YORK Musical Society will give a dramatic performance of Sir Karl Jenkins’s powerful work The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace at York Minster on November 19 with full orchestra and soloists.
YMS last performed this contemporary composition to a capacity audience in 2015, and its sentiment of “Better is peace than always war” is resonant anew in 2022.
To mark the transition to the new millennium in 2000, the Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds commissioned Jenkins to compose a work that looks forward with hope to a peaceful future after “the most war-torn and destructive century in human history”. However, the world is once again witness to much conflict, none more so than the present war in Ukraine.
Jenkins worked closely with Guy Wilson, Master of the Armouries at the time, to select the texts to be set to music in The Armed Man. Extracts of sacred texts from different world religions, including The Bible, the Mahabharata and the Islamic call to prayer, were combined with four parts of the Christian Latin Mass: Kyrie, Sanctus, Agnus Dei and Benedictus.
Words are also drawn from several secular sources, such as texts by Dryden, Tennyson, Rudyard Kipling and Japanese poet Toge Sankichi. Jenkins also combines a variety of musical styles to create what was to become a hugely successful and widely performed work.
To complement Jenkins’s Mass For Peace, YMS will perform Joseph Haydn’s Mass In Time Of War – Missa In Tempore Belli, also known as Paukenmesse (Kettle Drum Mass in German), due to its kettle drum solo.
Baritone soloist Thomas Humphreys
Haydn composed this work in 1796 during turbulent times, when his homeland of Austria was threatened with invasion by Napoleon Bonaparte. Nevertheless, this Mass, commissioned for Princess Maria Josepha of the Estaházy family, is often joyful and lyrical in tone.
The soloists will be soprano Ella Taylor, mezzo-soprano Chloe Latchmore, tenor Greg Tassell and baritone Thomas Humphreys. Ella is a former BBC Chorister of the Year with a passion for performing contemporary music; Yorkshire-born Chloe sang as a soloist with YMS for Bach’s St John Passion at York Minster in 2019; Greg sang the role of the roasting swan in Orff’s Carmina Burana for YMS at York Barbican in 2011; Thomas sings regularly with premier British choirs and orchestras and widely in opera too.
The Muezzin, who proclaims the Islamic call to prayer, will be Ustadh Mohamad Douba, an active member of York Mosque and Islamic Centre. He has been involved in York Welcomes Refugees, the association that gives sanctuary to those fleeing war and conflict.
York Musical Society’s musical director, David Pipe, says: “We’ve enjoyed exploring these contrasting works over the last two months. Karl Jenkins’s The Armed Man has become a modern classic, marrying a huge range of texts with an equally extensive range of musical styles.
“Haydn’s Missa In Tempore Belli, despite its military overtones, has an undeniable sense of optimism, sending the listener out on a wave of jubilant trumpet and drum fanfares.”
Tickets for this 7.30pm concert are on sale at the York Theatre Royal box office, on 01904 623568, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk and will be available on the door too. Prices: £25, £20, £12; students/under 18s,£6; children under 13, accompanied by a paying adult, free admission.
“I hadn’t realised how much I missed performing live,” says Harry Hill as he returns to touring after nine years
HARRY Hill, comedian, TV show host, writer, actor, artist and former doctor, is playing his first tour in nine years, promising absurdist Pedigree Fun! at the Grand Opera House, York, tomorrow night.
It was there that he last appeared in York, squeezing everything into Sausage Time in February 2013 after another long lull between tours since Hooves in 2006.
From Harry Hill’s TV Burp to You’ve Been Framed voiceovers and Junior Bake Off, Harry has been a fixture on the TV, but his brand of manic mayhem, slapstick comedy with daft props, pop culture send-ups, pertinent observational satire, daft songs and surrealist wit, always just too quick for the crowd, utterly suits the live arena.
“I hadn’t realised how much I missed performing live until lockdown stopped me from doing it,” says Harry, who turned 58 on October 1. “It’s great to be going back on stage and the good news is I’m planning a very silly show.”
A show with “brand-new amazing jokes in an all-singing, all-dancing one-man spectacular” with regular sidekick Stouffer The Cat, Harry’s new baby elephant, Sarah, and Ian, The Information Worm.
“No,” says Harry, correcting that piece of misinformation. “Not Ian.” What? Is the Information Worm worming his way out of the show? “No, he had to be cut. In the theatre no-one could see him. He’s been sacked!”
No tours for nine years, but it was not a case of Harry giving up live comedy. “I’ve never stopped doing stand-up; always doing bits here and there when I wasn’t doing anything else,” he says.
“When I worked as a doctor, I was being told what to do, which I reacted against,” says Harry Hill of his journey into comedy
“I would do ten minutes in clubs around town because that’s how you come up with the jokes till you’ve built up an hour, and then more. The new show is two halves of about 50 minutes because I think two hours is too much of anyone’s time!
“What I try to do is more of the stand-up in the first half with some videos, then it goes up a level in the second half with Gary, my son from my first marriage, coming on.”
