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York Early Music Christmas Festival will start…earlier!

Fieri Consort: taking a trip to Christmas Eve in 1629 Rome in York
THE 2019 York Early Music Christmas Festival is starting earlier, two hours earlier, to be precise, after Solomon’s Knot’s sold-out opening concert on December 7 was moved to 4.30pm.

Performing without a conductor and from memory at the National Centre for Early Music, the 14-piece baroque group will present Festive Music from 17th century France, as they make their much anticipated Christmas festival debut with a brace of Charpentier works, A Song On The Birth Of Our Lord and Pastoral On The Birth Of Our Lord, Jesus Christ.

“We’re a group of singers and players who are prepared to take risks in order to communicate more directly with our audiences,” they say.

To make sure they arrive in York well in time for their 12.30pm Sunday concert, the recorder group Palisander will be travelling by car, rather than risking public transport!

Lydia Gosnell, Miriam Monaghan, Caoimhe de Paor and Elspeth Robertson will perform A Yuletyde Eve on recorders of all shapes and sizes, as they return to the NCEM, in St Margaret’s Church, Walmgate, after playing there in March.

Expect an afternoon hour of “very entertaining” Renaissance music, including works by Praetorius and Tye, as well as some more familiar carols.

Owain Park, a former winner of the NCEM Young Composers Award, will direct his ensemble, The Gesualso Six, in Videte Miraculum at 6.30pm on December 8.

Inspired by Advent being a time of mystery, reflection and wonder, this two-hour journey through the ages and across borders will weave Christmas carols, such as Praetorius’s Es Ist Ein Ros Entsprungen, seamlessly with 21st century works, including Park’s luscious On The Infancy Of Our Saviour.

On December 9, wind ensemble Boxwood & Brass re-create A Georgian Country House Christmas at 7.30pm. Their “Band of Musick” play as a traditional Georgian militia ensemble of clarinets, horns and bassoon, regaling their audience with quintets, marches, dance music and regional carols.

Very sadly, Joglaresa’s Sing We Yule concert on December 10 at 7.30pm will be their last visit to the NCEM.  “Their leader, Belinda Sykes, has been diagnosed with terminal cancer,” says NCEM artistic director Delma Tomlin. “I shall deeply miss Belinda and her wonderful consort; she has been such a fantastic leading light of the Early Music world, and Joglaresa’s concerts here have been a joy.”

Belinda, singer and recorder and bagpipe player, will lead Joglaresa in an effervescent programme of traditional carols and wassails, lullabies and dance tunes, from Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales as they “chase out the chill from the Celtic fringes of Europe”.

On Wednesday, December 11 at 6.30pm, Fieri Consort will take a trip to Rome on Christmas Eve in 1629, where a performance of Giovanni Girolamo Kapsperger’s oratorio The Shepherds Of Bethlehem is taking place in the lavishly decorated Vatican palace.

Featuring a libretto by the future Pope Clement IX, this Christmas play tells the story of the Nativity through solos, duets, trios and full choruses, interspersed with instrumental and vocal pieces by Kapsperger and his contemporaries.

A second concert is on the move, this one on account of the NCEM being a polling station for the General Election on December 12. Ceruleo will now perform Burying The Dead at St Lawrence’s Church, Hull Road, instead.

Written by Clare Norburn and directed by Thomas Guthrie, with lighting by Pitch Black and costumes by Hannah Pearson, this new theatre show for the 21st century will take the 7.30pm audience on a fictional journey into the head of composer Henry Purcell, played by actor Niall Ashdown.

Purcell is in the throes of his final illness, suffering from feverish hallucinations, wherein the past, present and fantasy collide and his songs take on a life of their own.

Fretwork’s December 13 concert with mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston, winner of the 2018 Handel Singing Competition, has sold out. Their 6.30pm programme, From Virgin’s Womb, will interweave William Byrd’s In Nomines with seasonal Elizabethan music by Holborne, Peerson, Weelkes and Gibbons, the songs being accompanied by viols. Jollity meets piousness, rejoicing and reflection meet drunkenness and misbehaviour, in Fretwork’s company.

