Alice Wilson: Slack Habits finale tomorrow; solo album next month
YORK singer, artist and Ph.D student Alice Wilson will sing with Slack Habits for the last time at their Old White Swan debut in Goodramgate, York, tomorrow before focusing on her solo album.
For the February 22 gig, she steps in for departed
lead singer, Marsha Knight, re-joining bassist Iain Marchant, drummer Martin
Wilson, guitarist Andy Elmslie and keyboards player Josh Hill, with whom Alice
used to perform in an earlier incarnation of the York band.
Alice and songwriter, guitarist and producer Andy
Wilson – no relation – are progressing quickly with the album’s recording
sessions at his home studio in Holgate, with Andy aiming to have it fully mixed
and mastered in time for a March launch.
Alice, nearing 30, says she has “looked to music for escapism for even
longer than she has looked to books or alcohol”.
“ I was heavily tricked into thinking theatre was not a career,” says Alice Wilson
“My first forays were into musical
theatre when I was at Millthorpe School, then Fulford Sixth Form,” she reveals,
recalling her favourite role being Tallulah in Bugsy Malone when she was 16.
“I did theatre through GCSE to A-level
but was heavily tricked into thinking theatre was not a career.”
Instead, Alice has pursued a scholarly path, starting with joint degree honours in anthropology and sociology at Durham University, “so that I could do both science and arts,” she says.
Next came an MA in urban sociology at
the University of York, specialising in housing. “I’ve blagged my way into
pretty good educational institutions as a result of being a working-class queer,”
she says.
Writing her thesis, creating her art, singing: all in a day’s passage for Alice Wilson
“I’m now doing a Ph.D over the next
three years, again at the University of York, where I’m trying to make
radically affordable houses available for the people who need them.”
As part of her Ph.D in sociology with “heavy
fraternisation with environmental science”, Alice is building a tiny house in
the garden of her Heslington home, 30 square metres in size.
“You might think it’s a glorified shed,
but it’s not that glorified,” she says. “It’s a timber-framed structure with
super-insulation made from re-claims from demolition sites.
“Ideally it does inform my Ph.D, so I want to film it in progress, as well as writing a thesis, doing my art and singing all the while – though it all leaves minimal time for singing.”
Alice Wilson “hopes you enjoy the ear feel of her voice”
The tiny house, once complete, will have three rooms downstairs – a main living room, a tiny kitchen and tiny bathroom – and a stepladder will lead to the mezzanine level above: a crawl floor where you can sleep, says Alice. “It qualifies for recreational use, like a summerhouse, so I’ll use it mainly for painting in.”
As her official profile says: “Alice draws
and paints @neither.both.illustrations and post pictures of herself at the
gym @neither.both. Alice recycles, votes left, and worries about how
productive she is being, like all other millennial snowflakes. She hopes
you enjoy the ear feel of her voice.”
As Slack Habits’ songwriter, Andy most certainly enjoys that “ear feel of her voice”. “Alice sang with Slack Habits for a while, playing the Blues Bar in Harrogate, the National Harley Davidson Convention, pubs, festivals, Lendal Cellars and the Little Festival of Live Music in York, and being featured on BBC Introducing, before abandoning us to go into academia,” he says.
“But I didn’t want to let her talent go, so ten months ago we started working together again.”
Andy Wilson and Alice Wilson working on Alice’s album at his Holgate studio in York
The result is such songs as The Other
Woman, Put That Down and Cabaret Queen. “There’s also a mash-up of Led Zep’s
Whole Lotta Love that turns into Whole Lotta Last Waltz,” says Alice. “That
turns it into being a song about domestic violence.”
Andy adds: “I’ve happened to write and
produce for three or four female singers in recent years and the songs on Alice’s
album tell stories about all kinds of different fictional women, good, happy, sad or bad.
“When I started working with Alice, I
was stunned by her talents and charisma but I was also excited by her ability
to ‘become’ the characters she sings about.
So, it was obvious that she would be the perfect musical partner in an
album project that had been brewing for a while.
“Luckily she agreed and now it’s nearly ready. I hope people are going to be moved and entertained by Alice’s ‘other women’.”
