Melody Gardot looking out over the Paris skyline during lockdown
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 artwork for Melody Gardot’s From Paris With Love single in aid of healthcare workers
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….and a heart
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.
Oh, what a Knight: Chris Knight as Donkey in York Stage Musicals’ Shrek The Musical in September 2019. Shrek will return to the Grand Opera House in 2021
YORK Stage Musicals are to present The Hunchback Of Notre Dame in…2022.
“Theatres may be closed at the moment but that does not stop us planning for the future,” says artistic director Nik Briggs.
“We are honoured to be producing The Hunchback Of Notre Dame at the Grand Opera House in Autumn 2022. With lyrics by Wicked’s Stephen Schwartz and music by Aladdin’s Alan Menken, this is a very exciting project for us indeed.
“It was one where we were approached by the rights holders, like with Shrek The Musical. We love that because we’re not in the rat race to get it, and it’s nice they value the work we do, especially with Disney, who have very strict regulations.”
The York Stage diary for 2021 is taking shape with Shrek The Musical confirmed for a return to the Grand Opera House next spring, over the Easter holidays, and rights secured for Elf next winter.
Jacob Husband, as Adam, front, Alex Weatherhill, as Bernadette, and Joe Wawrzyniak, as Tick, in York Stage Musicals’ Priscilla Queen Of The Desert, The Musical, at the Grand Opera House, York. Picture: Benedict Tomlinson
More shows are being lined up too, not least a new work from Alex Weatherhill, who starred as Bernadette in York Stage Musicals’ production of Priscilla Queen Of The Desert, The Musical, in September 2017.
“Alex came to see us in Tim Firth’s The Flint Street Nativity and Steel Magnolias and said he wanted to do something for us, and we’re delighted as he writes the summer show at the Bridlington Spa,” says Nik.
Shrek The Musical will bring York Stage full circle, being the last show the company staged at the Grand Opera House before the Coronavirus pandemic shut down theatres and the first to be mounted by YSM once the Cumberland Street theatre re-opens.
As for The Hunchback Of Notre Dame, Nik says: “It’s a show we’ve always wanted to look at doing because it’s never been done in the West End, only in America, so it will be nice to bring it to York.”
Indeed it will but, after his tour de force as Shrek in Shrek The Musical last September, will Nik be playing the Hunchback? “Definitely not,” he insists. That Autumn 2022 slot still leaves plenty of time to change his mind, however.
FROM The Jam and The Selecter will form a double bill at York Barbican on January 15 2021, given a fair wind with further progress on Covid-19 social-distancing measures enabling the venue to re-open.
Founder bassist Bruce Foxton and vocalist/guitarist Russell Hastings’ band will be touring Britain to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Sound Affects, The Jam’s fifth studio album, performing this 1980 release in its entirety, complemented by a Jam back-catalogue selection.
Recorded by Foxton, frontman Paul Weller and drummer Rick Buckler, Sound Affects peaked at number two in the UK charts and boasted two of The Jam’s most-loved singles, Start! and That’s Entertainment.
From The Jam formed in 2007, originally with Buckler as the drummer until 2009, and have performed around the world, as well as charting with their 2017 album From The Jam Live!.
Pauline Black and Arthur ‘Gaps’ Hendrickson of special guests The Selecter
Joining them as special guests on the 2021 tour will be Coventry ska group The Selecter, fronted by Pauline Black and featuring original member Arthur ‘Gaps’ Hendrickson.
They too will be marking a 40th anniversary, in their case their 1980 2 Tone debut, Too Much Pressure, played in full, bolstered by further Selecter favourites. Expect to hear Three Minute Hero, On The Radio, Too Much Pressure, Missing Words, James Bond, The Whisper, Celebrate The Bullet and Frontline.
Tickets for January 15 are on sale at yorkbarbican.co.uk. Meanwhile, the Barbican website is yet to write the word Postponed across From The Jam’s July 11 gig this summer, already moved from April 3 after the Coronavirus lockdown. Watch this space for an update on a show built around the 40th anniversary of The Jam’s fourth studio album, Setting Sons, the one with The Eton Rifles, the Woking three-piece’s first top ten hit, peaking at number three.
“We can’t wait to perform the whole of Setting Sons live,” said Hastings when the 2020 tour was first announced. “The album has been noted as another one of The Jam’s best albums along with All Mod Cons. It seems that even the obscure album tracks like Little Boy Soldiers and Thick As Thieves are as popular when we play them live as the hit singles.” Will that tour ever happen? Wait and see.
Still from Survey Number Zero, by Priya Thuvassery, 2016
SCARBOROUGH Art Gallery’s online film series will resume on June 30 with Re-presenting India On Screen.
The 7pm screening marks a new and ambitious element of Scarborough Museums Trust’s digital programming, with filmmakers Suraj Prasad and Tarini Manchanda joining the post-screening Q&A live from Delhi in this international collaboration between Britain and India.