The Mellstock Band’s Philip Humphries has an interesting programme credit: not only voice, but also serpent. “Yes, this Dorset band bring real serpents,” says Delma, ahead of snakes arriving on December 14 at 1pm.

Humphries and co’s Christmas Frolics in period costumes will be an uproarious celebration of dance, drink and general misbehaviour, as carried on in many villages until a century ago, along with sobering admonitions from the puritans, parsons, preachers and angels.

Carols dedicated to dancing, bell ringing and cider will vie for attention with “the Devil’s own tunes”, complemented by the Wessex stories of Thomas Hardy and William Barnes.

The York musicians of the Yorkshire Bach Choir, under the direction of Peter Seymour, will close the festival with a 7pm performance of Handel’s Messiah at the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York, on December 14.Helen Charlston will be among the soloists, alongside soprano Bethany Seymour, tenor Gwilym Bowen and bass Gareth Brynmor John.

“We will echo Handel’s London performances, including some rarely heard versions,” says Peter.

All concerts will take place at the NCEM unless otherwise stated. Tickets are on sale on 01904 658338 or at tickets.ncem.co.uk.

Charles Hutchinson

Copyright of The Press, York
Fretwork: sold-out concert

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Yorkshire Shepherdess’s happy Christmas is on the cards for air ambulance charity

The Yorkshire Shepherdess Gathering Her Animals And Children In Time For Christmas: Anita Bowerman’s new charity Christmas card for Yorkshire Air Ambulance

YORKSHIRE Air Ambulance ambassador Amanda Owen and her farming family feature in a new charity Christmas card painted by Harrogate artist Anita Bowerman.

Owen, alias The Yorkshire Shepherdess, is at present drawing more than 1.5 million viewers to the second series of her Channel 5 documentary Our Yorkshire Farm on Tuesday nights.

She was first the focus of a Yorkshire Air Ambulance (YAA) charity card last year, showing Amanda surrounded by her beloved sheep and dogs on a harsh winter’s day.

Crimson Glory Vine (Vitis Coignetiae) at RHS Garden Harlow Carr, one of Anita Bowerman’s 12 paintings from her artist-in-residence year

Painted by Anita, it became the charity’s best-seller, with cards flying off around the world.

This year’s card for the YAA already is proving more popular than ever and once more all the proceeds will go to the charity.

Harrogate artist Anita Bowerman painting Amanda Owen, The Yorkshire Shepherdess, at her moorland farm for last year’s Yorkshire Air Ambulance Christmas card

“I’m absolutely delighted to feature again on the Yorkshire Air Ambulance Christmas cards,” says Amanda. “Anita Bowerman is a fantastically skilled artist who has a unique ability to depict children and animals in wonderfully intricate detail. 

“I’m hopeful that these cards will go worldwide and raise much-needed funds for this incredible charity. 100 per cent profit goes to the YAA.”

Amanda, hill farmer, mother of nine, photographer, public speaker and author, lives with husband Clive and their family at Ravenseat in Upper Swaledale, North Yorkshire, one of the highest, most remote hill farms in England.

Maytenus Boaria Tree at RHS Garden Harlow Carr, September, by Anita Bowerman

She has always supported the work of the YAA, given the remote area where they live and the nature of the charity’s work, but it was an introduction through Anita that brought Amanda and the charity closer together.

“I was contacted by Anita last year to ask if I’d be happy to collaborate with her and the YAA by painting me and my sheep as a scene for one of their Christmas cards,” says Amanda.

Travelling Home For Christmas:, one of Anita Bowerman’s Christmas card designs for Yorkshire Air Ambulance

“Obviously it was a real honour for me to accept, and the card went on to be the Charity’s best-selling Christmas card.

“I hear they were sending them out all around the world, and as far away as Canada. We have kept in contact since and when I was asked to be an ambassador, I was absolutely delighted. I genuinely couldn’t think of a better organisation to be involved with.  I was very emotional when they first asked me.”