All being well, that opportunity should come next month. In the meantime, watch her singing Slack Habits’ “absolute bangers”, ranging from rock and electric blues to smoky ballads, reggae and funk, from 9pm tomorrow (February 22) at the Old White Swan, Goodramgate, York.
A scene from Opera North’s The Turn Of The Screw. Picture: Tristram Kenton
REVIEW: Opera North in The Turn Of The Screw, Leeds Grand Theatre, February 18.Further performances on February 21, 25 and 27, then touring until March 19. Box office: 0844 848 2700 or at leedsgrandtheatre.com
PART of the fascination of any ghost story – and Henry James certainly intended The Turn Of The Screw to be one – is its dabbling with a world that we can never fully comprehend or understand.
We are frightened, as James was himself, by his own creation, by the horrors that our imaginations are led to conjure. The sky – or hell – is the limit.
Myfanwy Piper’s libretto retains most of James’s ambiguities, while Britten’s music wonderfully clarifies their existence but offers no definitive answers to the questions they pose.
We know of Britten’s own obsession with the corruption of innocence. We also have plenty of recent examples of the terrors that may befall children put into care, like Miles and Flora here. The question for a director of the opera is how unambiguous to be.
Alessandro Talevi’s production was certainly probing when it first appeared in the autumn of 2010. This time round, he opens up new possibilities: he hardly misses an opportunity to interpret and he has schooled all six of his cast into finely honed acting, without exception.
In Sarah Tynan’s Governess we have a minutely judged, sexually repressed ingénue: she is as surprised as we are by a lonely Mrs Grose’s fondling attentions. She is equally puzzled by Miles’s come-hither kiss, delivered just before he climbs into her bed: this boy may be in thrall to Quint, but is also prey to rampaging hormones.
So, which of these signals leads up an emotional cul-de-sac? Or are they merely figments of the governess’s fevered imagination? The fact that such questions need to be asked at all is a sure indication that Talevi knows exactly how to provoke.
He also views the tale from the children’s point of view. At one point, we are shown a Narnia-style, fairy-tale landscape – easily taken for a Victorian orangery stocked with exotic flowers – in which younger versions of Miles and Flora can be seen frolicking.
In Madeleine Boyd’s majestic set, Bly is a Victorian pile in need of more than a spring clean, with Quint glimpsed in the tower behind its tall, murky windows. The building itself is part of the oppression all its inmates feel, doubtless compelling them into aberration.
Her costumes are regulation late Victorian, shading into Edwardian, but her hair-styles are notable: the Pre-Raphaelite cast of Miss Jessel’s Titian tresses, Quint’s bright orange thatch and side-burns, Flora’s Alice-curls, all contrast firmly with the governess’s prim blonde bun.
The props are carefully selected too: a manic rocking-horse, a giant four-poster, from whose roof Flora dangles her puppets, a school desk, and a large horn above a turntable, on which Miles “plays” parody Mozart; all bask in Matthew Haskins’ shadow-laden lighting.
After an exceptionally clear prologue, Nicholas Watts fashions a menacing Quint, likely to cause many a nightmare, while Eleanor Dennis’s pregnant Miss Jessel finds an unearthly tone equally guaranteed to spook. Heather Shipp’s seemingly phlegmatic Mrs Grose flashes into emotion more than once.
Tynan’s keenly-observed governess is a study in bafflement as she steadily loses her marbles to guilt and self-reproach. Jennifer Clark’s lively, mischievous Flora suggests someone much younger than she looked, while Tim Gasiorek’s well-tuned, light-voiced Miles acts his socks off.
All have reason to be grateful for the exceptional clarity with which Leo McFall’s orchestra paints their various motifs; one could hardly imagine their playing being more finely nuanced. Talevi’s revival may raise more questions than it answers, but it unquestionably held this audience in rapt appreciation.
PORTICO Quartet play a standing show at The Crescent, off
Blossom Street, York, on Tuesday night.
Sending out echoes of jazz, electronica, ambient music and
minimalism since forming in London in 2005, these Mercury Prize nominees have
created their own singular, cinematic sound over the course of five studio
albums and one EP.