Gary, inevitably, takes the form of a dummy. “He’s got Covid, so we have to do a Covid test on stage,” reveals Harry. “Then there’s Sarah, the baby elephant. She won’t have been seen outside London, so she’s fresh and new and very nervous. I’ve rescued her from a circus clown who had a fetish for ears.”
How has his 2022 tour contrasted with his Sausage Time travels? “Well, I’m that much older, and my show is very physical, so I’ve been hobbling to the car after the show out of breath and in a pool of sweat,” says Harry.
“I had planned to get fit for the tour but then I hosted Junior Bake Off, so I put on a little weight with all those cakes.”
The pandemic lockdowns and the loss of his friend, fellow comedian Sean Lock, to cancer in August 2021, sparked Harry’s return to stand-up gigs. “I’d sort of forgotten, the thing that I really like about live comedy is being able to do what I want, which is what first attracted me.
“Whereas when I worked as a doctor, I was being told what to do, which I reacted against. It’s the same with TV, with people saying, ‘No, do it like this’. ‘Don’t do that’.
“My view is that people want to escape the everyday and on a good night, I do achieve that,” says Harry Hill
“The other thing is, and I don’t know if it’s nostalgia, but audiences are more up for it, because, (a), they’re pleased to see you’re bothering, and (b), it’s often the first time they’ve been out to a big gig when people are still nervous.”
Did the NHS put out a request to Harry to revive his medical skills during Covid? “I’m still on the register, and yeah, they approached me. I got an email, like all retired doctors, asking if I would help out, right at the start, when everyone thought it was a chance to play their part.
“So I clicked on this email and the next thing I got was another email, from the General Medical Council, saying, could I start working at the Nightingale Hospital [in London]?
“Well, I was available, but fortunately, because everyone washed their hands and stayed indoors, I was never called on.”
Now Harry is focusing once more on that alternative medicine: laughter, or in his case “a very silly show”. “There are trends in comedy, as with all things, and silliness is coming back, particularly now,” he says. “My view is that people want to escape the everyday and on a good night, I do achieve that.
“I take people on this journey where I say, ‘it’s not a dream’ and we re-set what’s normal for people after what we’ve all been through.”
Part of the pleasure for Harry is enjoying his badinage with dummy Gary in his chair and the unruly Stouffer. “It’s like having an alter-ego psychologically,” he says. “As a kid and as a comedian, I’m a big fan of double acts, and sadly there aren’t really acts like that anymore,” he says.
Fight! Harry Hill’s autobiography, published in 2021
“I was once in a double act, The Hall Brothers, with a friend of mine when we were students. We had a few laughs, but we liked the idea of it more than the work, because it’s hard work being a double act – and it’s only half the money!”
Harry’s autobiography, Fight! Thirty Years Not Quite At The Top, was published last November. What did he learn about himself? “I don’t know about that, but I was surprised by how much I’d got done, how single-minded I was,” he says.
“It wasn’t a psychological study but I learned the most important thing is to enjoy the process, not whether something is a success or a failure.
“It was a tongue-in-cheek title because there is no ‘top’, That’s the thing you discover. If that’s your motivation for success, you’ll find there’s always someone more successful than you.”
Savour the enjoyment of being creative, just as Harry did when his artwork featured in Grayson’s Art Club, iconoclastic artist Grayson Perry’s art-of-the-people series on Channel 4 during lockdown. “That was the best thing on the TV to come out of lockdown,” he says. “My wife [Magda Archer] is an artist and we were invited to his house for dinner. He was just as interesting as he is on the TV.
“I’ve always been interested in the visual side of things.” Witness Harry’s tour brochures, or his trademark attire of brothel creepers, slim-fit suit, elongated collars as if designed by Salvador Dali and a pocketful of pens.
Pedigree Fun! in that rata-tat-tat voice is on its way to York. Welcome back, Harry Hill.
Harry Hill: Pedigree Fun, Grand Opera House, York, November 2, Box office: 0844 871 7615 or atgtickets.com/york
Did you know? Harry Hill’s real name is Matthew Keith Hall.
Nico Darmanin’s Alfredo Germont and Alison Langer’s Violetta Valéry in Opera North’s La Traviata. Picture: Richard H Smith
ALESSANDRO Talevi’s production, first seen in September 2014, returned without any revival director, so we must assume that he took full responsibility for any shortcomings that remained.
To enable the maximum number of performances, the three principals were double-cast, as were the conductors.
We were spared the bacilli behind the all-seeing eye that dogged Violetta’s every move – it began as a moon – but the slow handclap from masked males behind a screen at her death was still there, as tasteless and inexplicable as ever. Was this supposed to be a judgment on the courtesan and her trade or misogyny pure and simple? The Carmen charade at Flora’s party also stayed in, complete with explanatory signs.
Fortunately, there were musical compensations, not least in the Violetta Valéry of Alison Langer. Her quiet organisation of her Act 1 double aria seemed to emanate from a singer of much wider experience: her coloratura was calmly controlled and her phrasing succulently spacious, where others so often seem anxious to get it out of the way.
