New Music Features

Green Man Festival review - rustic Welsh epic is wet but joyful

Phoebe Michaelides Wednesday, 23 August 2017

After the gruelling five-hour coach journey to Powys, Wales, we strolled over a bridge into Glanusk Park, through two security guards, and into Green Man with only so much as a sing-song “Bore da”. Satisfied, we picked a spot and set up camp in the intense heat.

theartsdesk Q&A: Composer Nitin Sawhney

Matthew Wright Tuesday, 22 August 2017

Composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Nitin Sawhney is one of Britain’s most diverse and original creative talents.

theartsdesk at the Istanbul Music Festival: East and West in perfect balance

David Nice Wednesday, 14 June 2017

The time is out of joint for Turkey at the moment, but it’s still a country equally split between those looking to the west for the culture of ideas and the more conservative element which at least needs its voice respected. They co-exist peacefully in a great cosmopolitan city like Istanbul, which recently joined Ankara and Izmir in rejecting increased powers for its leader.

theartsdesk at The Hospital Club

theartsdesk Wednesday, 03 May 2017

The Arts Desk is delighted to announce a new partnership with The Hospital Club in Covent Garden. There are plenty of private members club in central London, but The Hospital Club is uniquely a creative hub with its own television studio, gallery and performance space, which for certain events are open to non-members.

Jazz FM Awards 2017

peter Quinn Thursday, 27 April 2017

Hosted by Jazz FM presenter, Jez Nelson, an impressively varied mix of UK and international artists from the worlds of jazz, blues and soul were honoured at the fourth Jazz FM Awards on Tuesday night.

Decade Zero, Dave Maric, Phronesis, Engines Orchestra - preview

Matthew Wright Tuesday, 25 April 2017

Decade Zero is a new commission from acclaimed contemporary classical composer Dave Maric, receiving its world premiere this weekend at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival.

French Touch, Red Gallery

Kieron Tyler Friday, 17 March 2017

Un Voyage Á Travers Dans Le Paysage Électronique Français, the French subtitle, goes further. French Touch is the first exhibition to celebrate and dig into France’s electronic music heritage: exploring the lineage which laid the ground for the world-wide success of Daft Punk.

Listed: How I Do Love Thee

theartsdesk Tuesday, 14 February 2017

Love is in the air. Today, men and women and boys and girls will be pondering how to say it with roses and cards and candlelit dinners: those three words that contain multitudes. As the old strip cartoon never quite got round to saying, love is... the human condition, which is why a good quantity of the culture we review on this site has to do with it. To help you get into the mood for romancing, we have asked our...

theartsdesk in Reykjavík: Iceland Airwaves 2016

Kieron Tyler Sunday, 13 November 2016

On the final night of Iceland Airwaves 2016, Polly Jean Harvey and her band are ranged in a line just inside the edge of the stage constructed inside Valshöllin, a sports hall south of Reykjavík’s city centre. The festival’s five days have climaxed with a diamond-hard performance drawing heavily on this year’s Hope Six Demolition Project album.

Comment

Leonard Cohen: Turning the Darkness Into Beauty

mark Kidel Friday, 11 November 2016

Leonard Cohen, who has died at 82, was one of those artists born with a wisdom and maturity that cut deep into the baby-boomer youth culture of his times. He provided the perfect antidote to the innocent optimism of the 1960s, a vision shot through with world-weariness, melancholy and humour. Those who dismissed him as a purveyor of bed-sit self pity missed the point, hooked as they were on hedonism, and blind to the ever-present horrors and recurring tragedy of the world.