Reviews
David Nice
Few conductors would think of putting Bernstein’s comic-sexy Fancy Free ballet and the orgasmatron of Scriabin’s The Poem of Ecstasy together in a concert's second half. In fact I’ll wager, without research, that it’s never been done before. Yet as Music Director of the Royal Opera, Antonio Pappano has proved himself style-sensitive in everything from Mozart to Turnage – even Wagner, though that took time – and so he proved in bringing his orchestra onstage for their first, long-overdue mixed-programme concert together here.It will now be an annual event, Pappano told us before the music Read more ...
aleks.sierz
Recent plays with the verb “to care” in their titles – another is Michael Wynne’s Who Cares – suggests that the inequalities of life in Britain today can no longer be treated with our habitual indifference. This transfer of Alexander Zeldin’s devised drama from the Yard Theatre in London’s East End looks at the infamous zero-hours contracts, which have been much debated in recent months. As such, it is a rare representation of working-class life today.Staged in the National Theatre’s small temporary space, which has been effectively transformed into the storage area of a meat Read more ...
Tom Birchenough
Whatever you make of Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-liang’s Stray Dogs (Jiao you), it’ll likely have you looking at your watch. If you’re hypnotized by its almost narrative-free, stretched naturalism – stretched so far as to become effectively stylization – part of the interest will be in knowing just how long the director holds some of his crucial scenes; the closing one, wordless and virtually still, must come in at almost a quarter of an hour. If it’s mesmerizing self-indulgence that hits you instead, the question may be when to head for the door when this distinctly testing 138-minute work Read more ...
Veronica Lee
A couple stand on the stage, squaring up to each other. They are in the middle of an argument. The Man has just, out of the blue, suggested they have a baby. The Woman, understandably, needs time to adjust to the idea. Particularly as they are in IKEA. In the checkout queue. So starts Duncan Macmillan's very funny and touching two-hander about the disintegration of a relationship.In 70 tightly packed minutes we see their coupledom move from that engaging first scene, through arguments, lovemaking, failed pregnancy, the possibility of adoption and much more. The couple's initial debate about Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
Perhaps only Sheridan Smith could have played the role of Lisa Lynch in The C Word [***], not just because of the no-messing directness she brought to the role, but because Lynch nominated her for the job. Lynch had attained a particular kind of celebrity as author of the blog, Alright Tit, about how she was coping with a diagnosis of breast cancer. This became the book, The C Word, and when a tv adaptation was mooted, Lynch tweeted Smith and said "only you can play me".The bitter twist in the tale was that Nicole Taylor's original C Word screenplay ended when Lynch had been declared Read more ...
Sebastian Scotney
“Songs of Vienna” by the Britten Sinfonia turned out to be a concert of chamber works, with never more than six performers on the stage at any time. It was built around two appearances by the Canadian soprano Barbara Hannigan, who performed pieces with voice by Chausson and Schoenberg. They are clearly part of her core repertoire, and she sings them with passion and from memory.The rest was something of a rag-bag: curiosities from the juvenilia of Mahler, Schoenberg and Richard Strauss, plus a couple of the pieces from the Second Viennese School's music for private performances: a Read more ...
Gavin Dixon
Jiří Bělohlávek and the BBC Symphony Orchestra are on to a good thing with Czech opera. Prague is a major centre for world-class opera, but much of the repertoire performed there is all but unknown abroad. Bělohlávek, who holds positions in both Prague and London, has found a way to broaden its audience: presenting a series of concert performances with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and soloists brought in from the State Opera. The repertoire may be obscure, at least for London audiences, but the idiomatic performances that result ensure nothing is treated as a mere curiosity. Here we have a Read more ...
alexandra.coghlan
How many words would you expect in an average libretto? 10,000? 15,000? Whatever that number is you can triple it and then some for The Virtues of Things – a new opera from Sally O’Reilly and Matt Rogers of astonishing, exhausting, battering wordiness. And with all these extra words what does it have to say? Not a great deal, frankly.If you’ve read your Saussure – or, failing that, Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude would do – then you’ll be familiar with the concept of "signifiers" and "signifieds". (Yes, a basic knowledge of semiotics really is necessary to get to grips with an opera Read more ...
Guy Oddy
The Warlocks are a psychedelic band from LA who dress not unlike the Velvet Underground in their prime and are clearly not given to star-like behaviour. They slope onto the stage at Birmingham’s Rainbow, tune up and burst straight into “Red Camera” from their 2009 album The Mirror Explodes. A heavy, dense mediation that comes on like a deep, Spacemen 3-flavoured drone, it whacks up the volume and sets the tone for the evening. It doesn’t get the audience moving around much but it certainly grabs their attention.As the track comes to an end, singer and guitarist Bobby Hecksher announces, “That Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Various Artists: Building Bridges - Eurovision Song Contest Vienna 2015Mind-bogglingly, Australia is a first-time entrant in Eurovision 2015. The nature of Europe may be a concern for some backwards-looking British voters in next week’s election, but the inclusion of Australia in a competition organised by the European Broadcasting Union extends the remit of being European beyond even the wildest imaginings of foolish fringe politicians. The competition may be seen on Australia’s TV screens, but is that any reason for them to perform? Apparently, it is.The booklet with the double CD of Read more ...
alexandra.coghlan
Let’s get one thing straight at the outset: Szymanowski’s 1926 opera Król Roger isn’t a lovely occasional oddity, a rarity whose appeal is largely novelty, or a dust-it-off-once-a-decade sort of piece. It’s that rarest of things, a real and original masterpiece whose worth has been unaccountably undervalued. This new production by Kasper Holten does nothing to obscure its beauty, making a strong case not only for the work’s sensual appeal, but also the larger philosophical architecture underpinning this maverick score.That Król Roger has recently begun to enjoy more attention internationally Read more ...
Florence Hallett
It’s far too easy to think about the history of art as a series of class acts, with one superlative achievement following another. Exhibitions tend to encourage this view, and the notion of a superstar artist is key to persuading us that the latest blockbuster is unmissable. We know that the artists with the biggest reputations were not always celebrated in their own lifetimes, but just as the characterisation of the great artist as a lone genius is misleading and fanciful, this one-room exhibition shows that casting art history’s lesser-known figures as sorry failures is equally misguided. Read more ...