Category: Festivals

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More Things To Do in York and beyond when dinosaurs and Ronan return. Here’s Hutch’s List No. 33, from The York Press

Natural History Museum takes to the stage in Dinosaurs Live at Grand Opera House, York. Picture: Pamela Raith 

THE dinosaurs are roaring and roaming anew and love is in the air in Charles Hutchinson’s top tips for summer joy.

Children’s show of the week: Natural History Museum presents Dinosaurs Live, Grand Opera House, York, today, 2.30pm and 4.30pm

FOR the first time since 1881, the “home of dinosaurs”, London’s Natural History Museum, is going on tour, teaming up with Mark Thompson Productions for a “dinosaur adventure like no other”.

Suitable for age three upwards, the show takes a pre-historic journey to the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods as  life-like dinosaurs come alive on stage. In addition, today’s audiences will learn more about fossils, time scales and how our planet has changed over hundreds of millions of years. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Junk Drawer Theatre Company exploring the vicissitudes  love in Thank You, I Love You at Theatre@41 

Love stories of the week: Junk Drawer Theatre Company, Thank You, I Love You, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, today, 7pm

STEP into a world where love is found in the quiet moments, the whispered goodnights and the spaces between words in Lucy Connor-Mulhall’s Thank You, I Love You’s 70-minute exploration of connection: romantic, platonic and everything in between.

Through fragmented memories, late-night conversations and the weight of unspoken emotions, Junk Drawer Theatre Company’s Rachael Lanaghan, Emine Altinsoy, Billy Abbey, Holly Carter, Luke Quarrington and Isobel Pilot’s characters navigate love, loss, and longing. Some hold on too tightly, others learn how to let go, in a reminder that love is not so much the  grand gestures, more the smallest, softest things, such as a shared bed, a stolen glance, a promise to light the sky for someone who needs it. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Texas singer Sharleen Spiteri: On song at Scarborough Open Air Theatre tonight

Coastal gig of the week: Texas, TK Maxx Presents Scarborough Open Air Theatre, tonight. Gates open at 6pm

THIS weekend, Sharleen Spiteri leads Glasgow band Texas through five decades of hits, from I Don’t Want To Be A Lover, Say What You Want and Summer Sun to Inner Smile, Mr Haze and Keep On Talking. Rianne Downey supports. Box office: scarboroughopenairtheatre.com.

Ronan Keating: Returning to York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend today 

Irish craic of the whip of the week: Ronan Keating, York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, today. Gates open at 11.15am; first race, 1.25pm; last race, 5pm

IRISH singer, presenter and talent-show judge Ronan Keating returns to the York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, back on the Knavesmire track where he performed with Boyzone in July 2018.

Expect both solo and boy band favourites. “If you’re going to a festival or a racecourse, you have to give the people what they want, what they’re expecting, and because of the Boyzone documentary that’s on Sky and NOW TV, I’ll be doing more Boyzone hits than normal this time,” he says. For race-day tickets, go to: yorkracecourse.co.uk.

Helena Mackie: Oboe soloist at the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic’s concert at Ryedale Festival 

Ryedale Festival finale: Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Final Gala Concert, Hovingham Hall, Sunday, 6.30pm

THE ‘Liverpool Phil’ make their Ryedale Festival debut this weekend, exploring the Italian vistas of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No 4, complemented by Mozart’s Oboe Concerto (featuring soloist Helena Mackie), Faure’s serene Pavane and Poulenc’s mischievous, charming Sinfonietta. For the festival programme and tickets, go to: ryedalefestival.com. Box office: 01751 475777.

James Willstrop:  From squash court to stage in musical ode to beautiful mothers, sporting ambition and fatherhood at Friargate Theatre

Edinburgh Fringe preview of the week: James Willstrop in Daddy, Tomorrow Will I Be A Man?, Friargate Theatre, York, July 28, 7.30pm

JAMES  Willstrop, cynical and driven only by his sporting success, is on the verge of becoming world number one in squash. A chance meeting leads to an agonising dilemma that  threatens everything he has worked so hard to achieve.

Through tender recollections of his mother Lesley, who died when he was 17, and by undertaking the hardest training session of his life in real time, Willstrop learns lessons about ambition, success and love in the Harrogate sportsman, actor and writer’s solo musical ode to beautiful mothers, sporting ambition and fatherhood. Box office: ridinglights.org.

Annie Kingsnorth, left, Martin Shaw and Abigail Cruttenden in Robert Bolt’s A Man For All Seasons at the Grand Opera House, York

Political play of the week: A Man For All Seasons, Grand Opera House, York, July 29 to August 2, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday matinees

THE greatest, most powerful and dangerous figures who shaped English history are brought vividly to life in Robert Bolt’s award-winning play, directed by Jonathan Church on a tour that visits York in its only northern outing before a West End run.

Now 80, The Professionals, Judge John Deed and Inspector George Gently star Martin Shaw playsSir Thomas More: scholar, ambassador, Lord Chancellor, friend to King Henry VIII  and man of integrity. When Henry demands a divorce from Catherine of Aragon, clearing the way for him to marry Anne Boleyn, the staunchly Catholic Thomas is forced to choose between loyalty and conscience, committing an act of defiance that can only lead to the ultimate price. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

York Stage: Celebrating 100 years of Disney songs in Disney’s Dare To Dream Jr at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre 

Musical revue of the week: York Stage in Disney’s Dare to Dream Jr, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, August 1, 7.30pm; August 2, 2pm and 4pm

HONOURING 100 years of Disney music, this60-minute revue follows an eager group of trainees on their first day at a fictional Walt Disney Imagineering Studio. As the trainees set out to help each other discover their dreams, they work together to explore the power of those dreams to unite, inspire and make anything possible.

Disney’s Dare To Dream Jr includes songs that appear for the first time in a Disney stage musical, notably fan favourites from The Princess And The Frog, Coco, Enchanto and Frozen II in a showcase of contemporary songs, timeless classics and new medleys to surprise and delight Disney devotees of all ages. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

Sweet Legacies: Exhibition at York TheatreRoyal  to tie in with this summer’s community play, His Last Report

Exhibition of the week: Sweet Legacies, York Theatre Royal, until August 3

YORK Theatre Royal’s foyer is transformed into a pop-up exhibition of photography, visual arts, audio, film and more as part of the Sweet Legacies community engagement project.

The project has seen the Theatre Royal work with 22 community groups across the city to put on a series of fun, free and inclusive activities and events.

The free exhibition is open to all to learn more about the project and the Rowntree family to coincide with the Theatre Royal and Riding Lights community play His Last Report.

In Focus: York Proms, York Museum Gardens, York, Sunday

Soprano Lucy Farrimond: Performing at Sunday’s York Proms

NO tickets will be available on the gate for Sunday’s seventh York Proms at York Museum Gardens, presented by classical chart-topping York soprano Rebecca Newman.

Topping the bill will be rising operatic singers soprano Lucy Farrimond and tenor Oscar Bowen-Hill, performing with the orchestra under director Ben Crick.

Royal Northern College of Music graduate Farrimond made her BBC Proms solo debut in 2019 aged 21, singing Haydn’s The Creation at the Royal Albert Hall with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, and has performed on the BBC, ITV, BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4.

Bowen-Hill has graduated with BSc 1st Class honours in Cognitive Science and Singing, sings with the London Philharmonic Choir and is embarking on the next steps of his career with scholarships at St Paul’s, Knightsbridge, London, and Oxford Bach Soloists.

Farrimond and Bowen-Hill will lead the Proms finale, including Jerusalem and Land Of Hope And Glory, rounded off with fireworks lighting up St Mary’s Abbey, as well as performing operatic arias and show songs. Classical orchestral pieces and film music will feature too.

The main stage will be complemented by York Proms’ biggest ever community stage, presenting more than 200 York performers, including the York Philharmonic Male Voice Choir in its centenary year, opening the event with a rendition of the National Anthem with the orchestra.

Taking part too will be York Rock Choir, Lucy’s Pop Choir, Bridge Shanty Crew, York Musical Theatre Company and the Katie Ventress Dance School.

Gates will open at 5pm for Fast Track tickets and at 5.30pm for Standard. Picnics are permitted, including alcohol and glass bottles but bags will be checked on arrival. Picnics are allowed, with alcohol and glass bottles, although bags will be inspected on arrival. Camping chairs? Yes. Tables, parasols, trolleys and BBQs? No. No dogs will be admitted, except for assistance dogs.

A quick check of the York Proms website confirms that Adult General Sale, Disabled and Child tickets are still on sale; Adult Fast Track and Teen tickets have sold out. To book, go to: yorkproms.com/collections/tickets-2025. 

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REVIEW: Steve Crowther’s verdict on Ryedale Festival, Eric Whitacre (conductor) & National Youth Choir of Scotland, Hovingham Hall, Hovingham, July 20

Conductor and composer Eric Whitacre. Picture: Marc Royce

THE concert opened with a charming theatrical gesture: the choir entered the auditorium in single file, splitting symmetrically to surround the audience — with conductor Eric Whitacre positioned halfway up the central aisle — to perform the composer’s Lux Aurumque.