Gallery Screenings Online, on the last Tuesday night of each month, features films selected to give audiences a new perspective on both visiting exhibitions and the permanent Scarborough Collections. Each is followed by a question-and-answer session.
Re-presenting India On Screen will feature short films by director, cinematographer and editor Priya Thuvassery; Gautam Valluri, an artist working with film; Suraj Prasad, co-founder of Lightcube, a film collective in New Delhi, and Tarini Manchanda, a filmmaker based in New Delhi.
Built around short films that re-think how India has been and continues to be re-presented on screen, the event will be co-hosted by Suraj Prasad and curator Martha Cattell.
The catalyst for June 30’s online screening was an item in the Scarborough Borough Collection: a journal by colonialist traveller Colonel James Harrison, from Brandesburton in East Yorkshire.
Suraj says: “The idea that colonialism is necessarily connected to a specific identity and location is convoluted and over-simplified; we are all colonialists to some degree. Perhaps our images can help reveal a lot about how we see the world.”
Still from The Dhenuki Cinema Project, by Suraj Prasad, 2016
Harrison’s journal and photographs offer a specific representation of India through an external and colonialist perspective, observes Martha. “This screening will consider how filmmakers have used moving images to represent India. It will feature archive and contemporary works, drawing on themes of ecology, architecture and colonialism,” she says.
“It will aim to challenge pre-existing biases and colonist hangovers of India on screen, and is part of ongoing work at Scarborough Museums Trust to decolonialise the Scarborough Collections.”
Each Gallery Screening will have optional live captions from a stenographer; downloading the app version of Zoom is recommended for those wishing to use this function.
A “social story” – a visual guide – will be created too, with illustrations by Scarborough artist Savannah Storm to explain the format and accessible elements of the screening.
Access to the June 30 event is by password only, available, along with a link, by emailing Martha Cattell at Martha.cattell@smtrust.uk.com. Email the same address for access to the social story.
The introduction and Q&A will be available post-event on Scarborough Museums Trust’s YouTube channel: bit.ly/YouTubeSMT.
Visit the trust’s YouTube channel at the same address to watch the recorded introductions and Q&As from previous Gallery Screenings.
Singers and musicians recording Up On The Roof remotely for the Joseph Rowntree Theatre’s Raise The Roof campaign
THE Joseph Rowntree Theatre, in York, is launching a song on You Tube to help raise £5,000 towards vital roof repairs.
At a time when the future is looking bleak for many theatres in the Coronavirus crisis, York’s community theatre in Haxby Road is determined to buck the trend of depressing news by using lockdown as a chance to further its expansion plans.
Launching the online video this week kick-starts Raise The Roof, the JoRo’s fundraising campaign with a £90,000 target.
Aptly, the choice of song is a cover of The Drifters’ hit Up On The Roof, written in 1962 by Gerry Goffin and Carole King.
Jess Douglas: Arranger, pianist, co-organiser
The video has been produced, arranged and performed by York performers who call the Art Deco building their theatrical home, many of them also counting themselves among the JoRo’s army of volunteers. Put together during lockdown via socially distanced media, it can be viewed at youtu.be/IPsw4VQcMsg.
Stage manager Ollie Nash and Jessica Douglas, a regular musical director of shows at the JoRo, have brought together a team of singers and musicians to create the video. “It’s been a real challenge under lockdown conditions,” says Ollie. “In the week leading up to its release, I spent 30 hours pulling all the bits together for the final edit.”
Arranged by Jessica and mixed and edited by Ollie, Up On The Roof is performed by Abigail Atkinson, Chris Gibson, Helen Singhateh, Jennie Wogan, Nick Sephton, Paul Blenkiron, Ruth McCartney, Sandy Nicholson and Susan Blenkiron. Backing them in the recording are Jessica Douglas, piano, Clark Howard, drums, Georgia Johnson, bass, Damien Sweeting, guitar, and Emily Jones and Tom Marlow, violin.
Graham Mitchell, the JoRo’s fundraising and events director, says: “We’ve had great fun putting this video together. The fact that so many of our performing and volunteering community came together ‘virtually’ to produce it shows just how much the future success of the theatre means to them.”
Ollie Nash: Spent 30 hours “pulling all the bits together for the final video edit”
Against a backdrop of growing fears over the future for many arts venues across the country, the Joseph Rowntree Theatre believes it is in a “particularly strong position”.
How come? Because the charity that runs it owns the building and the theatre is operated entirely by more than 170 unpaid volunteers.
Dan Shrimpton, chair of the board of trustees, says: “We’re using this period of enforced closure to look after and improve the fabric of the building. The roof repairs need to be completed before we can move on with our major plans to expand the building.