The Winter Walk At RHS Garden, Harlow Carr, December, by Anita Bowerman

Amanda adds: “I’m aware that living as remotely as we do, the YAA is a vital service that can make the difference between life and death. We have had our fair share of medical emergencies, though we’re fortunate to have never yet ourselves required the services of the YAA.”

Painting Amanda and her family and animals is always such a joy for Anita. “In the card you can see Amanda with some of her children, sheepdogs, a robin, Tony the Pony, an owl, a robin and much more,” she says.

“The holly hanging above them is kept in this ancient barn all year. The original painting can be seen in my Dove Tree gallery and studio in Harrogate.

The Snow Lays Deep And Crisp And Even: Anita Bowerman’s third design for her 2019 Christmas cards for Yorkshire Air Ambulance

“It’s a privilege to be able to support the vital work of the YAA through the sale of these cards, and having Amanda as an ambassador is a bonus.” 

Priced at £4 for ten cards, they are available at yorkshireairambulance.org.uk/product/Yorkshire-shepherdess-2/ or from Anita’s gallery in Back Granville Road, Harrogate. (Visit anitabowerman.co.uk for location details and opening times.)

Anita has illustrated two more cards for the YAA this Christmas: Ribblehead Viaduct and Malham Cove. Meanwhile, copies of last year’s card are still available at yaa.org.uk/shop.

The Tarn At RHS Garden Harlow Carr, November, by Anita Bowerman

If you are seeking Christmas presents or cards, Anita will be hosting champagne and canapes events to mark the eighth anniversary of her gallery on December 5 from 6pm to 8pm and December 7, 10am to 3.30pm.

“I’m also artist-in-residence this year at RHS Garden Harlow Carr, in Harrogate, where I’ll be appearing in the shop there every Saturday, from 4pm to 8pm, during Harlow Carr’s Glow winter illuminations until Christmas,” says Anita, who will be doing mini-demonstrations and chatting to visitors.

Glow: the winter illuminations at RHS Garden Harlow Carr, Harrogate, pictured in November 2017

“I’ve finished all 12 paintings of the gardens, one for each month, all made using moss, twigs and leaves, and now have my prints and cards in the shop.”

The Glow winter illuminations at Harlow Carr light up the gardens after dusk every Thursday, Friday and Saturday until December 28, from 4.30pm to 8pm, except on Boxing Day, with last admission at 7pm.

On those days, special lighting effects transform Streamside, the Queen Mother’s Lake, Winter Walk, the Doric Columns and Alpine House.

New for this year, as part of the Glow adventure, you can enjoy illuminated sculptures, such as a silver angel; meander through a tunnel of twinkling lights as you enter the Kitchen Garden, and finish the trail at a festive-themed marquee with Christmas carols.

Glow tickets can be booked at gardentickets.rhs.org.uk/

Did you know?

Yorkshire Air Ambulance serves five million people across Yorkshire, carrying out more than 1,500 missions every year. The charity operates two state-of-the-art Airbus H145 helicopters and needs to raise £12,000 every day to keep saving lives.

Charles Hutchinson

Chris Gorman’s film footage of Anita Bowerman at work at RHS Harlow Carr, Harrogate, during her year as artist-in-residence.

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Tom Taylor to headline Laugh Out Loud line-up at York Barbican

Taylor made: Harrogate comedian Tom Taylor spins his stories at York Barbican

HARROGATE comedian and Sitting Room Comedy promoter Tom Taylor hops over to York to headline the Laugh Out Loud ComedyClub line-up at York Barbican on December 20.

Taylor is an award-winning humorist and writer who featured on BBC Radio 4 in the BBC New Comedy Award with his offbeat musical comedy and droll one-liners.

MIke Newall: smooth-talking Manchester comic

Both a stand-up and character actor, Taylor has penned and performed two murder mystery solo shows, A Charlie Montague Mystery: The Game’s A Foot and Try The Fish/ The Man With The Twisted Hip, as seen at York’s Great Yorkshire Fringe.