I’ve attended a number of concerts here — almost all of them orchestral — and all compromised by the venue’s generous acoustic. That’s hardly surprising, given that Hovingham Hall’s concert space was originally the North Yorkshire estate’s 18th-century riding school. But not this time. The choral sound resonated beautifully, the balance was impeccable and so was the singing.

Not only is Eric Whitacre a superb composer and a highly accomplished conductor, but he’s also completely at ease in his role as presenter. Instantly engaging and often funny, he gave us a deeper understanding of the choral works being performed.

The second piece had the wonderfully descriptive title: Leonardo Dreams Of His Flying Machine. The opening burst into dissonant flight in a work that embraced the dramatic. The vocal landscape was rich, enhanced by miniature suspended cymbals and tambourines to sex-up the score. The result was a fitting tribute to the great innovator’s visionary ornithopter and his enduring fascination with flight.

As visually engaging as the conductor and chamber choir undoubtedly were, I couldn’t take my eyes off the elephant in the room: an upright piano, front and right of stage. Then, halfway through the programme, Mr Whitacre graciously welcomed the festival’s artistic director and distinguished pianist Christopher Glynn to the platform.

The composer’s Seal Lullaby is his setting of the Rudyard Kipling poem and reminded me of the music by Howard Blake in Dianne Jackson’s animated film of Raymond Briggs’s , The Snowman. The tonal harmonic clusters and gentle dissonances were very effective and sweetly sung, but it was a bit sugary for my palette. Given the instrument’s limitations, Christopher Glynn’s ability to produce such a refined sound was impressive.

Whitacre’s Sing Gently impressed both as a choral work and in its timely ambition. Written in 2020 during the global Covid-19 lockdown, the piece was commissioned for Virtual Choir 6. Its premiere performance featured 17,572 singers from 129 countries – making it his largest virtual choir to date (I looked these statistics up).

The setting of the lyrics – “May we sing together, always. May our hearts always be gentle” – was simple and unembellished, and the performance sincerely heartfelt. I thought this gentle plea for empathy, community and kindness really resonated in a world that seems to be embracing the exact opposite.

The composer’s Hurt couldn’t be more different. It is actually a choral arrangement of a Trent Reznor song recorded by Nine Inch Nails as part of their iconic 1994 album, The Downward Spiral and later by the great Johnny Cash on 2002’s American IV: The Man Comes Around.

National Youth Choir of Scotland artistic director Christopher Bell

The choir delivered a genuinely rich, darker sound world with prominent dissonances reinforcing the rawness of text: “I hurt myself today/ To see if I still feel/ I focus on the pain/ The only thing that’s real”.

The choir’s role worked brilliantly: transforming from support, commentary and then integrating with the excellent soloist. The sustained minor second cadence created a haunting effect.

The mood shifted again with two of Moses Hogan’s well-known arrangements of African American spirituals: Elijah Rock and Joshua Fit The Battle (Of Jericho). Both pieces were great, bristling with vitality and razor-sharp articulation.

The vocal narrative was driven with authentic intent. However, the sheer rhythmic energy, dramatic dynamic contrasts and interplay between the powerful homophonic sections and lighter, more intricate imitation passages of the latter lingered longest in my mind.

Before looking at the musical offering from Bach, I must give a mention to Christopher Bell, the long-serving artistic director – and driving force – behind the very highly regarded NYCOS chamber choir. A point generously acknowledged by Eric Whitacre.

This and a slight whinge: the concert was about 15-20 minutes too long which, given the seating on offer, was a bit of an ask.

For me, the highlight of the concert was Come, Sweet Death: J S Bach, arranged (or rather, reimagined) by Edwin London and realised by Rhonda Sandberg.

That title needs a little unpacking: Bach’s Komm, Süßer Tod (Come, Sweet Death) was originally written in 1736 for solo voice and basso continuo. Edwin London’s concept transforms it into a richly layered choral work – the true act of creative reinterpretation – freeing the singers from strict rhythmic coordination, a distinctly modern choral approach. But it is Rhonda Sandberg who created the practical performing score, bringing London’s vision to life.

The choir reverted to surrounding the audience, with Eric Whitacre directing from the centre. All seemed like business as usual, as the Bach arrangement exchanged lines of recognisable authenticity. Then, suddenly, that world stopped – as if someone had pressed a button – and we were transported into the most exquisite, psychedelic, timeless sound world.

The music floated, as the choir bled out the original sacred tune like some otherworldly canon. A work of genius? Quite possibly. And a fitting close to a concert that constantly surprised.

Review by Steve Crowther

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What’s On in Ryedale, York and beyond. Hutch’s List No. 32, from Gazette & Herald

Harvey Stephens’ Jamie New, front left, with his Sheffield schoolmates in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Everybody’s Talking About Jamie. Picture: Matthew Kitchen

FROM dazzling dancing to doodling, disco favourites to an orchestral festival debut, Charles Hutchinson highlights summer delights that lie ahead.

Musical of the week: Pick Me Up Theatre in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, until Saturday, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee

AT 16, Sheffield schoolboy Jamie New has no interest in pursuing a traditional career. He wants to be a drag queen. Supported by his loving mum and encouraged by friends, can Jamie overcome prejudice, beat the bullies and step out of the darkness into the spotlight?

Written by Tom MacRae and The Feeling’s Dan Gillespie Sells, this joyous underdog story is staged by York company Pick Me Up Theatre with Harvey Stevens, 15, and Gemma McDonald leading the cast. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

Helmsley Arts Centre’s poster for Doodle Fest’s creative workshops

Summer holiday activity of the week: Doodle Fest, The Art of Doodling Art Festival Creative Workshops, Helmsley Arts Centre, today, 10am to 3pm, ages eight to 11; tomorrow, 9.30am to 11am, ages five to seven; tomorrow, 1pm to 4pm, ages 12 to 16

ARTIST Nicola Hutchinson guides participants through taking doodling skills to the next level, from experimenting with different forms and techniques to discovering new ways to express yourself through art. Turn your sketches into articulated characters; design giant doodled picture frames to showcase your masterpieces; let your imagination run wild as your doodles come to life in beautiful works of art.

All materials will be provided, but bring a sketchbook if you have one at home. All levels and abilities are welcome; snacks and drinks are provided; dress to get messy. Tickets: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.

Sharleen Spiteri: Fronting Texas at Scarborough Open Air Theatre

Coastal gigs of the week: TK Maxx Presents Scarborough Open Air Theatre, Judas Priest, tonight; Texas, Saturday. Gates open at 6pm

JUDAS  Priest, formed in Birmingham in 1969, are still receiving a Grammy nomination in 2025 for Best Metal Performance, on top of being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, appointed by shock rocker Alice Cooper, in 2022. Their 19th studio album, Invincible Shield, was released in March 2024. Tonight’s support act will be Phil Campbell & The B**stard Sons.

This weekend, Sharleen Spiteri leads Glasgow band Texas through five decades of hits, from I Don’t Want To Be A Lover, Say What You Want and Summer Sun to Inner Smile, Mr Haze and Keep On Talking. Rianne Downey supports. Box office: scarboroughopenairtheatre.com.

Steve Steinman’s Love Hurts: Feel the power of ballads and anthems at Grand Opera House, York

Jukebox show of the week: Steve Steinman’s Love Hurts, Power Ballads & Anthems!, Grand Opera House, York, tomorrow, 7.30pm

FROM  the producers of Anything For Love and Vampires Rock comes the latest Steve Steinman venture, this one built around power ballads and anthems performed by a powerhouse cast of singers and a seven-piece band.

Love Hurts embraces Fleetwood Mac, Heart, Whitesnake, Billy Idol, Aerosmith, Tina Turner, Cutting Crew, Foreigner, REO Speedwagon, Rainbow, Van Halen, Europe, Air Supply and more. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Sophie Ellis-Bextor: On course for the York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend

Dancefloor double bill of the week: Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Natasha Bedingfield, York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, Friday. Gates, 4pm; first race, 5.30pm; last race, 8.23pm

AT the only evening meeting of the Knavesmire racing calendar, kitchen disco queen  Sophie Ellis-Bextor and fellow Londoner Natasha Bedingfield each play a set after the seven-race sporting action.

Ellis-Bextor, 46, draws on her five top ten albums and eight top ten singles, such as Murder On The Dancefloor and Take Me Home. Bedingfield , 43, has the hits Unwritten, Single, These Words, I Wanna Have Your Babies and Soulmate to her name. For race-day tickets, go to: yorkracecourse.co.uk.

Fifties and Sixties’ tribute gig of the week: Music Masters, Kirk Theatre, Pickering, Friday, 7.30pm

MUSIC Masters’ time machine of a five-piece band transport Friday’s audience back to 1950s and 1960s’ pop with their dedication to vintage vocal harmonies, instrumental prowess and revival of the spirit of a golden age when music was the heartbeat of a generation. As the old saying goes, “be there or be square”. Box office: 01751 474833 or kirktheatre.co.uk.

