'Small Great Things' by Jodi Picoult

29 June 2017

Jodi Picoult's novel 'Small Great Things', which I have just finished reading (as an unabridged audio book, narrated by Noma Dumezweni, Jeff Harding and Jennifer Woodward), is a very impressive exploration of racism in contemporary America. When Ruth Jefferson, an experienced and highly respected nurse working in a hospital in Newhaven, Connecticut, is removed from caring for a newborn baby because his white supremacist parents do not want an African American touching their son, she is understandably angry and upset. When the baby then dies suddenly and unexpectedly, Ruth finds herself suspended and charged with murder. But 'Small Great Things' resists the melodrama this plot suggests and focuses instead on the prejudices, explicit and implicit, of everyone involved. Telling the story through the eyes of Ruth, her white liberal lawyer and the baby's skinhead father, Picoult alternates narrators, often overlapping different views of the same scene. She makes all these characters very real and believable - even making the fascist father almost sympathetic. Ultimately she shows the unconscious racism of well-meaning people like the liberal lawyer to be as damaging as the more blatant prejudice practised by the baby's parents. I was struck by her distinction between 'equality' and 'equity' - suggesting that treating everyone the same is often not enough to redress the balance. What appears, initially, to be a fairly grim thriller turns into a thought-provoking examination with well drawn characters and some beautiful writing.

Aegon Birmingham Classic Tennis

27 June 2017

On Saturday we were at the Priory Club in Edgbaston, Birmingham to see the semi-finals of the Aegon Birmingham Classic tennis tournament. It was great to see the former Wimbledon Champion, Petra Kvitová, returning to form following an enforced absence from the game after being attacked and injured by an intruder in her home at the end of last year. It was a shame her semi-final was cut short by an injury to her opponent, Lucie Šafárová, but still good to see her playing so well. The second semi-final was a thriller, with Garbiñe Muguruza – last year’s French Open winner – losing in three sets to the young Australian doubles specialist Ashleigh Barty. It was one of those tennis matches where you genuinely couldn’t tell who was going to win. Even at 5-1 down in the final set Muguruza looked as if she still might triumph. It was a really exciting match. We finished the day with an entertaining, if fairly one-sided, doubles semi-final won by Chan Hao-ching and Zhang Shuai. We had been looking forward to seeing Ashleigh Barty again in the doubles but her semi-final was a walkover after one of her opponents pulled out through injury. The problem with a pre-Wimbledon tournament is that anyone who feels the slightest twinge is clearly not to going to risk missing Wimbledon. Nevertheless we had a really enjoyable day of tennis in Birmingham.

Northampton Symphony Orchestra concert

20 June 2017

One of the first things you are taught about classical music is not to clap between the movements of a piece. I can remember my primary school teacher telling us, before we attended a schools concert at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester that, even if every other child in the audience applauded at the end of the first movement, we should not. My former boss, Robin Osterley, while he was a music student, attended an early music concert at the Royal Albert Hall at which he felt he was the only person not clapping between movements – only to discover that this mid-piece applause was a deliberate part of the authentic recreation of early classical music. As a performer, audience applause that is a genuine response to the exciting conclusion of a movement (rather than a polite ripple because the audience feels it is expected) is always welcome. I fondly remember such a spontaneous reaction to the end of the first movement of Grieg’s ‘Piano Concerto’ performed by Peter Donohoe in a concert I played in as a teenager at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. So when, in our Northampton Symphony Orchestra concert last Saturday, the thrilling climax of the first movement of the Tchaikovsky ‘Violin Concerto’, played by the incredible young Polish violinist Kamila Bydlowska, drew rapturous applause, it felt like fitting appreciation of a stunning performance. Admittedly the concert programme failed to mention how many movements there were in the Concerto – so some audience members might have been anticipating an early interval glass of wine! But nobody seemed disappointed when we embarked on two more movements that showcased the breathtaking skills of this stunning young soloist. We started the concert with Hubert Parry’s ‘Symphonic Variations’ – an interesting missing link between Brahms’ ‘St Anthony Variations’ and Elgar’s ‘Enigma Variations’ which really grew on me over the weeks we rehearsed it. I was also intrigued to get to know the ‘Overture to King Lear’ by Hector Berlioz – an exciting piece with two great tunes that seems to have far too happy an ending for Shakespeare’s great tragedy. The concert concluded with the latest in our season of Fifth Symphonies, Mendelssohn’s ‘Reformation Symphony’. I watched the symphony from the audience, as there are only two horn parts, and really enjoyed the orchestra’s performance. This concert programme was another interesting mix of the familiar and lesser-known repertoire from Conductor John Gibbons. We will complete our exploration of Fifth Symphonies next month with perhaps the most famous of them all, Beethoven’s Fifth.

'Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng' by Orchestra Baobab

15 June 2017

My interest in ‘world music’ stems from reading Robin Denselow’s glowing review, in The Guardian on 6 September 2002, of ‘Specialist in All Styles’ - the spectacular reunion album by the legendary 1970s Senegalese band, Orchestra Baobab (see: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2002/sep/06/worldmusic.artsfeatures). Inspired by this five-star review I bought the album and then took the opportunity to see Orchestra Baobab live at the Derngate in Northampton. At that concert I bought a copy of Songlines magazine (which included a major feature on Orchestra Baobab). I soon became a Songlines subscriber and then a regular attender of the annual WOMAD Festival. I owe Orchestra Baobab a huge debt of gratitude for opening up a world of music to me. I have a particular soft spot for their retro fusion, and that of the other great big bands of the 1970s such as the Rail Band of Mali and Bembeya Jazz of Guinea. Their re-appropriation of Cuban salsa – which itself stemmed from an adaptation of traditional West African music – created an infectiously danceable mix. This week I have been listening to the new album from Orchestra Baobab, ‘Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng’, which honours one of the band’s original singers who died last November. This is an interestingly varied album with the classic Orchestra Baobab sound (guitars, percussion, brass) augmented by the inclusion, for the first time, of a kora – the West African 21-string harp-lute. The album also features guest vocals from some other stars of West African music, Cheikh Lo and Thione Seck. It is a confident, assured, laid-back set of songs from one of the great African bands.

'White Tears' by Hari Kunzru

7 June 2017

Having really enjoyed Hari Kunzru’s brilliant debut novel ‘The Impressionist’ (reviewed here in September 2013), I was looking forward to his latest book, ‘White Tears’, which I have just finished reading (as an unabridged audio book, narrated by Jonathan Todd Ross). ‘White Tears’ starts as a tale of two young, white record producers in contemporary New York who create a fake recording purporting to be an authentic 1930s blues track. They decide to call their imaginary black blues singer Charlie Shaw but are disconcerted when they are approached by someone who claims to have met Charlie Shaw in 1959. As the novel progresses boundaries between the present and past get increasingly blurred as we struggle to work out what is ‘authentic’. ‘White Tears’ at times feels like a ghost story, with the mythical singer seeking vengeance for the wrongs done to him a lifetime ago. The book uses magical realism to create a dreamlike atmosphere which reminded me of Kazuo Ishiguro’s ‘The Unconsoled’. But unlike that often deliberately frustrating novel, ‘White Tears’ does eventually arrive at an explanation, of sorts. The first half of the book, with its its New York setting and two young partners in crime, reminded me of Donna Tartt’s ‘The Goldfinch’ (reviewed here in 2014). ‘White Tears is an interesting and ambitious undertaking and Hari Kunzru is clearly a very accomplished writer but I’m not convinced it fully worked. The book was slow to get going and felt far too long. It was hard to sympathise with any of the main characters and, although the denouement was cleverly satisfying, it was hard work getting to it.

