the beautiful spaces of the State Theatre Centre, striving to create an immersive, soundscapey, spine-tingling choral experience for our audiences.  COVID created some serious challenges – as we were never able to occupy the same space as the audience we had to get creative!  But we were still able to sing from the balconies, fill the Heath Ledger Foyer with powerful acoustic sound, and even include a secret soundscape in the hidden staircases – which we dubbed ‘Concrete Canopy’.  Despite challenges and stresses, we were able to put on a great show, and felt very grateful to be able to do so in a COVID world.