Ronan Keating: Returning to York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend on Saturday

Irish craic of the week: Ronan Keating, York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, Saturday. Gates open at 11.15am; first race, 1.25pm; last race, 5pm

IRISH singer, presenter and talent-show judge Ronan Keating returns to the York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, back on the Knavesmire track where he performed with Boyzone in July 2018.

Expect both solo and boy band favourites. “If you’re going to a festival or a racecourse, you have to give the people what they want, what they’re expecting, and because of the Boyzone documentary that’s on Sky and NOW TV, I’ll be doing more Boyzone hits than normal this time,” he says. For race-day tickets, go to: yorkracecourse.co.uk.

Helena Mackie: Soloist for Mozart’s Oboe Concerto at Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra’s Ryedale Festival debut

Ryedale Festival finale: Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Final Gala Concert, Hovingham Hall, Sunday, 6.30pm

THE ‘Liverpool Phil’ make their Ryedale Festival debut this weekend, exploring the Italian vistas of Mendelssohn’s Symphony No 4, complemented by Mozart’s Oboe Concerto(featuring soloist Helena Mackie), Faure’s serene Pavane and Poulenc’s mischievous, charming Sinfonietta. For the full festival programme and tickets, go to: ryedalefestival.com. Box office: 01751 475777.

Alan Fletcher: Heading to Pocklington with his band in September

Show announcement of the week: Alan Fletcher, Pocklington Arts Centre, September 19, 8pm

NEIGHBOURS soap star Alan Fletcher will swap Ramsay Street for Pocklington Arts Centre for an evening of song. Known to millions as Dr Karl Kennedy in the long-running Australian series, he has carved out a career as a musician too, first fronting rock band Waiting Room, then as an Americana and alt-country singer-songwriter.

In 2024, singer and guitarist Fletcher’s five-piece band sold out 22 British dates promoting his album The Point. Now they return to showcase latest album Back To School. His compositions blend humour (For The Love Of Lager, How Good Is Bed) and poignant reflections on love, life and everything in between (Hey You, The Point, Back To School). Box office: 01759 301547 or pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk.

Kate Rusby: Performing with the Singy Songy Session Band at Ryedale Festival. Picture: David Angel  

In Focus: Ryedale Festival, Kate Rusby, When They All Looked Up, Milton Rooms, Malton, July 25, 7pm, sold out

BARNSLEY folk nightingale Kate Rusby makes her Ryedale Festival debut on Friday, performing songs from her new album with her Singy Songy Session Band.

Released on Pure Records on April 25, When They All Looked Up is Kate’s first studio set of new material since 2019’s Philosphers, Poets & Kings. In that time, she has delivered the Christmas albums Holly Head in 2019 and Light Years in 2023 and the covers collection Hand Me Down in 2020.

Combining original compositions with re-imagined traditional songs, When They All Looked Up spans a dynamic sonic landscape, from intimate acoustic arrangements to rich, immersive soundscapes, on intimate, uplifting, joyous and profoundly moving songs that explore human stories, themes of resilience, self-discovery and connection.

First single Let Your Light Shine is a heartfelt message to Kate’s teenage daughters, Daisy and Phoebe, and to all in need of encouragement, elevated by the addition of Barnsley Youth Choir’s Senior Choir. 

The album cover artwork for Kate Rusby’s When They All Looked Up

“This song is my advice to my daughters, but also to anyone who might need to hear it,” says Kate. “It’s about embracing who you are, having faith in your unique gifts, and letting the world see your light. Be strong, be positive and be kind.”

The full track listing is: How The World Goes; Today Again; Ettrick; Let Your Light Shine; The Moon Man; Judges And Juries; The Barnsley Youth And Temperance Society; The Girl With The Curse; Master Kilby; The Yorkshire Couple and Coal Not Dole.

On December 20, Kate will bring her Christmas Is Merry tour – her 20th anniversary celebration of festive folk joy – to York Barbican. As ever, she will perform traditional South Yorkshire carols, Christmas chestnuts and her own winter songs, drawn from her six Christmas albums, in the company of her regular band and the “Brass Boys” at 7pm. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

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More Things To Do in York and beyond as Rowntree report makes dramatic impact. Hutch’s List No. 32 from The York Press

Amelia Donkor and Antony Jardine: Playing Gulie Harlock and Seebohm Rowntree respectively alongside 100-strong community ensemble in His Last Report at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Millie Stephens

YORK Theatre Royal’s community play takes top billing in Charles Hutchinson’s selections for summer satisfaction.

Community play of the week: York Theatre Royal and Riding Lights Theatre Company present His Last Report, York Theatre Royal, today to August 3  

FOCUSING on pioneering York social reformer Seebohm Rowntree and his groundbreaking investigation into the harsh realities of poverty, Misha Duncan-Barry and Bridget Foreman’s play will be told through the voices of York’s residents, past and present.

Seebohm’s findings illuminate the struggles of the working class, laying the foundation for the welfare state and sparking a movement that will redefine life as we know it. However, when fast forwarding to present-day York, what is Seebohm’s real legacy as the Ministry begins to dismantle the very structures he championed in His Last Report’s York story with a national impact? Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

Bean there, done that: “Appetite For Destruction” artist Lincoln Lightfoot takes his spay can to York’s iconic Bile Beans mural advert at VandalFest

Street art takeover of the summer: Vandals At Work present VandalFest, today, Sunday, then July 25 to 27, 11am to 6pm

VANDALS At Work reunite with youth homelessness charity Safe and Sound Homes (SASH) for VandalFest, the immersive street art takeover of a disused office block with a 2025 theme of the playful, cheeky, witty and mischievous.

Among more than 30 artists from the UK and beyond are Bristol graffiti pioneer Inkie, subversive stencilist Dotmasters, inflatable prankster Filthy Luker, master of optical illusions Chu, rooftop renegade Rowdy and York’s own Sharon McDonagh, Lincoln Lightfoot and Boxxhead. Entry is free, with a suggested £3 donation to SASH.

Craig David: In party mood at Scarborough Open Air Theatre today

Coastal gigs of the week: TK Maxx Presents Scarborough Open Air Theatre, Craig David TS5 Show plus special guest Patrick Nazemi, today; Judas Priest, July 23. Gates open at 6pm

SOUTHAMPTON rhythm & blues musician Craig David parades his triple threat as singer, MC and DJ at his TS5 party night – patented at his Miami penthouse – on the East Coast this weekend. On the 25th anniversary of debut album Born To Do It, expect a set combining old skool anthems from R&B to Swing Beat, Garage to Bashment, while merging chart-topping House hits too.

Judas  Priest, formed in Birmingham in 1969, are still receiving a Grammy nomination in 2025 for Best Metal Performance, on top of being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, appointed by shock rocker Alice Cooper, in 2022. Their 19th studio album, Invincible Shield, was released in March 2024. Wednesday’s support act will be Phil Campbell & The B**stard Sons. Box office: scarboroughopenairtheatre.com.

Heather Leech in Gleowit Productions’ King Harold’s Mother at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre

Historical solo show of the week: Gleowit Productions in King Harold’s Mother, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, tonight, 7.30pm

IN 1066, a mother loses four sons; three killed at the Battle of Hastings, one branded as a traitor. However, these are times of turmoil, where crowns on the head go with swords in the hand, and this mother has lost everything.

Two years later in Exeter, King Harold’s mother, Gytha Thorkelsdottir, makes her last stand against the might of the new king, William. She is forced to face the consequences of her own actions, to accept the overwhelming might of the Conqueror. Is nothing all she is left with? Is nothing better than this, asks Gleowit Productions in King Harold’s Mother, written and performed by Heather Leech. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

Dame Harriet Walter: Pride And Prejudice celebration at Wesley Centre, Malton

Ryedale Festival theatre event of the week: Pride And Prejudice, Dame Harriet Walter, Melvyn Tan and Madeleine Easton, Wesley Centre, Malton, Sunday, 7pm

THIS theatrical retelling of Pride And Prejudice by novelist and Austen biographer Gill Hornby marks the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth. Star of stage and screen Dame Harriet Walter brings the romance of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy to life in an intimate drawing-room setting, in much the same way that Jane herself first read the story aloud to family and friends.

Carl David’s score for the 1995 BBC television adaptation will be performed by pianist Melvyn Tan and violinist Madeleine Easton. The festival runs until July 27; full details and tickets at ryedalefestival.com. Box office: 01751 475777.