'Double Acts' by John Finnemore

2 June 2017

It is wonderful to see the return this week of John Finnemore’s ‘Double Acts’ (Wednesdays at 6.30 pm on BBC Radio 4) – a series of 30-minute comedy dramas, each featuring a different two actors. As with his first series, originally broadcast in 2015, John Finnemore has attracted an amazing cast and each of his short plays is beautifully constructed, invariably with a twist you really don’t see coming – often playing on the radio listener’s actual inability to see visual clues. This week’s opener, ‘The Queen’s Speech’ starring Stephanie Cole and Kerry Goldiman, was a fairly gentle start to the second series which you can listen to at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08rrc0m. I am really looking forward to the next five weeks.

‘Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour’ by Lee Hall

26 May 2017

Last Saturday we were at the Duke of York’s Theatre in London to see ‘Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour’ - Lee Hall’s stage adaptation of Alan Warner’s novel ‘The Sopranos’. Vicky Featherstone’s National Theatre of Scotland/Live Theatre, Newcastle production, first seen in the 2015 Edinburgh Fringe Festival is now enjoying a West End run. It tells the tale of a group of schoolgirls from Oban visiting Edinburgh to take part in a choir competition. But these girls are not really there for the singing: their day out is a riot of drink, drugs, sex and extremely bad language, set to a soundtrack of classic ELO songs. Six young actors play both the six main characters and all the people they encounter in Edinburgh, narrating their story to us as well as playing out the key scenes – as if they are recounting the events to friends after returning home. This technique reminded me of John Godber’s ensemble plays for Hull Truck Theatre Company, such as ‘Shakers’ (reviewed here in November 2009) and ‘Teechers’ (reviewed here in September 2010). The play also could also be seen as a Scottish, female alternative to Alan Bennett’s ‘The History Boys’, The close-harmony singing of the Our Ladies cast is excellent – both in the school choir songs and the ELO numbers (for which they are accompanied on stage by a three-piece band). Lee Hall’s writing is sharp and often very funny. But I thought the show overplayed the shock value of Catholic schoolgirls running wild: the sex and violence was a bit unrelenting and most of the characters’ stories ended very bleakly. There were excellent performances and great music but it was a play that seemed to want to shout at its audience too loudly for too long.

'In the Woods' by Tana French

19 May 2017

My exploration of the Dublin Murder Squad novels by Tana French has now taken me back to the start. I’ve just finished reading the first novel in the series, ‘In the Woods’ (as an unabridged audio book, narrated by John McCormack). This story had a lot in common with the last Tana French book I read – ‘Faithful Place’ (reviewed here in April 2017). Both novels have a narrating detective who was personally involved in a historical crime at the centre of new investigation and both these detectives proved to be fairly unsympathetic protagonists. As with most of the Dublin Murder Squad books, Tana French is almost as interested in the relationship between the investigating detectives (here Rob Ryan and Cassie Maddox) as in solving the crime. Although there were some signs of an author finding her way a little with this first book in the series, I found the plot of ‘In the Woods’ a particularly intriguing puzzle. And French’s writing is always intelligent and eloquent.

Croatia

19 May 2017

We had a wonderful holiday in Croatia last week. We were staying in the village of Slano on the Dalmation coast, North of Dubrovnik. It’s a beautiful area – a Croatian version of the French Riviera, with a narrow, winding coastal road providing spectacular views of steep, wooded slopes leading down to the deep blue Adriatic sea. We did a lot of walking – along the coast, into the mountains and on the idyllic island of Koločep – seeing amazing views and stepping carefully to avoid the occasional snake! The medieval, walled old town of Dubrovnik is stunning – it’s a real tourist trap but well worth braving the crowds. You can see why it is in so much demand as a film set. We also walked up Mount Srd to the Fortress overlooking Dubrovnik where there is a sobering exhibition about the 1991 siege of the old town, when Serbian and Montenegrin forces bombed this unique heritage site. Watching recordings of the ITN coverage of the siege felt very strange as we stood in the same area that some of the bombs were falling on the TV screen.

