Preview
theartsdesk
So maybe there’s a bigger quota of popular Proms, leading Stephen Walsh to lambast what he sees as "junk" to avoid. It surely doesn’t matter. Among the 89 concerts, some of them beyond the Royal Albert Hall, the mix of old and new, middle-of-the-road and deeply serious, is as strong as ever. There’s no dumbing-down.A recent online article for a paper which should know better posits well-known classics as “lowbrow”. When it comes to Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini or Holst’s The Planets, there’s no such thing: these masterpieces are popular for a reason. Many Prommers will be Read more ...
David Nice
Advice to young musicians, as given at several “how to market your career” seminars: don’t begin a biography with “one of the finest xxxs of his/her/their generation”. From my side, I’m allowed to use it occasionally: surely Timothy Ridout is the finest viola-player of his generation, and last night he struck sparks off four other artists at the top of their game: violinists Maria Włoszczowska and Tim Crawford, fellow viola-player Ting-Ru Lai and cellist Tim PosnerWith any other musicians, I might have regretted not checking the programme carefully before I went: the Mozart string Read more ...
theartsdesk
Bergen International Festival, the largest curated festival for music and performing arts in the Nordic region, launches on 26 May at 11:30 GMT+1 with an opening ceremony – with free digital access – hosted by trumpet player Tine Thing Helseth.The opening programme, The American Moth, anchors this year’s theme “This is America?” The international co-production by Alan Lucien Øyen and his company winter guests is a hybrid, multi-medial performance combining dance, theatre in multiple languages, and cinematic live video.Other highlights of American culture include the 2021 Festival Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Ten years ago yesterday, on Monday 14th February 2011, one of theartsdesk’s writers, Joe Muggs, reviewed an album called Paranormale Aktivitat, by an outfit called Zwischenwelt. It was the first ever Disc of the Day, a new slot inserted into theartsdesk’s front page design, where it still resides today. By the end of the year, we’d introduced the now-obligatory stars-out-of-five system, keeping in the swim with other reviewing media. Since then, Disc of the Day has covered approximately 2600 albums and, before COVID, when the tube trains were running, it gave me great pleasure to see those Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Although Metallica are screening a freshly recorded concert across America’s drive-in cinemas at the end of the month, we’re no nearer to actual gigs anywhere, especially the UK. Hold tight. We’ll get there. In the meantime, here are three events worth taking a look at.AIM Music AwardsTonight (Wednesday 12th August), the annual AIM Music Awards will occur online here from 7.00 PM. The event features performances by two leading names in UK hip hop, Little Simz and AJ Tracey, as well as a tribute to the late great Afro-beat drumming legend Tony Allen by Femi Koleoso from UK jazz unit the Ezra Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
This week would have been peak summer event antics but not in 2020. However, the game is far from up; the punks and the metallers are making a strong show in full virtual festival force this weekend, and there's another chance to time travel to a classic Glastonbury set from 20 years ago, and a brand new show from the revitalised Mike Skinner. Dive in!Rebellion: The Online FestivalBlackpool Rebellion Festival has been celebrating punk rock for almost quarter of a century. It has played host to many of the genre’s biggest names, from The Damned to Public Image Ltd to Toyah Willcox. This year Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
We are no nearer live music returning and, as venues across the country face financial collapse, it’s clear that even when we reach some sort of "new normal", far from all will be left standing. This is clearly a disaster for British music. #SaveOurVenues offers an opportunity to help over 500 UK venues stay alive: details here. In the meantime, as ever, there's still plenty happening online. Check out these three.Cambridge Folk at HomeThe Cambridge Folk Festival is one of Britain’s oldest but, like every other green field event, they’ve been kyboshed by COVID. However, in conjunction with Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Everyone keeps upping their game with what and how they’re presenting music in these unwelcome times, and this week sees a red hot selection on offer. Below is a cross section of the best that’s out there to see, hear and get involved withTomorrowland Around the WorldAs the weeks pass, new standards are being set for the presentation of music online. Nowhere more so than with epic European EDM festival Tomorrowland. Working with experts in 3D design, video production, gaming and special effects, they will be presenting eight stages, each one with a landscape equivalent to around 10 square Read more ...
David Nice
It seems a shame that large-scale organisations can’t be more flexible when government guidelines shift. True, the arts couldn’t jump at two days’ notice when outdoor events were licensed by our ever-vacillating government. The BBC Proms could have adjusted, but it seems the programme is now carved in stone – mostly archive material until the end of August.No need, either, for the drive-in set up English National Opera is promising at Alexandra Palace in September. I can’t say that the idea of Puccini’s La bohème, the most perfectly proportioned opera in the repertoire, being filleted to 90 Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
The lockdown which began in March is now noticeably easing, although in the realm of gigs and festivals things are still nowhere near operative. Nonetheless, theartsdesk is responding to the changes by ceasing our many weeks of New Music Lockdown Specials and looking forward to an increasing amount of actual live events. This week, we can only offer one, alongside plenty of streamed entertainment, but it’s early days. Here’s to the future. Dive in!Supersonic presents SofasonicBirmingham’s Supersonic is one of the only shindigs in Britain’s jammed annual summer festival calendar that truly Read more ...
David Nice
It’s begun: very limited access to live music, the chance to sit before one or two players in the same room – as we were doing only three and a half months ago, in some cases thousands of us before an orchestra of up to a hundred musicians. When the big symphonies and operas can return is anyone’s guess; there is currently no real light at the end of the tunnel, in the UK at least, given the endless vortex into which governmental indecision and lack of funding have plunged us.Hope begins to fade with lack of a rescue package; without it, even flagships like the Royal Opera House will not be Read more ...
David Nice
As the Wigmore Hall goes dark again for the summer after a stupendous series of June weekday recitals - you can still catch them all on film at the Wigmore's website, or on BBC Radio 3, and Boyd Tonkin's review of two concerts will appear here on Sunday - the shadows grow on what our goverment's going to do about the arts. In a nutshell, Germany has bailed out the scene to the tune of one billion euros, and the British arts have so far has received - £0. The "five-step roadmap" just put out by Oliver Dowden is lazy, back-of-envelope stuff and offers nothing in practical terms. Orchestras, Read more ...