“The new insulation and solar panels will significantly reduce our operating costs and also the impact we have on the environment. The expansion plans will make our venue even greener and more accessible.”
A peck on the cheek of a teenage Judi Dench from a cheeky young chap at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre is a favourite anecdote among theatre volunteers
The roof has stood the test of time, not needing any major work since the theatre was built 85 years ago. The Raise The Roof appeal is not the first time it has appeared in a news article, however. In 2012, the Daily Telegraph published the story of a teenage Judi Dench coming down from the roof after watching the sunset with a group of friends.
One brave young man took the opportunity to sneak a quick kiss on the way down the ladder! Dame Judi does not remember the name of the cheeky chap, but it is a favourite anecdote among the theatre’s volunteers.
To launch the Raise the Roof campaign, the JoRo has set up a Just Giving page and is encouraging people to donate “even just the amount of a takeaway coffee”. Go to: justgiving.com/campaign/Raise-the-Roof.
The Joseph Rowntree Theatre, in Haxby Road, York
Did you know?
THE Joseph Rowntree Theatre was built by the Joseph Rowntree Village Trustees as a place for recreation and education for the benefit of Rowntree employees and the York community.
Seebohm Rowntree opened the Haxby Road theatre in 1935. It remains a vital community asset, run entirely by volunteers for the people of York. A board of 13 trustees and 170 volunteers give 17,000 hours of volunteering time every year.
Last year, the JoRo put on more than 135 performances, staged by 35 York groups and several professional touring companies.
Can’t wait to get out, like these sled dog racers in Dalby Forest from Tony Batholomew’s online exhibition Forest 100: A Year In The Life? If so, read on…
METRE by metre, Downing Street daily briefing by catch-you-by-surprise Downing Street daily briefing, we are moving closer to the beginning of the end of the 10 Things To See Next Week In York shutdown.
However, there is still no theatre, concert venue or cinema re-opening for the foreseeable future, although cinemas are making plans to do so in July. Watch this ever-shifting space.
In the meantime, amid the loosened-lockdown dawn of summer, when football and horse racing are back, albeit with no crowds, and beaches are back, but too crowded, the search continues for entertainment, enlightenment and exercise at home and farther afield.
From behind his door, increasingly ajar, CHARLES HUTCHINSON makes these suggestions.
Drive-In Cinema parks up in York next month, but unlike in this poster, viewers will have to stay in, not on, their cars throughout each screening
Daisy Duke’s Drive-In Cinema, Knavesmire, York, July 3 to 5
STATIC cinemas, no, but Boris Johnson’s Government has given the green light to drive-in cinemas with social distancing rules in place.
North Easterners Daisy Duke’s Drive-In Cinema have been quick off the mark to announce a Drive-In Saturday (one for David Bowie fans), and a Friday and Sunday too, from July 3 to 5.
Interaction between staff and customers will be kept to a minimum, with cars parked two metres apart and those attending expected to remain within their vehicles for the duration of the screenings on LED screens with the sound transmitted to car radios.
Four screenings a day are in store, with the film line-up taking in The Jungle Book, The Lion King, Mamma Mia!, Frozen 2, Bohemian Rhapsody, The Greatest Showman, A Star Is Born, 28 Days Later, Pulp Fiction and Joker. Tickets can be booked at dukescinema.epizy.com.
Oh, and if theatres are still closed come December, would there be any takers for a drive-in pantomime?
Rosy Rowley: Reprising her role in the 2012 York Mystery Plays as Mrs Noah in the York Radio Mystery Plays
York Radio Mystery Plays, on BBC Radio York, Sunday mornings throughout June
YORK Theatre Royal and BBC Radio York are collaborating to bring the York Mystery Plays to life on the airwaves on the Sunday Breakfast Show with Jonathan Cowap.
Working remotely from home, a cast of 19 community and professional actors has recorded four 15-minute instalments under the direction of Theatre Royal associate director Juliet Forster.
After Adam And Eve and The Flood Part 1, the series continues with The Flood Part 2 this weekend and Moses And Pharaoh on June 28. Hear the earlier ones at bbc.co.uk/sounds.
York In Flood, 2019, taken by Museum Gardens, from Katherine-of-Yorkshire’s exhibition at Village Gallery, York
Galleries re-opening…
NO, not the big ones yet, such as York Art Gallery, but among those to announce the re-opening of doors in York this week are Simon Main’s Village Gallery, in Colliergate, and Ann Petherick’s Kentmere House Gallery, in Scarcroft Hill.
Village Gallery is presenting a photographic show by Instagrammer Katherine-of-Yorkshire until August 2. “Katherine regularly posts photographs on Instagram, mainly of York, and usually in black and white, using the camera on her phone to take the photos,” Simon says.
“She manages to convey a deep feeling of peace, even when documenting the major floods in York that happen all too regularly, as well as showing a different perspective of well-known places.”
