fri 22/09/2023

ASH Smyth

ASH Smyth's picture
Bio
ASH Smyth has written about music and the arts for The Oxford Times, The First Post, The Spectator, Music Teacher, Early Music Today, whatsonstage.com, Guernica, Stop Smiling, and the Sri Lankan Sunday Times. He is the co-author (with Richard Suart) of They'd None of 'Em Be Missed, a potted history of WS Gilbert's "Little List".

Articles By ASH Smyth

latest in today

Peter Grimes, English National Opera review - not quite the...

Britten’s biggest cornucopia of invention seems unsinkable, and no-one seeing his breakthrough 1945 opera for the first time in this revival will...

Expend4bles review - last ride for the over-the-hill gang?

Thanks to numerous arguments and disagreements over script, casting etc, nine years have elapsed since Expendables 3 hit the multiplexes...

Mahler 9, Hallé, Elder, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review...

For someone who said when he first took the helm at the Hallé that he “didn’t do much Mahler”, Sir Mark Elder has a pretty good track record. He’s...

Album: Kylie Minogue - Tension

Two years after the release of her rather flaccid Disco album and five since her somewhat inadvisable foray into country-ish music, 2023...

First Person: 'America's sweetheart organist'...

I have always had a fascination with concert programmes. I did my Doctorate thesis on this subject. I remember vividly as a youngster attending...

R.M.N. review - ethnic cleansing in rural Romania

If you think we’ve got culture wars, then welcome to Transylvania. This rugged...

Lorelle Meets The Obsolete, The Lexington review - forceful...

Can there be too much repetition? Is there a limit to the level of rhythmic insistence which can be tolerated? Judging by the enthused reaction to...

The White Factory, Marylebone Theatre review - what price di...

This powerful play’s immediate backstory, with Moscow sentencing its author to eight years’ jail and its director going into forced exile, is not...

Album: Devendra Banhart - Flying Wig

Had Devendra Banhart been born between 1940 and 1950, he’d likely be a household name. His output– very loosely – sits between Cat Stevens, Syd...

A Year in a Field review - exemplary eco-doc

A shot of a dead field mouse sets the tone for this sobering “slow cinema” documentary, narrator-director Christopher Morris’s response...