There are a number of potential hazards photographers covering live gigs have to be wary of. One, in the analogue days, was running out of film in the middle of a shoot. Another is getting so caught up in the excitement that you forget why you’re there in the first place.

Tony Lewis was working as a young snapper at the Sydney Morning Herald early in his career when he arrived for an afternoon shift in 1985 and was told to head straight to Darling Harbour to join a group of music fans who had won a competition run as part of Double J’s tenth birthday celebrations.

“So I got on this boat with 300 people and we didn’t know what we were going to see. Then we get out to Goat Island [in Sydney’s Port Jackson] and there’s the Oils all set up to play with Sydney Harbour in the background – it was amazing.

“I almost didn’t get enough photos… I was so caught up in the excitement of the crowd that I reckon I spent too much time jumping up and down and singing along, and maybe didn’t concentrate hard enough on taking pictures.”

Tony Lewis’s photo of Rob Hirst performing with Midnight Oil on Goat Island in 1985.

That concert – which was also filmed and later released on video – has been described as one of the triumphs in the career of Midnight Oil, whom Lewis photographed again 36 years later at WOMADelaide’s 2021 twilight concerts in King Rodney Park.

One of the photographer’s pictures from the 1985 Oils’ gig, a close-up of drummer Rob Hirst, is among around 60 of his photographs that will be shown on the large LED screens at The Lab in an exhibition playing across various dates from November 30. The photos cover music gigs, dance, theatre and other live performances he has captured over 40 years while working for newspapers, as a freelancer and for events including WOMADelaide, Adelaide Festival, Adelaide Fringe and Darwin Festival.

Lewis, who also takes photos for InDaily, says he was still a schoolboy when he first photographed a live show. It was in the 1970s at Adelaide’s Apollo Stadium, the muso was Little Richard, and the camera was an old 35mm he’d inherited from his grandma.

“I didn’t know what I was doing at all and I took a couple of pictures with the flash and he’s a little dot off in the distance, but it was a great concert because he was a fantastic performer. He was wearing a jacket that was all made out of little squares of mirror and at the end of the show he took it off and twirled it around chucked it out into the crowd.”

Devo members strike a pose at Adelaide Airport in 1982. Photo: Tony Lewis

Those pictures have been lost to time, but Lewis’s exhibition will include some of the earliest photos he took for publication – including one of Michael Hutchence performing with INXS at the 1982 Adelaide University O’Ball on the Barr Smith Lawns. He was working for The Advertiser at the time, and was dispatched to the airport that same year to cover the arrival of Devo.

“Another young photographer and I decided it would be good to get a picture like this,” he says, pointing to an image that captures the quirky essence of the American band. “I’ve gone and laid down on the tarmac outside Adelaide Airport with a wide-angle lens and a flash either side of my head, and Paul convinced them to come and bend over me and pull strange expressions.”

Lewis may not like to pick favourites among his photos, but the Hutchence and Devo pictures are displayed on a wall in his home – along with another taken at Australian Dance Theatre’s Adelaide rehearsal studio in 1989 and one of Annie Lennox performing with the Eurythmics at Covent Garden in ’84 (shot when he was freelancing in London and used his metropolitan police media pass to talk his way into the wings).

The photos he has selected for the exhibition have been pulled together by his son Oscar Lewis, a technical producer and occasional music photographer himself, to play on 20-minute loop on The Lab’s LED screens. They include a number taken at WOMADelaide, including singer Neneh Cherry and Senegalese star Youssou N’Dour reuniting on stage to perform their hit song “7 Seconds” in 2015, French singer Christine and the Queens taking the show off stage in 2019, and MC Mr Bruce from British duo The Correspondents crowd-surfing in 2013.

“I was at that time still official photographer at WOMAD so I was lurking at the ramp where they let the artists up onto Stage Two and he was side of stage waiting to go on. I said, ‘Do you mind if I come on stage?’, because you could see there would be really good shots of the crowd. And he said, ‘Yeh, no worries, as long as you don’t mind getting kicked in the shins’.

“I went up and stood in the back corner, and when he went out to crowd surf, I just came out to the front of the stage and took that shot.”

The Correspondents’ MC Mr Bruce crowdsurfing at WOMADelaide. Photo: Tony Lewis

Memorable Adelaide Festival shows Lewis has captured include Barrie Kosky’s dramatic production of Saul in 2017 and Grace Jones’ electrifying outdoor show in Elder Park in 2018. A photo of Jones – in full flight, with gold-skull face mask, spiked mane and full body paint –­ is the hero image for the exhibition. Lewis recalls that because of the paint, the Jamaican singer couldn’t sit down and had to be delivered by bus from her hotel to the park, where her wild performance and striking costumes captivated both the photographer and audience.

In the past couple of decades, continual improvements in digital technology have made life much easier for photographers shooting live performances. It still requires skill, well-honed instinct and good timing to capture a top shot, but there’s no fear of running out of film, and, as Lewis points out, it is easier to overcome challenges such low lighting.

“The other thing that’s made a huge difference with modern digital cameras is that you can shoot without making a noise these days. I’ve been shooting for the Adelaide Festival for probably eight, 10 years, and there’d be some shows, particularly classical shows, where you’re holding your breath waiting for there to be a noisy bit.”

Tony Lewis’s exhibition, AAA, launches at The Lab in Light Square on November 30, and will be available to view on various dates until December 9. See the website for details.

Adelaide’s Gravity & Other Myths performing their award-winning show The Pulse. Photo: Tony Lewis

Michael Hutchence during an INXS gig in Adelaide in 1982. Photo: Tony Lewis

French singer Christine and the Queens takes the show off stage and into the crowd at WOMADelaide in 2019. Photo: Tony Lewis

Annie Lennox in London in 1984. Photo: Tony Lewis

Australian Dance Theatre members rehearsing, circa 1989. Photo: Tony Lewis