Open by appointment only until further notice, Kentmere House is displaying A Life In Colour, Work from the Studio of Jack Hellewell, 1920-2000, including unframed pieces never seen before, to mark Hellewell’s centenary.
North York Moors, by Jack Hellewell, at the re-opened Kentmere House Gallery, York
Mother Shipton’s Pixie Village Trail, Knaresborough
HAVE you ever dreamt of stepping into an utterly enchanted realm, deep in the captivating woodland, filled with fairy rings and secret doorways, where pixies are waiting to play?
If so, at Mother Shipton’s you can tread carefully through the land of the woodland people and keep your eyes peeled as you follow the trail to see their tiny houses.
Visitors will be provided with a trail sheet to explore the natural woodland at their own pace. Please note, open to pre-booked car admissions only, this Pixie Village event will not include any confined spaces and the actors will not be interacting with visitors, in order to reduce large gatherings of crowds and physical contact.
Shed Seven: Rearranging two big outdoors concerts in Yorkshire for their 2021 diary
Seek out the good news
NO York Festival with Madness, Westlife and Lionel Richie at York Sports Club from tomorrow until Sunday. No revival of Alan Ayckbourn’s Just Between Ourselves opening at the SJT tonight for a summer run. No Ronan Keating: Twenty Twenty gig at York Barbican tomorrow.
However, one festival is going ahead, albeit in revised online form, namely the York Early Music Festival, from July 9 to 11, with York countertenor Iestyn Davies’s concert with lutenist Elizabeth Kenny as the stand-out.
Keating’s Twenty Twenty show will now be in Twenty Twenty One, on January 13 to be precise. Meanwhile, York’s Britpop alumni Shed Seven have re-arranged two 2020 outdoor concerts for next year, now playing Doncaster Racecourse post-racing on May 15 2021, rather than August 15 this summer, and headlining an all-Yorkshire bill at the Piece Hall, Halifax, on June 26 2021, instead of the same date this year.
The artwork for Bob Dylan’s new album, Rough And Rowdy, out tomorrow
And what about…
79-YEAR-OLD Bob Dylan’s first album of original songs in eight years, Rough And Rowdy Ways, out tomorrow, on Columbia. Phoebe Bridgers’ Punisher and Maccabees frontman Orlando Weeks’s solo debut A Quickening as further album recommendations. Spike Lee’s new Vietnam War film, Da 5 Bloods, streaming on Netflix. The Salisbury Poisonings, on BBC iPlayer, York actor Mark Addy among the cast. Talking Heads, Alan Bennett’s isolation monologues re-visited in Covid-19 times with two new additions, on BBC One from Tuesday.
Gardens at National Trust properties re-opening, such as Beningbrough Hall; bookings only. Val and Emma Carr’s Stanley & Ramona dinky coffee house, in Bishopthorpe Road, serving up coffee and cake again, hurrah.
Walks through the rhododendrons at Forestry England’s Wheldrake Wood and watching out for the tiny toads and frogs at the RSPB’s Fairburn Ings. Tony Bartholomew’s Forest 100: A Year In The Life online exhibition of Dalby Forest from spring 2019 to spring 2020 at forestryengland.uk
York countertenor Iestyn Davies: Performing at the revised 2020 York Early Music Festival on July 9. Picture: Benjamin Ealovega
Courtney Marie Andrews: June 17 2021, not June 17 2020, for a night out in Pocklington
AMERICAN country singer Courtney Marie Andrews should have been playing Pocklington Arts Centre tonight. Instead she will do so on…June 17 2021.
Courtney’s postponed date with a full band was to have been a showcase for her new break-up album, Old Flowers, originally set for release on June 5 on Loose/Fat Possum Records.
Phoenix-born Courtney, 29, is now rescheduling the album launch too, again in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. “Hello dear ones,” she says on the Loose website. “Unfortunately, I must push back the release to July 24th. In order to protect the safety of its workers, the vinyl manufacturing plant producing my record is temporarily closed for the time being, meaning it won’t be possible to meet the original release date.
“During these strange times, I think it’s important we work together, rather than trudge ahead alone and abandon those who have helped artists along the way. I can’t explain to you how much this record means to me personally, and I am so incredibly excited for it to reach your ears soon. It’s just showing up fashionably late, 2020 style.”
In the meantime, Courtney has released another taster from Old Flowers: the late-May single It Must Be Someone Else’s Fault, accompanied by a video directed by V Haddad and choreographed by Marlee Cook-Parrot, alias Marlee Grace, a writer and dancer who focuses on improvisation and self-expression.
Haddad reflects: “It Must Be Someone Else’s Fault inspired us to create a video exploring being and becoming a woman and the world that surrounds her in this journey. Through dream-logic, we set out to interweave our characters through choreographed echoes and mirror moments of dance to draw out an ode to matriarchy, empathy, and sisterhood.”