She also looked young enough for the role – a rarity in itself – with a touch of frailty that was engaging. On this showing, she is at the start of something really big. Certainly she looks and sounds ready for it.
Nico Darmanin was a diffident Alfredo Germont at the start, almost as if embarrassed by his affair. His tone was also pinched. To give him the benefit of the doubt, it is possible that Talevi saw him as an angry young man in the lead-up to throwing his winnings at Violetta. But we saw the real Darmanin – and Alfredo – in Act 3 when he sounded altogether more relaxed. We needed more of this resonance earlier on.
“On this showing, Alison Langer is at the start of something really big. Certainly she looks and sounds ready for it,” predicts reviewer Martin Dreyer
Damiano Salerno, like Darmanin making his company debut, is an experienced Verdian and brought a certain finesse to his Giorgio. But there was a sense in which he was holding back, that there was more to give.
The conductor for this threesome was Jonathan Webb, certainly a safe pair of hands and ever conscious of balance. The climax of Violetta’s duet with Giorgio in Act 2 needed better preparation and for once he might have let the orchestra off the leash a little. A little untidiness in the cause of bravura is excusable.
The minor aristocrats were given plenty of vim, and there were distinctive contributions from Amy J Payne’s Annina and Victoria Sharp’s Flora. For the record, the other team of principals were Máire Flavin as Violetta, Oliver Johnston as Alfredo and Stephen Gadd as his father, with Manoj Kamps taking the baton.
Review by Martin Dreyer
Further performances on tour in Newcastle, Nottingham and Salford until November 17
Nicholas Watts’s Orpheus and Ashnaa Sasikaran’s Eurydice. Picture: Tom Arber
OPERA North originally billed this collaboration as ‘Monteverdi reimagined’. In the absence of much explanation, our own imaginations were allowed to run wild with fears of an East-West confrontation, with Monteverdi’s magic – as near as we regularly get to the fountainhead of opera, after all – irreparably diluted and the Orpheus myth literally shot to hell.
That was the gamble these companies undertook. A brief press release sent to all punters more recently looked like special pleading. One feared the worst. The reality is much different.
For seekers after truth – as we all must be when we undertake to see a new production – there turn out to be many pleasing parallels between music of the Baroque and that of the sub-continent.
It is often forgotten that Venice sits handily at the crossroads of ancient trade routes between East and West. Modal systems of music, typified by Gregorian chant, were another obvious link between the two, surviving as they do in Indian raga procedures, even if some have been gradually ironed away in western tonal patterns.
As Neil Sorrell points out in an exceptionally penetrating programme note, the voice was central to Monteverdi’s musical imagination and remains so in Indian music. Indian players routinely expect to be able to reproduce vocally what they express through their instruments.
To that extent, western musical education has been straitjacketed, not least in the dichotomy between ‘classical’ and ‘pop’, the partial result of the separation of vocal and instrumental musics. For a full rapprochement, perhaps we in the West need to broaden our approach.
Composer, sitar player and OPera North artist-in-residence Jasdeep Singh Degun. Picture: Justin Slee
This production, which has been several years in the making and delayed by Covid, forcefully reminds us of these parallels. Its moving spirit as composer – apart from Monteverdi – is Jasdeep Singh Degun, who worked in close co-operation with Baroque ace Laurence Cummings.
Singh Degun’s work adds almost an hour to Monteverdi, although the result morphs seamlessly between the two. He allows the various Indian singers to use their own languages so that we have eight, Hindu and Urdu foremost among them, jostling alongside Striggio’s Italian. All are helpfully side-titled.
The staging is in the hands of Anna Himali Howard, whose task is undoubtedly lightened by having Leslie Travers as her set and costume designer. Together they work out a way of connecting the real world with the underworld, the living with the dead.
The professed aim of their co-production is to move from a celebration of love through the darkness of grief-laden despair to the eventual rekindling of hope.
Nothing particularly unusual there, you may suppose, except that their true goal is to communicate the universality of the Orpheus myth via musical means far more wide-ranging than Monteverdi ever could have envisaged.
Travers’s set is the back garden of a semi-detached suburban house, with all the instruments arranged down the sides of a ‘V’ which opens embracingly towards the audience. So Cummings’ harpsichord rubs shoulders with Singh Degun’s sitar, Kirpal Singh Panesar’s bowed esraj with Emilia Benjamin’s lirone, while Céline Saout doubleson harp and the zither-like swarmandal and Vijay Venkat covers no less than five instruments from both camps.
Kaviraj Singh: Plays in the orchestra and takes the role of the resolute Caronte in Orpheus. Picture: Tom Arber
There are 19 players in all. From a western standpoint, the juxtaposition of instruments is undeniably exotic, adding a magical, other-worldly aroma, while the extraordinary Indian percussion supplies positively addictive momentum.
