America
CD: Jennifer Hudson - I Remember MeSaturday, 23 April 2011
If, as the cliché goes, hardship begets soulfulness, then given her life story between her 2008 debut and this (Wikipedia can provide the details if you're feeling ghoulish), Jennifer Hudson should now be the new Aretha. As it goes, she wasn't short... Read more... |
SweetgrassSaturday, 23 April 2011
The monumental documentary Sweetgrass captures the back-breaking final sheep drives by the herders of the Raisland-Allestad Ranch, Montana, into the vertiginous heights of the Absaroka-Beartooth Mountains, which lie north of the Yellowstone National... Read more... |
Director Lucien Castaing-Taylor on the Making of SweetgrassSaturday, 23 April 2011
I grew up in Liverpool, but my grandmother was from the Lake District - Wordsworth country, and about as rural and remote as could be. We used to stay with her on weekends, and I still remember the sense of freedom as we escaped the post-industrial... Read more... |
theartsdesk Q&A: Conductor Andrew LittonFriday, 22 April 2011
We’re talking in Berlin for two reasons: Andrew Litton has just renewed his contract with the Bergen Philharmonic – he’ll see out at least 12 years as the Norwegian orchestra’s principal conductor – and they’ve now reached the holiest of holies on... Read more... |
CD: Fleet Foxes – Helplessness BluesWednesday, 20 April 2011
Without intending to, Fleet Foxes set a benchmark with their debut album in 2008. One that resonated. So much so that the release of their second album, Helplessness Blues, is accompanied by sell-out shows at top-drawer venues. The love of their... Read more... |
Lakeboat/ Prairie du Chien, Arcola Theatre Studio 2Sunday, 17 April 2011
David Mamet plays can, nearly always, be relied upon to be muscular. Leastways, when you think about his early signature plays – American Buffalo (1975), Sexual Perversity in Chicago (1976) and the Pulitzer award-winning Glengarry Glen Ross (... Read more... |
Meek's CutoffThursday, 14 April 2011
Kelly Reichardt’s quietly radical vision of the Wild West is a slender, provocatively ambiguous work and the antithesis to the genre’s muscular action-packed epics. It’s a western which aligns us with those who don bonnets rather than Stetsons, and... Read more... |
Cold WeatherWednesday, 13 April 2011
To describe this movie as slow-burn would be like saying snails live in the fast lane. The latest work from indie auteur Aaron Katz (Dance Party USA and Quiet City) who wrote, directed and edited, is 97 minutes long, but nothing happens for its... Read more... |
Josh Ritter, Liquid Room, EdinburghWednesday, 13 April 2011
I’ll say this much for Josh Ritter last night, he was happy to be there. I’ve never seen a man grin quite so much on stage, and apparently with complete sincerity. Before the Idaho-born singer-songwriter played a note he promised that “we’ll have a... Read more... |
Thrill Me, Tristan Bates TheatreMonday, 11 April 2011
Does the perfect murder make for the perfect musical? One doesn't have to make undue claims for the work's chamber-size appeal to warm to Thrill Me, the American two-hander that has arrived at the Tristan Bates Theatre as this season's entry in... Read more... |
The Kennedys, HistoryThursday, 07 April 2011
It's unlikely that this soap-esque miniseries about America's most notorious political clan will stir up the kind of furore in Britain that has engulfed it in the States. Over there, merely to mention the Kennedys seems to conjure up visions of a... Read more... |
McCoy Tyner, Ronnie Scott'sWednesday, 06 April 2011
Inspired to take up the piano by his neighbours Bud and Richie Powell, Philadelphia’s McCoy Tyner made jazz history as a member of the early-1960s John Coltrane quartet before emerging as a leader at Blue Note records. If his voicings seem any less... Read more... |
