Of the many ways to promote goodwill, here's one of the best: Launch a two-week international sports event with an opening celebration that is as refined as Michelle Kwan, as bold as Ian Thorpe, yet begins and ends almost as quickly as a Marion Jones sprint.

That is what the producers of Tuesday's Goodwill Games opening night gala pulled off in the intimate Brisbane Entertainment Center. In only 90 minutes, they paraded a dizzying number of musicians and supporting performers across multiple stage, sprinkled in a few speaking dignitaries, and cranked up the adrenaline for the 12 days of competition in 14 sports that is yet to come.

After a carefully timed production heavily geared to musical interpretation, an array of dancing dragons, flame jugglers and flying monkeys yielded to the globally acclaimed singing siblings from Ireland, the Corrs. That head-turning foursome was joined in the night's concert finale by Australian vocal icon Keith Urban and (we're not making this up) the group from Northeastern Victoria known as Killing Heidi.

Amid the energy generated by the musical entertainment, there was little threat any of the 9,000 guests here would be slowly killed off by excruciating speeches. There were many trips to the podium, but not one orator overstayed his welcome.

Australian swimming champion Kieran Perkins and Thorpe, the younger fellow legend, drew the longest and loudest applause, with Perkins calmly delivering the message that two competitors from opposing nations embracing after a close race can deliver "more impact than a lifetime of diplomacy".

Thorpe did not sing, dance or play a guitar but he stood before the arena of adoring countrymen with a rock star's aura. And with a boyish smirk Thorpe welcomed athletes from visiting nations, then added: "We wish them luck, but not too much."

He was joined by an "A" list from the roster of Goodwill Games ambassadors, including Dutch swimmer Peter van den Hoogenband, Jones, the U.S. Olympic sprinting champion, Russian gymnastics star Alexi Nemov, and the Australian pole vault goddess Tatiana Grigorieva.

These once and future champions shared the evening's program with an array of musical talent, which can be seen in the United States on Tuesday, beginning at 10 p.m. ET, during the 2001 Goodwill Games kick-off telecast on TNT. The roster of performers included vocalists Vanessa Amorosi, Adrian Ross, Graeme Connors, David Campbell and Debelah Morgan, guitarist Karin Schaupp and the premier "boy band" Down Under, Human Nature

Ted Turner, the man who created and launched the Goodwill Games 15 years ago in Moscow because he was weary of that frequent human nature to politicize sports, joined Tuesday's party as well. The AOL Time Warner vice chairman was allotted 90 seconds of speaking time and barely used it.

For the fifth time since 1986, the Goodwill Games will "celebrate through sport the brotherhood of all people on our planet," Turner said.

Brisbane appears an ideal place to do some global celebrating. It might be the No. 3 city in Australia behind Sydney and Melbourne but it's hard to detect any clouds of inferiority hanging over the Queenslanders.

To the contrary, proclaimed Premier Peter Beattie to a crescendo of cheers, "we regard ourselves as amongst the friendliest people in the world."

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