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We are bowled over! We knew that theartsdesk.com had plenty of supporters out there – we’ve always had a loyal readership of arts lovers and professionals alike – but the…
Helen Hawkins |
If your heart sinks every time a Shakespeare funny-man enters, here comes the RSC to put an unforced grin on your face. Its latest Feste is the real deal: an emcee with true…
Rachel Halliburton |
“My goal was to take the Messiah as if it had been written yesterday,” the conductor and eminent French harpsichordist Christophe Rousset told Tom Service on Radio 3 on Saturday…
Helen Hawkins |
With teasing timing, the latest revival of a Tom Stoppard play at the Hampstead Theatre arrived just hours after his funeral, a weird echo of his maxim, “Every exit is an entry…
Thomas H. Green |
VINYL OF THE MONTHManduria Bite Me (Wild Honey)
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The debut from Milan punkers Manduria is a six-tracker haemorrhaging rock…
Gary Naylor |
Bat away your lurgy, stop that coffin’ and get up to Finsbury Park for a laugh laden, ballad blitzing, sensational spoof starring the toothsome Transylvanian. If that sentence is…
Thomas H. Green
Yes, I know. Maybe everything bitched about them is true; an eye-watering marketing push, cynically calculated, monied, etc. Maybe it is not. I’ve no real idea.But, but, but, the…
Gary Naylor
Wonder is a word that is used too often in theatre, somewhat emptied of meaning by marketing’s emasculating of language. It’s used even less honestly by critics - we’ve seen too…
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, O2 Academy, Glasgow review - revisiting the past produces mixed results
Jonathan Geddes
Towards the end of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's run-through of their old album Howl, bassist Robert Levon Been told the crowd the "pain was nearly over". By BRMC standards that's…
graham.rickson
Family crises and relationship breakdowns are familiar subjects for films to tackle. Both are central to Aribam Syam Sharma’s 1990 feature Ishanou (The Chosen One), where divine…
Markie Robson-Scott
Chinese-American director Bing Liu’s first feature – his Minding the Gap, a wonderful documentary about himself and his skateboarding buddies in Illinois, was Oscar-nominated in…
joe.muggs
One of this year’s best music books, Songs in the Key of MP3 by Liam Inscoe-Jones, paints a picture of musicians of the “streaming era” having a different relationship to the past…
Kieron Tyler
Heard now, 50 years after its release, Tangerine Dream’s Rubycon sounds like what it became: part of the musical template for Jean-Michel Jarre’s 1976 international breakthrough…
Adam Sweeting
This follow-up to 2022’s Man vs Bee finds Rowan Atkinson reprising the role of Trevor Bingley, a bumbling no-hoper who is somehow still at large in the community. He’s now…
Bernard Hughes
There is, of course, a long tradition in this country of Christmas Messiah performances – but it’s not one I’ve ever previously participated in. This was the first time I’ve ever…
Gary Naylor
Ask many a boomer about their scariest childhood memory, and they may very well cite the extraordinary 1957 East German production, The Singing Ringing Tree, shown regularly on…
Jenny Gilbert
Filmmakers Powell and Pressburger were not the first to portray ballet dancing as a fatal obsession and choreographer Matthew Bourne won’t be the last, but the latter’s 2016 stage…
aleks.sierz
The National Theatre has a long record of starry revivals so this version of John Millington Synge’s The Playboy of the Western World, with a cast led by Nicola Coughlan (yes,…
graham.rickson
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¡Feliz Navidad! – Mexican Baroque Music for Christmas Kölner Akademie/Michael Alexander Willens (CPO)Two of the…
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Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
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tv
Where's Edmund Blackadder when you need him?
Jeremy Renner keeps chaos at bay in Taylor Sheridan's traumatic crime drama
Vintage documentary series boosted by sound and vision upgrades
film
Bing Liu directs a lukewarm adaptation of Atticus Lish's novel
Underwhelming parody of ‘Downton Abbey’ and its ilk
new music
A seasonal slant on the most wide-ranging record reviews in the universe
Alongside a whole heap of other excellent music from the last 12 months
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, O2 Academy, Glasgow review - revisiting the past produces mixed results
The American trio's 20th anniversary celebration of 'Howl' did not always convince
classical
Christopher Rousset brought bold stripes of colour to his interpretation
Performance combines the best of two different approaches
opera
Emily D'Angelo shines as Handel's impetuous, besotted protagonist
Playing from strength in a game where the Royal Northern has all the cards
Best of all possible casts fill every moment of Christopher Alden’s Handel cornucopia
theatre
The “Shakespeare laugh” has no place in this refreshingly wacko Illyria
Crammed with wit and knowledge, this 1995 play can't totally disguise its origins as a radio play
dance
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
A strong revival for this stage adaptation of a British film classic
Christopher Marney's revitalised company gains momentum with each appearance
comedy
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Reunion of sketch show's creators
Storytelling that playfully wrongfoots the audience
books
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Bennett’s virtuosic prose returns to ponder intimacy, but treads some old ground
Broad and idiosyncratic survey of classical music is insightful but slightly indigestible
visual arts
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
The sky’s the thing
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