Joining him in the Fishergate Bar will be casual, smooth-talking, story-telling Manchester comedian Mike Newall, whose Nineties’ Britpop haircut has gained him the nickname “The Real Magic Mike”.

Debra-Jane Appleby: no-nonsense northerner

Debra-Jane Appleby, former winner of the Leicester Mercury Comedian of the Year and Funny Women Comedy Award in 2005, completes the 8pm line-up with her no-nonsense northern take on the world.

Doors open at 7pm, and the host, as ever, will be Laugh Out Loud promoter Damion Larkin.

Tickets are on sale on 0203 356 5441, at yorkbarbican.co.uk or in person from the Barbican box office.

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White Cube’s Harland Miller comes home for biggest solo show at York Art Gallery

York, So Good They Named It Once, by Harland Miller, oil on canvas, 2009, copyright Harland Miller, Photo copyright: White Cube (Stephen White)

YORK artist and writer Harland Miller’s largest ever solo exhibition will be held in his home city next year.

Harland Miller: York, So Good They Named It Once will run at York Art Gallery from February 14 to May 31 2020.

Supported by fellow North Yorkshireman Jay Jopling’s White Cube galleries in London, the show features Miller’s best-known series, the Penguin Book Covers and the Pelican Bad Weather Paintings.

These works directly refer to the 55-year-old artist’s relationship with York, the city where he was born and grew up before moving to London, as well as making wider references to the culture and geography of Yorkshire as a whole.

Death, What’s in it For Me?, by Harland Miller, oil on canvas, 2007, copyright Harland Miller, Photo copyright: White Cube (Stephen White)

The titles are all sardonic statements on life: York, So Good They Named It; Once Whitby – The Self Catering Years; Rags to Polyester – My Story and Incurable Romantic Seeks Dirty Filthy Whore.

In addition to these dust-jacket paintings, Miller will show works from his recent Letter Painting series: canvasses made up of overlaid letters to form short words or acronyms in a format inspired by the illuminated letters of medieval manuscripts.

Miller left Yorkshire to study at Chelsea School of Art, graduating in 1988 with an MA, since when he has lived in London, New York, Berlin and New Orleans.

He has held solo exhibitions at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, in 2009 and Palacio Quintanar, Segovia, Spain, in 2015. Group exhibitions include the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, in 1996; Kunsthalle Mannheim, Germany, 2004; Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 2005, 2006 and 2007; Sculpture in the Close, Jesus College, Cambridge, 2013, and Somerset House, London, 2016.

In 2008, Miller curated the group show You Dig The Tunnel, I’ll Hide The Soil, an homage to Edgar Allan Poe to mark the bicentenary of his birth, at White Cube and Shoreditch Town Hall, London.

Ace, by Harland Miller, oil on canvas, 2017, copyright Harland Miller, Photo copyright: White Cube (George Darrell)

His first novel, Slow Down Arthur, Stick To Thirty, the story of a child who travels around northern England with a David Bowie impersonator, was published by Fourth Estate in 2000.

That same year, Book Works published his novella, At First I Was Afraid, a study of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, based on the true story of a female relative, whose box of Polaroid images, all of oven knobs turned to “Off”, was discovered by Miller.

In his artwork, he continues to create work in the vein of his Penguin covers, wherein he married aspects of Pop Art, abstraction and figurative painting with his writer’s love of text. He now includes his own phrases, some humorous and absurd, others marked by a lush melancholia.

Charles Hutchinson

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History forgot genius scientist Nicholas Saunderson but musical will tell his story

Adam Martyn: partially sighted actor who will play 18th century blind scientist Nicholas Saunderson in No Horizon next year

NO Horizon, a new musical that tells the forgotten story of a Yorkshire maths genius, will tour to York Theatre Royal next April after more than a decade in the making.

Andy Platt’s show is inspired by the life of Nicholas Saunderson, a blind scientist and mathematician from the West Riding village of Thurlstone, near Penistone, who overcame impossible odds to become a Cambridge professor and friend of royalty.