This chimes with the overall theme of an album created in the aftermath of a long-term relationship ending, leading to Courtney’s most vulnerable writing on ten new songs that chronicle her journey through heartbreak, loneliness and finding herself again.
“I didn’t lie in what I wrote because it was a very cathartic process,” says Courtney Marie Andrews of her break-up album
“There are a million records and songs about heartbreak, but I did not lie when writing these songs,” Courtney says. “This album is about loving and caring for the person you know you can’t be with.
“It’s about being afraid to be vulnerable after you’ve been hurt. It’s about a woman who is alone, but OK with that, if it means truth. This was my truth this year: my nine-year relationship ended and I’m a woman alone in the world, but happy to know herself.”
Truth hurts, love hurts, but Courtney found writing Old Flowers “a safe place, a place of comfort”. “I didn’t lie in what I wrote because it was a very cathartic process,” she says. ”It was the only way I could channel what I was going through but I think sometimes people do lie in these situations because vulnerability is scary – and when you’re vulnerable you show your weakest emotions, and people are uncomfortable with that.”
By way of contrast, Courtney benefited from the confessional self-analysis. “Songs can predict your future or look back at what’s happened, and I didn’t realise that I felt the way I did until I started writing them,” she says.
“I definitely learned a lot about vulnerability: not hiding behind a character I learned so much about my relationship and goodbyes. Everything has a reason and we’re always searching for ourselves and for joy in our lives.This record is no different: when you reach the end of the tunnel, you reach the light and life goes on.”
Produced by Bon Iver and Big Thief producer Andrew Sarlo, Old Flowers was recorded at Sound Space Studio, a private studio in Los Angeles, with only three musicians: Andrews on vocals, acoustic guitar and piano, Twain’s Matthew Davidson, on bass, celeste, mellotron, pedal steel, piano, pump organ, Wurlitzer and background vocals, and Big Thief’s James Krivcheniaon drums and percussion.
“You can’t revive old flowers, but they remain beautiful even when they’ve died and they’re preserved,” says Courtney, drawing parallels with the end of her long-term relationship.
“I think it may be only the third or fourth album to have been made there. Andrew had made a connection with the owner, and it’s just an amazing downtown space in the arts district of LA with giant windows and so many cool instruments in there,” says Courtney.
“Andrew and I had both decided the album needed to be made in a very intimate space with the fewer cooks in the kitchen, the better, and this place was perfect.
“A lot of the record was just Matt and me and I guess it was like a musical dance of communication between the two of us, and then James added those small moments of magic between our ‘dancing’.”
Old Flowers is Courtney’s seventh album, following on from 2018’s May Your Kindness Remain; 2016’s Honest Life; 2013’s On My Page; 2010’s No One’s Slate Is Clean; 2009’s Painters Hands And A Seventh Son and 2008’s Urban Myths.
“I definitely look at albums in their own right. I’m with Neil Young on that,” says Courtney. “Every album has its own journey. It would be a disservice and an injustice if I were to try to make the same record over and over again. The best artists are constantly re-born with each album.”
Old Flowers finds Courtney in full bloom. “The title means lots of things to me, one of them being that you can’t revive old flowers, but they remain beautiful even when they’ve died and they’re preserved.
“A friend of mine once said to me that flowers are timeless, and I can agree with that sentiment.”
Courtney Marie Andrews plays Pocklington Arts Centre on June 17 2021. For tickets, go to pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk.
Piece in our time? No, not until next year after Shed Seven’s Piece Hall headline show was moved to next June
YORK band Shed Seven’s all-Yorkshire bill at The Piece Hall, Halifax, is being rescheduled for a second time.
The Coronavirus lockdown put paid to the original date of June 26 2020, first moved to September 19. Now, third time lucky, the Sheds’ show will take place on June 26 2021.
Joining the Sheds that West Yorkshire day will be Leeds bands The Pigeon Detectives and The Wedding Present and Leeds United-supporting York group Skylights, plus the Brighton Beach DJs.
Tickets for this Futuresounds Events open-air concert are on sale at £42.50, premium seats £55, at lunatickets.co.uk, seetickets.com and gigantic.com.
This is the second outdoor Shed Seven show in 2020 to need a new date. They should have been chasing winners as well as Chasing Rainbows at Doncaster Racecourse on August 15, but that Live After Racing debut is now a non-runner instead of being under starter’s orders at 5.45pm.
The new race day will be May 15 2021, the post-racing show now re-billed as Don 2021 Music Live.
When announcing the Halifax headline gig, Shed Seven lead singer Rick Witter said: “We’re doing this Piece Hall show partly because our 2018 gig at Manchester’s Castlefield Bowl went so well.”
