Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust

The Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust (The Trust) was established in September 1954 under the guidance of H. C. ‘Nugget’ Coombs, Governor of the Commonwealth Bank, Sir Charles Moses General Manager, Australian Broadcasting Commission and John Douglas Pringle, Editor of The Sydney Morning Herald. It aimed to establish drama, opera and ballet companies nationally.

In 1954 The Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust (AETT) was established “to provide a theatre of Australians by Australians for Australians”. Named to commemorate Queen Elizabeth II's visit to Australia, The Trust raised £100,000 by a public appeal. The trust had an agreement with the Commonwealth government to match public donations 'in the ratio of 1:3 and to provide ongoing funding'. With substantial contributions from both the public and the Commonwealth Government, The Trust commemorated the first visit of Her Majesty the Queen, who had taken the title “Queen of Australia” in 1953, and ever since The Trust has been the only arts body to bear her name.

The hope in 1954 was that there would occur in the arts in a new Elizabethan age, as productive and inspiring as the first Elizabethan age in in the sixteenth century.

The Trust has nurtured and seen to independence many of Australia's most significant performing arts companies including Opera Australia and the Australian Ballet Foundation. The Trust also formed, maintained and administered two music Opera and Ballet orchestras, one each in Sydney and Melbourne, to accompany ballet and opera companies, and one smaller orchestra of Sydney freelance musicians named the Elizabethan Sinfonietta.

Other companies initiated by The Trust include the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), the Marionette Theatre, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the Australian Ballet School, the Theatre of the Deaf, Performing Lines and the Bell Shakespeare Company.

In 1974, the late Geoffrey Wynter Armstrong bequeathed a sum of money to The Trust to establish a memorial fund to be known as the Geoffrey Wynter Armstrong and Elizabeth Mary Martin Scholarship. The annual award is currently administered by Music & Opera Singers Trust Limited (MOST®).

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