Often described as an 18th century Stephen Hawking, Saunderson was born in 1862 and by the age of one he was blinded by smallpox. In an era before Braille, it is said he taught himself to read by running his fingers over the gravestones in a local churchyard.

He learned Latin and Greek and became Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge, a post also held by Sir Isaac Newton, Charles Babbage and the aforementioned Stephen Hawking. 

In his day, Saunderson spent time with kings and queens and had a reputation that spread across Europe. Remarkably, his field of expertise was not in mathematical equations, but in lecturing about optics.

It is thought that Saunderson, who was elected a member of the Royal Society, may have been the earliest discoverer of Bayes’ theorem, a mathematical formula for determining conditional probability.

A past performance of No Horizon, set to be revived on a northern tour in 2020

Described by singer and BBC Radio Two presenter Elaine Paige as “one to watch out for”, Platt’s musical will run in York on April 9 and 11 – no performance on Good Friday – as part of its 2020 northern tour mounted by Right Hand Theatre, in the wake of an Edinburgh Fringe run in 2016.

The show was first written in 2003 by Platt, a former headmaster who rediscovered Saunderson’s remarkable journey after it was forgotten by history. 

“Saunderson’s achievement as the Stephen Hawking of his day was phenomenal,” says the writer and producer. “I wanted No Horizon to entertain and move the audience at the same time as restoring Saunderson to his rightful place as a national icon. Next year’s tour is the culmination of a 15-year dream.”

The lead role of Saunderson will be played by the partially sighted Adam Martyn, from Doncaster, South Yorkshire, who trained at Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts.

He will be on the road in the 2020 tour from March 19, when No Horizon opens at The Civic, Barnsley, the nearest major theatre near to Saunderson’s birthplace.

The poster for next spring’s tour of No Horizon by Right Hand Theatre

After further shows there on March 20 and 21, the tour will head on to the Viaduct Theatre, Halifax, March 26 to 28; Leeds City Varieties, March 31 and April 1; Cast, Doncaster, April 2 to 4; Harrogate Theatre, April 7 and 8; York Theatre Royal, April 9 and 11, and Millgate Arts Centre, Delph, Saddleworth, April 15.

Helen Reid, producer at Right Hand Theatre, says: “I’m so excited we’ve managed to pull off and organise a northern tour. It’s only taken over a decade to do it!

“We couldn’t have done it without the support of our fan base at the Edinburgh Fringe and locally, to help bring the show to a wider audience. 

“We look forward to seeing our old fans and new fans alike at any of the northern venues. The support we’ve had so far from the public and celebrities has been immensely rewarding for Andy and the producers. We thank them all.”

The 2020 tour is funded by Arts Council England and Foyle Foundation, co-commissioned by Cast, Doncaster, and The Civic, Barnsley, and supported by Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind.

York tickets are on sale on 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk; Leeds, 0113 243 0808 or cityvarieties.co.uk; Harrogate, 01423 502116 or at harrogatetheatre.co.uk.

Charles Hutchinson

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Here comes Cleveland Watkiss’s night of Jamaican sunshine at NCEM

Jamaican joy: London jazz singer Cleveland Watkiss celebrates his Caribbean roots at the NCEM, York

HACKNEY jazz singer Cleveland Watkiss brings the winter sunshine to the National Centre for Early Music in York on Thursday when presenting his Great Jamaican Songbook concert.

Marking his 60th year with a joyous show, Watkiss revives some of the greatest songs written by Jamaican legends Gregory Isaacs, Dennis Brown and Delroy Wilson et al as he presents a personal project exploring music that connects him to his Jamaican roots.

Watkiss will be delving into Jamaica’s long history of pioneering musical sounds, from Mento and Ska to Reggae, Dub and Roots, as well as highlighting record labels and producers such as Studio One, Coxsone Dodd, TuffGong, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, and King Tubby.