In the first half (Acts 1 & 2), the garden is the venue for the wedding of Nicholas Watts’s Orpheus and Ashnaa Sasikaran’s Eurydice, with friends and relatives happily congregating with candles and balloons. Their joy is cut tragically short with the arrival of Kezia Bienek’s Silvia, carrying Eurydice’s red and gold sari, signifying her demise.
After the interval, the sky is black, the buildings expunged and the profuse flowers (‘head gardener’ Ali Allen) disappears, resurfacing only when Orpheus returns home as the Apollo of Singh Panesar offers spiritual relief from his pain.
The earlier guests have become spirits in the underworld, which adds a touch of the uncanny. Choral traditions are slight in India, but all the voices meld well, and the differing solo vocal ornamentations sound complementary rather than antagonistic, implying compromise on both sides.
Watts began nervously but gradually blossomed on opening night until reaching a peak of emotional resonance in ‘Possente spirto’; Sasikaran makes a charming, gentle Eurydice. Bienek is a forthright Silvia and Chandra Chakraborty a lively Proserpina. Kaviraj Singh offers a resolute Caronte and Singh Panesar an equally persuasive Apollo; significantly, both also play in the orchestra. Dean Robinson’s Pluto strikes the right conciliatory note.
Just about the only mild disappointment is the dancing, which is largely circular and rudimentary. But overall, this is a happy conjunction of two powerful traditions, a cross-fertilisation that promises further musical riches.
Review by Martin Dreyer
Further performances on tour in Newcastle, Nottingham and Salford until November 19.
Mezzo-soprano Alice Coote. “Superb solo interventions“. Picture: JiyangChen
IT is some time since York Minster’s nave was filled for a professional concert, but a full house for Ryedale Festival’s promotion of Verdi’s Requiem, doubtless encouraged by the first-class array of performers, was amply rewarded.
Although Verdi’s Catholic faith left him early and his Requiem for Alessandro Manzoni is unashamedly operatic, it is also an act of reverence, as we were reminded by the hushed aura of its opening.
But the forthright entry of the choral basses at ‘Te decet’ left no doubt that this was to be an evening that left none of the terrors of death unexplored, as Verdi intended. The soloists confirmed this with a forceful Kyrie that was the polar opposite of the usual grovel.
This was to be the essence of Sir Mark Elder’s approach. Accordingly, the Dies Irae opened with a fearsome attack from both choir and orchestra. Soon afterwards, the trumpets were thrilling at ‘Tuba mirum’, with the four on stage in a controlled crescendo and the four off-stage fanfare trumpets joining in from the side aisles. Indeed, the Hallé’s brass covered themselves with glory throughout, returning majestically in the Sanctus.
‘Liber scriptus’ marked the first of mezzo-soprano Alice Coote’s superb solo interventions, a full-throated blast that raised the drama to a new level and culminated in a spine-tingling high A flat –extending the determination she had brought to Orfeo in Huddersfield last week.
Sir Mark Elder, conductor of the Hallé Orchestra. Picture: Hannah Knox
There were no weaknesses among the soloists. The soprano Natalya Romaniw was the only one to employ any operatic swoops, mostly early on and tastefully, to theatrical effect. She also had ample capacity to soar above the chorus at full pelt and still be heard. Her final high B flat was a couple of shades louder than the absurd triple piano Verdi demands but beautifully sustained nonetheless.
In the tenor solo after what was a succulent soprano-alto duet at ‘Recordare’, Thomas Atkins announced himself with noble resonance and shaped its ending stylishly. He sounds ready for a worldwide career as a Verdi tenor. James Platt’s bass was portentous at the ‘Confutatis’ and added gravitas to the solo ensembles.
While individually distinctive, the soloists also maintained a pleasing balance and blend, which is far from a given in this work. The Hallé Choir was impressive at both ends of the dynamic spectrum. ‘Hosanna in excelsis’ in the Sanctus built to a huge climax, but even more imposing was the extremely quiet opening to the closing Responsory, a magical effect heard far too rarely from large choirs. The orchestral strings exhibited similar restraint.
It crystallised the loving care with which Elder had shaped this five-star Requiem. It had been given in memory of Richard Shephard, a valuable friend of both York Minster and the Ryedale Festival until his death last year.
Footnote: I listened to much of this performance through gritted teeth because of two roaming photographers, one of whom prowled around my bay in the side aisle (where the sound incidentally is best of all) like a capricious cat-burglar, blocking my view and distracting many others with his antics.
Who authorised this? Were the performers asked for their permission? It was totally beyond the pale. The solution – if photographs really are essential – is to take them during rehearsals or hire a professional with telephoto lenses.
Madly in love but kept apart by social hierarchy: Lovesick sailor Ralph (Jack Storey-Hunter) and the Captain’s daughter, Josephine (Alexandra Mather), in York Opera’s HMS Pinafore
YORK Opera will set sail at York Theatre Royal with Gilbert & Sullivan’s operetta HMS Pinafore or The Lass That Loved A Sailor from November 16, steered by a new production team of Annabel van Griethuysen and Tim Selman.
