theartsdesk com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Robert Beale
Friday, 03 May 2024
Kahchun Wong, the Hallé’s principal conductor from the coming autumn season, presided in the Bridgewater Hall for the first time yesterday since the announcement of his...
Iain Sinclair
Friday, 03 May 2024
Iain Sinclair is a writer, film-maker, and psychogeographer extraordinaire. He began his career in the poetic avant-garde of the Sixties and Seventies, alongisde the likes of Ed...
James Saynor
Friday, 03 May 2024
The 21st century learnt afresh about the reality of carpet-bombed cities thanks to the Syrian civil war, which began in 2011. And the Syrian war-set movie Nezouh begins with a...
Joe Muggs
Friday, 03 May 2024
This album has a lot to live up to. Its predecessor Future Nostalgia came along just as the Covid crisis was properly kicking into gear, and it became, in its way, era...
Saskia Baron
Thursday, 02 May 2024
On the morning of the press show of Laughing Boy, the BBC news website’s top story was about the abuse of children with learning disabilities by the staff at a special school...
David Nice
Thursday, 02 May 2024
While the Royal College of Music Symphony Orchestra were performing Messiaen’s Turangalîla-Symphonie – weirdly, despite its size and difficulty, a repertoire staple – over at the...
Katie Colombus
Thursday, 02 May 2024
Sia has well and truly stepped into her power. Gone are the days of releasing songs that were pitched to megastars but...
Demetrios Matheou
Wednesday, 01 May 2024
Towards the end of David Haig’s new adaptation of Philip K Dick’s 1956 science fiction short story, someone asks if three...
Miranda Heggie
Wednesday, 01 May 2024
It was her 2018 album Be the Cowboy which saw Mitski propelled to stardom status. Laurel Hell, which followed in 2022, saw...
Thomas H Green
Wednesday, 01 May 2024
Skirting along the peripheries of doom metal, unbeknownst to almost everyone, there existed a band called Mammoth Weed...
Jane Edwardes
Tuesday, 30 April 2024
Small-scale shows, nurtured in offbeat places, are becoming all the rage in the West End. Red Pitch, Operation Mincemeat,...
Boyd Tonkin
Tuesday, 30 April 2024
As he approaches his 70th birthday, Masaaki Suzuki has not just travelled into pastures new but proved himself thoroughly at...
Jonathan Geddes
Tuesday, 30 April 2024
First Nadine Shah raised hopes, then dashed them. “I’ve never had a dance off onstage before,” she observed at one point,...
Sarah Kent
Tuesday, 30 April 2024
In 1903, Wassily Kandinsky painted a figure in a blue cloak galloping across a landscape on a white horse. Several years...
Nick Hasted
Tuesday, 30 April 2024
Isabelle (Eva Green) leans over, her long hair catches fire from a candle, and Matthew (Michael Pitt) devotedly snuffs it...
Guy Oddy
Monday, 29 April 2024
On Friday evening, dance veterans Orbital touched down in Birmingham to celebrate two of the most significant and acclaimed...
Veronica Lee
Monday, 29 April 2024
An appearance on Taskmaster and the publication of her acclaimed memoir Strong Female Character have helped propel Fern...
Kieron Tyler
Monday, 29 April 2024
The Lemon Twigs aren’t shy about telegraphing their inspirations. A Dream is all we Know, their swift follow-up to last May’...
David Nice
Sunday, 28 April 2024
Four years embracing pandemic, genocide and rapid environmental degradation predicted by Wagner’s grand myth have passed...
disc of the day
Album: Dua Lipa - Radical Optimism
An admirable attempt to catch the magical groove that helped us through lockdown
tv
Blue Lights Series 2, BBC One review - still our best cop show despite a slacker structure
The engaging Belfast cops are less tightly focused this time around
Baby Reindeer, Netflix review - a misery memoir disturbingly presented
Richard Gadd's double traumas are a difficult watch but ultimately inspiring
Anthracite, Netflix review - murderous mysteries in the French Alps
Who can unravel the ghastly secrets of the town of Lévionna?
