Monday, August 19, 2013

'Sherlock Holmes' by Mark Hayward

19 August 2013

We were back in the gardens of Woburn Abbey last Friday to see The Pantaloons' production of 'Sherlock Holmes'. This new adaptation, written and directed by Pantaloon Mark Hayward, combined several Conan Doyle stories (including 'The Speckled Band', 'The Blue Carbuncle' and 'The Hound of the Baskervilles') with the usual Pantaloons mixture of pantomimic clowning and audience interaction (“there is no fourth wall!”, “Watson, stop narrating!”). It was lots of fun. There were just four actors – two playing Holmes and Watson and the other two playing everyone else. As with the wonderful Patrick Barlow stage adaptation of ‘The Thirty Nine Steps’, half the fun is in anticipating how they are going to cope with the challenges this throws up. I particularly enjoyed Holmes turning his powers of observation and deduction on a member of the audience: I suspect his amazingly accurate conclusions may have been influenced by some pre-show research with the audience member's friends and family but the little boy sitting to my right was genuinely amazed (“how did he do that?!”). And The Pantaloons are very good at planting an idea very early in the show that returns triumphantly to resolve the plot at the end. It was a very enjoyably silly evening but it was incredibly manic and overplayed (even by the standards of The Pantaloons) and I wondered whether it might actually have been funnier if more of it had been played straight.

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Monday, August 12, 2013

'After the Fire, a Still Small Voice' by Evie Wyld

12 August 2013

I've just finished reading 'After the Fire, a Still Small Voice' by Evie Wyld (as an unabridged audio book, narrated by David Tredinnick). This debut novel tells the parallel story of two generations of an Australian family, with alternating chapters dealing with Frank Collard – escaping, in the present day, to the remote shack that had belonged to his grandparents on the North coast of Australia – and Frank's father Leon, growing up in Sydney several decades earlier. This is a tale of parallels between fathers and sons: Leon's own father's life was irreparably damaged by his experience of fighting in the Korean War and Leon then suffers a similar fate when he is called up to serve in Vietnam. 'After the Fire, a Still Small Voice' is a book about loneliness and the plot moves very slowly, with both main characters spending long stretches of the novel alone. The writing is beautiful and delicate but it's a sad, gentle tale of broken relationships.

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'A Midsummer Night's Dream' by William Shakespeare

12 August 2013

I really enjoyed the open air production of 'The Importance of Being Earnest' by The Pantaloons that we saw last August (reviewed here in August 2012) so I was looking forward to their return to the gardens of Woburn Abbey last weekend. The Pantaloons are a group of five young actors who bring a comedy-sketch-group approach to open air theatre, full of backchat, audience interaction, improvisation, original music and infectious silliness. Their production of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' played well to these strengths but also demonstrated their more serious acting skills. It was a very funny and enjoyable evening. I particularly liked the impromptu use of three members of the audience to play the fairies – Cobweb, Peaseblossom and Mustardseed. While the acting was excellent, the limitations of such a small cast meant that I am not sure anyone who wasn't already familiar with the play would have been able to follow all the intricacies of the plot. Nevertheless it was great fun and I can't wait for The Pantaloons production of 'Sherlock Holmes' which is at Woburn this Friday.

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Thursday, August 08, 2013

Madrid

8 August 2013

We had a lovely few days in Madrid last week but boy it was hot! The temperature peaked at 41 degrees on Thursday but fortunately it was a very dry heat, so not quite so horrendous as that sounds. Nobody goes to Madrid in August (it's too hot!) and the Madrileños all head off to the coast so the city was very quiet and we were able to visit all the main tourist attractions without having to queue for anything. We took an excellent guided walking tour of the centre, visited the wonderful Prado and Thyssen-Bornemisza art galleries and looked at the state rooms of the magnificent Royal Palace. You can see a few of our photos at: http://culturaloutlook.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Madrid2013.

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WOMAD 2013

8 August 2013

With so much exotic and unusual music from all over the world on show, it might seem surprising to pick a brass band from Manchester as my highlight of the 2013 WOMAD Festival at Charlton Park in Wiltshire. But Riot Jazz are a brass band in the New Orleans tradition of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band or the The Hot 8 Brass Band (reviewed here in January 2013) and their set in the Big Red Tent at WOMAD was thrilling and incredibly engaging. Riot Jazz come with their own irrepressible compere, MC Chunky, whose persuasive patter in a strong Manchester accent had an audience of around two thousand leaping up and down for an hour. Wonderful cover versions of 'Don't You Want Me Baby?' and 'Living on a Prayer' sent us all away smiling (have a listen to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JVSpjpkZ4U). Other high points of my weekend at WOMAD included the amazing ethereal Tuvan throat singing of Huun Huur Tu, impressively competitive duets of Indian classical music from Debapriya Adhykary and Samanwaya Sarkar, another chance to see the great Malian singer Rokia Traore (reviewed here in December 2008) and Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino – an excitingly energetic band from the heel on Italy's boot who play (and dance) traditional pizzica folk music with an infectious enthusiasm. I wasn't able to stay to see Brazilian legend (and former Minister of Culture) Gilberto Gil (reviewed here in July 2010) close the festival on the Sunday evening so it was great to have had the chance to see Gil and Peter Gabriel in conversation on BBC Radio 4's 'Loose Ends' on the Radio 3 stage on Saturday. Like going to see BBC Radio Scotland's 'MacAulay & Co' before a day at the Edinburgh Fringe, 'Loose Ends' provided the chance to sample several acts performing at the festival in bite-sized chunks and reminded me of Charlie Gillet's much missed Radio London broadcasts from WOMAD. I saw a total of 18 complete performances over the weekend. I really enjoyed Bwani Junction – an indie rock band from Edinburgh who play with an African guitar sound that makes them seem like a cross between Vampire Weekend, Arctic Monkeys and Big Country. These Scottish lads have some authentic African links – the father of guitarist Dan Muir was the manager of the Bhundu Boys (who played at the very first WOMAD Festival, 31 years ago) and Dan has apparently been playing alongside the Bhundus' Rise Kagona since he was 10 years old (which can't have been that long ago as all four members of Bwani Junction looked about 12 to me!). I should also give a special mention to David Wax Museum from Boston, Massachusetts, who play an upbeat mix of old-fashioned Americana with a Mexican influence. The band, who put out their recordings on their own label and have only just managed to arrange distribution to Europe, were making their first visit to England and played a fantastic set on the Charlie Gillett stage on the Saturday evening just as torrential rain arrived. At any other point in the weekend (which was dominated by glorious sunshine) they would undoubtedly have attracted a crowd numbering in the thousands. Instead, they performed to around 200 people huddling under umbrellas. Nevertheless they put on a magnificent show and deserve a much bigger audience. You can see a selection of my photos from the 2013 WOMAD Festival at: http://www.culturaloutlook.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/WOMAD2013.

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