Serenata, Kangaroo Valley
November 11, 2018

Like many country towns throughout this country, the tiny hamlet of Kangaroo Valley has become a hive of cultural and creative activity. As disaffected city-dwellers seek havens for their twilight years, towns like ‘The Valley” have become a beacon for arts people. When one arrives, others visit and find themselves looking at real estate. Within a few years, evenings of choral singing and chamber music become weekend concerts and, gradually, events, concert series and festivals.

Such is the case with Kangaroo Valley, nestling quietly in the Southern Highlands, about an hour between Mittagong and Nowra, and a couple of hours’ drive from Sydney or Canberra.  It takes barely an hour before its village life and lush pastures spin their calming magic – think of the movie Babe which was filmed around the area – and people begin to think about their crippling city mortgages.

Timothy Constable and Tim Brigden. Photo © Vincent Plush

Two decades ago, Belinda Webster, the genial founder of the trail-blazing Tall Poppies record label, was probably the first arts-person to arrive. Around the same time, writer and law academic Peter Wesley-Smith bought a property...