In the line-up areDuncan Bellamy, drums and electronics; Milo Fitzpatrick, bass; Taz Modi, hang drums and keys, and Jack Wylie, saxophone.
Portico Quartet made their breakthrough with 2007’s Knee-Deep In The North Sea, followed by the John Leckie-produced Isla in 2010, the self-titled Portico Quartet in 2012 and Art In The Age Of Automation in August 2017, plus its companion EP, Untitled, in April 2018.
Each album has seen Bellamy, Fitzpatrick, Modi and Wylie expand their
palette or explore new trajectories, a modus operandi continued with last
October’s Memory Streams, released on Gondwana
Records.
Ouroboros presents Portico Quartet at The Crescent, York, on Tuesday (February 25). Tickets cost £18.50 from The Crescent or Earworm Records, in Powells Yard, Goodramgate or at seetickets.com or more on the door from 7.30pm.
James, fronted by Tim Booth, centre, will play Deer Shed Festival this summer
JAMES will be the Saturday night headliners at July’s Deer Shed
Festival at Baldersby Park, Topcliffe, near Thirsk.
The Manchester band, led by Boston Spa singer Tim Booth, will top the July 25 bill, following in the footsteps of Johnny Marr, Goldfrapp, John Grant and Richard Hawley.
Deer Shed Festival’s delighted director, Oliver Jones, says: “There’s no doubt James are one of the biggest bands we’ve ever booked for Deer Shed.
“Their back catalogue is astonishing, with track after track of excellent guitar anthems, and their most recent album [August 2018’s Living In Extraordinary Times] confirmed that they’re still at the absolute top of their game. I’m not sure we’ve ever had a band that can pack out Leeds First Direct Arena before.
“Curating a line-up of artists that we personally love every year
is always a source of much pride for our team, and James now sit on top of what
we think is both the best and most star-studded music bill we’ve ever put
together.”
Formed in 1982, James have charted with such singles as Sit Down, Destiny
Calling, Laid, Sound, Born Of Frustration, Sometimes, Come Home, Tomorrow, She’s
A Star, Just Like Fred Astaire and Getting Away With It (All Messed Up), as
well as releasing 15 studio albums.
James, who headlined Scarborough Open Air Theatre in 2015 and 2018, join Stereolab, on July 24, and Baxter Dury, on July 26, to complete Deer Shed 11’s trio of main-stage headliners.
Meanwhile, the family-friendly festival’s latest additions, announced today, are The Soft Cavalry, the new project from Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell and her husband, Steve Clarke, on the Lodge Stage on July 25, before DIY supergroup Shopping take up the late-night party slot on the same stage.
French-Caribbean act Dowdelin, indie-rock band Marthagunn and Hullensian post-punk outfit Low Hummer all join Deer Shed’s In The Dock stage bill. Elsewhere, David Thomas Broughton and Andrew Cushin strengthen the festival’s north eastern contingent, alongside Marsicans, Life and Ruthie.
Manchester club night DJs Across The Tracks and Leeds DJ and
production duo Baba&Ganoush join Happy Mondays’ Bez on the late-night
silent disco line-up.
Deer Shed’s tenth anniversary event last summer sold out with record audience numbers. Tickets for Deer Shed 11 are on sale at deershedfestival.com, where further festival information can be found too.
Kate Tempest: playing Deer Shed 11 on July 26
Deer Shed Festival 11’s confirmed acts:
James; Stereolab; Baxter Dury; Ghostpoet; Cate Le Bon; Kate Tempest (Telling Poems); Tim Burgess; The Twilight Sad; Warmduscher; Boy Azooga; Sinkane; Dream Wife; Roddy Woomble; Jesca Hoop; The Soft Cavalry; Snapped Ankles; Melt Yourself Down.
Liz Lawrence; LIFE; Marsicans; Erland Cooper; Dry Cleaning;
Admiral Fallow; W.H. Lung; Ren Harvieu; Shopping; International Teachers of
Pop; Avalanche Party; I See Rivers; Kitt Philippa; Rachael Dadd; Native Harrow;
Kate Davis; Big Joanie; Do Nothing; Egyptian Blue; Rina Mushonga; Dowdelin;
Friedberg; Heidi Talbot & Boo Hewerdine; Ruthie.