You can see some of my photos of Croatia at: http://culturaloutlook.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Croatia2017

'Far From The Madding Crowd' by Thomas Hardy, adapted by Adrian Preater

5 May 2017

On Thursday we were at The Place in Bedford to see the Hotbuckle Productions performance of ‘Far From The Madding Crowd’, adapted from the novel by Thomas Hardy by Adrian Preater. It was an excellent show – high quality fringe theatre with four actors playing multiple parts. It had the feel of a  summer outdoor touring production with clear, accessible story-telling, live music and plenty of humour. They steered a course which avoided the danger of being worthy but dull, while not making the comedy too broad and pantomimic. The play used narration passing between each of the four actors in turn, creating a sequential relay Greek Chorus (as in the Propeller production of ‘Henry V’, reviewed here in December 2011, and Polly Findlay’s production of ‘Antigone’ at the National Theatre, reviewed here in June 2012).   The actors – Adrian Preater, Virginia Lee, Mimi Edwards and Matthew Rothwell – were all excellent, conjuring up their different characters through changes of stance and facial expression as much as with costume changes. It was a very likeable and moving performance.

Northampton Symphony Orchestra concert

3 May 2017

I first encountered the stunning young Latvian pianist Arta Arnicane in June 2014 when she joined the Northampton Symphony Orchestra to give a remarkable performance of two Gershwin pieces, 'Rhapsody in Blue' and the 'I Got Rhythm' variations for piano and orchestra (reviewed here in June 2014). That concert is still fondly remembered by members of the orchestra and our audience, in particular for Arta’s encore, 'The Serpent's Kiss' – a Rag Fantasy by William Bolcom, which drew gasps, laughter, rapturous applause and a standing ovation. On Saturday Arta Arnicane was back in Northampton to play the ‘Piano Concerto No 3’ by Bela Bartok – an incredibly challenging work which required intense concentration by all of us in the orchestra, but which Arta seemed to float through with ease. The delicate slow movement, in particular, was beautifully moving: it was a very impressive performance. The first half of the concert also featured William Alwyn’s ‘Symphony no. 5 “Hydriotaphia”’. Our conductor, John Gibbons, is a champion of the Northampton-born composer, Alwyn: we played his piece ‘The Magic Island' (inspired by 'The Tempest') in the NSO’s Shakespeare celebration, 'The Bard's Birthday Bash' last year (reviewed here in April 2016). Alwyn’s 5th Symphony is an entertaining, programmatic work which builds on his extensive experience as a composer of film music. Rhythmically and harmonically unpredictable, it presented some similar challenges to the Bartok but I enjoyed getting to know it and the symphony seemed to go down well with our audience. The second half of the concert contained two much more familiar works, Mussorgsky’s ‘A Night on a Bald Mountain’ as well as the mighty ‘Symphony No 5’ by Sibelius, continuing our season of 5th symphonies. Considered by some to be the greatest symphony of the 20th century, Sibelius’ 5th is a gorgeous melting pot of harmonies with some lovely moments for us horn players. It was a fascinating concert which saw the orchestra rise to a series of very different challenges. You can get a flavour of several elements of Saturday’s concert by watching this 2014 performance of William Alywn’s ‘Piano Concerto No 2’ by Arta Arnicane with the Ealing Symphony Orchestra, conducted by John Gibbons: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZFAibVtQBQ

'Zanaka' by Jain

28 April 2017

If you want to cheer yourself up I would recommend listening to ‘Zanaka’ – the debut album by young French singer/songwriter Jain. 25-year-old Jeanne Galice has French and Madagascan parents and grew up in the United Arab Emirates and the Republic of Congo. Her songs are bright, cheerful pop incorporating a wide range of Arabic and African influences. The result is incredibly cool and funky. Though musically quite different, her sense of style and beautifully choreographed performances have a lot in common with that other young French talent, Christine and the Queens. Take a look at Jain’s tribute to the late great South African singer Miriam Makeba (‘Mama Africa’) at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59Q_lhgGANc and the wonderfully upbeat song ‘Come’ at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDXOzr0GoA4