film
Blu-ray: The Dreamers
Bertolucci revisits May '68 via intoxicated, transgressive sex, lit up by the debuting Eva Green
theartsdesk Q&A: Marco Bellocchio - the last maestro
Italian cinema's vigorous grand old man discusses Kidnapped, conversion, anarchy and faith in cinema
new music
Album: Dua Lipa - Radical Optimism
An admirable attempt to catch the magical groove that helped us through lockdown
Mitski, Usher Hall, Edinburgh review - cool and quirky, yet deeply personal
A stunningly produced show from one of pop’s truly unique artists
classical
Hallé, Wong, Bridgewater Hall review - meeting a musical communicator
Drama and emotional power from a new principal conductor
Guildhall School Gold Medal 2024, Barbican review - quirky-wonderful programme ending in an award
Ginastera spolights the harp, Nino Rota the double bass in dazzling performances
Queyras, Philharmonia, Suzuki, RFH review - Romantic journeys
Japan's Bach maestro flourishes in fresh fields
opera
Götterdämmerung, LPO, Jurowski, RFH review - outside looking and listening in, always with fascination
Every orchestral phrase and colour perfect, vocal drama often a notch below
Simon Boccanegra, Hallé, Elder, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - thrilling, magnificent exploration
Verdi’s original version of the opera brought to exciting life
Aci by the River, London Handel Festival, Trinity Buoy Wharf Lighthouse review - myths for the #MeToo age
Star singers shine in a Handel rarity
theatre
Laughing Boy, Jermyn Street Theatre review - impassioned agitprop drama
Strong ensemble work highlights the plight of people with learning disabilities
Minority Report, Lyric Hammersmith Theatre review - ill-judged sci-fi
Philip K Dick’s science fiction short story fares far better on screen
Two Strangers (Carry A Cake Across New York), Criterion Theatre review - rueful and funny musical gets West End upgrade
A Brit and a New Yorker struggle to find common ground in lively new British musical
dance
All You Need Is Death review - a future folk horror classic
Irish folkies seek a cursed ancient song in Paul Duane's impressive fiction debut
MacMillan Celebrated, Royal Ballet review - out of mothballs, three vintage works to marvel at
Less-known pieces spanning the career of a great choreographer underline his greatness
Carmen, English National Ballet review - lots of energy, even violence, but nothing new to say
Johan Inger's take on Carmen tries but fails to make a point about male violence
comedy
Jonathan Pie, Duke of York's Theatre review - spoof political reporter takes no prisoners
Tom Walker in a bravura display
Spencer Jones: Making Friends, Soho Theatre review - award-winning comedian mines his post-lockdown escape to the country
If big chickens scare you, this is your thing!
Books
Extract: Pariah Genius by Iain Sinclair
A form-defying writer explores the troubled mindscape of a Soho photographer
Jonn Elledge: A History of the World in 47 Borders review - a view from the boundaries
Enjoyable journey through the byways of how lines on maps have shaped the modern world
Lisa Kaltenegger: Alien Earths review - a whole new world
Kaltenegger's traverses space in her thoughtful exploration of the search for life among the stars
visual arts
Expressionists: Kandinsky, Münter and the Blue Rider, Tate Modern review - a missed opportunity
Wonderful paintings, but only half the story
Eye to Eye: Homage to Ernst Scheidegger, MASI Lugano review - era-defining artist portraits
One of Switzerland's greatest photographers celebrated with a major retrospective
Stephen review - a breathtakingly good first feature by a multi-media artist
Melanie Manchot's debut is strikingly intelligent and compelling
latest comments
We saw Opening Night yesterday and felt...
Spot on! To me it was like a panto version...
Saw this wonderful opera last night in Cheltenham...
Couldn't agree more. THIS is the one to see to...
I watched it yesterday and it made feel like "Oh...
I saw this today at The Curve, why any theatre...
Y'all be giving out 100's like hotcakes, do y'all...
Seen in Oxford 9th April. I agree entirely...