Barbra Streisand "TIMELESS" Australian Concerts
Sydney 9 & 10 March 2000
Sydney Football Stadium
Melbourne 15 & 17 March 2000
Colonial Stadium, Docklands
The most anticipated concert tour in Australian entertainment history was confirmed for the year 2000. Barbra Streisand made her first visit to Australia in March 2000 to play landmark concert events in Sydney and Melbourne. The engagements were announced by Australian promoter and entrepreneur Kevin Jacobsen OAM and Ms. Streisand's career-long manager, Martin Erlichman. The concerts, the first ever for Barbra outside the United States, Canada and London, followed Barbra's Millennium concerts on New Year's Eve & New Year's Day, at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. It was previously confirmed that the engagements at the MGM Grand would be her final concerts in the United States, but Barbra had long wanted to fulfil a lifetime dream of performing for her Australian fans.
"My priorities have shifted," Ms Streisand said. "I want to travel and enjoy my life. There are places in the world my husband and I want to visit and Australia has always been one of them. I am so looking forward to seeing the country and meeting the people. Australians have been wonderfully supportive throughout my career. The time seemed right, the dawn of a new millennium, to realise my dream and say thanks to my Australian fans".
Ms. Streisand performed in Sydney at The Sydney Football Stadium on 9 & 10 March, and in Melbourne at Colonial Stadium, Docklands, on 15 & 17 March, 2000. The original opening night in Sydney was March 8, but was postponed to March 9 due to poor weather at the outdoor venue. Both venues were specifically configured to meet the benchmark of quality, the trademark of a Barbra Streisand concert event.
Tour promoter Kevin Jacobsen said that this was the pinnacle event in his career as a promoter of live entertainment. "The arrangement for these rare concert events by an artist who has dominated and inspired the music world for nearly four decades is one of the most important artistic occasions for our country. We know that Barbra Streisand is revered worldwide, but I think even she may be overwhelmed with the Aussie enthusiasm that will be rolled out for her by her fans here. Every major venue in the world has been competing for the chance to present Barbra Streisand in concert. It is a great compliment to Australia we have secured the event.
Barbra Streisand's manager Martin Erlichman said, "I think the Australian audiences are in for an extraordinary event. The concerts each have their own special magic and I'm sure that Australia will have a sense of something that is quite different for us, quite wonderful. Ms Streisand is the most sought after entertainer in the world today and she has never before embarked on a tour of this size in a foreign territory, so this makes the tour particularly unique.
Erlichman pointed out that Ms Streisand historically had dedicated most of her creative time to her recording career, to her work as director, producer and actress in motion pictures and, recently, to her Barwood Films' slate of issue-orientated motion pictures for television. He noted that, prior to her MGM Grand concerts just over five years ago, she had gone nearly three decades without performing for pay in public. The New Year's Millennium concerts in Las Vegas set a one day performance sales record in the United States. The New Year's Eve concert racked up the highest one day total of any single performance in the 33 year history of the ticketing arm, Ticketmaster.