London
Black British Musical Theatre 1900-1950, Wigmore Hall review – a disappointing missed opportunityWednesday, 22 September 2021
The Wigmore Hall is a bastion of white musicians playing the music of white composers to a largely white audience and it is to the credit of the management that, in seeking to diversify, it staged this lecture-recital on the history of black... Read more... |
The Lodger, Coronet Theatre review - underdeveloped family dramaTuesday, 21 September 2021
The Coronet Theatre is a beautiful space – it’s a listed Victorian building, and the bar’s like something out of a film about Oscar Wilde. Unfortunately, Robert Holman’s The Lodger, a new play about family and trauma, doesn’t live up to its... Read more... |
DVD/Blu-ray: The ServantTuesday, 21 September 2021
Switching between upstairs and downstairs makes your soul melt, in this first of three Joseph Losey/Harold Pinter films, a savage class satire filmed in the freezing winter of 1963. Hugo (Dirk Bogarde) is the obsequious, insinuating butler who comes... Read more... |
Michael Janisch Band, Ronnie Scott's review - jazz's ace of bass makes a welcome returnWednesday, 15 September 2021
This was, said bassist Michael Janisch, his first gig since January last year, and his crack group’s Monday evening set, kicking off at the un-jazzy hour of 6.30pm, was an energising, dynamic group performance from A-list British musicians who are... Read more... |
Album: Rudimental - Ground ControlSaturday, 28 August 2021
To coin a cliché, the fourth album from London pop-dance success story Rudimental is a game of two halves. The first is off-putting and dull but halfway through, the band seem to wake up. There are 16 songs on the album. The eighth, “Handle My Own... Read more... |
Album: Kurupt FM - The Greatest Hits (Part 1)Thursday, 19 August 2021
People Just Do Nothing is a mockumentary BBC TV series, now ended, about fictional Brentford pirate radio crew Kurupt FM. It’s also a comedy based entirely on the Dunning-Kruger Effect, in that the humour derives from the worldview of all the key... Read more... |
Esfahani, Gibson, Manchester Collective, BBC Proms review – variety, but not always in proportionWednesday, 18 August 2021
I was looking forward to this Prom by the Manchester Collective, an exciting young group founded in 2016, which has quickly established a reputation for innovative presentation of contemporary repertoire. And while I found the playing excellent,... Read more... |
2:22 A Ghost Story, Noël Coward Theatre review - unconvincing, sporadically amusing genre playSaturday, 14 August 2021
Danny Robins tells us what we’re in for with his title, so we’re warned. And it’s not long before we get the “things that go bump in the night”, the creaking floorboards, the “I know this sounds crazy, but…” because they’re the essential components... Read more... |
Constellations, Vaudeville Theatre review - multiple casts continue to shineFriday, 13 August 2021
This week is peak time to test out Nick Payne’s hypothesis of life as a series of accidents, narrow squeaks and near misses. While the Perseids are doing their August explosive thing, go home after the show and look in the night sky with a lover,... Read more... |
Album: Jungle - Loving in StereoThursday, 12 August 2021
The UK is currently in the middle of a jazz, funk and soul renaissance. Homegrown, grassroots talent is producing an abundance of glorious music both retro and forward facing, in a way not seen since the combined influence of Soul II Soul and the... Read more... |
Twelfth Night, Shakespeare's Globe review - foot-stompingly good funWednesday, 11 August 2021
The best version of Twelfth Night I’ve seen is not called Twelfth Night. For sheer knockabout entertainment, nothing beats the 2006 film She’s the Man. But Sean Holmes’ production for the Globe’s summer season, brimming with song and physical comedy... Read more... |
BBCNOW, Bancroft, BBC Proms review – American music from across the spectrumMonday, 09 August 2021
In this most atypical Proms season this was actually an archetypal Proms programme: a world premiere: a neglected masterpiece and a good solid 19th-century symphony for those put off a bit by the first two. But this American-themed programme never... Read more... |
