The art beat of YORKshire
THEATRES can “re-open” from July 4, but not for performances. That’s like saying pubs can re-open but not serve any beer.
Theatre’s future and indeed theatres’ futures are hanging by a thread. For once, take something other than the besmirching of Winston Churchill’s statue seriously, Prime Minister, not wiffle-waffle about “can re-open”.
SCARBOROUGH theatre company Animated Objects is taking part in this summer’s Scarborough Borough Council community outreach programme.
Artistic director Lee Threadgold’s company has created the costumes for children to dress as the young people’s Red Arrows for Scarborough’s virtual Armed Forces Day to mark this national event coming to the East Coast resort in June 2021.
On Monday this week, the council launched its virtual celebration of the Armed forces with various events and films being aired on the Scarborough Armed Forces website, scarborougharmedforcesday.co.uk, and Facebook page, facebook.com/ScarboroughArmedForcesDay/.
Animated Objects Theatre Company is “a small company that delivers really big ideas”, specialising in large-scale events, outdoor theatre, giant artworks and performances.
THE National Centre for Early Music’s lockdown season of free concerts from York presents a double bill of Sollazzo Ensemble and BarrocoTout on Saturday.
“We have selected the very best concerts from two ensembles who won the York Early Music International Young Artists Competition in 2015 and 2017 respectively,” says director Dr Delma Tomlin.
To view these concerts for free at 1pm, follow facebook.com/yorkearlymusic/ or log on to the NCEM website, ncem.co.uk.
Directed by mediaeval fiddle player Anna Danilevskaia, joined by sopranos Perrine Devillers and Yukie Sato, tenor Vivien Simon, fiddle player Sophia Danilevskaia and harpist Vincent Kibildis, the Swiss group were recorded on July 11 2015.
Formed in 2014 in Basel, Switzerland, where the members were all studying at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, that year they were selected for the “EEEmerging” programme supported by Creative Europe, going on to win the main prize in the YorkEarly Music International Young Artists Competition and the public’s Friends of York Early Music Festival Prize in 2015.
They built their winning performance around Jehan de Cordoval and Jehan Ferrandes, two blind fiddle players in the 15th century court of Burgundy, playing works by Guillaume Dufay and Loyset Compère, among others, that they would have peformed .
“Cordoval and Ferrandes caught our attention because, unlike many medieval musicians known today, they were famous exclusively as performers, not as composers or theorists,” said Anna.
“Soloists before the time of soloism: the simple fact of their existence and their success offers us a perspective on the richness of the musical scene at the Burgundian court in the 15th century.”
BarracoTout, from Belgium, were recorded on July 15 2017 when winning the York Early Music International Young Artists Competition, having been selected in 2015 for the EEEmerging programme (EEE standing for ‘Emerging European Ensembles’)
Carlota Garcia, flute, Izana Soria,violin, Edouard Catalan, cello, and Ganael Schneider, harpsichord, presented To Paris And Back: Return, a programme of 17th and 18th century works by Henri-Jacques de Croes, Jean-Marie Leclair and Georg Philipp Telemann.
In 2018, they recorded their first album for Linn Records, La Sonate Égarée, an album dedicated to Henri-Jacques de Croes.
Izana Soria said of her fellow Belgian: “Born in Antwerp, de Croes was an important innovator of his time. He was maître de musiqueof the Chapelle Royale in Brussels and Frankfurt, and, like Telemann, able to synthesise the Italian, French and German styles in his sonatas and symphonies.
“The Largo of his sixth sonata has an operatic lyricism, whereas the Fuga combines markedly rhythmical passages, typically baroque dissonances and pre-classical articulations, with a polished and convincing result.”
Formed in Brussels in 2013, BarrocoTout take their name from a sketch on the Spanish comedy show Muchachada Nui: Barroco Tu (meaning “Baroque yourself”), and their mission is to explore work written for their four-piece formation by well-known composers, while also re-discovering other composers who have fallen into oblivion.
TONIGHT should have been the press night for Emeritus director Alan Ayckbourn’s revival of his 1976 garage-and-garden dark comedy, Just Between Ourselves, at Scarborough’s Stephen Joseph Theatre.
However, as with the no-longer upcoming world premiere of his 83rd play, Truth Will Out, the summer production of this rarely staged Seventies’ gem has been scuppered by the Coronavirus crisis that has led to the SJT being closed.
