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Theartsdesk
Wednesday, 01 October 2025
It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.It followed some hectic and intensive months when a disparate and eclectic...
David Nice
Monday, 24 March 2025
So much looked promising for Irish National Opera’s first Wagner: the casting, certainly, the conductor – Music Director Fergus Sheil knows and loves this music – and the venue (...
Robert Beale
Monday, 24 March 2025
Mariam Batsashvili, the young virtuosa pianist from Georgia, is a star. No doubt about that. Trained at the Liszt Academy in Weimar and winner of the International Franz Liszt...
Helen Hawkins
Monday, 24 March 2025
When the world’s darkness is too much, there is a Netflix rabbit-hole you can disappear down to a kinder place: the Korean romcoms section. This is a recommendation for romcom...
Jonathan Geddes
Monday, 24 March 2025
It took until the last song before Lauren Mayberry started to well up onstage, which was good going. The singer had mentioned early on the prospect of a hometown Glasgow gig for...
Kieron Tyler
Monday, 24 March 2025
On the cover of her eponymous debut album, the Bolton-raised Toria Wooff reclines on a church pew located in Stanley Palace, a 16th-century mansion in her adopted city of Chester...
Kieron Tyler
Sunday, 23 March 2025
The thrill of hearing “Crawdaddy Simone” never wears off. As the September 1965 B-side of the third single by North London R...
Simon Thompson
Saturday, 22 March 2025
The Scottish Chamber Orchestra has had to put up with its fair share of artist cancellations over the last month, and the...
Saskia Baron
Saturday, 22 March 2025
Brief History of a Family is a psychological thriller with a story familiar to anyone who has seen Ripley, Saltburn or Six...
Graham Rickson
Saturday, 22 March 2025
Donizetti: Songs Vols. 3 & 4 Michael Spyres (tenor), Carlo Rizzi (piano) – Vol. 3, Marie-Nicole Lemieux (mezzo-...
Thomas H Green
Saturday, 22 March 2025
Selena Gomez is the enormously successful Disney child star who grew up to be a Hollywood actor and global pop sensation. As...
David Nice
Friday, 21 March 2025
Tamino in the operating theatre hallucinating serpents? Sarastro’s acolytes wheeling lit-up plasma packs? From the central...
Saskia Baron
Friday, 21 March 2025
Two Strangers Trying Not to Kill Each Other is a documentary portrait of photographer Joel Meyerowitz, acclaimed for...
Adam Sweeting
Friday, 21 March 2025
The power struggle between New York crime bosses Vito Genovese and Frank Costello is one of the foundational stories of the...
Thomas H Green
Friday, 21 March 2025
For fans of The Horrors, the headline here is that, 20 years into the career, for their sixth album, the band have lost two...
Nick Hasted
Thursday, 20 March 2025
François Ozon is France’s master of sly secrets, burying hard truths in often dazzling surfaces, from Swimming Pool’s erotic...
David Nice
Thursday, 20 March 2025
Imagine if Bach had set Cardinal Benedetto Pamphili’s allegory of Beauty breaking free from Pleasure with the guidance of...
Kieron Tyler
Thursday, 20 March 2025
The body language fascinates. Mercury Rev’s frontman Jonathan Donahue could be playing a theramin. The arm movements fit the...
Helen Hawkins
Thursday, 20 March 2025
Held up by the censors in India though screened at Cannes and nominated for an International Oscar, Sandhya Suri’s 2024 film...
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disc of the day
Album: Toria Wooff - Toria Wooff
Assured but too measured debut album from Americana-inclined singer-songwriter
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Subscribe to theartsdesk.com
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
The Potato Lab, Netflix review - a K-drama with heart and wit
Love among Korean potato-researchers is surprisingly funny and ideal for Janeites
Adolescence, Netflix review - Stephen Graham battles the phantom menace of the internet
How antisocial networks lead to real-life tragedy
Drive to Survive, Season 7, Netflix review - speed, scandal and skulduggery in the pitlane
The F1 documentary series is back on the pace
film
Brief History of a Family review - glossy Chinese psychological thriller feels shallow
Immaculately crafted family drama aimed at international art house audiences
Two Strangers Trying Not to Kill Each Other review - a portrait of photographer Joel Meyerowitz
Scenes from a seemingly picture-perfect marriage
The Alto Knights review - double dose of De Niro doesn't hit the spot
Barry Levinson's Mafia saga drifts gently into the sunset
new music
Lauren Mayberry, Barrowland, Glasgow review - solo star stays too close to the day job
The Chvrches singer mixed some great tunes with an overly heavy sound.
Album: Toria Wooff - Toria Wooff
Assured but too measured debut album from Americana-inclined singer-songwriter
Music Reissues Weekly: Too Far Out - Beat, Mod & R&B From 304 Holloway Road 1963-1966
Maverick producer Joe Meek’s maximum-impact approach to the beat-group scene
classical
Batsashvili, Hallé, Wong, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - a star in the piano universe
The Georgian pianist brings precision and freedom to Liszt’s warhorses
Naumov, SCO, Egarr, Queen's Hall, Edinburgh review - orchestral magic rescues some punishing music
Hard-driven Beethoven, monotonous Eötvös, some light from Kernis
Classical CDs: Shipping lines, sabre dances and sea lice
Neglected piano concertos, Italian art songs and new music for trombones
opera
Der fliegende Holländer, Irish National Opera review - sailing to nowhere
Plenty of strong singing and playing, but the staging is static or inept
Die Zauberflöte, Royal Academy of Music review - first-rate youth makes for a moving experience
The production takes time to match Mozart's depths, but gets there halfway through
theatre
Dear England, National Theatre review - extra time for stirring soccer classic
James Graham adds a neat coda to his ode to decency in sport
Weather Girl, Soho Theatre review - the apocalypse as surreal black comedy
A Californian weather girl copes with fires inside and outside her head
Clueless: The Musical, Trafalgar Studios review - a perfectly manicured update
KT Tunstall's new score brings bite and momentum to a high octane evening
dance
Romeo and Juliet, Royal Ballet review - Shakespeare without the words, with music to die for
Kenneth MacMillan's first and best-loved masterpiece turns 60
Light of Passage, Royal Ballet review - Crystal Pite’s cosmic triptych powers back
Total music theatre takes us from the hell of exile to separation at heaven’s gates
comedy
Harry Hill, Wilton's Music Hall review - madcap comic on terrific form
Utterly daft mix of new material and favourite old characters
Books
Henry Gee: The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire - Why Our Species is on the Edge of Extinction review - survival instincts
A science writer looks to the stars for a way to dodge our impending doom
Jonathan Buckley: One Boat review - a shore thing
Buckley’s 13th novel is a powerful reflection on intimacy and grief
visual arts
Echoes: Stone Circles, Community and Heritage, Stonehenge Visitor Centre review - young photographers explore ancient resonances
The ancient monument opens its first exhibition of new photography
Hylozoic/Desires: Salt Cosmologies, Somerset House and The Hedge of Halomancy, Tate Britain review - the power of white powder
A strong message diluted by space and time
latest comments
I saw Nureyev and Fonteyn dance this wonderful...
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Thank you for this fantastic review. While I...
Stopped watching about half an hour in because...
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Excellent review. I saw this production in York...