The Wedding Present’s David Gedge, left, and Reception writer-director Matt Aston, pictured walking through Leeds, will be teaming up for a chat at Bluebird Bakery, Acomb, on Sunday

Gig and chat show the week: An Evening of Conversation and Music with David Gedge from The Wedding Present, Rise@Bluebird Bakery, Acomb Road, Acomb, York, Sunday, 8pm, doors 7pm

DAVID Gedge, long-time leader of The Wedding Present, discusses his “semi-legendary” Leeds indie band’s 40-year-career and his life in the music industry, in conversation with Amanda Cook. York writer/director Matt Aston joins him too on the eve of rehearsals for Reception – The Wedding Present Musical, ahead of its premiere at Slung Low, The Warehouse, Holbeck, Leeds, from August 22 to September 6.  

Sunday’s event concludes with Gedge’s 20-minute acoustic set drawn from The Wedding Present’s cornucopia of arch, romantic yet perennially disappointed songs of love, life’s high hopes and woes, chance and no chance. Box office: eventbrite.com.

Listen to David Gedge discuss 40 years Of The Wedding Present, the Reception musical and his Rise@Bluebird Bakery show with Two Big Egos In A Small Car podcasters Charles Hutchinson and Graham Chalmers at:

https://www.buzzsprout.com/1187561/episodes/17507606-episode-233-interview-special-with-david-gedge-from-the-wedding-present

Out with the old, in with New: Harvey Stevens’ Jamie, front left, with his Sheffield school classmates in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Everybody’s Talking About Jamie

Musical of the week: Pick Me Up Theatre in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, July 22 to 26, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee

AT 16, Sheffield schoolboy Jamie New is terrified of  the future and has no interest in pursuing a traditional career. He wants to be a drag queen. He knows he can be a sensation. Supported by his loving mum and encouraged by friends, can Jamie overcome prejudice, beat the bullies and step out of the darkness, into the spotlight?

Written by Tom MacRae and The Feeling’s Dan Gillespie Sells, this joyous underdog story is staged by York company Pick Me Up Theatre with Harvey Stevens, 15, and Gemma McDonald leading the cast. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

The poster for Steve Steinman’s Love Hurts, Power Ballads & Anthems!, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York

Jukebox show of the week: Steve Steinman’s Love Hurts, Power Ballads & Anthems!, Grand Opera House, York, July 24, 7.30pm

FROM the producers of Anything For Love and Vampires Rock comes the latest Steve Steinman venture, this one built around power ballads and anthems performed by a powerhouse cast of singers and a seven-piece band.

Love Hurts embraces Fleetwood Mac, Heart, Whitesnake, Billy Idol, Aerosmith, Tina Turner, Cutting Crew, Foreigner, REO Speedwagon, Rainbow, Van Halen, Europe, Air Supply and more. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Sophie Ellis-Bextor: On course for Knavesmire

Dancefloor double bill of the week: Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Natasha Bedingfield, York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, July 25.Gates, 4pm; first race, 5.30pm; last race, 8.23pm

AT the only evening meeting of the Knavesmire racing calendar, kitchen disco queen Sophie Ellis-Bextor and fellow Londoner Natasha Bedingfield each play a set after the seven-race sporting action.

Ellis-Bextor, 46, will draw on her five top ten albums and eight top ten singles, such as Murder On The Dancefloor and Take Me Home, from a pop career now stretching beyond 25 years. Bedingfield , 43, has the hits Unwritten, Single, These Words, I Wanna Have Your Babies and Soulmate to her name. For race-day tickets, go to: yorkracecourse.co.uk. 

In Focus: The Floating Fringe, Arts Barge, York, July 24 to 26

The launch poster for The Floating Fringe

ALL aboard for The Floating Fringe, a celebration of grassroots, home-grown performances on the Arts Barge, moored at Foss Basin Moorings, off Tower Street, York.

This bold new arts festival is taking over the Selby Tony former cargo barge for three jam-packed days of comedy, theatre and family entertainment, offering a long-overdue space for the city’s vibrant and emerging Fringe scene.

“Led by a new generation of creatives, The Floating Fringe is here to shake things up,” says lead organiser Kai West, the York artist, printmaker and Bull band member. “It’s a spirited response to past commercial Fringe attempts that failed to take root, replacing polished formulas with passion, playfulness and local and up-and-coming talent.

“This is about more than just putting on a show.  It’s about building a community. With its intimate setting and grassroots ethos, The Floating Fringe aims to be the artistic home for Fringe arts, acts and audiences alike: a long-awaited space for expression where alternative, up-and-coming and independent voices can truly thrive.”

Kai continues: “York has always had the talent, the audiences and the appetite for Fringe. What it’s been missing is a space that actually belongs to the community. After seeing other commercial attempts come and go, we wanted to create something independent, accessible and genuinely rooted in York’s creative scene. The Arts Barge has always been about building something meaningful for York, by York. The Fringe is just another part of that.”

The Arts Barge itself is part of that story. A passion project years in the making, it was crowd-funded and community-built by the Arts Barge Project to bring an accessible floating arts space to York. Now fully operational and moored in the centre of the city, the barge is more than a venue. “It’s a symbol of what’s possible when local creatives are given the freedom to build something of their own,” says Kai.

From comedy to original theatre and family-friendly daytime shows, The Floating Fringe promises a weekend packed with performances, connection and grassroots energy. “Whether you’re a Fringe fanatic or just curious to see what York’s creative underground has to offer, everyone is welcome aboard,” says Kai.

Box office: https://wegottickets.com/thefloatingfringe/

The Floating Fringe programme

Theo Mason Wood

Thursday

5pm to 6pm, Robocop vs The Terminator vs Gabriel Featherstone. Three titans of entertainment face off in a bloody, mind-mangling, no-holds-barred battle to the death. 

6.30pm to 7.30pm, Richard Brown: Nauseatingly Woke Full-Grown Jellyfish. Underground Fringe favourite known for thoughtful, intelligent and dark alternative comedy.

8pm to 9pm, Seymour Mace Does Things With Stuff. “It’s better than watching people do things,” says Seymour. “It’s better than paying to watch people do things. I was doped up on watching other people do things. I forgot how to do things I’ve just remembered. Look what I done!”

9.30pm to 10.30pm, Theo Mason Wood: Legalise Kissing. York-raised Netflix writer and award-winning comedian delivers a punk-clown manifesto on love, identity and modern chaos in a genre-defying mix of stand-up, surreal storytelling and live techno anthems. “This is comedy like you’ve never seen before,” says Mason Wood.

Bobby Cockles

Friday

5pm to 6pm, Clown: Bobby Cockles Goes To Hell!  The Good Room presents a dark stand-up journey through the terrible adventure of a cursed Cockney clown. Being in love can be absolute hell!

6.30pm to 7.30pm, Eryn Tett Is Sponsored By The Global Megacorp Institute of Manchester, work in progress. Multi award-winner is developing her next show: an immersive comedy packed with her trademark offbeat (mostly “yo mama”) jokes, top-secret ceremonies and a non-stop handshake.

8pm to 9pm, York The Plank: A Bunch of Local Legends. Fast, furious and gloriously chaotic stand-up comedy showcase helmed by Chris Booker, comedian, aspiring sci-fi writer and charmingly under-qualified sea captain for the night.

9.30pm to 10.30pm, Thor Odin Stenhaug, One Night Stand Baby. A show about love, life (drawings) and being not only a son to your parents but more like a mutual friend.

Sir Dickie Benson

Saturday

2pm to 3pm, Moon Rabbit Theatre presents Shirley: A Ghost Story. Why do people write ghost stories? Is it to explain away the fear? To spread it? Or do they write to reveal the ghosts inside them?

3.30pm to 4.30pm, Caroline McEvoy: Train Man. Tale of sibling rivalry in post-Troubles Northern Ireland, told with gut-punch gags and emotional blows as McEvoy reckons with her lifelong battle with her younger brother, who loves trains and getting his way.

5pm to 6pm, Alfie Packham: My Apologies To The Chef.  Voilà! Alfie serves up new jokes in his fresh show about friends, family, loneliness, enemies – and  which of these he prefers. Bon appétit.

6.30pm to 7.30pm, Jain Edwards, She-Devil. Jain isn’t like other girls. She’s worse. But she’s finally ready to lean in (and receive a little forehead kiss from hubby). Expect silly, subversive comedy in a show about conspiracy theories, autism and men turning on you.

9.30pm to 10.30pm, Sir Dickie Benson Interacts With The Audience Whether They Like It Or Not. Encounter the last Hollywood hell-raiser; an octogenarian, thespian barbarian with a pint of vodka and a smouldering hash pipe whose capacity for drink is matched only by his boundless charm and mercurial temper.

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REVIEW: Martin Dreyer’s verdict on York Early Music Festival, Helen Charlston, mezzo soprano, and Toby Carr, theorbo, Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, 9/7/2025

Helen Charlston: “Projection and accentuation of words is amongst the best I have encountered in a long while, I am tempted to say unrivalled,” writes reviewer Martin Dreyer. Picture: Julien Gazeau

HELEN Charlston’s elegant mezzo had already been heard at the festival’s opening event with Fretwork, but this solo recital with theorbist Toby Carr deserved special mention, not least for an attractive new work commissioned by the National Centre for Early Music from composer Anna Disley-Simpson and librettist Olivia Bell.

