Last Friday night saw the opening of Adelaide’s Fringe Festival in typical style. Celebrating the whole gamut of arts practice, the Adelaide Fringe officially opens every two years with a parade around the city’s East End. Earlier in the day, the forecast was looking grim for the celebrations, with an extremely unusual torrent of February rain around lunchtime. Fortunately the rain held off for the parade, and seemed to have little effect on the turnout to the after party.

Actors, musicians, comedians, visual artists, dancers, puppeteers, carnies and more made this parade as colourful and resplendent as ever, and when it arrived at Rymill Park around 9.30, there was a great night’s entertainment waiting for all and sundry. Across Rundle Street, the Garden of Unearthly Delights opened the previous weekend, and has proved boomingly popular since. On that occasion Sydney’s The Bird headlined the festivities, while this night was all about South Australian produce. Thousands of people spilled into the two parks and across the streets to look, listen and celebrate artistic expression.

Northern Territory didge ‘n’ drum act eMDee was the only interstate act on the Rymill stage, kicking of the proceedings in their unique way. The night peaked during the Beat Smugglers’ set, where an intense and attentive dancefloor made navigating through the park to food stalls, bars and sideshow attractions somewhat difficult. The live beats were as intense as ever, and many a fresh face was well impressed by these season performers. Local drum ‘n’ bass duo Skyvver and Djon followed on, but many found their selections too much for the mild summer night and the area thinned out somewhat. There was no shortage of street entertainment to be found that night, from drummers and tapdancers to acrobats and jugglers and the Spiegeltent was at capacity for most of the evening.

MKB were an unusual choice for the next spot at Rymill Park, with their experimental, often character driven hip hop. Almost like a post modern art-band, their beats were often reminiscent of the work of fellow performer, DJ Trip. The final performer was the esoteric Tim Koch, who peformed from the DJ ‘tower’in the middle of the park after the final appearances of the video MC’s. The Fringe Festival is an exciting time to be out in Adelaide, and even better than that, it’s now official: thanks to BankSA, Adelaide Fringe will now become an annual event.

Be sure to check out the broad range of cultural content available this year at http://www.adelaidefringe.com.au

Click here for photos from the party…