His 7.30pm set list takes in the work of Don Drummond; Ernest Ranglin; the Barrett Brothers; Jackie Mittoo; Leroy  ‘Horsemouth’ Wallace; Alton Ellis; Ken Booth; The Wailers; Millie Small; Marcia Griffith; Dawn Penn; Dennis Brown; Gregory Isaacs; Burnin’ Spear and Johnny Osbourne, many of whom graduated from The Alpha Boys School under the tutelage of Sister Mary Ignatius Davis, alias “The Nun”.

Thursday night’s musical guests are drawn from Watkiss’s collaborators old and new: Orphy Robinson, on keyboards and percussion; Ray Carless, saxophones; Byron Wallen, trumpet; Delroy Murray, bass; Brandon Murray, guitars; Dan Barnett, drums, and Phil Ramocon, keyboards.

Tickets cost £18, concessions £16, on 01904 658338 or at tickets.ncem.co.uk.

Charles Hutchinson

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Why Pocklington’s blues and roots weekend was its biggest and best yet

Guitarist Robbie McIntosh, right, leads a workshop during the Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend at Pocklington Arts Centre earlier this month

POCKLINGTON Arts Centre is celebrating its “biggest and best” Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend yet.

Hosted by guitarist Robbie McIntosh and blues slide guitarist Michael Messer from November 15 to 17, this annual event drew a full house of students from across Britain and raised £20,000 for the Pocklington economy.

The students spent the weekend being tutored by McIntosh, who has toured with Paul McCartney, Norah Jones, and The Pretenders, and fellow regular host Messer.

The three-day event featured guitar and slide guitar tuition, jam sessions, student performances and the Acoustic Blues House Party, when Pocklington Arts Centre opened its doors to the public for a one-off concert starring Messer and McIntosh.

The opening day was featured in an afternoon live broadcast on BBC Radio Humberside with presenter Phil White and his crew.

“This year’s Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend was a resounding success; in fact it was the most successful one eve,” says Messer. “I’ve been involved with running this event at Pocklington Arts Centre for 16 years and I couldn’t hope for a better venue.

“The PAC staff are so helpful, supportive and welcoming that everyone, participants and tutors, want for nothing.

Guitarists Robbie McIntosh, left, and Michael Messer at this month’s Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend at Pocklington Arts Centre

“In addition, the various hotels and restaurants around town all welcomed us and provided us with fantastic service.

 “All I can say is, ‘thank you Pocklington and we very much look forward to next year’s Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend’.”

Data collated from surveys conducted by the arts centre have shown that students attending the weekend spent around £20,000, including accommodation and visits to pubs, restaurants, cafes and shops.

Arts centre director Janet Farmer says: “We said last year that our Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend just keeps going from strength to strength, but this year has just blown us away.

“Hosting the event not only fills our auditorium, studio and bar with the incredible sounds of acoustic blues and roots music, but also the average expenditure from every single student also makes for a resoundingly positive experience for everyone involved, including local businesses. We very much look forward to welcoming everyone back again next year.”

The 2020 Acoustic Blues and Roots Weekend will take place from November 13 to 15. Watch this space for confirmation of when tickets will go on sale.

Charles Hutchinson

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Ebor Players celebrate silver anniversary of Bishopthorpe pantos with Mother Goose

Ebor Players cast members for Mother Goose gather at Bishopthorpe Village Hall

THE Ebor Players mark the 25th anniversary of their first pantomime by staging Mother Goose from December 2 to 7 at Bishopthorpe Village Hall, near York.

David Rose will play the title role after “taking a huge break with tradition” last year when, for the first time in more than 20 years, he switched to the dark side as the villainous Abanazar in Aladdin.

“Although I thoroughly enjoyed the change, this year I’m back in frocks for my traditional role as dame,” he says.

The Ebor Players were formed in 1994 in Bishopthorpe. “The aim was to present a pantomime in the village,” recalls David. “Now, 25 years later, the Players just go from strength to strength.

“Our pantomimes today bear little resemblance to those early years. The group has evolved to present a much slicker, more professional-looking show. This year’s show, Mother Goose, has a cast and crew of more than 40 people and is a riot of colour, music and laughter, with something for everyone.”