Neither had been on my radar before – definitely my loss – but their new piece is an exciting collaboration that bodes well for their futures. It was specifically designed to fit within the festival’s Heaven & Hell subtitle, “a reflection on the story of man’s fall from grace”, in the words of the brochure.

Bell contributes an extremely witty poem, Purgatory: a waiting room, which immediately lends itself to monodrama, in which the ‘keeper of the keys’ offers advice and comfort to a new arrival wondering whether they will end up above or below.

The surprise here, mirrored three times in a refrain, is that the visitor has a choice: ‘Beach or snow? Joy or woe? Peace or party? Sparse or hearty? Fire or ice? Naughty or nice?’

Although not the refrain, this extract conveys something of the poem’s internal rhymes, not to say its Betjemanesque humour. But behind its clipped, conversational tone lies deeper philosophy; comedy and ideas are cleverly intermingled.

Disley-Simpson’s through-composed approach is essentially tonal, but above all she is alive to the text and clearly understands what suits the voice, using emphatic leaps when need be.

She could hardly have had a better advocate than Charlston, whose projection and accentuation of words is amongst the best I have encountered in a long while, I am tempted to say unrivalled.

The theorbo, too, is given more than a mere underlay, with speedier riffs, for example, that invigorate the refrain. Toby Carr played with typical fluency throughout.

There was a clear feeling of teamwork between all four – two creators and two performers – that might valuably lead to something genuinely operatic, a one-act piece, for example, with a mute ‘visitor’ being harangued by the key-keeper, allowing even more amusing theatrics than a static singer can achieve. But the potential the work throws up is indisputable.

The first part of the evening, ‘Heaven’, took place in the Great Hall upstairs; after the interval, appropriately for ‘Hell’, we moved downstairs to the gloomier, candlelit Undercroft.

The downside of this was that it took the BBC all but an hour to move equipment accordingly. But the broadcasts, when they come up on BBC Radio 3 on July 27 and August 3, will surely prove the whole exercise worthwhile.

‘Heaven’ included especially poignant accounts of Purcell’s The Blessed Virgin’s expostulation, in which Charlston fully inhabited the virgin’s volatile misgivings, and of Lord, What Is Man?, with despondency quite blown away by a forthright final quatrain and Hallelujah.

In ‘Hell’, aside from the premiere and some tasty Charpentier, we had Carissimi’s wonderfully volatile take on Lucifer and some meatily mischievous Monteverdi. Both performers were on top form. Don’t miss them.

Review by Martin Dreyer

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REVIEW: Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture, Keighley & Worth Valley Railway and York Theatre Royal present The Railway Children, Oxenhope Station *****

Farah Ashraf’s Roberta in the Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture revival of York Theatre Royal’s The Railway Children at Oxenhope Station. Picture: James Glossop

FULL steam ahead for The Railway Children becomes even fuller steam ahead as E Nesbit’s story returns to the railway line where Lionel Jeffries’s charming 1970 film was filmed, Jenny Agutter’s red petticoat, Bernard Cribiins’s bluster et al.

This re-sparking of York Theatre Royal’s Best Entertainment Olivier Award award winner for Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture becomes even more resonant in highlighting Nesbit’s call for tolerance, integration, safe sanctuary and understanding of “otherness”, in our overheated age of Reform, rejection, division and more overt racism. It reemphasises how Bradford has always been a beacon for multiculturalism, a cornerstone of this year’s festival.

In 2008, in the audacious apex achievement of Damian Cruden’s 22 years as York Theatre Royal artistic director, he teamed up with prolific York playwright Mike Kenny to transform the National Railway Museum freight depot into a tented traverse theatre in the heart of York, the most-storied railway city in the north.

The Railway Children felt right at home there, so much so that it booked a return ticket in 2009. Now, The Railway Children has “come home” to the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway (when Jeffries transferred Nesbit’s rural location from Kent to Oakworth station up north in an inspired move).

Excited City of Culture and Worth Valley volunteers are omnipresent as audience members board the steam train – eight carriages long – at Keighley Station to travel the line’s full money’s worth to Oxenhope Station, to the accompaniment of Stand & Be Counted Theatre’s immersive scene-setting soundtrack on the themes of exile, sanctuary, compassion and kindness.

Stalls are selling beer, pies, railway and E Nesbit & Co merchandise, all part of the 2025 event theatre experience, if you wish, and a large poster is advertising  this winter’s “tale by rail”  production of  The Christmas Carol (Haworth Railway Station, tickets www.kwvr.co.uk).

A sign denotes Oxenhope stands 600ft above sea level – York is only 49ft by comparison – and Tuesday’s audience  is already on a high, its mood best captured by Cruden’s dandy pink linen suit, as we enter the Engine Shed, denuded of its locomotives since work began on site in May.

Normally functioning as the “Exhibition  Shed”, home to the highly recommended autumn beer festival, it has been temporarily renamed the Auditorium (rather less evocative than the Signal Box Theatre at the NRM), as the 500 seats fill either side of a track, divided into Platform One and Platform Two.

The air is filled with the chatter and clatter of the railways: station announcements, the porter’s whistle, engines pumping and Yorkshire bird song, the herald to the brilliant sound design engineered by Craig Vear throughout.

Cruden has got all the old band back together: same director, writer, set and costume designer, Joanna Scotcher, lighting designer, Richard G Jones, composer, Christopher Madin, and sound designer, Vear. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, unlike Peter’s model train that needs soldering.

Oxenhope has become Oakworth station, where Scotcher’s design is a work of wonder suffused with a nostalgic Edwardian beauty: a wooden station bridge at one end, the station porter’s office at the other. On the track run wooden pulleys on wheels, pushed along the line by stage hands in railway staff attire to facilitate scenes being played out at various points to ensure everyone has a close-up. Her period costumes are a delight too, from top hat to coat tail, school cap to immaculate suits and the prettiest of dresses.

Jones’s lighting, whether for moorland sunlight, midnight gloom or a murky tunnel, complements every dramatic mood, twist and turn, evoking soot and fresh air alike. Look out especially for the flickering of lights as the rattling sound of  a train thunders by, doing the loco-motion in dazzling style. All the while, Madin’s score could not be more evocative.

In Kenny’s adaptation, the adult “Railway children” look back at their childhood Yorkshire re-location from London, seamlessly morphing into the childhood selves, Farah Ashraf’s concerned Bobby, Raj Digva’s ripping Peter and Jessica Kaur’s puppy-enthusiastic Phyllis.

Equally seamless is Kenny’s nod to Bradford UK City of Culture.  Father (Paul Hawkyard) married Mother (Asha Kingsley) while working in India, then brought his young South Asian family to London, doubling up on their “otherness” when Mother brings her children to Yorkshire in 1905 after Father’s mysterious arrest. 

Kingsley’s Mother stands out with her Indian accent; the children with their refined London airs that can find them putting their foot in it, but always unintentionally.

In a later change, Kenny has transformed Hawkyard’s Russian refugee, the great writer Shepansky, into a Ukrainian Russian: a topical and impactful decision typical of his playwriting prowess.

Dramatic set-pieces, humour, tragedy and triumph combine with the searing social politics in Kenny’s script, the humour exemplified in Graeme Hawley’s portrayal of station porter Mr Perks, sometimes prickly, certainly as punctual as he is punctilious, but avuncular too, topped off by the famous birthday-present scene that moves you to tears.

From the three leads, with their combination of playfulness, squabbling and knowing adult reflection, to Kingsley’s burdened Mother; Moray Treadwell’s grand Old Gentleman to the young people’s ensemble; the multitude of multi-purpose battered suitcases to the delayed-for-maximum-impact of the locomotive, Cruden’s return to The Railway Children is a triumph. Whisper it quietly in York, but bouncing back in Bradford UK City of Culture,  it may be the best production yet.

The Railway Children, Keighley Station and Oxenhope Station, West Yorkshire, on track until September 7. Box office: https://bradford2025.co.uk/event/the-railway-children/.

By Charles Hutchinson 

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Life’s a rollercoaster ride out at York Racecourse for Ronan Keating at Music Showcase Weekend on July 26

Ronan Keating: On track for York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend

RONAN Keating returns to the York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend on July 26, back on the Knavesmire track where he performed with Boyzone in July 2018.

“I’ve been to York numerous times,” says the 48-year-old Dubliner. “My manager lives in York. He knows the good places to go, like the Star Inn The City.”

Ronan also played solo shows at York Barbican on his Time Of My Life Tour in September 2016 and on his thrice-rearranged Twenty Twenty Tour in July 2022 (first booked for June 2020, then January 2021, then January 2022, in Covid-enforced changes).

“York audiences are always up for a good time,” he says as he looks forward to performing after a Saturday race card featuring the prestigious Group 2 Sky Bet York Stakes.

When playing in the open air, “the only thing is the sound issue for the artists and you get that at all outdoor gigs, whereas somewhere like the [York] Barbican is acoustically fantastic and is always going to sound better. You learn a lot from it,” says Ronan who will draw on his experience of playing to large al-fresco crowds at next weekend’s concert.

