Adelaide Fringe

Float into space and meditate under the stars at Adelaide’s Planetarium dome

By Rebecca Wilson

Posted on February 2, 2022

Experience a full dome sound bath with interdimensional music and 360-degree visuals of deep space.

All images: Kenneth Scott, Supernature productions

Get ready to head to the moon with AD Astra: To the Stars unique immersive experience coming to Adelaide for Fringe Festival 2022.

AD Astra: To the Stars is described as a full dome sound bath that envelopes its guests with interdimensional music and 360-degree visuals of deep space. Imagine closing off all your senses to the outside world and floating into an otherworldly place, surrounded by stars.

The experience is produced by Darren Curtis and Bradley Pitt with Sacred Resonance as they return for their 15^th Fringe season this year with brand new fully immersive and meditational performances.

Working with the top musicians, researchers and spiritual thinkers, Sacred Resonance have spent more than two decades investigating cutting-edge discoveries in musicology and archeoacoustics (an interdisciplinary field studying the relationship between people and sound). They are now bringing their years of creative work to share with the people of Adelaide.

Based at the Adelaide Planetarium, AD Astra has been described by commentators as a “spectacularly mesmerising” and “uniquely moving” experience not too be missed. For the yogis, astrology buffs and sci-fi lovers, this 50-minute experience invites you to resonate and recharge your body and mind.

“What we are doing in AD Astra is fusing ‘space sounds’ with Tibetan bowls, cosmic synths and overtone singing,” said Darren and Bradley.

“The sounds will take you into a place of deep relaxation by slowing down the brainwaves so that you’re in the optimum state for the body’s natural healing ability to occur and feel that optimal state of wellness.”

For the sceptics out there, sound baths (at least in one study) have been known to help relieve stress, fatigue and depression symptoms.

Darren Curtis, who has a bachelor’s in music technology (Honours), also completed his thesis on binaural beat frequencies and theorised how they could have therapeutic applications (A.K.A super science-y stuff that will require a bit of googling!)

“Binaural beat therapy is an emerging form of sound wave therapy,” Darren and Bradley said.

“It uses certain tones to effect harmonious brain wave states and can produce more feelings of wellbeing.

“So we create meditation music, musical installations and immersive experiences using this sonic technology and other sister disciplines that can effect therapeutic states on and in people.”

As well as AD Astra, Sacred Resonance is also introducing the Late Night Celestial Garden South Bath to the Fringe festivities this year.

This time, meet at the Bicentennial Conservatory in the Adelaide Botanic Gardens and gaze at the waning crescent moon, surrounded by the lush rainforest sanctuary.