Stage director Annabel and conductor Tim will be at the helm of a production at the Theatre Royal for the first time.
HMS Pinafore was G&S’s first big success, both in Great Britain and the United States, establishing their still undiminished position at the pinnacle of light opera in this country.
Although they had had significant success with Trial By Jury and The Sorcerer, the world of light opera in the 1850s and 1860s was dominated by the works of Jacques Offenbach, full of catchy tunes and brilliantly orchestrated.
Breaking into this field of theatre and dominating it across the English-speaking world must be due greatly to the witty and topical libretti by W.S. Gilbert. In conjunction with Sullivan’s sparkling and tuneful musical settings, HMS Pinafore established the rock on which all the subsequent G&S repertoire would be founded.
Annabel van Griethuysen’s Carmen in York Opera’s Carmen at York Theatre Royal in October 2018. Now dietician Annabel switches from mezzo-soprano singing to stage directing HMS Pinafore
The story follows Ralph, a lovesick sailor, and Josephine, the Captain’s daughter, who are madly in love but kept apart by social hierarchy. The musical numbers, loved by young and old alike, include We Sail The Ocean Blue, Never Mind The Why And Wherefore and When I Was A Lad.
As usual with York Opera’s G & S productions, a healthy mix of youth and experience combines in the cast. New to the company are Jack Storey-Hunter in the leading tenor role of Ralph Rackstraw and Polina Bielova as Cousin Hebe.
Well-known cast members in the line-up include Alexandra Mather in the leading soprano role of Josephine; John Soper as Sir Joseph Porter; Ian Thomson-Smith as Captain Corcoran; Rebecca Smith as Little Buttercup and Anthony Gardner as Dick Deadeye.
York Opera in Gilbert & Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore, York Theatre Royal, November 16 to 19, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
Sea-bound: Jack Storey-Hunter’s Ralph and Alexandra Mather’s Josephine in York Opera’s HMS Pinafore
Book launch for Paul Thompson and John Watterson’s Beware Of The Bull: The Enigmatic Genius of Jake Thackray
Paul Thompson and John Watterson: Beware Of The Bull – The Enigmatic Genius of Jake Thackray Concert & Book Launch, presented by Black Swan Folk Clubat National Centre for Early Music, York, October 28
DESPITE being a household name in the mid-to-late 1960s, Jake Thackray is now largely forgotten.
His humorous topical songs popped up on That’s Life (and before that Braden’s Week). The ephemeral nature of much of his television material was not made with posterity in mind. His slim album output does not fit neatly anywhere – certainly not anywhere near the mainstream.
For those who cottoned on in his lifetime (he died in 2002), or have discovered him through famous admirers, Thackray is held in the highest of esteem.
Paul Thompson and John Watterson have done much to keep the cult alive. Watterson’s Fake Thackray project is much more than a tribute turn, also breathing life into songs unheard in decades or putting new music to works never completed.
Two rarities graced the performance at the NCEM, The Ferryboat, extolling the charms of a public house, and a scabrous number about National Service that was aired, reluctantly, once in 1986.
The new biography seems to have kickstarted a wave of renewed interest in this Yorkshire chansonnier. Thompson and Watterson have produced a wonderfully researched book, the work of dedicated fans rather than biographers for hire.
It does not shy away from the sadness of his decline and later years, and also makes a strong case for his writing (Thackray was a columnist of note for the Yorkshire Post in the early 1990s, his contributions posted, often hilariously late, from his Welsh outpost).
Tantalising gaps in the story remain, particularly how Thackray’s time in France and civil-war Algeria transformed him both as a guitarist and performer. What the French made of Thackray is also unknown.
His love of their language and the chanson form is well documented however. Unique among his English contemporaries Thackray sought to write songs that contained both humour, poetry and insight – in the French style of Georges Brassens, where the words come before all else.
Watterson and Thompson performed ten songs, and 50 years after Thackray’s heyday, crowds continue to laugh and admire his singular dexterity with words. The performers chose their selections carefully, as Thackray’s humour is sometimes dated (all on stage exchanged knowing looks after the line “I shan’t lay a finger on the crabby old bat face” from La-Di-Da, which drew a consciously muffled laugh). His stories of the underdog, or sticking it those in authority, will never go out of style.
The artistry of the material shone. Bantam Cock, freed from its maddening keyboard refrain, was out-and-out funny while the Widow Of Bridlington was both sad and wry (a precursor to Richard Thompson’s Beeswing).
Thompson and Watterson did a splendid job performing these difficult songs. Perhaps Thompson unnecessarily underlined a line or two, in contrast to Thackray’s determinedly deadpan style, but it was a treat to hear the tunes live.
Thackray was a complicated man, marked by his difficult upbringing in Leeds. This working- class hero really did have (smelly) feet of clay. In later years, after the stage fright and weekly terror of performing on national television had passed, his songwriting slowed dramatically as he toiled to write more serious works. One of these, Remembrance, is one of the best anti-war songs, but not one you are ever likely to hear on November 11.