Instead, why not head to @ArchivingAlanA for Simon Murgatroyd’s exclusive new interview with the Scarborough playwright, who discusses his classic play and his thoughts on it now. Find it at archivingayckbourn.home.blog/?p=1100@Ayckbourn.
In “the one with the car”, set on four birthdays, Dennis thinks he is a master at DIY and a perfect husband but in reality he is neither. When he decides to sell his car, Neil turns up as a potential buyer, wanting it for his wife Pam’s birthday.
In Ayckbourn’s dissection of man’s inhumanity to woman, as two couples become unlikely friends, aided and abetted by Dennis’s meddling live-in mother, Marjorie, a collision course becomes inevitable.
Sheridan Morley said of the 1977 West End premiere: “I had the feeling I’d seen Uncle Vanya rewritten by and for the Marx Brothers.” Bernard Levin’s verdict in The Sunday Times proclaimed: “Ayckbourn has gained an immense reputation with a series of plays in which puppets dance most divertingly on their strings. Here he has cut the strings and then stuck the knife into the puppets.”
How frustrating there will be no SJT revival this summer, but make sure you do listen to Ayckbourn’s 84th premiere, his audio play for lockdown, Anno Domino, starring Ayckbourn himself and his wife Heather Stoney,
In one of his lighter pieces, charting the break-up of a long-established marriage and its domino effect on family and friends, Ayckbourn, 81, and Stoney play four characters each, aged 18 to mid-70s. “We were just mucking about in our sitting room,” says Ayckbourn of a world premiere available for free exclusively on the SJT’s website, sjt.uk.com, until noon on June 25.
“DARLINGS, I am in London for a bit to try and get things moving and it’s safe to say that it is depressing as F!” So wrote York drag diva divine Velma Celli to her adoring devotees on email on Saturday lunchtime.
“Anyway, I’ll plod on as long as I can. So, I am doing my show ‘Me & My Divas’ next Saturday [June 27] and I would LOVE for you to join me LIVE from LANDAN!”
Since then, Velma, the glorious cabaret creation of actor Ian Stroughair, has returned to Bishopthorpe, from where his series of online performances, streamed live from the Case De Velma Celli kitchen, will resume this weekend.
Tickets for the 8pm show cost £7 at ticketweb.uk/event/velma-celli-me-live-stream-tickets/10614645. As always, tickets come off sale at 5pm and the link will be sent out at around 6pm
Here Charles Hutchinson has a quick catch-up with Velma in the lead-up to Saturday’s virtual date with divas galore.
How did it feel heading back to London from York after three months in home-town lockdown?
“It was both exciting and nerve-wracking…”
…You say you went back to London to “try and get things moving”. What can you do at this stage?
“I was hoping to network with restaurants and other smaller venues planning to open on July 4, but it was impossible, so I’m back in York for two weeks.”
How did your last online York kitchen show, Equinox, go on June 13? What did you perform with your remote guest Jodie Steel, the West End star of Wicked, Six and Rock Of Ages?
“It was the best yet! SO much fun. Jodie and I sang Take Me Or Leave Me from Rent [the American musical in which Ian Stroughair played the messianic Angel].
What’s the history of Me & My Divas?
“I first performed it in January this year in Perth, Australia, at Fringeworld, winning the Best Cabaret award for the season.”
What’s the content of this new show?
“No diva is safe, no riff she won’t sing – so strap yourself in and let the belt-off begin.
“Me & My Divas is an overindulgent diva fest celebrating the songs and behaviour of all of your favourite divas, including Celine, Mariah, Whitney, Aretha, Cher, Britney (maybe not!) and many more.”
Definitely being one yourself, what are the qualifications required to be a diva, Velma?
“Crazy, talented and confidence to suit.”
Will you have a guest joining you remotely, like you did with Twinnie, Louise Dearman and Jodie Steel for your previous online shows?
“I am working on this. Hopefully I will.”
What are your upcoming plans as lockdown loosens ever more expansively?
“Darlings, you can now book Velma OR Ian to perform privately for your ‘Bubble’ in your outside space/garden or publicly if you have a venue with enough room for social distancing indoors or out!!!
“Get in touch if this is something you might be interested in at stroughair2@hotmail.com.”
SCARBOROUGH’S Stephen Joseph Theatre is taking its two community choirs online from next week to work on songs culminating in a video.
The Funky Choir and Global Voices each have around 30 members and both always welcome new members.
