[1][3][2][5] As mandated by the Olympic Charter, the proceedings combined the formal and ceremonial opening of this international sporting event, including welcoming speeches, hoisting of the flags and the parade of athletes, with an artistic spectacle to showcase the host nation's culture and history.

[19] In August 2000, the organisers announced the eleven main performers, the twenty-one composers and four conductors held in a press conference in Melbourne.

The first edition of the festival, which founded by artistic director Rhoda Roberts, was the first of four leading up to the 2000 Summer Olympics, with some events held at the Sydney Opera House.

Inside the case were a pair of green and gold socks, cheer band, a replica of the 2000 Summer Olympics torch, lapel pin, event program, postcard, cards, earplugs, stickers and a Kodak CD-ROM.

It was hosted by Seven Network's Sports Commentator David Fordham and news presenter Chris Bath, while seven months pregnant with her first child, live on the northern stage in the stadium.

It featured various performances, including a Welcome to Country from the Wangal people, children singing the official Team Welcome Song "G'day G'day", a recognition of the Bidding team and the Olympic volunteers, a recognition from the United Nations of the Olympic Truce, Mexican waves, and a singalong of "Waltzing Matilda" with John Williamson.

Verse 2 (Sung by Julie Anthony with orchestra) Beneath our radiant Southern Cross We'll toil with hearts and hands; To make this Commonwealth of ours Renowned of all the lands; For those who've come across the seas We've boundless plains to share; With courage let us all combine To Advance Australia Fair.

The Governor-General Sir William Deane, the Prime Minister John Howard, and the President of the IOC Juan Antonio Samaranch, arrived after a jazz fanfare was performed by Jim Morrison and Swing City, his brother's Big Band.

[33] The Australian National Anthem, Advance Australia Fair, was then sung by both Human Nature and Julie Anthony, accompanied by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Simone Young.

The Awakening segment celebrated Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, which was claimed at the time to date back over 60,000 years.

The segment featured Indigenous Australians from the Central Desert, the Numbulwar, Yirrkala, Ramingining and Manningrida peoples of Arnhem Land, Torres Strait Islanders, and the Koorie clan of NSW.

[38][39] The segment featured Indigenous Australians from the Central Desert, the Numbulwar, Yirrkala, Ramingining and Manningrida peoples of Arnhem Land, Torres Strait Islanders, and the Koorie clan of NSW.

The segment ended when the Wandjina ancestral spirit appears[40] (in the form of a 32-metre diameter cloth in the style of a rock portrait) roaring and flinging a lightning bolt to ignite a bushfire.

[37] The fauna, which were represented by seven large paintings by Ngemba artist Jeffrey Sammuels and were then revealed, depicting the Indigenous animal life in Australia.

Tin Symphony Part 1 — The music, co-written and co-produced by Ian Cooper and John Frohlich, includes an Irish jig montaged with drums, bush sounds and voice.

Irish dancers present in this section danced on the corrugated iron sheets, with umbrellas made up to look like giant cogs and wheels to represent the industrial growth of Australia.

Finally, performers representing migrants from Oceania with an emphasis on New Zealand and New Guinea came into the stadium in vivid blue costumes and with Pacific style music.

It included "Also Sprach Zarathustra", "Chariots of Fire", "Ode to Joy", "Bugler's Dream", "Waltzing Matilda", and John Williams "Olympic Fanfare & Theme".

Once the Sydney 2000 Olympic Band made their introduction, they took their place in front of the ceremony stage, and volunteers came out to begin the Parade of Nations.

[54] Australian music legends, singers John Farnham and Olivia Newton-John[55] walked among the Olympic competitors and performed the theme song Dare to Dream, which was written especially for the occasion by award-winning songwriters Paul Begaud, Vanessa Corish and Wayne Tester.

"[57] Samaranch gave a recognition of Indigenous Australians, by summarising the artistic section in these words: "I would like to express our respect to those who have made Australia what it is today, a great country, with a special tribute to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

During the song, an enormous white flag the size of the stadium field was passed over the audience on the southern stand and was brought down over the crowd by volunteers.

[64] Then, celebrating 100 years of women's participation in the Olympics,[17] all of the last torchebearers were women and Olympic Medalists: Betty Cuthbert and Raelene Boyle,[31] Dawn Fraser,[65] Shirley Strickland de la Hunty,[65] Shane Gould[31] and Debbie Flintoff-King[65] was the last torchbearer inside the stadium track, before handing it over to Cathy Freeman.

The cauldron then rose out from the water, above Freeman's head, and then was transported up a long waterfall, where it finally rested on a tall silver pedestal above the stadium as the ceremony concluded with a fireworks display.

[8][17] The planned climax to the ceremony was delayed by a technical glitch of a malfunctioned limit switch, which also severed the communications cable to override the program.

[70][71] Then Premier of New South Wales Bob Carr claimed a few days after the ceremony that it was perhaps the most important work of art ever produced in Australia's history.

"[73] Journalist Peter FitzSimons said that the atmosphere at the stadium that night was electric and said of the Artistic section that "it was a colourful and colossal kaleidoscope on overdrive, with Australia's cultural buttons being played like piano keys in the hands of a master.

"[32] The Sunday Telegraph described it as a "truly great moment" in Australian history, going on to say that about the Awakening segment that it was "Australia's global declaration that it acknowledged its indigenous people and cared about their future, while feeling considerable regret – yes even sorrow – about the past."

"[74] The only negative review reported at the time was from The Washington Post, where Sally Jenkins described the ceremony as traditional, expensive and too long; as something that "a roving band of wild dogs couldn't cure.

[8] In the ceremony's Media Guide, the author notes that four months earlier, during the Corroboree 2000 reconciliation event, 250,000 Australians of all backgrounds walked across Sydney Harbour Bridge as support for recognition of past wrongs towards the First Nations peoples.