Yorkshire is the centre of the Thackray cult, so with luck we will be graced with many more opportunities to savour this underappreciated master of his craft channelled through Thompson and Watterson.
40 YEARS and counting. Accessible Arts and Media, the York charity committed to helping people to shine, also knows a thing or two about parties. And organised chaos!
This sold-out event also celebrated a number of milestones, including AAM’s 30-year partnership with York St John University in performances from York St John Contemporary Ensemble and Communitas Choir.
Their well-chosen songs combined celebration, inclusion and elegy. Each of the performers (AAM supports disabled young people and adults, older people living with dementia and memory loss and people with mental ill-health) were able to take part on their own terms.
Rose Kent speaking at Accessible Arts and Media’s Big Birthday Bash
Centre stage were the trio of AAM groups, starting with IMPs ,who set the afternoon off, then the first performance of the Movers and Shakers choir, before Hands and Voices brought the house down to finish. There were a number of star turns, some planned and others taken on the spur of the moment.
Rose Kent, who has overseen so much over the past 30 years, was the master of ceremonies and our guide, introducing songs from AAM’s past and present. The charity has stuck true to its commitment to helping people to feel happy, connected and valued. The warmth in the room, and the miles of smiles was testament to that.
The party ended with an all-on-stage, uproarious We’re AAM How’z At, (to the tune of On Ilkla Moor Baht’at), marvellously conducted by Anna Snow. As AAM’s innovative minds ponder the future, we need them making music and making friends more than ever.
Filip Fredrik’s Elements: Showing at Aesthetica Short Film Festival 2022
A FILM festival with international pedigree, poetry clashes, comedy aplenty and Constellations shine out for Charles Hutchinson.
Festival of the week: Aesthetica Short Film Festival, across York, Tuesday to Sunday
AESTHETICA Short Film Festival returns for 300 films in 15 venues over six days in York in its 12th edition. The BAFTA-Qualifying event will have a hybrid format, combining the live festival with a selection of screenings, masterclasses and events on the digital platform until November 30.
New for 2022 will be York Days, a discount scheme with the chance to save 50 per cent on prices on the Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday programmes. Comedies, dramas, thrillers, animation, family-friendly films and documentaries all feature, complemented by workshops, the Virtual Reality Lab, installations and the festival fringe. Box office:asff.co.uk/tickets.
Malaika Kegode: Guest appearance at Say Owt Slam’s birthday party. Picture: Jon Aitken
Birthday party of the week: Say Owt Slam’s 8th Birthday Special, with Malaika Kegode, The Crescent, York, tonight (29/10/2022), 7.30pm
SAY Owt, York’s loveable gang of performance poets, Stu Freestone, Henry Raby, Hannah Davies and David Jarman, welcome special-guest Bristol poet Malaika Kegode to a high-energy night of words and verse, humour and poet-versus-poet fun.
“It started as a one-off gig! I can’t believe we’re still slamming eight years later,” says artistic director and host Raby. “Whether you’re a veteran or looking for something new, everyone is welcome at a Say Owt Slam, where each poet has a maximum of three minutes to wow randomly selected judges with their poetry.” Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
David O’Doherty: Change of date for York gig
On the move: David O’Doherty: Whoa Is Me, Grand Opera House, York, changing from Monday to February 5 2023, 8pm
HERE he comes again, albeit later than first planned, trotting on stage with all of the misplaced confidence of a waiter with no pad.
“There’ll be lots of talking, some apologising and some songs on a glued-together plastic keyboard from 1986,” promises David O’Doherty, comedian, author, musician, actor and playwright, 1990 East Leinster under-14 triple jump bronze medallist and son of jazz pianist Jim Doherty. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or atgtickets.com/York.
Flo & Joan: Musical comedy duo offer thoughts on topics of the day
Musical comedy of the week: Flo & Joan, Sweet Release, Grand Opera House, York, Tuesday, 7.3pm
FLO & Joan, the British musical comedy duo of sisters Nicola and Rosie Dempsey, play York as one of 30 additional dates on their 2022 tour after their return to the Edinburgh Fringe.
Climbing back out of their pits, armed with a piano and percussion, they poke around the classic topics of the day with their fusion of comedy and song with a dark undertow.
The sisters have penned five numbers for the West End musical Death Drop and have written and performed songs for Horrible Histories (CBBC), Rob Delaney’s Stand Up Central (Comedy Central) and BBC Radio 4’s The Now Show. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or atgtickets.com/York.
Emilio Iannucci: Starring in Nick Payne’s romantic two-hander Constellations at the SJT
Play of the week outside York: Constellations, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, running until November 12
WHEN beekeeper Roland meets scientist Marianne, anything could happen in University of York alumnus Nick Payne’s romantic and revealing exploration of the many possibilities that can result from a single meeting. Reminiscent of Sliding Doors and Kate Atkinson’s novel Life After Life, this two-hander starring Carla Harrison-Hodge and Emilio Iannucci ponders “What if?”.
