20th century
Who Do You Think You Are? - Marianne Faithfull, BBC OneThursday, 19 September 2013
We know, not least through her own account, of Marianne Faithfull's colourful progress as winsome Sixties pop star, lover of Mick Jagger, junkie on the streets of Soho and her artistic rebirth as gravel-throated chanteuse. Here, her frequently... Read more... |
Peaky Blinders, BBC TwoFriday, 13 September 2013
Much hype has been whipped up around this tale of a gang of thuggish, racketeering bookies in Birmingham just after World War One. It's a pretty good cast, with Helen McCrory's Aunt Polly laying down the law within the criminal Shelby family,... Read more... |
Sound of Cinema: The Music that Made the Movies, BBC FourFriday, 13 September 2013
BBC Four’s new series Sound of Cinema: The Music that Made the Movies is shocking. The overwhelming majority of arts-based TV consists of programmes consigning specialist knowledge/presenters to the sidelines in favour of dumbed-down, easily... Read more... |
Martin Luther King and the March on Washington, BBC Two/MLK: The Assassination Tapes, BBC FourWednesday, 28 August 2013
It was only today I learned that, for copyright reasons, it is impossible to use Martin Luther King’s iconic “I Have A Dream” speech in its entirety without paying a hefty licensing fee to his estate. That knowledge made it easier to understand why... Read more... |
Jewels, Bolshoi Ballet, Royal Opera HouseTuesday, 13 August 2013
The Bolshoi’s summer season in London has so far been straight-down-the-line trad: Swan Lake as an opener, Bayadère, Sleeping Beauty. Now, however, with Balanchine’s Jewels, they’ve at least dipped a pointe shoe into the 20th century, if rather... Read more... |
Prom 39: Khan, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, AthertonTuesday, 13 August 2013
The fascination of the East has been a constant in classical music’s history, from the jangling sounds of the Janissary bands to Mozart’s Seraglio, Sheherazade’s dreamy tales to Britten’s seductive gamelan. Last night’s Prom gave the East a chance... Read more... |
Billy Budd, Glyndebourne Festival OperaSunday, 11 August 2013
It’s not a crowd-pleaser like Albert Herring, nor wittily fanciful like A Midsummer Night’s Dream or macabre like The Turn of the Screw and certainly not the classic that Peter Grimes has become, and until three years ago Glyndebourne had never even... Read more... |
Prom 26: Serkin, BBC Symphony Orchestra, KnussenFriday, 02 August 2013
You wait years for a live performance to test whether Tippett’s Second Symphony is a masterpiece, and then two come along within six months. Both are due to the missionary zeal of the BBC Symphony Orchestra management, determined to give an... Read more... |
A Victorian Eye, Jermyn Street TheatreThursday, 01 August 2013
“Monet is only an eye, but my God, what an eye,” Cézanne once said of the Impressionist painter. Unlike Cézanne, British artist William Blake Richmond, named by his artist father after the elder Richmond’s visionary mentor William Blake, had no... Read more... |
Britten: The Canticles, Linbury Studio TheatreThursday, 11 July 2013
As good old Catullus put it, I hate and love, you may ask why. No doubt it's my job as a critic to probe such difficult responses to Britten's Canticles. Why am I so repelled by the sickly-sweet lullaby Isaac sings just before daddy's about to put... Read more... |
Company of Heroes 2Friday, 28 June 2013
Fusing the intensity of first-person shooters like the Call of Duty series with top-down strategy games doesn't immediately seem a good fit. First-person shooters work because you respond viscerally to bullets flying past your face and the fear of... Read more... |
Three Church Parables, Aurora Orchestra, Aldeburgh FestivalWednesday, 19 June 2013
In Britten’s centenary the Aldeburgh Festival has come up with two mesmerising opera happenings. The innovation is to stage Peter Grimes on the town’s beach, a few hundred yards from the composer’s beachside Aldeburgh first home, amid a splurge... Read more... |