That applies to choosing his set list too, eschewing album tracks. “If you’re going to a festival or a racecourse, you have to give the people what they want, what they’re expecting, and because of the Boyzone documentary [Sky Original’s Boyzone: No Matter What] that’s on Sky and NOW TV, I’ll be doing more Boyzone hits than normal this time.

“It’s been Sky Documentaries’ most successful documentary. It’s been word of mouth. No-one knew what was coming. We were in the thick of making our own film – we had to say ‘No’ to Louis Theroux – when there was the Backstreet Boys one  [Larger Than Life on Paramount+], so we could fallen through the cracks.

“It’s surprised everybody. Our story is unbelievable, not normal, and it was hard to hear each of us talk about each other. It was tough, it was hard-hitting.”

“I never saw it as ambition,” says Ronan Keating. “My dad was a football coach and I had a belief in graft that came from him”

Each band member, Keating, Shane Lynch, Keith Duffy and Mikey Graham, filmed 15 hours of footage individually over “three long days”. “We produced the film, but Curious Films made it, and they interviewed some people from the Nineties’ tabloid press and ex-manager Louis [Walsh].”

Therapy before the documentary had helped Ronan to “learn about myself”. Had he been ambitious, he reflected? “I never saw it as ambition. My dad was a football coach and I had a belief in graft that came from him. I just worked my a**e off, and it was rewarding because we kept getting accolades, and then I get offered the chance to make a song on my own for the film Notting Hill [his chart-topping debut single in 2000, When You Say Nothing At All] – and that’s seen as ambitious but anyone else would do that.”

From boy band to men in adulthood, “some members in the band are not as close as they used to be, but I’m talking to all of them,” says Ronan. Given the documentary’s success, could Boyzone re-form for the first time since  their “Thank You & Goodnight” farewell tour in 2019? “I’m saying nothing!” he says.

Ronan’s career has taken him into presenting duties. “I was asked to host Eurovision in 1997 [in Dublin] and the MTV Award in Europe, so I started doing that ‘on the side’. I knew I could do it, but I didn’t think it was really me, but then Magic Radio came to me offer me the Breakfast show with  Harriet [Scott], and though I didn’t enjoy the early hours, I loved doing radio. It was everything. People felt we were in their house with them.”

Ronan has been a fixture on the BBC’s The One Show too, co-presenting with Alex Jones. “The One Show is a powerful show, and I love working with Alex. She’s a superstar,” he says. “I’ve been lucky and have chosen shows pretty well,” now adding The Voice Australia 2025 to that list.

If life has indeed been a rollercoaster, then Ronan’s abiding popularity has prompted York Racecourse head of marketing and sponsorship James Brennan to say ahead of next weekend’s performance: “Ronan has felt like part of the family for the best part of 30 years, whether it is entertaining with his friends in the band or as a solo artist, charity campaigner or breakfast show host. I’m looking forward to an event that music and racing fans will treasure as a memory.” Spot on , sir.

Looking ahead, Ronan is working on new music. “I’m making a duet that will be out in late July or early August,” he says. Who with? “He’s a very good friend of mine in the industry. It’s quite a big deal for us.” Watch this space.

Ronan Keating, York Racecourse Music Showcase Weekend, July 26: gates open at 11.15am; first race, 1.25pm; last race, 5pm. Sophie Ellis-Bextor and Natasha Bedingfield perform post-racing on July 25: gates, 4pm, first race; 5.30pm; last race, 8.23pm.

Please note, these race days are integrated racing and music events and admission is not available on a “concert only” basis. At each meeting, the gates will be closed at the time of the last race. For race day tickets, go to: www.yorkracecourse.co.uk.

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REVIEW: Steve Crowther’s verdict on Sollazzo, York Early Music Festival, National Centre for Early Music, York, July 10

Sollazzo artistic director and vielle player Anna Danilevskaia

IT is almost ten years since I heard this stand-out ensemble – as winners of the prestigious York Early Music International Young Artists Competition in 2015 and then again in 2016 – and I was really looking forward to hearing them again.

Under the stewardship of artistic director and vielle player Anna Danilevskaia, Sollazzo has continued to explore and share a rich vein of Medieval and early Renaissance music. This evening, it was the music of the 14th-century composer Francesco Landini.

The concert opened with an instantly engaging Kyrie Rondello (Anonymous) featuring the whole ensemble, an ensemble that clearly enjoyed each other’s company. Crisp instrumental exchanges – Natalie Carducci and Anna Danilevskaia’s vielle, Christoph Sommer’s lute and Roger Helou’s organetto – were complemented by an evolving harmonic cloud of individual melodies created by singers Carine Tinney (soprano) and the two tenors, Jonatan Alvarado and Lior Leibovici. Quite wonderful.

This was followed by Landini’s instrumental ballata, Somma Felicita, Ms Danilevskaia and Roger Helou clearly relishing their melodic exchanges.

I thought I heard the ‘Landini cadence’ calling card, but the performance of O Piñata Vagha completely knocked me off kilter. Goodness me, this was sublime. The seamless interplay between soprano Carine Tinney, Mr Helou and Anna Danilevskaia had a medieval ring of authenticity.

The modal nature of the melodic lines and the beautifully integrated ornamentation by Ms Tinney gave the performance a transcendental magic. OK, I admit it, I was hooked. And from that moment on, I simply couldn’t take my ears off Carine Tinney.

That said, it was the clean, vibrato-free singing of tenor Jonatan Alvarado that drew the ear in Landini’s Questa Fanciulla. The agile precision of his singing blended seamlessly with soprano Ms Tinney, creating crystal-clear melodic lines within the polyphonic texture. This was reinforced by the delicate interplay of the accompanying vielle, lute and organetto.

The second section of the concert programmed four instrumental works by Landini. All magnetically engaging and a real joy. The standout, however, was the luminous quality and artistry of Roger Helou’s organetto playing. Even his retuning of the organetto – with vocalise support – proved to be a rewarding listen. Not that Mr Helou’s performance was superior, obviously, but that the impression was so haunting and familiar. To my ears, it sounded (almost) exactly like a recorder.

The closing work in this grouping was a beautiful interpretation of Niccolò da Perugia’s 14th-century ballata, Il Megli è Pur Tacere. Here, heavenly matters were put aside in favour of earthly matters of unrequited love. Although the words express the emotional burden of keeping silent in the face of pain, love, or truth, the performance itself brimmed with a rustic vitality.

The closing grouping opened with Giovanni da Firenze’s Quand Amor, a madrigal expressing fragility and introspection. The performance embraced the melancholic, contemplative mood, and the performance by Carine Tinney – glissandos bleeding into adjacent notes, achingly beautiful ornamentation – once again stood out.

The concert concluded with a touching and always engaging performance of Francesco Landini’s hymn to virtue, Perche Virtù: “Since virtue does make humans steady and strong/Run towards virtue, if you want to escape death”. Well, who could disagree with that?

Sollazzo’s use of period-appropriate tuning and musically transparent textures absolutely enhances historical authenticity, but it’s the seamless blending of voices with period instruments that truly sets them apart.

Finally, I knew Francesco Landini was celebrated as a singer and poet; that he was a virtuoso organetto (portable organ) player and that he was blind from early childhood (smallpox) – earning him the nickname “Magister Franciscus Caecus” (Master Francesco the Blind). I just didn’t know how truly remarkable a composer he was.

Review by Steve Crowther

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What’s On in Ryedale, York and beyond. Hutch’s List No. 31, from Gazette & Herald

Dr Adam Parker, curator of archaeology at York Museums Trust, holding the Thor’s Hammer Pendant at the Viking North exhibition at the Yorkshire Museum, York

VIKING treasures, street art indoors, Fringe comedy previews and Ryedale Festival’s Austen celebration bring out the summer smiles in Charles Hutchinson.

Museum launch of the week: Viking North, Yorkshire Museum, York

VIKING North is filled with magnificent objects, many unseen for generations and others that have never been on public display, adding up to “the best collection of Viking finds to be shown outside London” as these Viking treasures reveal the North’s power base, wealth and skills.

Telling the story of the Viking Age in the North of England from AD866 to 1066, the exhibition is underpinned by new archaeological research and cutting-edge technology and features objects from Yorkshire Museum’s own collection, the Vale of York hoard, co-owned with the British Museum, and specially loaned national and regional items, including from the Viking Army Camp at Aldwark, North Yorkshire.