'South of the River' by Blake Morrison

20 April 2017

Blake Morrison is a poet who received great acclaim for his candid and moving memoirs of his parents – ‘And When Did You Last See Your Father?’ (1993) and ‘Things My Mother Never Told Me’ (2002) – both of which I read and enjoyed some years ago. In 2007 he published his second novel, ‘South of the River’ which I have just finished reading. Reviews praised this as a state-of-the-nation novel – a British Jonathan Franzen or Philip Roth – but it felt to me much more like a David Lodge novel, with the same deceptively accessible prose disguising an incredibly clever structure and serious themes. ‘South of the River’ follows five interlinked individuals through the years immediately following the 1997 general election with each chapter written from the point of view of one of these five main characters. Although it doesn’t have the set-piece comic scenes of a David Lodge book, Blake Morrison demonstrates a similar lightness of touch and subtle planting of plot points that return later in the story. It’s a compelling set of stories that resists the temptation to neatly tie up all its loose ends. Unsurprisingly Blake Morrison shows a poet’s attention for words and word-play but what most impressed me was his ability to make us sympathise with each of the five main characters, even when their views were in opposition with each other. In this respect ‘South of the River’ did remind me of Jonathan Franzen’s ‘The Corrections’ but also of ‘Small Island’ by Andrea Levy. ‘South of the River’ is a really enjoyable novel covering an interesting period of our recent history through a series of connected personal stories. By the end I had become attached to these characters and really wanted to know what happened to them next.

'An American in Paris' by George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin and Craig Lucas

19 April 2017

George Gershwin wrote ‘An American in Paris’ in 1928 as a symphonic poem suggesting the experience of a first-time visitor falling in love with the French capital (complete with its car horns!). The piece has become a staple of the orchestral repertoire: I played it with Northampton Symphony Orchestra in 2010 (reviewed here in April 2010). In 1951 Vincente Minnelli took the music (and its title) and combined it with some popular Gershwin songs and a script by Alan Jay Lerner to create the famous film starring Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron. The climax of the film is a 17-minute ballet sequence using the original Gershwin orchestral work. In 2015 the English choreographer Christopher Wheeldon created a stage musical version of ‘An American in Paris’ (with book by Craig Lucas) which played to great acclaim on Broadway. That original Broadway production, choreographed and directed by Christopher Wheeldon, is now at the Dominion Theatre in London where we saw it last Friday. It is a truly wonderful show – beautiful, uplifting and charmingly old-fashioned. To call it a musical is slightly misleading – the show is more a ballet interspersed with songs. It draws on Gershwin’s ‘An American in Paris’ and a range of his other orchestral compositions to create the score for a succession of big ensemble dance pieces. I spotted music from Gershwin's 'Cuban Overture' which I played with Northampton Symphony Orchestra last year (reviewed here in June 2016). But the show also includes some of Gershwin’s best-known songs including ‘I Got Rhythm’, ‘'S Wonderful’ and ‘But Not For Me’. The dancing was amazing: both the leads are star ballet dancers – Robert Fairchild was a Principal Dancer with the New York City Ballet and Leanne Cope gave up her position as First Artist with the Royal Ballet to take this role. All the cast danced beautifully but Robert Fairchild was particularly compelling – his movement, even in the acted scenes, was wonderfully fluid with the elasticity of a cartoon character. And these dancers are also impressive singers. The set by Bob Crowley, lighting by Natasha Katz and projections by 59 Productions created a stunning and dynamic theatrical landscape. The plot might have been a bit thin but this was an outstanding evening in the theatre. And the climax was, of course, an extended ballet duet featuring the original ‘An American in Paris’ music in full. Highly recommended.