Serious Sam Barrett; Eve Owen; Low Hummer; Irish Mythen; Rajasthan
Heritage Brass Band; Tom Joshua; Brigid Mae Power; David Thomas Broughton;
Conchur White; Gary Stewart; Beccy Owen; Morrissey & Marshall present
Dublin Calling; Steo Wall; The Magpies; Padraig Jack; Andrew Cushin; Bez (DJ);
Rory Hoy (DJ); Meg Ward (DJ); Across The Tracks (DJ); Baba&Ganoush (DJ).
Richard Durrant: cycling from concert to concert en route from Orkney to Sussex. York awaits on June 14
THE National Centre for Early Music’s 20th
anniversary spring season in York opens not with the raising of a glass of
champagne, but with a Cuppa & A Chorus.
Led by community musician Chris Bartram, the 2pm to 4pm
session on February 24 is an opportunity to sing in a relaxed environment and
enjoy a cup of tea, a slice of cake and a friendly chat.
Up to 50 singers attend each monthly gathering to sing “songs you know and love and explore new ones from around the world”, and further sessions of “Connecting Through Singing” will follow on March 30, April 20, May 18 and June 22. The charge is £3.50 each time; booking is recommended and more details can be found at ncem.co.uk/cuppachorus.
Helen Charlston: taking part in the University of York Song Day on February 29. Picture: Ben McKee
2020’s concert programme opens with the University of York
Song Day, an afternoon and evening of three concerts under the title The Year
of Song on Leap Year Saturday, February 29. The focus falls on romantic lieder
in the 19th century company of Robert Schumann at 12.30pm; Robert
and Clare Schumann at 3pm and their protégé Johannes Brahms, along with Robert,
at 7pm.
Soprano Bethany Seympour, mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston,
tenor Gwilym Bowen and fortepiano player Peter Seymour perform the first and
last concerts; soprano Emily Tindall, bass Jonty Ward and fortepiano player
Nicky Losseff, the middle one.
Silent Films At The NCEM return with Franz Osten’s 1928 epic
Shiraz: A Romance Of India (cert U) on March 8 at 7.30pm, telling the story
behind the creation of the Taj Mahal, screened in a BFI restoration with a
score by Anoushka Shankar.
Acoustic Triangle: blurring the boundaries between classical, jazz music and the avant-garde on June 23
As part of the Yorkshire Silent Film Festival, running from May 5 to 17 with live music in village halls, theatres, cinemas and the NCEM, a double bill of Funny Business (U) at 4pm and The Woman One Longs For (PG) at 7pm will be shown on May 10.
Jonny Best’s piano accompanies Laurel & Hardy and comedy’s greatest female clown, Mabel Normand, in Funny Business; Best is joined by violinist Irine Rosnes for Curtis Bernhardt’s 1929’s German film, The Woman One Longs For, wherein Marlene Dietrich shines in her first starring role as a mysterious femme fatale in a steamy tale of erotic obsession.
Folk At The NCEM has two concerts to be presented in association with York’s Black Swan Folk Club: Urban Folk Quartet, supported by Stan Graham, on March 9 and Kathryn Roberts & Sean Lakeman’s On Reflection show on April 22.
Jazz drummer Jeff Williams: in Bloom at the NCEM. Picture: Bob Hewson
Urban Folk Quartet’s high-energy, multi-instrumental
virtuosos Joe Broughton, Paloma Trigas, Tom Chapman and Dan Walsh combine
Celtic tunes and traditional song with Afrobeat, Indian classical, funk and
rock.
2020 marks 25 years of husband-and-wife duo Kathryn Roberts
and Sean Lakeman making music together. To celebrate this anniversary, they
take a whistle-stop tour through their past, revisiting and reinterpreting
songs from the early days of folk supergroup Equation to latest album Personae,
via a nod or two to their extra-curricular musical adventures.
