At Home He Feels Like A Tourist

Category: London

• Choral Classical Music Concert Culture Enlightenment London Symphony

  Beethoven Choral Symphony: LSO at the Barbican review *****

  London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Simon Rattle (conductor), London Symphony Chorus, Simon Halsey (chorus director), Iwona Sobotka (soprano), Anna Stéphany (mezzo-soprano), Robert Murray (tenor), Florian Boesch (baritone) Barbican Hall, 12th February 2010 Not quite the Tourist’s last Beethoven fix before lockdown. A very dramatic take on various of the piano sonatas from Boris Giltburg was to follow…

  June 7, 2020
• Class Comedy Culture France London Satire Theatre

  God of Carnage at the Rose Theatre Kingston ***

  God of Carnage Rose Theatre Kingston, 11th February 2020 I remain ambivalent about the work of French playwright Yasmina Reza. I can see why she would wish to lampoon “middle-class” mores in her contemporary comedies of manners. There is, after all, a long and illustrious dramatic tradition of doing so.…

  May 28, 2020
• Acting Age Culture London Performance Theatre Time

  all of it at the Royal Court Theatre review *****

  all of it Royal Court Theatre, 11th February 2020 So we will have to wait for Alistair McDowall’s latest full length play The Glow at the Royal Court, postponed thanks to you know what. Mr McDowall was the pen, and brains, behind dystopian/sci-fi/mystery/thriller/social satires Brilliant Adventures, Talk Show, Captain Amazing,…

  May 27, 2020
• Agency Class Culture Family Feminism London Patriarchy Theatre

  Nora: A Doll’s House at the Young Vic review ****

  Nora: A Doll’s House Young Vic Theatre, 10th February 2020 It is not difficult to see why theatre-makers, and audiences, continue to be drawn to drawn to Ibsen’s masterpiece, now over 140 years old. First and foremost, there is the still extraordinarily powerful message. Just think what old Henrik would…

  May 27, 2020
• Classical Music Concert Concerto Culture London Russia Soviet Union Symphony War

  Noseda and the LSO at the Barbican review ****

  London Symphony Orchestra, Gianandrea Noseda (conductor), Roman Simovic (violin) Barbican Hall, 9th February 2020 Prokofiev – Symphony No 1 in D major Op 25 “Classical” Prokofiev – Violin Concerto No 1 Op 19 Mussorgsky arr Rimsky-Korsakov – Prelude to “Khovanshchina” Shostakovich – Symphony No 9 in E flat major Op 70 The latest all Russian instalment in…

  May 20, 2020
• Albums Antiquity Culture Ecology Gigs History London

  Julian Cope at the Barbican Hall review ****

  Julian Cope Barbican Hall, 8th February 2020 February 21st 1982 if I am to believe t’Internet. Which, given that the source, Setlist.fm, is not associated with the hate and porn that comprises the vast majority of the web, seems reasonable in this case. The sorely missed Hammersmith Palais. The Teardrop…

  May 9, 2020
• Colonialism Culture Empire London Race Theatre Victorian

  The Gift at the Theatre Royal Stratford East review ***

  The Gift Theatre Royal Stratford East, 8th February 2020 Another in the lengthening list of contemporary plays where the reach of ambition exceeds the grasp of execution. Janice Okoh has set her sights on “imperialism, cross-racial adoption, cultural appropriation … and tea” with her “outrageous” play set firstly, in Victorian…

  May 7, 2020
• Classical Music Concert Culture London Piano Sonata

  Evgeny Kissin, Beethoven piano sonatas at the Barbican Hall review ***

  Evgeny Kissin Barbican Hall, 6th February 2020 Ludwig van Beethoven Piano Sonata No 8, Op 13 Pathétique 15 Variations and a Fugue, Op 35 Piano Sonata No 17, Op 31 No 2 Tempest Piano Sonata No 21, Op 53 Waldstein Encore: various Bagatelles Op 126, Op 33, Variations Op 76 and Ecossaise WoO…

  May 4, 2020
• Culture Family Horror London Puppetry Theatre

  What the Dolls Saw at the Vault Festival review ****

  What the Dolls Saw House of Macabre, Vault Festival, 5th February 2020 Off to the Vaults again, this time with the SO, to What the Dolls Saw from the all women House of Macabre company. It is a dark comedy, as one might have guessed, penned by Nic Lamont, who…

  April 26, 2020
• Culture Enlightenment Feminism History London Magic Mortality Myths Philosophy Religion Science Fiction Theatre Time

  Faustus: That Damned Woman at the Lyric Hammersmith review ***

  Faustus: That Damned Woman Lyric Hammersmith, 5th February 2020 I bet Chris Bush was good at English at school and maybe beyond. In the precis question. For she has an unerring eye/ear/pen for taking complicated/contentious/convoluted issues and dramas and rendering them explicable, topical and entertaining. Kicking off with TONY! The…

  April 25, 2020