'Faithful Place' by Tana French

18 April 2017

I’ve been continuing my journey through the Dublin Murder Squad novels by Tana French. Having read her latest book ‘The Trespasser’ (reviewed here in January 2017) I went back to an earlier novel, ‘Faithful Place’, which I have just finished reading as an unabridged audio book, narrated by Gerry O’Brien. ‘Faithful Place’ is told through the eyes of Detective Frank Mackey: in my backwards reading of the series I first encountered Frank Mackey in ‘The Secret Place’ (reviewed here in December 2016) in which Frank’s 16-year-old daughter Holly alerts Detective Stephen Moran to information about a murder at her boarding school. In ‘Faithful Place’ Holly is 9 years old and witness to a murder mystery involving her father’s family. This novel is slightly different to the others in the series in that the narrator is not a member of the Dublin Murder Squad (Frank is an Undercover Detective) and the crime at the centre of the story, which was committed 22 years ago, involves him and his family directly. ‘Faithful Place’ is another intriguing mystery but I found Frank Mackey a fairly unsympathetic protagonist. This book was more enjoyable as a piece in the jigsaw puzzle of novels created by Tana French. It was interesting to see Detective Scorcher Kennedy – the narrator of ‘Broken Harbour’ (reviewed here in May 2016) through the eyes of one of his colleagues. And it was satisfying to understand the beginning of the relationship between Frank Mackey and Stephen Moran which plays an important part in ‘The Secret Place’.

Caro Emerald

12 April 2017

Four years ago, in April 2013, I turned on the TV, which happened to be tuned to the BBC Red Button channel, and stumbled upon a looped recording of a concert in the BBC Radio Theatre which immediately grabbed my attention. Completely forgetting whatever it was I had actually been switching on to watch, I found myself sitting through the entire concert, waiting for it to restart and watching back up to the point where I came in. This mesmerising performance was a session for BBC Radio 2 by the Dutch singer Caro Emerald. Her old-fashioned big band swing, updated by a modern four-to-the-floor dance beat, reminded me of the wonderful French group Caravan Palace who play the gypsy jazz swing of Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli to pounding high-tempo electronic beats (reviewed here in July 2009). The use of samples from vintage recordings also brought to mind the Greek group Imam Baildi (reviewed here in May 2009) and the electronic tango of Gotan Project. Inspired by the Radio 2 concert I became a fan of Caro Emerald and would particularly recommend her 2013 album ‘The Shocking Miss Emerald’. So it was very exciting to get the chance to see her live this Tuesday at Milton Keynes Theatre. The 1400-seat theatre was completely sold out – I bought my ticket in November last year. Support was provided by the Israeli singer Irit whose lovely debut album ‘Hello’ is a summery feel-good collection of songs with a real international feel. Caro Emerald was stunning: trained as a jazz singer, her voice is strong and precise. Though her music draws on big band jazz it has more of a pop feel: there are no vocal hystrionics and the seven-piece band is very slick and polished. They use less electronics and sampling than Caravan Palace, Imam Baildi or Gotan Project – you could imagine them as a dance band transplanted from the 1940s to 2017. Indeed it was interesting to note how many of the songs are built on traditional ballroom and Latin rhythms (including tango, waltz, charleston, samba and cha cha cha). Regular readers will know that I love a band that dances to its own tunes and Caro Emerald and her band looked like they were having a great time – so was I. “Could you ever dream it - I have never dreamed, dreamed a night like this”.

You can take a look at footage of that 2013 Caro Emerald BBC Radio 2 session on YouTube – start with: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIg8PG7Xs9w

‘I Capture The Castle’ by Teresa Howard and Steven Edis, based on the novel by Dodie Smith

10 April 2017

On Saturday we were at Watford Palace Theatre to see ‘I Capture The Castle’ – a new stage musical by Teresa Howard and Steven Edis, based on the novel by Dodie Smith. This premiere production is a collaboration between Watford Palace Theatre and Bolton Octagon, directed by Brigid Larmour. It’s a lovely show – charming, quirky, moving and not taking itself too seriously. The music, by Steven Edis and Sona Morris’s choreography play on the 1930s setting, including a foxtrot, waltz and tango. Teresa Howard’s book and lyrics are witty and playful, capturing the mood of this classic coming-of-age novel. ‘I Capture the Castle’ feels like a mixture of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ and ‘Cold Comfort Farm’ – not an easy trick to pull off. The cast were excellent, including two young leads at the very start of their careers – Lowri Izzard as Cassandra and Theo Boyce as Simon. And Ti Green’s set cleverly recreated the eccentric dilapidation of the castle that forms the family home. ‘I Capture The Castle’ is a beautiful miniature musical which reminded me of David Wood and Richard Taylor’s musical adaptation of ‘The Go-Between’ by L P Hartley (reviewed here in November 2001).