Performances will start at 7.30pm each evening. “Our Saturday night adults-only shows have always been so popular and oversubscribed, so this year we’ve introduced a Wednesday evening adults-only – 16 plus – cabaret-style event, but at the same price as our regular shows” says David. “So you can come along, have a drink and let your hair down for the evening.”

Tickets cost £8 for adults, £6 for children, at ticketsource.co.uk\ebor-players, on 07591 297221 or via the Ebor Players’ Facebook page.

Charles Hutchinson

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York company Pilot Theatre to stage premiere of Crongton Knights

Olisa Odele: cast as McKay in Pilot Theatre’s Crongton Knights

YORK company Pilot Theatre have assembled the cast for next year’s world premiere of Crongton Knights.

Adapted for the stage by Emteaz Hussain from Alex Wheatle’s award-winning novel, Corey Campbell and Esther Richardson’s co-production will be launched at the Belgrade Theatre, Coventry, from February 8 to 22 before playing York Theatre Royal from February 25 to 29.

In Crongton Knights, life isn’t easy on the Crongton Estate. McKay and his mates favour keeping their heads down, but when a friend finds herself in trouble, they set out on a mission that goes further than any of them imagined. 

Katie Donnachie: playing Bushkid in Crongton Knights

Pilot Theatre’s show will take you on a night of madcap adventure as McKay and his friends, The Magnificent Six, encounter the dangers and triumphs of a quest gone awry.

The pulse of the city will be alive on stage, propelled by a soundscape of beatboxing and vocals laid down by the cast and created by musician Conrad Murray.

Rehearsals will begin in Coventry on January 6 2020. Leading the cast will be Olisa Odele as McKay, having played Ola in Chewing Gum on E4 and PC Merrick in BBC1’s Scarborough, while Kate Donnachie will take the role of Bushkid; Simi Egbejumi-David, Festus; Aimee Powell, Venetia; Khai Shaw, Jonah; Marcel White, Nesta, and Nigar Yeva, Saira.

Khai Shaw: taking the role of Jonah in Crongton Knights

The production team is led by Corey Campbell, artistic director of Strictly Arts Theatre Company and co-artistic director of the Belgrade Theatre for 2021, and Esther Richardson, Pilot’s artistic director. The designer is Simon Kenny; lighting is by Richard G Jones, who lit The Railway Children at the National Railway Museum, York.

Crongton Knights will be the second of four co-productions between Pilot Theatre, Derby Theatre, Belgrade Theatre, Coventry, and York Theatre Royal, who last year formed a partnership to develop theatre for younger audiences in tandem with the Mercury Theatre, Colchester.

Heather Agyepong as Sephy in Pilot Theatre’s Noughts & Crosses at York Theatre Royal in April 2019. Picture: Robert Day

From 2019 to 2022, the consortium will commission and co-produce an original mid-scale touring production each year. Each show will play in all the consortium venues, as well as touring nationally. 

The consortium’s first production, Noughts & Crosses, was seen by more than 30,000 people on tour this year, with 40 per cent of the audience being aged under 20.

After the Coventry and York runs, Crongton Knights will be on tour until May 9, with further Yorkshire performances at the Lawrence Batley Theatre, Huddersfield, from March 31 to April 4. York tickets are on sale on 01904 623568, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or in person from the Theatre Royal box office.

Charles Hutchinson

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Mark Hird picks favourite Scrooge as Pick Me Up musical prepares to fly

Bah Humbug! Mark Hird as Scrooge in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Scrooge The Musical. Picture: David Harrison

WHO is your favourite Scrooge? Albert Finney? Tim Curry? Patrick Stewart? George C Scott? Lionel Barrymore on the radio?

Maybe Michael Caine in The Muppets’ Christmas Carol? Jim Carrey? Or how about Jim Backus as the voice of Mister Magoo in Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol, or even Bill Murray’s Frank Cross in Scrooged?