The SJT’s associate director for children and young people, Cheryl Govan, herself a Funky Choir member, says: ”Singing is a great way to unwind – we all do it in the shower! – and it really doesn’t matter if you’re a brilliant singer or not. Singing is scientifically proven to make you feel happier.
“Don’t be put off if you think you can’t sing: this is about having a good time. The best bit about Zoom choirs is that only the people in your own house can hear you!”
The Funky Zoom Choir will meet on Tuesdays at 7pm from June 30 after going from strength to strength in the past few years, developing a varied and colourful set of lively pop, funk, disco and soul covers.
Musical director Mark Gordon, a prominent face on the Scarborough music scene for more than 30 years, performs regularly with many bands and takes on the role of musical director for theatre shows.
Mark teaches music in Scarborough schools and runs youth orchestras, jazz bands, rock workshops and choirs, as well as being a private piano teacher.
The Global Voices Zoom choir will gather remotely on Thursdays at 7pm from July 2 to resume singing songs from around the world, from warm-ups, short rounds and chants to more complex, exciting songs.
Choir leader, music teacher and composer Sarah Dew creates musical journeys in soundscapes that blend her field recordings, melody and ambient sound art. Poetic narrative features in many of her ethereal works and she has written extensively for her band Raven, whose performances around the region over many years celebrate life, love and the universe.
Looking forward to next week’s re-start, Cheryl Govan says: “The Funky Choir will be learning Car Washby Rose Royce – a funky song if ever there were one! The end result will be a fun and lively video.
“Global Voices will be learning Nina Simone’s I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free, giving participants the chance to reflect on what freedom means to them. This reflective, but super-fun, process will result in a thoughtful video to accompany the song.”
Membership of The Funky Choir and Global Voices costs £35 each for a five-week term. For more information, go to: sjt.uk.com/getinvolved/adult.
BUOYED by their Enemies anthem entering the official physical singles chart at number two at the weekend, York indie-rock band Skylights have booked their biggest headline show yet.
The Leeds United-supporting four-piece from Acomb will top the bill at Leeds Brudenell Social Club on Saturday, February 20 2021, with tickets going on sale on Wednesday at 9am at seetickets.com/tour/skylights. “Where better [to play] than one of the country’s number one venues, the Brudenell,” they enthused on Twitter today.
In April, Skylights signed a deal with 42’s Records to launch their debut album, whose title and release date are now awaited.
In the meantime, singer Rob Scarisbrick, guitarist Turnbull Smith, bass player Jonny Scarisbrick and drummer Myles Soley are celebrating the chart success of Enemies. “What a few weeks it’s been for us. Waiting for the charts felt like forever,” they said on Twitter.
“No-one has the type of loyal fan base we have. The number two position for a song that was available for streaming since January is down to our fans and I hope you all feel part of it.”
KAISER Chiefs’ pop-meets-art exhibition at York Art Gallery can be enjoyed all over again online.
The Leeds indie rock band collaborated with senior curator Beatrice Bertram in 2018 to create When All Is Quiet, an innovative show that “explored the liminal spaces between art and sound, sensation and perception, and creation and performance”.
For the December 14 2018 to March 10 2019 run, Kaiser Chiefs hand-picked 11 paintings from York Art Gallery’s collection to show alongside a selection of songs by contemporary musicians and sound artists that have influenced their practice directly.
You can listen to the Spotify playlist at: open.spotify.com/playlist/0Vs2kvg5xcPV8Pnna3l66d?si=NV1iSHX8QLavG_GMDveA5A.
The exhibition featured work by Peter Donnelly; Bryan Winter; John Hoyland; Jack Butler Yeats; Malcolm Edward Hughes; Oliver Bevan; John Golding; L. S. Lowry; J. M. W. Turner, Rebecca Appleby and Bridget Riley.
The chance to “re-visit” When All Is Quiet: The Kaiser Chiefs in Conversation with York Art Gallery comes courtesy of Art UK at @artukdotorg.
Kaiser Chiefs should have been playing their Forest Live gig at Dalby Forest on Friday (June 26), but the Covid-19 pandemic intervened.
IF you can’t wait for York countertenor Iestyn Davies’s July 9 concert with lutenist Elizabeth Kenny at the online 2020 York Early Music Festival, tune into BBC Radio 3 today.
At 1pm, Davies and Kenny will be introduced by Martin Handley live at London’s Wigmore Hall, where they will perform works by Purcell, Dowland, Campion, Johnson, Mozart and Schubert.
