Soprano Louise Keast’s $43,000 scholarship win is something to sing about. It leads HELEN MUSA’s latest Arts in the City column. 

Canberra-trained soprano Louise Keast has won the 2026 Sydney Eisteddfod Opera Scholarship, receiving the $43,000 John Lamble Foundation Scholarship to support overseas study and the next stage of her operatic career.

National Opera’s Heroines celebrates opera’s most memorable female characters, featuring Canberra operatic voices and the National Opera Chorus, The Street Theatre, October 3-4.

Prof Lisa Slade, the Hugh Ramsay Chair in Australian Art at the University of Melbourne, will present the NGA’s 2026 Annual Lecture, Australian Art: who decides?, before joining artist Richard Lewer for an in-conversation discussion, National Gallery, October 1.

ANU Law Revue returns with The Odycease and Desist!, a new student-written sketch comedy packed with mythology, satire and absurd humour. Canberra Rep Theatre, October 1-3.

Canberra Bach Ensemble will perform Bach’s Trauerode BWV 198, written on the death of Christiane Eberhardine, Electress of Saxony and Queen of Poland, and regarded as one of the composer’s most expressive sacred works, St Christopher’s Cathedral, October 3-4.

Tongan-Australian writer and Sweatshop Literacy Movement general manager Winnie Dunn will deliver the 2026 Ray Mathew Lecture, speaking on representation in literature. National Library, October 1. Free event.

Celebrating its 30th year, the Japanese Film Festival returns with a program spanning Australian premieres, animation, horror, samurai epics and contemporary drama, Palace Electric and National Film and Sound Archive, September 26-October 13.

Piano duo Andrew Rumsey and Ivan Horvatic will appear in a concert –  Magic, Spells, and Other Worlds – at Greenaway Studio, Chapman, October 3.

Children aged three and over are invited into a world of music, storytelling and imagination with Especially on Birthdays, from Shiny Heart Productions, featuring playful audience participation, physical theatre and a score by Mulan composer Matthew Wilder, Tuggeranong Arts Centre, September 30.

News all day, every day at CityNewsQBN.com.au.