“Constellations plays with time and space in the most brilliant way,” says director Paul Robinson. “Deeply human, deeply moving, it genuinely tilts the world for you. I challenge anyone not to leave the theatre just a bit more aware of what a fragile and remarkable thing life is.” Box office: 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com.
Bring It On: “The thrill of extreme competition”
Backflip of the week: York Stage in Bring It On: The Musical, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Wednesday to Saturday, 7.30pm; Saturday matinee, 2.30pm
THE York premiere of Bring It On backflips into the JoRo in a youth theatre production directed by Nik Briggs. Inspired by the film of the same name, this story of the challenges and surprising bonds forged through the thrill of extreme competition is packed with vibrant characters, electrifying contemporary songs and explosive choreography.
This Broadway hit is the energy-fuelled work of Tony Award winners Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton), Jeff Whitty (Avenue Q) and Tom Kitt (Grease: Live). Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Humour on hand: Harry Hill promises Pedigree Fun on his first tour since 2013
Very silly show of the week: Harry Hill, Pedigree Fun!, Grand Opera House, York, Wednesday, 7.30pm
COMEDIAN, writer, actor, artist and former doctor Harry Hill and his big shirt collars take to the stage for an all-singing, all-dancing surrealist spectacular in his long-awaited return to the live arena for the fist time since 2013’s Sausage Time tour.
“I hadn’t realised how much I missed performing live until lockdown stopped me from doing it,” he says. “The good news is I’m planning a very silly show.” Full of pop-culture spoofs, no doubt.
Audiences will meet Harry’s new baby elephant, Sarah, along with regular sidekick Stouffer the Cat. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or atgtickets.com/York.
John McCusker: Fiddler supreme on 30th anniversary tour
Fiddler on the road: The John McCusker Band 30th Anniversary Tour, National Centre for Early Music, York, Wednesday, 7.30pm
SCOTTISH fiddle player John McCusker will be joined by Ian Carr, Sam Kelly, Helen McCabe and Toby Shaer for his concert series in celebration of 30 years as a professional folk musician since cutting his teeth in The Battlefield Band at 17.
To coincide with this landmark, McCusker has released a Best Of album featuring tracks from his solo records and television and film soundtracks, alongside a book of 100 original compositions, John McCusker: The Collection.
“I’m delighted to be able to get this special show on the road and celebrate 30 years as a professional musician,” says McCusker. “I’m looking forward to performing the highlights from my back catalogue and revisiting memories associated with those tracks.
“It’s brilliant that I’ve been able to make music and perform for 30 years and I’ve worked with so many incredible people in that time. I’ve never had a plan; good things have just happened and, so far, it’s worked out as well as I could possibly have dreamed of. I can’t wait to play with my friends again.” Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk.
York Settlement Community Players’ cast for Vanya And Sonia And Masha And Spike: Mick Liversidge (Vanya), top left, Victoria Delaney (Sonia) and Susannah Baines (Sasha); Andrew Roberts (Spike), bottom left, Sanna Jeppsson (Cassandra) and Livy Potter
York premiere of the week: York Settlement Community Players in Vanya And Sonia And Masha And Spike, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Thursday, Friday, 7.30pm; Saturday, 2.30pm, 7.30pm
VANYA and his sister Sonia live a quiet life in the Pennsylvania farmhouse where they grew up, but when their famous film-star sister, Masha, makes an impromptu visit with her dashing, twenty-something boyfriend, Spike, a chaotic weekend ensues.
Resentment, rivalry and revealing premonitions begin to boil over as the three siblings battle to be heard in Christopher Durang’s comedy, winner of the 2013 Tony Award for Best New Play with its blend of Chekhovian ennui, modern-day concerns of celebrity, social networking and the troubling onset of middle age. Jim Paterson directs Settlement Players’ production. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Plastic Mermaids: “Emotional exploration of the many facets of heartbreak”
Time to discover…Plastic Mermaids, The Crescent, York, November 10; Oporto, Leeds, February 2 2023
AFTER playing Glastonbury and Camp Bestival in the summertime, Isle of Wight five-piece Plastic Mermaids are off on an 11-date tour to promote their second album, It’s Not Comfortable To Grow, out now on Sunday Best.
Led by brothers Douglas and Jamie Richards, who approach life like an art project, they face up to their dark side in an emotional exploration of the many facets of heartbreak on such psych-rock and electronica numbers as Girl Boy Girl, Disposable Love, Something Better and Elastic Time. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
Doctor Dorian Deathly’s nights of face melting horror must wait until January2023
YORK spookologist and ghost botherer Doctor Dorian Deathly was to have swapped walking the (ghost) walk for talking the (ghost) talk for Halloween season, but Covid has “done a right number on him”, in the words of Deathly Dark Tours operations manager Dede Deathly.
Moving indoors from the city streets, Visit York’s New Tourism Business Award Winner for 2022 would have been presenting six fright nights of scary tales, spooks caught on film and ghost stories of England’s “most haunted city”, to be experienced from the relative safety of a seat at Theatre@41, Monkgate, from tonight until October 31. The performances will take place from January 24 to 28 2023 instead.