'Twelfth Night' by William Shakespeare

7 April 2017

Regular readers may remember I am a fan of the theatre director Simon Godwin, having really enjoyed his productions of 'Two Gentlemen of Verona' (reviewed here in July 2014), 'Man and Superman' (reviewed here in May 2015), 'The Beaux' Stratagem' (reviewed here in September 2015) and ‘Hamlet’ (reviewed here in April 2016). You may also have noticed that ‘Twelfth Night’ is one of my favourite Shakespeare plays – I’ve reviewed productions of ‘Twelfth Night’ here four times (in February 2007, August 2009, November 2009 and March 2012). So I was nervous about the incredibly raised expectations I was bringing to Simon Godwin’s National Theatre production of ‘Twelfth Night’ which we saw via the NT Live cinema screening on Thursday evening. For this we made a first visit to the beautiful new Quarry Theatre in Bedford – a converted church, owned and run by Bedford School. I needn’t have worried: Simon Godwin’s ‘Twelfth Night’ was a delight. The production, noted for casting Tamsin Greig as a female Malvolio (Malvolia), was not the most subtle I have seen. The comedy was broad and exaggerated, with plenty of mugging and glances at the audience. But it was very very funny. I enjoyed the more serious comedy moments, such as the tender scenes between Tamara Lawrance’s Cesario and Phoebe Fox’s Olivia (who were both excellent), better than the pantomimic performances of the more ridiculous characters. Even so, you couldn’t fail to laugh at Daniel Rigby’s nervously physical Andrew Aguecheek and Tim McMullan (who we last saw almost stealing the show as Mendoza and The Devil in that production of 'Man and Superman') playing Sir Toby Belch in the style of Bill Nighy. And Tamsin Greig gave a compelling performance as Malvolia, her body and face twitching to reveal each growing understanding of her predicament.

Ceredigion

4 April 2017

We had a lovely holiday last week in a cottage near Tregaron in Ceredigion, West Wales. We got some wonderful weather, particularly in the first half of the week, and did a lot of walking – in the Cambrian Mountains, along the Ceredigion Coast Path and in the wooded valley along the River Mynach near Devil’s Bridge. We visited the towns of Aberystwyth, Aberaeron and Rhayader and took part in ballroom dancing sessions in Aberaeron and Llwyncelyn. But I think the highlight of the week was driving across the tiny, steep mountain road from Beulah to Tregaron – a stunning drive through spectacular scenery in beautiful weather.

'Following the Martian Invasion' by Francis Spufford

22 March 2017

BBC iPlayer is a wonderful thing. Having really enjoyed Stephen Baxter’s sequel to ‘The War of the Worlds’ by HG Wells, 'The Massacre of Mankind' (reviewed here in February 2017), I had noticed that BBC Radio 4 was broadcasting a new dramatisation, by Melissa Murray, of Wells’ novel. Searching for ‘The War of the Worlds’ on iPlayer revealed not only this drama (still available to listen to at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08hdllz) but also an interview with Stephen Baxter about 'The Massacre of Mankind' on BBC Radio 3’s ‘Free Thinking’ programme (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b088jl60) and ‘Following the Martian Invasion’ – a series of five 15-minute programmes broadcast on Radio 4 in which Francis Spufford retraces the journey of HG Wells’ Martian invaders. I’ve just finished listening to this series and it’s a little gem. Spufford starts at Horsell Common in Surrey, where the Martians first landed, and then follows their progress across the South East of England to Primrose Hill in London. In each episode he is joined by a range of experts to discuss ‘The War of the Worlds’ in terms of literary style, political theory, physics, anatomy, military strategy, science fiction and social history. It’s like an extended edition of Melvyn Bragg’s ‘In Our Time’ recorded on location. Even if you’ve never read ‘The War of the Worlds’, ‘Following the Martian Invasion’ is a fascinating exploration of late Victorian Britain. You can listen to all five episodes on BBC iPlayer at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08hdpd9/episodes/player