The madcap Listies… The Q, Queanbeyan, October 24-25. Photo: Andrew Wuttke

Chaotic comedy to a string quartet, dancing to orchestral music, HELEN MUSA covers it all; in this week’s Arts in the City column.

Kids and families can dive into hilarious chaos with The Listies: 110% Ready! Billed as a madcap hour of puns, gags and improvised silliness centred on the everyday scramble of getting out the door, the show comes fresh from a run at Melbourne’s Malthouse Theatre. Richard Higgins and Matt Kelly bring their antics for four performances of serious silliness at The Q, Queanbeyan, October 24-25.

The Australian String Quartet will perform Franz Schubert’s gripping Death and the Maiden, written from the depths of despair, alongside Britten’s String Quartet No. 2 and Paul Stanhope’s first quartet, Elegies and Dances, as part of its national tour, Convergence. Gandel Hall, National Gallery of Australia, October 19.

Walkley Award-winning journalist and historian Margaret Simons will deliver this year’s Rod Wallace Memorial Lecture for the Friends of the National Film and Sound Archive. She will explore the future of broadcasting, the predicted end of terrestrial television and why the ABC still matters. Arc Cinema, October 20.

Elizabeth Cameron Dalman, her company and visiting Taiwanese artists will perform repertoire from her Australian Dance Theatre years, works from Mirramu Dance Company and a new piece, Family Tree. The program, ECDysis, marks Dalman’s 60-year career and the 60th anniversaries of both Australian Dance Theatre and the Canberra Theatre Centre. The Courtyard Studio, October 24-26.

The Alma Moodie Quartet will welcome clarinettist Olivia Hans-Rosenbaum from Amsterdam for Brahms’ Clarinet Quintet and Hindemith’s grand First String Quartet. Wesley Music Centre, October 21.

The Canberra Mandolin Orchestra, directed by Michael Hardy, presents Lounge Jazz in an intimate new Fyshwick venue, weaving sultry vocals from multilingual chanteuse Theodora Volti with the tones of mandolins, guitar and bass. Expect smooth classics made famous by Nina Simone and Nat King Cole. Grainger on Geelong, October 25.

The Canberra Symphony Orchestra’s 2026 season has a line-up of highlights in Llewellyn Hall including Verdi’s Requiem, Debussy’s La Mer with Deborah Cheetham Fraillon’s Star Filled Sky, Hitchcock’s Psycho with live score, the return of The Music of Hans Zimmer.

QL2 Dance brings heroes, villains, damsels in distress, power and submission to the stage in Main Character Energy – The Chaos Project, where dancers aged 8-16 will work alongside professional choreographers including QL2 alumni Jack Ziesing, Ruby Ballantyne and Olivia Wikner. Belco Arts, Belconnen, October 24-25.