No-show blow: Covid-19 has scuppered Paul Banks and Rick Witter’s Shed Seven Acoustic set at next month’s Platform Festival at The Old Station, Pocklington
The revived Britpoppers drew 8,000 that June day; the capacity will be 5,500 for the Piece Hall, a renovated 18th-century Halifax cloth hall that now houses history exhibits and independent shops, bars and restaurants.
Last year, the Sheds mounted their biggest ever Shedcember winter tour, chalking up their record run of 23 shows between November 21 and December 21, with Leeds First Direct Arena on December 7 at the epicentre.
“After we did the Shedcember gigs, we just fancied doing something similar to Castlefield Bowl this summer, but this time a Yorkshire gig,” said the Stockport-born Witter, when interviewed in January.
Stockport, Mr Witter?! “I know, but I consider myself a Yorkie now,” said Rick, who attended Huntington School in York.
“I remember Embrace playing The Piece Hall [Elbow have done likewise], and it’s taken a few months to confirm our gig since we came up with the idea of playing there. We wanted to do an outdoor show, and to do it in such a salubrious setting will be a great buzz.”
Seven summer festival appearances by the Sheds have been knocked on the head by the Covid-19 pandemic and so too has Rick Witter and Paul Banks’s Shed Seven Acoustic headline show at Pocklington’s Platform Festival on July 11
Roll on next summer, the all-Yorkshire day at the Piece Hall and Shed Seven’s first run-out at Donny racecourse. “I went as a guest to see Kaiser Chiefs play at York Racecourse [July 22 2016], and it was a great day out,” said Rick. “People love it because it’s a full day out with racing and music. Let’s feel the love that day as everyone makes a big day of it. We can’t wait.”
KENTMERE House Gallery, in Scarcroft Hill, York, is re-opening from this week but by appointment only until further notice.
Ann Petherick would normally welcome visitors on Thursday evenings and the first Saturday and Sunday of each month, as well as by arrangement, but in these prevailing Covid-19 times, only the latter will apply for now…but even that is a welcome step forward in loosened lockdown.
To make a viewing appointment, contact Ann on 01904 656507 or 07801 810825 or at ann@kentmerehouse.co.uk.
On show is A Life In Colour, Work from the Studio of Jack Hellewell, 1920-2000, including unframed pieces never seen before.
Ann always intended to devote much of this year’s exhibition programme to Hellewell, as 2020 would have been his centenary year. “Since we had to close under the Coronavirus lockdown, we’ve been updating the website regularly, especially Jack’s section, featuring his views of Yorkshire and elsewhere,” she says.
North York Mpors, by Jack Hellewell
“Now we’re re-opening, there’ll be a rolling exhibition of Jack’s work, including works on paper and on canvas, with prices ranging from £500 to £1,500.”
After his death in 2000, Kentmere House Gallery was appointed to manage Jack’s artistic estate on behalf of his family, since when exhibitions have been held in Ilkley, Leeds, Stoke-on-Trent, Bristol, London and Vienna. “There were several more planned in 2020, although some may now have to be deferred to 2021,” says Ann.
Ever since Ann saw Jack’s work in a gallery in Ilkley 25 years ago, he has been one of her gallery’s most loved and respected artists and work from his studio is on show there permanently.
“Jack lived for his painting, describing himself as ‘a fanatical painter’ and spending all day and every day painting, especially after his wife died,” says Ann. “Towards the end of his life, his daughter said the only way she knew he was really ill was when he stopped painting
“He loved it when he sold work but hated having to be involved with the selling and, as a result, most of the work we show will never have been seen before outside his studio.”
Ebb Tide, Filey, by Jack Hellewell
Jack’s attic flat overlooking Ilkley Moor was always neatly stacked with canvasses and work on paper. “Initially he would say ‘I haven’t done much’, and then the paintings would start to appear: astounding in their quality and consistency and always singing with colour,” says Ann.
“The gentlest, quietest and most modest of men, there were few who were privileged to know him, but he had a delightful sense of humour, which also appears in his paintings.”
Jack Hellewell was a Yorkshireman through and through. Born in Bradford in 1920, he trained as a painter at Bradford College of Art – where David Hockney studied too – from 1949 to 1952 and in later life lived in Menston and Ilkley.
He saw war service in Egypt, North Africa and Italy and he then worked as a graphic designer. His travels with his family took him to Australia, Austria, New Zealand, the South Seas and, frequently, to Scotland.
In 1976, he gave up his design work to become a full-time painter, returning to West Yorkshire to do so.
Kentmere House Gallery owner and curator Ann Petherick
“All his work was executed entirely from memory – he always refused to sketch on site, believing that ‘it ties you down’ – and everything was derived from personal experiences,” says Ann.
“Jack’s travels and encounters had a dramatic impact on his painting and he had an amazing ability to retain the essence of a place, so that years – or even decades later – he could produce a painting from it.”
Much of his work used the visual experience of intense light in warmer climates, as compared with the more subtle light he found in Britain.