Sea, Swell, Scribe: Jo Walton, Ruth King and Nicky Kippax combine in Pyramid Gallery’s exhibition of paintings, pottery and poetry

Exhibition of the week: Sea, Swell, Scribe, Jo Walton, Ruth King and Nicky Kippax, Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, until August 31, open 10am to 5pm, Monday to Saturday

WHAT happens when you let a poet loose in an art gallery with a piece of charcoal? If the juxtaposition of sumptuous curvy and pointy pots against a backdrop of textured metallic atmospheric paintings is inspiring her, then she will scribble words and phrases all over the plinths

York artist Jo Walton, from Rogues Atelier, potter Ruth King, from the Craft Potters Association, and poet Nicky Kippax, from Bluebird Bakery, combine in a show planned and organised by Pyramid  gallery manager Fiona Macfarlane and curated by Walton. Kippax has written Eksphratic verse in response to the paintings and pots.

Street artist Al Murphy in his Naughty Corner at VandalFest at 2, Low Ousegate, York

Street art takeover of the summer: Vandals At Work present VandalFest, 2, Low Ousegate, York, Friday to Sunday, then July 25 to 27, 11am to 6pm

VANDALS At Work reunite with youth homelessness charity Safe and Sound Homes (SASH) for VandalFest, the immersive street art takeover of a disused office block at 2 Low Ousegate, York, with a 2025 theme of the playful, cheeky, witty and mischievous.

The stripped-out interior provides four floors of blank canvas for bold, site-specific “intervention” that cover walls, floors and ceilings, complemented by live DJ sets.  Among more than 30 artists from the UK and beyond are Bristol graffiti pioneer Inkie, subversive stencilist Dotmasters, inflatable prankster Filthy Luker, master of optical illusions Chu, rooftop renegade Rowdy and York’s own Sharon McDonagh, Lincoln Lightfoot and Boxxhead. Entry is free, with a suggested £3 donation to SASH. 

Dame Harriet Walter: Pride And Prejudice celebration at Wesley Centre, Malton

Ryedale Festival theatre event of the week: Pride And Prejudice, Dame Harriet Walter, Melvyn Tan and Madeleine Easton, Wesley Centre, Malton, Sunday, 7pm

THIS theatrical retelling of Pride And Prejudice by novelist and Austen biographer Gill Hornby marks the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth. Star of stage and screen Dame Harriet Walter brings the romance of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy to life in an intimate drawing-room setting, in much the same way that Jane herself first read the story aloud to family and friends.

Carl David’s score for the 1995 BBC television adaptation will be performed by pianist Melvyn Tan and violinist Madeleine Easton. The festival runs until July 27; full details and tickets at ryedalefestival.com. Box office: 01751 475777.

Rob Auton: Barmby Moor comedian previews his Edinburgh Fringe show, CAN: The Story Of A Man Called CAN, at Theatre@41, Monkgate, York

Comedy event of the week: Halfway To Edinburgh, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, until Saturday

IN a week of Edinburgh Fringe previews and comedy nights, Nina Gilligan discusses memory loss, health anxiety and goldfish-related trauma in Goldfish tonight (8pm) and Hayley Ellis navigates middle age in Silly Mare (Work in Progress) tomorrow (8pm).

Susan Riddell and Kate Dolan, on Friday (7.30pm), and Barmby Moor surrealist Rob Auton and Chloe Petts, on Saturday (7.30pm), round off the festival tasters. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Georgi Mottram: Classical BRIT Award nominee performing at Voices United concert in aid of St Leonard’s Hospice

Charity event of the week: Ian Stroughair presents Voices United: Rubies For Our Angel, Grand Opera House, York, Friday, 7.30pm

YORK cabaret artiste and West End musical actor Ian Stroughair co-hosts this fundraiser to mark St Leonard’s Hospice’s 40th anniversary with radio presenters Joanita Musisi and Laura Castle, introducing a night of musical theatre and rock and pop classics.

On the bill will be Stroughair in Velma Celli drag diva regalia; York singer Jessica Steel and guitarist Stuart Allan; York musical theatre actress Joanne Theaker; retro party band Jonny And The Dunebugs; The Voice UK 2024 semi-finalist Lois Morgan Gay and West End classical singer Georgi Mottram. Box office: https://shorturl.at/G3qhV or atgtickets.com/york.

Strictly between us: Anton du Beke and Giovanni Pernice team up for Together Again at York Barbican

Dance show of the week: Anton Du Beke and Giovanni Pernice in Together Again, York Barbican, Friday, 7.30pm

STRICTLY Come Dancing alumni Anton Du Beke and Giovanni Pernice promise “more fun, more dance, more song and even more entertainment than ever before” in the terpsichorean double act’s new show Together Again, full of breathtaking routines, stunning choreography and a seamless blend of Ballroom, Latin and musical theatre. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Craig David: In party mood at Scarborough Open Air Theatre this weekend

Coastal gig of the week: Craig David TS5 Show, Scarborough Open Air Theatre, Saturday; gates open at 6pm

SOUTHAMPTON rhythm & blues musician Craig David parades his triple threat as singer, MC and DJ at his TS5 party night, patented at his Miami penthouse. On the 25th anniversary of debut album Born To Do It, expect a set combining old-skool anthems from R&B to Swing Beat, Garage to Bashment, while merging chart-topping House hits too. Box office: scarboroughopenairtheatre.com.

Amelia Donkor and Antony Jardine: Playing Gulie Harlock and Seebohm Rowntree respectively alongside 100-strong community ensemble in His Last Report at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Millie Stephens

Community play of the week: His Last Report, York Theatre Royal, Saturday to August 3  

FOCUSING on pioneering York social reformer Seebohm Rowntree and his groundbreaking investigation into the harsh realities of poverty, Misha Duncan-Barry and Bridget Foreman’s play will be told through the voices of York’s residents, past and present.

Seebohm’s findings illuminate the struggles of the working class, laying the foundation for the welfare state and sparking a movement that will redefine life as we know it. However, when fast forwarding to present-day York, what is Seebohm’s real legacy as the Ministry begins to dismantle the very structures he championed in His Last Report’s York story with a national impact? Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

In Focus: Clap Trap Theatre in Pennyroyal, Helmsley Arts Centre, July 19 & 20, 7.30pm

Florrie Stockbridge’s Daphne, left, and Natasha Jones’s Christine in Clap Trap Theatre’s Pennyroyal

HELMSLEY Arts Centre artistic director Natasha Jones and musical partner Florrie Stockbridge take to the stage this weekend in Clap Trap Theatre’s production of Lucy Roslyn’s Pennyroyal.

Premiered in 2022 at the Finborough Theatre, London, this heartrending play about sisterhood and motherhood, enduring love and regrets many years in the making explores the things expected of women and what happens if life does not go to plan.

When Daphne (played by Stockbridge) is diagnosed with Premature Ovarian Insufficiency at 19, her sister Christine (Jones) steps in to help in the only way she knows how: by donating her eggs. For a while, the world seems corrected. However, as the years go by – and Daphne sets out on the long road of IVF – the sisters’ relationship begins to twist.

“I think of my body sometimes like it’s stubborn,” says Daphne. “We’re not good friends. Like it’s a spooky hotel, and I’m just a ghost haunting it. ’Cause you don’t live in a hotel, you just pass through.”

Pennyroyal is inspired by Edith Wharton’s 1922 novella The Old Maid, a 1922 novella adapted ten years later into a Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Zoe Akins. One hundred years on, the story is re-imagined by Roslyn, an award-winning Camden Town performer and writer.

Her most recent work includes Orlando, a previous collaboration with director Josh Roche and Jessie Anand Productions that won the Origins Award at VAULT Festival before transferring to the Pleasance, Edinburgh.

Other work includes Showmanship (Theatre503) and Goody (Pleasance, Edinburgh and Greenwich Theatre – Les Enfants Terribles’ Greenwich Partnership Award 2017). Her debut, The State vs. John Hayes, started life at the Edinburgh Fringe, before touring to Theatre Royal Bath, The Lowry, Salford, the King’s Head Theatre, London,  and OSH Brooklyn, New York.

Jones and Stockbridge have received directing and production support from Libby Pearson. Roslyn’s 80-minute play contains strong language and discussion of infertility and domestic violence. Box office: 01439 771700 or helmsleyarts.co.uk.

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More Things To Do in York beyond as the Vikings reveal power-base life skills. Here’s Hutch’s List No. 31, from The York Press

Dr Adam Parker, curator of archaeology at York Museums Trust, holding the Thor’s Hammer Pendant at the Viking North exhibition at the Yorkshire Museum, York

VIKING treasures, street art moved indoors, Fringe comedy previews and Ryedale Festival’s classical lustre bring out the summer smiles in Charles Hutchinson.

Museum launch of the week: Viking North, Yorkshire Museum, York

VIKING North is filled with magnificent objects, many unseen for generations and others that have never been on public display, adding up to “the best collection of Viking finds to be shown outside London” as these Viking treasures reveal the North’s power base, wealth and skills.

Telling the story of the Viking Age in the North of England from AD866 to 1066, the exhibition is underpinned by new archaeological research and cutting-edge technology and features objects from Yorkshire Museum’s own collection, the Vale of York hoard, co-owned with the British Museum, and specially loaned national and regional items, including from the Viking Army Camp at Aldwark, North Yorkshire.