When the show does go ahead, the deadpan Doctor Deathly will present The Complete History Of Ghosts in A Night Of Face Melting Horror through a combination of stories, paranormal sciences, horror, theatrical trickery, original music and perhaps the odd unexpected guest at 8.30pm each night.
“Together we will huddle around the stage and explore spine-chilling tales of hauntings, both local and further afield, dissemble horrors captured on film and follow the ghost story through from its origins to the Victorian classics and modern-day frights,” says Doctor Deathly, whose face-melting macabre amusements are suitable to age 13 plus as he considers what makes spines shiver and examines our obsession with tales of death, murder and hauntings.
Doctor Deathly was struck by the idea of doing a show at Theatre@41 after seeing Pick Me Up Theatre in The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾ The Musical last December. “It sparked the bit of the brain that causes trouble!” he says. “Rather than just having our ghost walks for Halloween, which we know will sell out, I thought, ‘let’s do something here’.
“During the last couple of years, we were doing lots of online events, streamed on Facebook during lockdown to thousands of people around the world. There are only a certain number of ghost stories for York on a prescribed route, when people want to see Shambles and the Minster, and we thought, ‘how can we show different things?’.
“We came up with the online show Tales From The Fireplace, where people would send in ghost stories and pictures and videos of encounters with ghosts. It was essentially like a TV show, where we got a few funny ones sent in; we were coming at it from that angle, analysing them and breaking them down. Some were brilliantly well written.”
The now defunct poster for Doctor Dorian Deathly’s postponed Halloween event at Theatre@41
This prompted Doctor Deathly to construct A Night Of Face Melting Horror. “First and foremost, it’s entertainment. People love ghost stories and we thought, what if we flip it on its head and people have to come out to the theatre to celebrate ghost stories from the wild?” he says.
“The thread through the show is the history of the ghost story, talking about the origins of those stories, what they come from, their place in both texts and the imagination. Then we look at how it exploded in Victorian times with huge interest in these stories.”
Born in Scarborough, Deathly’s inventor, actor Jamie McKeller, moved to York in 2004/2005, first performing in A Christmas Carol at the Castle Museum and with Lee Harris and The Dreaming in Terry Pratchett’s Rincewind.
“I’d been to York on fleeting visits, then I was getting on the train here to rehearse. One day I was walking through York, and it was snowing, and I popped into a coffee shop. Looking out at the Minster, I remember thinking, ‘how can I not move here?’.”
For 15 years, he was a professional actor. “It’s exhausting, a grind,” he says, delighted to now have a constant, stable income as a ghost walker. “It’s my company too, so I can do these crazy things.“
Part of York’s Guild of Spookologists , alongside Mad Alice, Shadows Of York (Mackenzie Crompton) and Damian Freddi’s Dark Chronicles, Doctor Dorian Deathly’s Deathly Dark Tours has taken on a second York tour guide to meet demand, Dorian being joined by Dafydd Deathly, from Wales.
“He ran virtual tours for us in Edinburgh and now he’s come back to York, I asked him if he would join me because the tour is so busy. We run six nights a week,” says Doctor Deathly.
“Why are you here, for this show full of ghosts, in a world of such niceties?” asks Doctor Dorian Deathly
“We did two shows a night in Summer 2021, but it’s a very non-traditional ghost tour, very theatrical, very big, with magic tricks. It’s very tiring! 30-year-old Jamie doing that each night, fine; 42-year-old Jamie, maybe not!”
Why, Dorian, are we drawn to the horror, the horror, of ghost stories, especially in York? “It’s that obsession with fear, but why do we do that to ourselves?” he asks himself. “Why do we like putting ourselves in that situation?
“The opening song in A Night Of Face Melting Horror poses a question: I directly ask, ‘what’s wrong with you, with all of us, in a world of The Great British Bake Off and The Great Pottery Throw Down, why are you here, for this show full of ghosts, in a world of such niceties? That’s the answer we’re looking for; the answer to that!”
Why does York suit ghost storytelling, Dorian? “I have friends who are tour guides around the country and sometimes I feel sorry for them because they have to talk about things that are no longer there in their city. But in York you can see a piece of wood dating from the 12th century, and you watch Americans blink as they take that in,” he says.
Once back to full health, his acting side will flourish once more as Jamie takes on the role of the baddie, the Sheriff of Nottingham, in Rowntree Players’ pantomime, Babes In The Wood, at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, on December 3, 4 and 6 to 10. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Doctor Dorian Deathly’s A Night Of Face Melting Horror (or The Complete History Of Ghosts), Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, will not run from October 26 to31, 8.30pm nightly, after all as a result of illness. The new dates will be January 24 to 28 2023. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
For more information on Doctor Dorian Deathly’s walking tours, visit www.deathlydarktours.com or call 07851 032041.
Forestry commission: Jamie McKeller ventures into the dark side as the Sheriff of Nottingham in Rowntree Players’ 2022 pantomime, Babes In The Wood