Mark Hird, who plays Scrooge from tomorrow (November 26) in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Scrooge The Musical at the Grand Opera House, York, has no hesitation in picking Alastair Sim from Brian Desmond Hurst’s 1951 film, Scrooge.

“I loved his performance! He was unashamedly nasty, but there was something in his eyes, that glint, that made you think there’s something going on there,” says Mark, who is leading Robert Readman’s cast, fresh from directing this autumn’s Pick Me Up musical, Monster Makers, at 41 Monkgate.

He now adds Charles Dickens’s Ebenezer Scrooge to a diverse Pick Me Up CV that includes Captain Mainwaring inDad’s Army, Colonel Pickering inMy Fair Lady and Uncle Fester in The Addams Family, and he is particularly enjoying performing the songs in Leslie Bricusse’s musical.

“Maybe we need another Dickens for this age,,” says Mark Hird, who sees the abiding resonance in A Christmas Carol

“The songs really help in bringing out Scrooge’s thoughts, whether in the 1970 film musical with Albert Finney or the stage version with six extra songs. You discover new things every time you do it.” says Mark.

“I’ve had the chance to play some really cold, nasty characters: there’s nothing redeemable about Inspector Wormold in Betty Blue Eyes or The Beadle in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street, but, on the other side, I also get to play all the ridiculously loveable characters, like Captain Mainwaring, Uncle Fester and Colonel Pickering.

“So, in many ways, Scrooge is more interesting because he goes on a journey from one to the other, and it’s really fun as an actor to make that transition, but also not to make him black and white. There are reasons in his past for some of the things he’s doing.”

Time for a quick refresher course: based on Dickens’s Victorian cautionary tale A Christmas Carol, Scrooge tells the tale of old miser Ebenezer Scrooge on the night he is visited by the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet To Come. Here that tale is told in an “all-singing, all-dancing, all-flying” show.

“I haven’t flown on stage before, but I’m not scared of heights,” says Mark Hird

All-flying, Mark?  “Yes, we have some flying in this show. Scrooge has to fly with Rory Mulvihill’s Ghost of Christmas Present, and Tony Froud’s Jacob Marley will float above the stage to sing his big number,” says the Scotsman.

“I haven’t flown on stage before, but I’m not scared of heights. I love walking the hills in Scotland.”

Joining Mark in the company will be Alan Park’s Bob Cratchit. “The advantage we have doing the show at the Grand Opera House, rather than our other home at 41 Micklegate, is that you can put on a big spectacle, but you can also have intimate scenes too, such as Cratchit and Tiny Tim’s scenes,” says Alan.

“But the experience of performing at 41 Micklegate develops that intimate form of acting, which you can then take into the bigger theatre,” says Mark.

He and Park see the contemporary resonance in Dickens’s story. “It’s amazing to look back at the impact Dickens’s book had on politicians, as well as general readers, concerning the inequality of working conditions for the working classes, and the cruelty Cratchit faces. That strikes a chord today,” says Mark.

” it’s really fun as an actor to make Scrooge’s transition, but also not to make him black and white,” says Mark Hird

“Cratchit thinks ‘this is my lot; I will make the most of what I have’, and he sees Scrooge as alien to his world, because that’s how society is,” says Alan.

“No politician will change Scrooge, but the three Ghosts do have an impact, which makes him change himself.

“But what’s more depressing is that if A Christmas Carol were to be played out in modern times, I’m not sure there would be sympathy for the Bob Cratchits of this world.”

“Maybe we need another Dickens for this age,” says Mark. “If the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come brought Dickens to 2019, I think he would be horrified.”

“You could argue that we need the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come to visit some of our politicians right now,” says Alan, as the winter-of-discontent General Election fast approaches.

Pick Me Up Theatre’s Scrooge The Musical runs from Tuesday, November 26 to Sunday, December 1 at Grand Opera House, York. Performances: 7.30pm, Tuesday to Sunday; 2.30pm, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. Box office: 0844 871 3024 or at atgtickets.com/york.

Charles Hutchinson

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