Sea, Swell, Scribe: Jo Walton, Ruth King and Nicky Kippax combine in Pyramid Gallery’s exhibition of paintings, pottery and poetry

Exhibition launch of the week: Sea, Swell, Scribe, Jo Walton, Ruth King and Nicky Kippax, Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, from today, 11am, to August 31, open 10am to 5pm, Monday to Saturday

WHAT happens when you let a poet loose in an art gallery with a piece of charcoal? If the juxtaposition of sumptuous curvy and pointy pots against a backdrop of textured metallic atmospheric paintings is inspiring her, then she will scribble words and phrases all over the plinths

York artist Jo Walton, from Rogues Atelier, potter Ruth King, from the Craft Potters Association, and poet Nicky Kippax, from Bluebird Bakery, combine in a show planned and organised by Pyramid  gallery manager Fiona Macfarlane and curated by Walton. Kippax has written Eksphratic verse in response to the paintings and pots.

Street artist Al Murphy in his Naughty Corner at VandalFest at 2, Low Ousegate, York

Street art takeover of the summer: Vandals At Work present VandalFest, today and tomorrow, July 18 to 20 and July 25 to 27, 11am to 6pm

VANDALS At Work reunite with youth homelessness charity Safe and Sound Homes (SASH) for VandalFest, the immersive street art takeover of a disused office block at 2 Low Ousegate, York, with a 2025 theme of the playful, cheeky, witty and mischievous.

The stripped-out interior provides four floors of blank canvas for bold, site-specific “intervention” that cover walls, floors and ceilings, complemented by live DJ sets.  Among more than 30 artists from the UK and beyond are Bristol graffiti pioneer Inkie, subversive stencilist Dotmasters, inflatable prankster Filthy Luker, master of optical illusions Chu, rooftop renegade Rowdy and York’s own Sharon McDonagh, Lincoln Lightfoot and Boxxhead. Entry is free, with a suggested £3 donation to SASH. Visitors can support the cause by buying limited-edition artworks and merchandise.

Ryedale Festival artist in residence and soprano Claire Booth

Festival of the week; Ryedale Festival 2025, until July 27

THIS North Yorkshire festival of delights will be led off by 2025’s artists in residence, saxophonist Jess Gillam, soprano Claire Booth and viola player Timothy Ridout, along with Quatuor Mosaiques, VOCES8 and composer Eric Whitacre.

Pianists Sir Stephen Hough and Dame Imogen Cooper, organist Thomas Trotter, Arcangelo, York countertenor Iestyn Davies and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic’s festival debut are further highlights. Jazz, folk and literature weave into the programme too: reeds player Pete Long and vocalist Sara Oschlag salute Duke Ellington; Barnsley’s Kate Rusby showcases her new album, When They All Looked Up, and Dame Harriet Walter channels Jane Austen’s wit in Pride And Prejudice. Full details and tickets at: ryedalefestival.com. Box office: 01751 475777.

McFly: Heading to the Scarborough seaside today

Coastal gig of the week: McFly, TK Maxx Presents Scarborough Open Air Theatre, today; gates open at 6pm

MCFLY’S Tom Fletcher, Danny Jones, Dougie Poynter and Harry Judd head to the Yorkshire coast to perform 5 Colours In Her Hair, Obviously, All About You, You’ve Got A Friend, I’ll Be OK, Star Girl, Don’t Stop Me Now, Obviously et al. Twin Atlantic and Devon complete the bill. Box office: scarboroughopenairtheatre.com.

Josie Long: Opening Theatre@41’s week of Edinburgh Fringe previews and comedy nights. Picture: Matt Crockett

Comedy event of the week: Halfway To Edinburgh, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, July 13 to 19

A WEEK of Edinburgh Fringe previews and comedy nights takes over Theatre@41, Monkgate, kicking off with comedian, writer, podcaster and filmmaker Josie Long’s Work In Progress on July 13 at 2pm, followed by two Mark Watson selections, Sam Nicoresti and Lulu Popplewell’s Fresh For The Fringe double bill at 7.30pm.

Molly McGuinness and Phil Ellis are in preview mode on July 14 (8pm); Nina Gilligan discusses memory loss, health anxiety and goldfish-related trauma in Goldfish on July 16 (8pm), and Hayley Ellis navigates middle age in Silly Mare (Work in Progress) on July 17 (8pm). Susan Riddell and Kate Dolan, on July 18 (7.30pm), and Barmby Moor surrealist Rob Auton and Chloe Petts, on July 19 (7.30pm), round off the festival previews. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Phil Grainger, left, and Alexander Flanagan Wright. Picture; Charlotte Graham


News just in: Wright & Grainger in The Gods The Gods The Gods, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, July 15, 7.30pm

IN a very late addition to Theatre@41’s packed programme for next week, Easingwold duo Wright & Grainger return their Edinburgh Fringe gig theatre hit The Gods The Gods The Gods to North Yorkshire soil for one night only.

Combining 12 tracks, four stories, three performers and one exhilarating experience, Alexander Flanagan Wright and Phil Grainger mix big beats, heavy basslines, soaring melodies and heart-stopping spoken word into a show that has headlined festivals and sold out venues from Wānaka Festival of Colour in New Zealand to the Sydney Opera House in Australia, the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Mumbai, India, to Stillington Mill. Please note: this event is standing room only; chairs will be available for those unable to stand. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Georgi Mottram: Classical BRIT Award nominee performing at Voices United concert in aid of St Leonard’s Hospice

Charity event of the week: Ian Stroughair presents Voices United: Rubies For Our Angel, Grand Opera House, York, July 18, 7.30pm

YORK cabaret artiste and West End musical actor Ian Stroughair co-hosts this fundraiser to mark St Leonard’s Hospice’s 40th anniversary with radio presenters Joanita Musisi and Laura Castle, introducing a night of musical theatre and rock and pop classics.

On the bill will be Stroughair in Velma Celli drag diva regalia; York singer Jessica Steel and guitarist Stuart Allan; York musical theatre actress Joanne Theaker; retro party band Jonny And The Dunebugs; The Voice UK 2024 semi-finalist Lois Morgan Gay and West End classical singer Georgi Mottram. Box office: https://shorturl.at/G3qhV or atgtickets.com/york.

Dance is SO embracing: Dancefloor double act Anton & Giovanni reunite for Together Again at York Barbican

Dance show of the week: Anton Du Beke and Giovanni Pernice in Together Again, York Barbican, July 18, 7.30pm

STRICTLY Come Dancing alumni Anton Du Beke and Giovanni Pernice promise “more fun, more dance, more song and even more entertainment than ever before” in the terpsichorean double act’s new show Together Again, full of breathtaking routines, stunning choreography and a seamless blend of Ballroom, Latin and musical theatre. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Ancient Hostility: Harmony singing and drones at YO Underground 4 in The Basement

Navigators Art presents YO Underground 4, The Basement, City Screen, York, July 18, 7.30pm to 10.30pm

YORK arts collective Navigators Art plays host to a night of live, local and left-field folk song, electronica and film at The Basement. On the adventurous bill of York and regional acts will be: Andrew Metheven’s lo-fi folk music from the hills and the concrete; Ancient Hostility’s harmony singing and drones from members of Dawn Ray’d and All In Vain, and transdisciplinary artist Hannah-May Batley’s traveller ballads, storytelling, writing, performance and pigments.

Participating too will be: Mark Hanslip, who has a “PhD in shoving saxophones through computers” (possibly not literally); Namke Communications’ electronics and echoes, and multidisciplinary artist Things Found And Made, rummaging in zines, films, music, storytelling, pop-culture, esoterica and folklore. Box office: bit.ly/nav-events

The Wedding Present’s David Gedge, right, walking in Leeds with Reception writer-director Matt Aston

Gig announcement of the week: An Evening of Conversation and Music with David Gedge from The Wedding Present, Rise@Bluebird Bakery, Acomb Road, Acomb, York, July 20, 8pm, doors 7pm

DAVID Gedge, long-time leader of The Wedding Present, discusses his “semi-legendary” Leeds indie band’s 40-year-career and his life in the music industry, in conversation with Amanda Cook. York writer/director Matt Aston join him too on the eve of rehearsals for Reception – The Wedding Present Musical, ahead of its premiere at Slung Low, The Warehouse, Holbeck, Leeds, from August 22 to September 6.  

Next Sunday’s event concludes with Gedge’s 20-minute acoustic set drawn from The Wedding Present’s cornucopia of arch, romantic yet perennially disappointed songs of love, life’s high hopes and woes, chance and no chance. Box office: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/an-evening-with-david-gedge-from-the-wedding-present-tickets-1472506409309?aff=oddtdtcreator.

Listen to David Gedge discuss 40 years Of The Wedding Present, the Reception musical and his Rise@Bluebird Bakery show with Two Big Egos In A Small Car podcasters Charles Hutchinson and Graham Chalmers at:

https://www.buzzsprout.com/1187561/episodes/17507606-episode-233-interview-special-with-david-gedge-from-the-wedding-present