In York next month, Davies and Kenny, a former artistic adviser to the York Early Music Festival, will team up at a socially distanced, otherwise empty National Centre for Early Music for The Art Of Melancholy.
Streamed live from the former St Margaret’s Church, Walmgate, their 7.30pm programme will combine the music of Elizabethan lutenist John Dowland with Davies’s renditions and readings of poetry by Robert Burton, Michael Drayton, Rose Tremain, Leo Tolstoy and Dowland himself.
Tickets for the July 9 to 11 festival are on sale at tickets.ncem.co.uk and boxoffice@ncem.co.uk, with a festival package at £30, individual concert tickets at £10 each and illustrated talks at £3.50 each.
Back to today’s live Lunchtime Concert, one of a series of 20 recitals being broadcast from Wigmore Hall every weekday in June as part of BBC Arts’ Culture in Quarantine initiative.
Taking place without an audience present, these are the first live concert broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 since the start of lockdown, bringing together “some of the UK’s finest instrumentalists and singers in music from the 16th century to the present day”.
Today’s hour-long programme comprises:
Purcell: Strike The Viol from Come, Ye Sons Of Art Away;
Purcell: By Beauteous Softness from Now Does The Glorious Day Appear;
Purcell: Lord, What Is Man?;
Purcell: Rigadoon (arranged by Elizabeth Kenny);
Purcell: Sefauchi’s Farewell (arr. Elizabeth Kenny);
Purcell: Lilbulero (arr. Elizabeth Kenny).
Dowland: Behold A Wonder Here Opus;
Campion: The Sypres Curten Of The Night Is Spread;
Johnson: Fantasie;
Dowland: Sorrow, Stay, Lend True Repentant Tears;
Dowland: King Of Denmark’s Galliard;
Campion: I Care Not For These Ladies;
Anon: Mr Confess’ Coranto.
Mozart: Abendempfindung;
Schubert: Heidenröslein;
Schubert: Litanei Auf Das Fest Aller Seelen.
MELODY Gardot’s lockdown single From Paris With Love est arrivé “after incredible efforts made by fans to help finish the track”.
Confined in the French capital, where she now lives, the American singer-songwriter made headlines last month when she launched a call-out on social networks for musicians to join her on her remote new project with a “global yet personal tone”.
After reviewing hundreds of the online submissions from the United States, Armenia, South Korea, Japan, Australia, Brazil, Norway and beyond, the final piece is ready, completed in the first session at London’s Abbey Road studios after lockdown.
From Paris With Love combines the musicality and skills of orchestral musicians from all over the world who have never met, many of them out of work these past few months, unable to perform under COVID-19 strictures.
The hopelessness of this continuing situation for Gardot’s fellow musicians inspired the New Jersey-born singer to embark on her ambitious digital recording in isolation. All musicians chosen for the final project were paid a fee relative to the standard UK musicians’ studio wage.
“This project is a stunning example of how music is a universal language and how our global awareness is greater than ever” says Gardot, 35. “Seeing what’s happening around the world, we cannot ignore our need for love and connection during this time.
“I am so happy to see the generous response displayed in the vast array of characters, from all corners of the globe, coming together to create this unique piece of music. It is a symbolic gesture for the way we can offer hope as we look towards the idea of creation in the future.”
The global digital orchestra musicians were selected by producer Larry Klein, conductor, arranger and composer Vince Mendoza and veteran engineers Al Schmitt and Steve Genewick, who have worked in the past with Frank Sinatra, Joao Gilberto, Bob Dylan and Paul McCartney.
From Paris With Love’s accompanying video captures the selected musicians performing from their homes, complemented by a montage of people who sent video portraits of themselves with messages of love from all over the globe.
“This video is a kind of a digital postcard, made possible by the generous contributions of musicians and people currently confined,” says Gardot. “My hope is that this message will continue to find its way around the world and bring hope where hope is most needed to leave us all feeling more connected. My most heartfelt thanks to everyone who participated in the making of this project.”
Earlier this month, Gardot had the honour of being the first artist through the doors when Abbey Road Studio re-opened for business after ten weeks for a socially distanced album recording session.
From Paris With Love is being released on the Decca Records label to benefit healthcare workers; both Decca and Gardot are waiving their profit, instead paying a minimum of 50p to the charity Protégé Ton Soignant for each permanent download sold in the UK and 20p for each permanent download sold outside Britain or for every 150 streams.