Israel
theASHtray: Klinghoffer, Cape Town, and Debussy pisses off the poetsSaturday, 03 March 2012
Who does the PR these days for Middle Eastern extremists? Whoever it is clearly wasn’t on board when the Palestine Liberation Front decided to whack the Achille Lauro. Or wasn’t aware that chucking a wheelchair-bound pensioner into the Med was the... Read more... |
The Death of Klinghoffer, English National OperaSunday, 26 February 2012
In October 1985 four Palestinian terrorists boarded the Achille Lauro cruise liner, took the 400-odd passengers hostage, shot an old disabled American Jew dead and flung his body overboard. Of all the many atrocities in the long war between the... Read more... |
Survivor, Hofesh Shechter & Anthony Gormley, Barbican TheatreFriday, 13 January 2012
Empty vessels make the most noise. That pithy old aphorism floated into my head a scant few minutes into the much-heralded new work by the undoubtedly talented, but here way off-beam, Hofesh Shechter. And again, a few minutes later. And again, and... Read more... |
Barbican Centre, 2012 SeasonTuesday, 10 January 2012
London's Barbican Centre is 30 this year, and with a special Olympics subsidy boost as the world's eyes turn to the British capital this summer, it aims to be as lovely inside as it is famously unlovely outside. Film beauties Cate Blanchett and... Read more... |
Emanuel Gat Dance, Brilliant Corners, Sadler’s WellsMonday, 10 October 2011
“Jazz is my adventure,” said Thelonious Monk. “I’m after new chords, new ways of syncopating, new figures, new runs. How to use notes differently. That’s it. Just using notes differently.” Based on the title of the new hour-long piece by Israeli... Read more... |
My Summer Reading: Violinist Vadim GluzmanTuesday, 06 September 2011
Some violinists just play; others have a voice. Ukrainian-Israeli violinist Vadim Gluzman follows the distinguished line of great Petersburg violinist Leopold Auer - whose 1690 Stradivarius he currently plays - David Oistrakh and Isaac Stern, his... Read more... |
BBC Proms: Shaham, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, MehtaFriday, 02 September 2011
Police. Placards. Protests. And bag checks. It meant only one thing. Jews were performing at the Proms. Here we were in the Royal Albert Hall in London in 2011 witnessing a stage of musicians being barracked and abused for having the gall to be... Read more... |
Page Eight, BBC TwoMonday, 29 August 2011
I think I owe David Hare an apology. When I sat down to watch Page Eight, last night – being, as it is, his latest probing of our moral and political universe – I just assumed that our national intelligence services would be in for a trendy-... Read more... |
CD: Jazzsteppa - Hyper NomadsTuesday, 19 July 2011
It's always interesting to see how revolutions in music get folded back into the fabric of the culture that fomented them. Dubstep, which changed club culture so dramatically in the mid-2000s, is now an intrinsic part of that culture from mainstream... Read more... |
Hofesh Shechter, Political Mother: The Choreographer's Cut, Sadler's WellsTuesday, 12 July 2011
Only three years ago, Hofesh Shechter, the Israeli-born, London-based choreographer, made the leap into the big leagues, almost overnight, with his Uprising/In Your Rooms double bill. The following year he produced a "Choreographer’s Cut", a bulked-... Read more... |
AmreekaMonday, 09 May 2011
The traditional place for such films is below the radar. A low-budget portrait of an ethnic minority in America which has schlepped round the festivals, Amreeka could just as easily have been cold-shouldered by distributors. It tells of a family of... Read more... |
Keren Ann, Jazz CaféWednesday, 06 April 2011
Keren Ann’s new album, 101, might showcase her new-found pop smarts but last night’s hour-and-a-half set ranged through her whole catalogue taking in country-flavoured balladry, early Velvet Underground chugging and introspective singer-songwriting... Read more... |