Scottish traditional folk duo Aly Bain & Phil Cunningham,
who have toured together since 1986, play on March 29 and folk guitarist,
composer and ukulele player Richard Durrant returns to the NCEM on June 14 as
part of his Music For Midsummer tour that will take him 860 miles by bicycle
from Orkney to Sussex.
Kathryn Roberts and Sean Lakeman: whistle-stop tour through 25 years of making folk music
On his fourth and longest Cycling Music adventure, travelling with his guitar and ukulele, he will be showcasing his new album Weald Barrows. “I’ll be cycling down from Orkney alone this year and this will, for me at least, introduce a magic and a concentration to the music,” says Durrant, whose 7.30pm concert will be featured in the York Festival of Ideas.
On May 25, the NCEM plays host to Youth Sampler Day from 11am to 4pm, a chance for 12 to 18-year-old musicians to play by ear, develop their creativity and discover more about the National Youth Folk Ensemble.
“This is a fantastic opportunity for young musicians to
learn from inspiring professional musicians, with no experience of folk music
necessary, and there’ll be opportunities to take part in a short audition for
the ensemble too,” says NCEM director Delma Tomlin.
Antonio Forcione: return visit to the National Centre for Early Music
Jazz At The NCEM presents the returning Italian guitarist Antonio Forcione on April 26; legendary London and New York drummer Jeff Williams’ Bloom trio, featuring pianist Carmen Staaf and bass guitarist Michael Formanek, on May 17, and University of York Jazz Orchestra, directed by James Mainwaring, with composer John Low on piano, in a May 29 programme spanning quasi-classical textures to full-on big band sounds.
The jazz line-up continues with innovative trumpet player and composer Byron Wallen’s Four Corners, with Rob Luft, on guitar, Paul Michael on bass and Rod Young on drums, on June 10, when they will be taking part in the York Music Forum Showcase too.
In a concert embraced by the York Festival of Ideas, Wallen
will be putting his new album Portrait in the spotlight, conceived when sitting
in the central square in Woolwich and being struck by the community around him
with its mixture of ages and nationalities. Wallen last played at the NCEM last
October as a member of Cleveland Watkiss’s band.
Trumpet player Byron Wallen: leading Four Corners at the NCEM. Picture: Urszula Tarasiewicz
Acoustic Triangle blur the boundaries between classical, jazz music and the avant-garde on their return to the NCEM on June 23 with their adventurous repertoire of compositions by band members Tim Garland (saxophone, bass clarinet) and Gwilym Simcock (piano), plus Kenny Wheeler, John Taylor, Bill Evans, Olivier Messiaen and Maurice Ravel. Double bassist Malcolm Creese completes their line-up.
World Sound At The NCEM welcomes more returnees, Scottish
combo Moishe’s Bagel, on March 27 with their cutting-edge, intoxicating,
life-affirming Eastern European and Middle Eastern folk and klezmer music.
Everything stops for tea at 7.30pm on June 9 in the second
World Sound event, Manasamitra’s Tea Houses: Camellia Sinensis, a show that
tells the story of tea as new live music mixes with lighting and soundscapes,
participatory tea rituals and ambisonic technology that captures the audience’s
emotional responses in the performance space.
Teatime at the NCEM in Manasamitra’s Tea Houses: Camellia Sinensis
Creator Supriya Nagarajan uses her experience of synaesthesia to explore the interplay between sight, sound, taste and smell in a multi-media show that directly engages the 7.30pm audience in a musical interpretation of a tea ceremony that now forms part of the York Festival of Ideas.
Early Music At The NCEM has two highlights: the Early Music Day on March 21 and the University of York Baroque Day on May 2.
Three concerts in one day make up the Early Music Day, featuring harpsichordist playing JS Bach’s 48 Preludes & Fugues Part 1 at 1pm at the NCEM; recorder ensemble Palisander, with the NCEM’s Minster Minstrels, presenting Double, Double Toil And Trouble at 3.30pm at the Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, and The Brabant Ensemble’s Cloistered Voices at 6pm at the NCEM. Previously known as the European Day of Music, the Early Music Day will be streamed across Europe.
