theartsdesk.com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Sebastian Scotney |
There were times when this event felt more like a devotional rite than a concert. Thirteen thousand of us had gathered at the Utilita Arena by the canals in Birmingham to be “…
David Nice |
Many epic biopics make a messy spread of their protagonist's life (the overrated Oppenheimer is a prime example). Not this one. Though De Gaulle's title in France means it could…
Thomas H. Green |
Music can be a life-healing catalyst, the untrammelled essence of heart and mind conveyed human and raw from the soul. There’s magic in that. Alternately, there’s singing, “Lost…
Martin Guttridge-Hewitt |
A tray of water, a metallic plate piled with salt, a bubble-producing plastic stick. The kind of tat that looks so cheap you probably wouldn’t trust it with an adult, let alone…
James Saynor |
At the start of theartsdesk’s third foray into the wonders of this year’s London Film Festival, let us pause to look back at the first LFF in 1957 (which makes this year’s event…
Veronica Lee |
What a delightful show this is: a big hit at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe and now enjoying an extended run at Soho Theatre, Highlander 70 is an inventive piece of found…
Guy Oddy
Over the last 30 years or so, the Avalanches have proved themselves to be samplers supreme and masters of the cut-up, producing soulful pop and hip hop tunes aplenty from a snip…
Sarah Kent
The 90s: Art and Fashion starts well. The first thing you see are Sarah Lucas’s boots. With razor blades inserted under the toe caps, they evoke the “fuck-you, I’ll fight my…
Adam Sweeting
This rather eccentric drama was created by Canadian writer/producer Jesse McKeown, and presents what for many viewers may well be their first visit to Newfoundland. The story…
Robert Beale
Lise de la Salle was not the soloist the NDR Radiophilharmonie Hannover originally planned to bring with them to open their UK tour in Manchester and Birmingham. But it was her…
Graham Rickson
Mention Keith and Candice-Marie to viewers of a certain age and they’ll probably think of banjos, obsessive chewing and Ordnance Survey maps. Both characters appeared in Mike…
Bernard Hughes
Last year I was at the convention of the Association of British Choral Directors in York and, at the end of a long day and feeling tired and headachey, I nearly didn’t go to the…
David Nice
After a morning spent mesmerised by Simon Abkarian's De Gaulle, a hero disappeared by his supposed allies only to bounce back, in Part One of Antonin Baudry's masterly film, could…
Sarah Kent
Given how relentlessly cheerful his paintings are, you’d have thought Pierre-Auguste Renoir would be a jolly cove. But his National Gallery retrospective opens with a self-…
Markie Robson-Scott
Alex Gibney’s documentary Musk is extraordinary, scathing and very long. It clocks in at three hours and 55 minutes – the LFF allowed a 10-minute interval - and you do feel it…
Robert Beale
In April last year, Yoel Gamzou took over a BBC Philharmonic concert at short notice, conducting Mahler’s Ninth Symphony. He made a big impression with it, bringing insights to…
Kathryn Reilly
It all began over a decade ago when Chris Lowe and Neil Tennant simultaneously read mathematician Andrew Hodges’ biography of Alan Turing, which is considered the definitive text…
Rachel Halliburton
I have to confess I was deeply sceptical that Haruki Murakami’s 1985 magical realist novel would work on stage. The plot, after all, which splices together cyberpunk and fantasy,…
Robert Beale
The stars in this rating are all down to the musical quality of the performance and the abilities of the singers – a leading quartet all of whom are making their Opera North…
disc of the day
The latest chapter in a Sci-fi concept series that revels in its ridiculousness
tv
Sea monster yarn is preposterous but quite entertaining
Last time around for Anthony Horowitz's bookish heroine Susan Ryeland?
film
Simon Abkarian amazes as director Antonin Baudry moves from occupation to liberation
More highlights from the annual movie jamboree - 'Wild Horse Nine', 'La Bola Negra', 'Artificial', 'Ink' and 'Behemoth!'
More from the first week of the LFF: Musk, No Good Men, A Common Story, Flies, Dependence and Prince
new music
First night of the 'Songs in the Key of Life' tour
The latest chapter in a Sci-fi concept series that revels in its ridiculousness
Science, art, geography, sign language and abstract music collide in Manchester
classical
Fun and fluency from a French pianist add to the splendour of orchestral sound
A Yorkshire community choir’s journey from a ragbag of young singers to world champions
Welcome airing for Bizet's incidental music, but Daudet's play loses its Provençal soul
opera
Energy, passion, intensity and tenderness in Garry Walker’s conducting
Inventive sets and choreogaphy, eclectic music, atone for a clunky libretto
An operetta once dogged by misfortune finds its happy ending at last
theatre
Philippe Decouflé's production stylishly channels the best of Murakami's vision
New play gives a modern twist to a traditional Chinese folk story set during the ghost month
Jonathan Larson's New York-centred show finds a loving London home
dance
The Royal Ballet principal shows off his tap skills, his colleague a Paganini party piece
The Pandora myth makes an underwhelming vehicle for the dangers of AI
Matthew Bourne’s 2000 hit revs up again with impressive dancers and a witty score
comedy
Silly but poignant US high school tale
Irish comic delivers a gag-heavy hour
books
Style fails to meet philosophical ambition in a novel that treads old ground
This revelatory biography is sympathetically told and endlessly entertaining
Clint Boon lovingly recalls those baggy, funky, sinsemilla-scented Madchester days
visual arts
Everything reduced to meaningless mush
Relentlessly cheerful paintings - like too much chocolate
It doesn’t get any better than this: the New York abstractionist, in a pristine and beautiful hang
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