THE SOUND OF MUSIC Australian Tour Cast Announced

Producers Andrew Lloyd Webber, John Frost, David Ian and the Really Useful Group today announced the names of the superb cast for the 2015-16 Australian tour of the world's favourite musical, The Sound of Music.

The Australian production will be led by Amy Lehpamer (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Once, The Rocky Horror Show) as Maria Rainer and Cameron Daddo (Legally Blonde, Big River) as Captain Georg von Trapp, starring alongside Marina Prior (Mary Poppins, The Secret Garden) as Baroness Schraeder, Jacqueline Dark (Opera Australia's Aida, Don Giovanni) as Mother Abbess, Lorraine Bayly (Calendar Girls, The Sullivans) as Frau Schmidt and David James (Playschool, Avenue Q) as Max Detweiler.

Liesl will be played by Stefanie Jones (Once) and Rolf by newcomer Du Toit Bredenkamp. The ensemble cast includes Johanna Allen (Sister Sophia), Eleanor Blythman (Sister Margaretta), Sophie Cheeseman, Colin Dean, William Groucutt, Stephen Madsen, Dominica Matthews (Sister Berthe), Katie McKee, Kathleen Moore, Ashleigh Rubenach and Sophie Weiss.

The lavish London Palladium production of The Sound of Music will commence in Sydney at the Capitol Theatre on 13 December this year, followed by a season at Brisbane's Lyric Theatre from 11 March, 2016. This acclaimed production of the legendary Rodgers and Hammerstein musical premiered in 2006 at the home of West End musical theatre, the London Palladium, where it celebrated a record-breaking 954 performances seen by well over 2 million people, before going on to enjoy sell-out seasons internationally.

"We have assembled a sensational cast to play these iconic roles," said the producers. "Cameron Daddo will be a wonderfully strong and stern Captain, and Amy Lehpamer, already with several musical roles to her name, will leap to stardom as Maria. We're very pleased to be working with Marina Prior again, and to bring Lorraine Bayly to musical theatre audiences. And we're especially pleased to bring acclaimed opera star Jacqui Dark to the musical stage."

"The Sound of Music is an iconic musical, probably the most loved musical of all, and contains all the elements which make a show magical," added John Frost. "It is exciting that Australian audiences will see a production of this quality, which has entertained so many people across the globe. I'm very much looking forward to the auditions to find our sets of von Trapp children too."

Inspired by the lives of the actual von Trapp family, The Sound of Music tells the uplifting story of Maria, a fun-loving governess who changes the lives of the widowed Captain von Trapp and his seven children by re-introducing them to music, culminating in the family's escape from the Nazis across the mountains from Austria. It features an unforgettable score that includes some of the most famous songs ever performed on stage, including My Favorite Things, Edelweiss, Do-Re-Mi, Sixteen Going On Seventeen, The Lonely Goatherd, Climb Ev'ry Mountain and the title song, The Sound of Music.

The musical originally premiered on Broadway in 1959 to record-breaking advance ticket sales, where it won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical. The show opened in London in 1961 and became the longest-running American musical of its generation. The 1965 Hollywood film, which starred Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, won five Academy Awards including Best Picture, and quickly became the highest grossing film in history. Even today The Sound of Music remains the most successful movie musical of all time.

The original Australian production of The Sound of Music opened at Melbourne's Princess Theatre in 1961 and ran for three years with a cast headed by the talented Australian soprano June Bronhill. Later Australian productions starred Julie Anthony and Lisa McCune as Maria.

Tickets for The Sound of Music go on sale on Monday 22 June.

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