theartsdesk.com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
David Nice |
Accolades first for the deep sound in Strauss of The Met Orchestra, newcomers to the Proms, under its Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who has been in the Albert Hall ring…
Gary Naylor |
Outside, this imagined world has collapsed, a few survivors of the flashes of two bombs scratching a living from a landscape that Mad Max would recognise from that howl of a first…
Nick Manasseh |
So the tune we'll discuss today in the imaginary seminar that occupies a certain part of my brain is…."When Jah Come" by Devon Irons (pictured below) - look it up everybody - a 7…
Thomas H. Green |
As the title of her fourth album suggests, South Carolina blues-rocker Hannah Wicklund is not happy. There’s a tangled yarn behind these songs, a tale of love, deception, and…
Simon Thompson |
Interspersal programmes – or “mind melds”, as I like to call them – can sometimes open up new vistas of listening and sometimes be tokenistic piffle. Happily, Monday morning’s EIF…
David Kettle |
Dracula: Lucy's Dream, Pleasance at EICC ★★★★If something’s scary, it’s usually because you know it’s a threat, and that it might cause you harm. If something’s creepy, however,…
Ellie Roberts
God Bless The Band feels like an unexpected encounter with your younger self. Compiling tracks from across Courteeners’ career, the collection revisits a period when British indie…
Bernard Hughes
Where the US President chose to mark the 250th anniversary of the founding of his country with a cage fight, the BBC stuck to music in this Prom of 20th century Americana.…
David Kettle
QFWFQ, Summerhall ★★★★At first glance, an iconic post-modern novel (or, perhaps more accurately, "novel") by Italo Calvino might not seem like the most obvious starting point for…
Peter Culshaw
Squint and you could be in 1968 - although this lot are rather better dressed and healthier than most hippies. I did see a bumper sticker “The Hippies Were Right”. But though it…
Graham Rickson
Joan Littlewood’s stage production of Oh! What a Lovely War was a huge success when premiered at Stratford East in 1963. Loosely based on a documentary-style BBC radio musical, it…
Adam Sweeting
Exactly how Ronnie Wood has reached the age of 79, after decades of rock’n’roll debauchery with the Faces and the Rolling Stones and surviving cancer twice, passeth all…
David Kettle
Up: Violin vs Football, French Institute in Scotland ★★★★★Is it theatre? Is it music, or maybe dance? Or even some kind of circus, or simply sport? In truth, the impossible-to-…
Guy Oddy
Mastodon, to those who are unaware of these US rock behemoths, fill a similar musical space to Iron Maiden or perhaps Rush, if they had louder guitars. Their music is wholly…
Rachel Halliburton
Last year, Chineke! delivered one of the Proms’ more hard-hitting offerings, in a programme including Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 10, “50 minutes of brutality, despair and terror…
Simon Thompson
There can be few more cultivated ways to spend a morning than with the chamber music of Francis Poulenc. The Gallic wit that’s so evident in his larger scale work is even more…
David Kettle
The gag – and it’s about as pitch-black a gag as you could imagine – is there in the title. Three African American guys hang out, shoot the breeze, chew the fat, discussing…
Kieron Tyler
“The Laughing Gnome” was David Bowie’s second single for the Deram label. It was released on 14 April 1967. That same day, he was on stage at the Ludwick Youth Centre in Welwyn…
David Nice
In a moving short programme interview, the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra's Principal Guest Conductor Anja Bihlmaier sums up the essence of her miraculous way with Mahler's Das Lied…
disc of the day
Fourth album from singer-guitarist contains old-fashioned rock songs and ire-fuelled vim
tv
The onetime 'Blue's Clues' TV host on doing battle with reports of his own demise
Alan Ritchson adds brain to brawn in the title role
John Hannah stars in smart and sun-drenched whodunnit
film
A knowing American horror parody that’s all-self-consuming
Dinosaurs hunt Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor through suburbia
new music
On the eve of the release of the new Soul Revivers album, a roots reggae expert goes deep
Fourth album from singer-guitarist contains old-fashioned rock songs and ire-fuelled vim
A compilation made up of new tracks, fan favourites and remasters
classical
Stupendous Salome flames to the back of the hall
Kurtág and Schubert converse across the centuries, Hollywood’s Golden Age dazzles
Lacklustre Copland and messy, misconceived Gershwin outweigh enjoyable Bernstein
opera
Singers, and players, rise above some clunky moments in Strauss's meta-opera
Missy Mazzoli’s impressive new opera follows Wynton Marsalis' jazz symphony opening night
Michael Gallen's riveting music-theatre piece has committed performances all round
theatre
Timely, if overly familiar, tale of men failing to deal with masculinity's excesses
Sinister puppetry, improv mayhem and a show in a box in three memorable offerings
Two striking shows at Summerhall take oblique perspectives on Palestine
dance
Matthew Bourne’s 2000 hit revs up again with impressive dancers and a witty score
Marianela Nuñez celebrates 28 years at the company
A test of stamina for the audience as well as the dancers
comedy
Larky cabaret; smart musical comedy; and a blast of a debut
Political gags; absurdist fun; and a personal update
books
This wide-ranging miscellany combines urban history and geography to nerdily entertaining effect
David Thomson explores the dark side of cinema, but still offers a flicker of hope
Joyce lurks in the margins of his own biography in a detailed history of Irish politics
visual arts
Great American photographers all in one place
Four artists' films and a computer game speculate on societal collapse
A wild imagination outlined in miniature
latest comments