Trumpet player Crispian Steele Perkins: performing at the University of York Baroque Day
The University of York Baroque Day is likewise divided into three concerts, taking the theme of Airs and Graces: A Musical Miscellany. At 12.30pm, trumpeter Crispian Steele Perkins joins Yorkshire Baroque Soloists for theatre music by Purcell and a flamboyant arrangement of Vivaldi’s La Follia; at 3pm, harpsichordist Masumi Yamamoto plays works by Handel, Scarlatti and Aime; the University Baroque Ensemble rounds off the day at 7pm with Scottish airs arranged by James Oswald and Geminiani.
Families At The NCEM brings Leeds company Opera North to York for 11.30am and 2pm performances of Dr Seuss’s Green Ham And Eggs in an introduction to opera for four to seven-year-old children and their families.
Two opera singers and a nine-piece orchestra begin their short
performance with an interactive workshop introducing families to the music,
instruments and themes within the piece, before they bring to musical life Dr
Seuss’s tale of the persistent Sam-I-Am’s mission to persuade a grumpy grouch
to try a delicious plate of green eggs and ham.
Sam Sweeney: playing the NCEM in the autumn
Looking ahead to the autumn, concerts in the NCEM diary already are folk trio Faustus (Benji Kirkpatrick, Saul Rose, Paul Sartin) on October 13; Chiaroscuro Quartet’s Mozart String Quartets, November 18; Unearth Repeat, with Sam Sweeney, Jack Rutter, Louis Campbell and Ben Nicholls, November 23, and Lady Maisery: Awake Arise, A Christmas Show For Our Times, with Jimmy Aldridge and Sid Goldsmith, December 18.
In this 20th anniversary year, “this spring we
are undertaking an essential refurbishment programme, in part to upgrade some
of the facilities that are showing the strain of so much usage,” says Delma, as
new loos and a kitchen take shape.
“We’ll be celebrating the anniversary fully in the autumn, especially
with a commission that will engage Early music with digital technology and field
recordings from Askham Bog. Yorkshire Wildlife Trust will be involved, as will
gamba player Liam Byrne this autumn.”
Tickets for the NCEM spring season are on sale on 01904 658338 and at ncem.co.uk.
George Thorogood: Good To Be Bad tour date at York Barbican
GEORGE Thorogood & The Destroyers will play York Barbican on July 22 on their Good To Be Bad: 45 Years Of Rock tour, their first in more than seven years.
“Ever since our first shows there in 1978, the UK has been one of our
favourite places to play,” says boogie-blues guitarist Thorogood, from
Wilmington, Delaware, who will turn 70 on February 24.
“We’re talking great venues, great energy and truly great audiences, and
we’re looking forward to coming back for it all. Expect our best, because
that’s what you’re gonna get.”
Since 1975, Thorogood & The Destroyers have sold more than 15
million albums and played more than 8,000 ferocious live shows, built around Who
Do You Love, I Drink Alone, One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer, Move It On Over
and his definitive badass anthem, Bad To The Bone.
“To hear George Thorogood flail his slide
up and down his guitar,” wrote Greil Marcus in Rolling Stone magazine, “you
might have thought he was Ben Franklin – that he’d discovered not the blues,
but electricity.”
In the Destroyers’ line-up alongside Thorogood will
be Jeff Simon on percussion, Bill Blough on bass, Jim Suhler on guitar and
Buddy Leach on saxophone.”
Tickets can be booked from Friday (February 21) at 10am on 0203 356 5441, at yorkbarbican.co.uk or in person from the Barbican box office.
Alfie Boe: performing at Scarborough Open Air Theatre for a fourth time
CHART-TOPPING tenor Alfie Boe will bring Armed Forces Day to a climax on June 27 with a 6pm concert at Scarborough Open Air Theatre.
The East Coast resort has the honour of hosting this year’s Armed Forces Day National Event that day.
Around 200,000 people, including members of the Royal Family and prominent
politicians, are expected to head to Scarborough for a series of events to
honour the dedication and sacrifice of the nation’s servicemen and women.
Boe says: “It is an amazing honour, as well as a huge thrill, for me to
be back at this wonderful venue to perform on Armed Forces Day.