“Jack always worked in acrylic, enjoying the contrasts it offers between strong and subtle colours, and the feeling of movement, which is such a feature of his work,” says Ann. “He had the ability both to use the medium neat on canvas or diluted on paper, the latter giving the effect of the most delicate watercolour.”
Jack exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition on several occasions in the 1990s; his work was featured on the Tyne Tees Television arts programme North-East Line and he has an entry in the definitive publication Artists In Britain Since 1945.
Kirkgate, Leeds, by Jonathan Hooper
“All this leads me to wonder how many other such artists there are: producing superbly rich and inspired work, yet largely unknown to the public and even more so to the art world, and never receiving a penny of public funding, nor any public recognition,” says Ann, who continues to ensure that all’s well that’s Hellewell by promoting his art assiduously in his centenary year.
Meanwhile, in an effort to keep spirits up during lockdown – not least her own – Ann has been Tweeting a painting from her extensive stock every day, under the heading of Art For The Day at @Kentmere_H_Gall.
“I try to link it to something relevant – the weather, or an event happening that day, for example – and I enjoy scrolling through my stock every morning, sometimes finding paintings I’d forgotten I had,” she says.
“I also try to create a contrast from one day to the next, such as the subtlety of Keith Roper’s pastels of the Fens, then the vibrancy of Jonathan Hooper’s oils of Leeds street scenes. It makes a lovely collection to look back on.
“It seems that others agree as many have been re-Tweeted in an attempt to cheer up someone’s day.”
Buttercups & Daisies, by Susan Bower, Kentmere House Gallery favourite, Royal Society of British Artists member and Federation of British Artists online art fair exhibitor
Farther afield, Ann is delighted that, on the eve of its 60th anniversary, the trail-blazing Federation of British Artists has set up a new art fair at the Mall Galleries, London.
Inevitably, the 2020 Figurative Art Fair is online, showing contemporary figurative art by elected members of the country’s leading national art societies: The Pastel Society; Royal Society of British Artists; Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours; Royal Society of Portrait Painters; New English Art Club; Royal Society of Marine Artists; Society of Wildlife Artists and Royal Institute of Oil Painters.
“Kentmere House Gallery shows work by members of all these societies,” says Ann. “This is a very exciting development as, in recent years, art fairs have come to be associated mainly with conceptual work, serving to alienate much of the potential market. However, there are strong signs of a change, with figurative painting enjoying a revival.
“At a time when artists and art institutions alike urgently need public support, this innovative venture will benefit artists across the country and give inspiration to all those who have become despondent at the appearance of their homes.
“It’s appropriate that the societies come together in this time of isolation to celebrate figurative art, contemporary artists, and the spirit of artistic collaboration.”
Fen Lane, Evening, by Pastel Society member, Kentmere House regular and Federation of British Artists show exhibitor Keith Roper
Nigel, meet Nigel: Cookery writer Nigel Slater with Giles Cooper, who played his younger self on stage and will do so again in next month’s radio play and animated film. Picture: Simon Annand
NIGEL Slater’s childhood memoir, Toast, is popping up again, this time online as a radio play and animated film with a recipe card from the cookery writer, from July 1 to 31.
For the full flavour to flood out, to match the interactive, sensory nature of the 2019 stage play, where the smell of food added to the pleasure, “new ways for audiences to feel, hear, smell and taste” Toast will be part of the broadcast experience.
This innovative response to lockdown times is being brought to the air by the Lawrence Batley Theatre, in Huddersfield, “rising to the forefront to make a difference during this cultural shift for a second time in a bid to raise money for the theatre industry when it faces ongoing struggles”.
Already, the West Yorkshire theatre has mounted an online adaptation of The Understudy, Henry Filloux-Bennett’s adaptation of David Nicholls’ 2005 novel. Starring Stephen Fry, it reached international audiences in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Kuwait, Russia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Switzerland and the United States, as well as in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.
Working in partnership with The Lowry, Salford, LBT’s Toast will feature the original West End cast, led by Giles Cooper, a close friend of Slater, who will be recording his lines in his London home, where Slater lived when he began writing his award-winning autobiography.
Cooper also played Slater in Toast’s national tour that visited York Theatre Royal last November. Now he reprises the role once more, re-joining, albeit remotely, his London co-stars Lizzie Muncey as Mum, Stephen Ventura as Dad,Marie Lawrence as Joan and Jake Ferretti as Josh, under the direction of Jonnie Riordan again.
The poster for Nigel Slater’s Toast
Filloux-Bennett’s two-hour adaptation of Slater’s autobiography vividly re-creates his childhood through the tastes and smells he shares with his mother, culminating in the young Nigel’s escape to London. From making the perfect sherry trifle, through the playground politics of sweets, the rigid rules of restaurant dining, and a domestic war over cakes, this tale of love, loss and toast is “A Play About Growing Up. With Food”.
