theartsdesk.com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Tom Birchenough |
We are bowled over! We knew that theartsdesk.com had plenty of supporters out there – we’ve always had a loyal readership of arts lovers and professionals alike – but the…
Bernard Hughes |
I have always been a bit ambivalent about the music of Arvo Pärt, recognising his achievement in crafting a new kind of choral music, while often finding it hard to love,…
Sarah Kent |
Regarded as one of Denmark’s most important artists, Anna Ancher is virtually unknown here, so this overview of her paintings is a revelation as well as a delight.
At roughly the…
Tim Cumming |
If you want a peek into a lost world of rock n roll degeneracy and decadence, you won’t find a better glory hole than the grubby, outlandish view offered by the video for “Hey…
David Nice |
Britten was less in the Weekend than the annual title suggested, however significant and striking the works: a singular song cycle, an anguished early viola solo transcribed for…
Robert Beale |
Elena Schwarz was back in Manchester to conduct the BBC Philharmonic only just over two weeks since her visit to the Hallé, and again conducting some mainstream heavyweight works…
aleks.sierz
Here comes Dad – and he’s muttering a mantra: “My name is Winston Smith and only good things happen to me.” With a name shared with the everyman protagonist of George Orwell’s…
Robert Beale
Sir Mark Elder was back on the scene of past triumphs last night as he returned to the Hallé at the Bridgewater Hall – and he has not lost his taste for the slightly unexpected.…
James Saynor
Given that the film industry is a fairly vain business, it follows that every movie is to some extent a vanity project. So it seems churlish to describe this new Daniel Day-Lewis…
Liz Thomson
Mavis Staples, the woman to whom a young Bob Dylan proposed marriage when they met at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival and whose voice he has described as his “favourite voice”.…
Thomas H. Green
VINYL OF THE MONTHMartel Zaire (Evil Ideas)Montenegro-born, Cyprus-based producer Martel Vladimiroff is a hard man to find out about. His meagre online imprint and extensive…
Tim Cumming
Opening acts don’t always enjoy a full house, but at at the Royal Albert Hall at the end of a UK tour in support of Suzanne Vega and her acclaimed new album Flying with Angels,…
Helen Hawkins
What defines a life? Money and success? Happiness? Clint Bentley’s Train Dreams employs a narrator, much as Terrence Malick’s Days of Heaven did, who fields big questions like…
joe.muggs
It’s weird, right? We’ve somehow stumbled into a world where, for all we’re told that algorithms homogenise music, actually more people than ever are exposed to very, very odd and…
Nick Hasted
Ash (Riz Ahmed) is one of cinema’s capable men, the kind of monastically devoted pro made to be a hitman or getaway driver. David Fincher’s The Killer parodied the type with…
Nick Hasted
“Rebellion begins with a breath,” an opening aphorism declares in this first film recounting Palestine’s 1936-39 Arab Revolt, long historically supplanted by Israel’s seismic 1948…
David Nice
Janáček described his nature-versus-humanity fable The Cunning Little Vixen as “a merry thing with a sad end”. In which case, the even stranger Makropulos Case is a chattery…
Heather Neill
Perspectives on Shakespeare's tragedy have changed over the decades. As Nonso Anozie said when playing the title role for Cheek by Jowl in 2004, white actors once "concentrated on…
Katie Colombus
After cancelling his Birmingham gig an hour before curtain-up due to illness, the anticipatory hype around whether Benson Boone’s London show at The O2 would actually go ahead was…
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Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
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tv
Rebecca Miller musters a stellar roster of articulate talking heads for this thorough portrait
Mick Herron's female private investigator gets a stellar adaptation
The director of hit TV series 'Gomorrah' examines another dark dimension of Italian culture
film
The actor resurfaces in a moody, assured film about a man lost in a wood
Clint Bentley creates a mini history of cultural change through the life of a logger in Idaho
Riz Ahmed and Lily James soulfully connect in a sly, lean corporate whistleblowing thriller
new music
One of their best-sounding classic LPs comes with live sets, rare film and dodgy studio jams
The most extensive, wide-ranging record reviews in the galaxy
classical
Music by Evelin Seppar highlights interesting intersection with Arvo Pärt’s holy minimalism
Superbly sequenced memorials balancing anger and reflection
A look back to the Covid experience in Dani Howard’s approachable and attractive Trombone Concerto
opera
Katie Mitchell sucks the strangeness from Janáček’s clash of legalese and eternal life
English National Opera's production of a 21st century milestone has been a tough journey
Celine Byrne sings gorgeously but doesn’t round out a great operatic character study
theatre
Debut piece of new writing is a meditation on responsibility and emotional heritage
David Harewood and Toby Jones at odds
Sam Heughan's Macbeth cannot quite find a home in a mobster pub
dance
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
ENB set the bar high with this mixed bill, but they meet its challenges thrillingly
Like Water for Chocolate, Royal Ballet review - splendid dancing and sets, but there's too much plot
Christopher Wheeldon's version looks great but is too muddling to connect with fully
comedy
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Irish comic mixes sentiment and sauciness
US comic's slick show about relationships
books
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Broad and idiosyncratic survey of classical music is insightful but slightly indigestible
Thomas Pynchon's latest (and possibly last) book is fun - for a while
visual arts
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Light as a physical presence
At last, a UK festival that takes photography seriously
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