A still from Felipe Castelblanco’s prize-winning work at the 2026 Aesthetica Art Prize exhibition at York Art Gallery
FROM the Aesthetica Art Prize to Boyzlife’s boyband hits, York River Art Market at Spark to NETheatre’s Shrek, Charles Hutchinson marks your card for plenty to enjoy.
Last chance to see: 2026 Aesthetica Art Prize, York Gallery, today and tomorrow, 10am to 5pm
WORKS by prize winners Felipe Castelblanco (Main Prize) and DIVA (Emerging Prize) are joined by 18 more shortlisted global artists in the 2026 Aesthetica Art Prize exhibition.
“This is art with purpose: work that operates as a force of disruption and recalibration, unsettling fixed ways of seeing and opening up new ways of understanding a world in flux,” says Aesthetica director Cherie Federico.
The mixed-media works address strong environmental themes, relationships to nature both past and present, as well as health and wellbeing in the modern age. Entry is included in general admission at yorkartgallery.org.uk.
York River Art Market organiser Caroline Turner
Market of the week: York River Art Market Winter Market, Spark: York, Piccadilly, York, today and tomorrow, 11am to 6pm
YORK River Art Market’s winter market at Spark:York features featuring 30 stall holders each day, selected from 180 applicants, spread between the studio upstairs and working spaces on the ground floor, with further stalls at the entrance and a couple more elsewhere. The focus will be on gifts and cards for Christmas. Admission is free.
Keith Duffy and Brian McFadden of Boyzlife: Returning to York Barbican tonight
Boyband alumni of the week: Boyzlife, featuring Keith Duffy and Brian McFadden, York Barbican, tonight, 7.30pm
BOYBAND supergroup Boyzlife, comprising Boyzone’s Keith Duffy and Westlife’s Brian McFadden, celebrate the hits from both defining Nineties and Noughties groups, who notched 55 million sales and 21 number ones between them. Here come I Love The Way You Love Me, All That I Need, No Matter What, My Love, I Lay My Love On You and more.
Recommended but sold out already at York Barbican in the week ahead are Scottish band Del Amitri, marking four decades of songs and stories in Past To Present on Monday (doors 7pm), and Alison Moyet performing the songs of Yazoo and from her two solo electronica albums, The Minutes and Other, on November 18 (doors 7pm). Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Alison Moyet: Focusing on electronica albums at York Barbican. Picture: Naomi Davison
Persian trio of the week: Nava Arts presents The Trembling Land, National Centre for Early Music, Walmgate, York, tonight, 7.30pm
THE Trembling Land brings together three prominent musicians from Iran, now spread out to three European countries: the Persian classical voice of Samin Ghorbani (based in Germany); the electronics, clarinet and arrangements of Rouzbeh Esfand (Netherlands) and the compositions of Vahid Taremi (UK), who plays the shurangiz,a six-string, long-neck lute.
Together they play “the sound of their shadows from a Trembling Land”, living in separate cities yet connected through a shared artistic language where they combine traditional Persian music and contemporary elements to “create a telling atmosphere of what remained unspoken rather than a pure retelling of the past”. Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk.
The poster for Rob Lamberti’s tribute concert to George Michael
Tribute gig of the week: Rob Lamberti Presents Perfectly George, York Barbican, Sunday, 7.30pm
ROB Lamberti’s dynamic show “tactfully and appropriately” celebrates the career of George Michael, from Wham! all the way through to the diverse eras of George’s solo career, taking in Careless Whisper, Faith, I’m Your Man, Club Tropicana and so many more as he tells the story of the East Finchley-born pop icon. Lamberti featured on the BBC’s Even Better Than The Real Thing in 2017 and Steve Coogan’s film Greed in 2020. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Helen Glaisher-Hernández and Lorena Paz Nieto: Exploring The Secret Art Songs of Women Latina Composers at NCEM
Spanish spotlight of the week: Lorena Paz Nieto & Helen Glaisher-Hernández: Mujeres Presentes, The Secret Art Songs of Women Latina Composers, National Centre for Early Music, York, November 17, 7.30pm
SPANISH soprano Lorena Paz Nieto and British-Hispanic pianist Helen Glaisher-Hernández explore the captivating world of Spanish and Latin American art song as conceived by its most outstanding and beguiling women composers. At 6.50pm, the two musicians give a pre-show talk in a chance to learn more about the female Ibe/rican composers featured in a programme presented in association with Instituto Cervantes Manchester. Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk.
Martin Roscoe: Piano soloist at York Guildhall Orchestra’s concert at Helmsley Arts Centre
Classical concert of the week: York Guildhall Orchestra, Helmsley Arts Centre, tomorrow, 3pm
CONDUCTED by music director Simon Wright, York Guildhall Orchestra presents an intimate chamber concert, using a small group of players from the full orchestra. Martin Roscoe will be the soloist for Beethoven’s Piano Concerto no.2 in Bb in an afternoon programme also featuring Richard Strauss’s Serenade for Wind in Eb op.7, Mendelssohn’s Intermezzo and Nocturne from Midsummer Night’s Dream and Mozart’s Symphony 25 in G minor. Box office: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.
Blair Dunlop: Showcasing new album What Still Survives at the NCEM. Picture: Paul Rhodes
Singer-songwriter of the week: Blair Dunlop, National Centre for Early Music, York, November 19, 7.30pm
CHESTERFIELD singer-songwriter and guitarist Blair Dunlop has made six studio albums and a live record since 2012 while touring extensively around the world. Once part of The Albion Band and a former winner of the BBC Radio 2 Horizon Award, he is on tour to promote the October 30 release of latest album What Still Survives, a record marked by his continuing pursuit of craftsmanship, curiosity and an unwavering commitment to the song itself.
At the heart of What Still Survives lies a meditation on endurance: what remains after upheaval, what survives the passage of time and what continues to connect us. Throughout the record, Dunlop reflects on the creative forces that shaped him, from the British folk tradition he grew up within, to the great songwriters of America’s West Coast. Liz Stringer supports. Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk.
A montage of cast members in NETheatre York’s Shrek The Musical
Musical of the week: NETheatre York in Shrek The Musical, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, November 20 to 22 and November 24 to 28, times vary
STEVE Tearle directs NETheatre York in Jeanine Tesori and David Lindsay-Abaire’s musical based on the Oscar-winning DreamWorks Animation film Shrek. Shrek the ogre is the unlikely hero who finds himself on a life-changing journey alongside a wisecracking Donkey and a feisty princess who resists her rescue.
Then throw in a short-tempered bad guy, a cookie with an attitude and multiple fairy-tale misfits in this irreverent tale of beauty truly being in the eye of the beholder. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.