The cast and creative team involved in Toast are taking part completely in isolation, with the actors’ lines, recorded at home, being brought to life by the sound design team of Alexandra Faye Braithwaite, Annie May Fletcher and Sophie Galpin.
Commenting on the LBT’s upcoming broadcast, Slater says: “Toast has already had a life as a book, a film and a stage production and I am thrilled to see it in its latest format as an animated radio play.
“To bring the play to such a wide audience is a brilliant idea from the Lawrence Batley Theatre and The Lowry and working with so many of the original production team and cast again has been an absolute joy.”
Writer Filloux-Bennett says: “I’m thrilled that we’ve been able to bring Toast back to this new virtual stage. We were completely blown away by the response the play had from audiences across the country, and we’re so excited that people who weren’t able to catch the play before now can, and that for those who enjoyed it on stage we can bring the story – and the Walnut Whips – back again.”
For more information on how to listen to Toast or watch the animated film next month, go to thelbt.org. Tickets cost £10 to £16 at thelbt.org/shows/nigel-slaters-toast-2/, with those booking for the higher price receiving a package of goodies, including a programme, Nigel Slater recipe card and two Walnut Whips, “so you can have a heart-warming and stomach-filling evening from your front room”.
The LBY website says: “You will receive an email with a link to the play and recipe card three days prior to the date that you have booked to watch the performance. If you have selected to receive a programme, recipe card and Walnut Whips, then you will receive these through the post prior to your performance date.”
Here is Charles Hutchinson’s review of Toast from last November
Nigel Slater’s Toast, York Theatre Royal, November 19 to 23 2019 *****
Giles Cooper in his stage role as Nigel Slater in Toast last year
HERE is the challenge facing director Jonnie Riordan. “Think about how long it takes to actually make a piece of toast, and then how do you do that on stage when you’re trying to keep the audience engaged?” he says.
It brings a new meaning to pop-up theatre in York after the summer Elizabeth version at Shakespeare’s Rose Theatre, and Riordan and writer Henry Filloux-Bennett have made a wonderful job of adapting cookery writer Nigel Slater’s coming-of-age memoir for the stage.
Like Jonathan Watkins for Matt Haig’s Reasons To Stay Alive, on tour at the Theatre Royal only two weeks ago, Riordan is both director and choreographer. However, whereas Watkins’s show took time to find its footing on a somewhat strange-looking set – was it a crater or a cracked cloud egg? – Toast is sure footed, even light on its feet from the start.
Nigel, our narrator, guides us through his story like Slater’s lovely writing leads you through his recipes and epicurean thoughts in his mellifluous books. Played by the delightful Giles Cooper in schoolboy tank top and short trousers, Nigel is nine and already drawn to the one cookery book in the Slaters’ Wolverhampton home: Marguerite Patten’s ground-breaking Cookery In Colour, a full-colour Sixties’ bolt out of the cordon bleu after the grey gravy of before.
From within the cream and brown Sixties’ kitchen of Libby Watson’s design, Cooper’s Nigel likes to orchestrate all the storytelling, stepping in and out of a scene to converse with the audience, but such is the skill of Filloux-Bennett’s writing that the events of his young life have a habit of pulling the rug from under him. At one point, his mother stops him in his tracks and tells him to re-trace his steps to relate the true, darker version of events.
Attention to detail: Giles Cooper’s Nigel Slater seeks culinary perfection in Toast
There is abundant humour, absolutely true to Slater’s own tone in his books, but the darkness has to break through too, given what happened to Slater in his childhood and teenage years.
His love of food is omnipresent, and yes, we see toast popping up in real time and later Nigel making mushrooms on toast with a chef’s flair and precision in one so young. We enjoy the culinary sensations, and when Nigel is regaling us with the delights of sweets – amid his father’s insistence that certain sweets are for boys, others for girls – bags of sweets are passed around the audience. The real Nigel Slater had a bag by his feet as he sat in the dress circle, by the way!
Food is at the heart of Toast, glorious food and not so glorious food in the case of Nigel’s father’s first attempt at making spaghetti bolognaise, mountains of “sick-smelling” Parmesan dust et al. Part of the joy here is having our own recollections of mishaps around our own kitchen tables.
Through food too, we see the difference between Nigel’s relationship with his Mum (Katy Federman), pretty much tied to the apron strings, such is their bond, and his abusive Dad (Blair Plant, back at his old Theatre Royal stamping ground).
Into the story comes the dreadful Joan (Samantha Hopkins) and assorted characters played by Stefan Edwards, as the first stirrings of Nigel’s sexuality play out.
Brilliant performances, a superb choice of soundtrack from La Mer to Dusty, and a finale as warm and toasty as toast make Toast a five-star treat, both measured and deeply flavoured like a Nigel Slater recipe.