“I’ve played there many times and I’ve always received such a warm
welcome from the good people of Yorkshire. The fact I will be performing as
part of Scarborough’s hosting of Armed Forces Day’s National Event will make it
even more special. I cannot wait for June 27; it will be an amazing evening.”
Mezzo-soprano Laura Wright, who has performed at major events
around the world, will be among those to join Boe on stage.
Boe, who has starred in stellar productions of Les Misérables and La Bohème, will be appearing at Scarborough OAT for the fourth time. He headlined Armed Forces Day concerts there in 2015 and 2018 and performed alongside his friend and collaborator in song, Michael Ball, in 2017.
He and Ball will next sing in Yorkshire at Leeds First Direct Arena on February
25. On his return in June, he will combine familiar favourites with selections
from last November’s celebration of songs of the 1930s and 1940s, As Time Goes
By, his first solo record since 2015.
Mezzo-soprano Laura Wright: joining Alfie Boe at the Armed Forces Day concert
Recorded with Grammy award winner Gordon Goodwin and his Big
Phat Band, the album journeyed through the defining songs of that golden
era, from the full force of Sing Sing Sing to the smooth The Way You Look
Tonight and title track.
Laura Wright, who topped the classical album chart with her debut, The
Last Rose, is writing and recording her seventh album. At 24, she composed the
Invictus Games anthem, Invincible, for Prince Harry and two years
later wrote Heroes, the first official anthem for England Women’s Cricket, and then
Brave for the Military Wives.
She became the first ever official singer of the England Rugby Union team
and has sung at the Rugby Union World Cup, the NFL series, the Grand National at
Aintree, Royal Ascot and the FA Cup Final.
Looking forward to presenting Boe on June 27, Peter Taylor, director of Scarborough OAT concert promoters Cuffe and Taylor, says: “Alfie is massively popular and is someone we are asked to bring back every year, so we are delighted to be welcoming him back to Scarborough OAT this summer.
“June 27 will be an extra-special night as the nation’s focus will be on Scarborough. It is such an honour to host the Armed Forces Day National Event and so we really could not think of anyone better to headline this concert than Alfie, who will be joined by the wonderful Laura Wright.
“It will
undoubtedly be an incredibly moving and special concert and, we feel, the
perfect climax to a day that celebrates the dedication and sacrifice of our
Armed Forces.”
Stuart
Clark, Scarborough OAT venue manager and event manager for the Armed Forces Day
National Event, says: “Alfie Boe is a firm favourite here and we are delighted
to welcome him back in 2020. His show will be a highlight of the prestigious
Armed Forces Day National Event in Scarborough and a wonderful musical
celebration dedicated to our Armed Forces.”
Tickets will go on general sale on Friday (February 21) at 9am at
scarboroughopenairtheatre.com; on 01723 818111 and 01723
383636, or in person from the Scarborough OAT box office, in Burniston Road, or
the Discover Yorkshire Coast Tourism Bureau, at Scarborough Town Hall, St Nicholas
Street.
For more information and a full list of Armed Forces Day 2020 events in Scarborough, go to scarborougharmedforcesday.co.uk.
Alfie Boe: lighting up Scarborough Open Air Theatre on June 27
SCARBOROUGH OPEN AIR THEATRE’s 2020 LINE-UP
Tuesday, June 9, Lionel Richie
Wednesday, June 17, Westlife
Saturday, June 20, Supergrass
Saturday, June 27, Alfie Boe
Saturday, July 4,Snow
Patrol
Friday, July 10,Mixtape,
starring Marc Almond, Heaven 17 and Living In A Box featuring Kenny Thomas
REVIEW: Albany Piano Trio,
British Music Society of York, Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York,
February 14 ***
GHOSTS are not generally associated with St Valentine’s Day, but orchids certainly could be. We had both in the Albany Piano Trio’s outing for the British Music Society of York, with the headily perfumed trio by Ravel and some romantic seasoning by Bloch thrown in for good measure.
The
“Ghost” arrived courtesy of Beethoven’s Trio, Op 70 No 1, whose nickname it is
(though conferred by Czerny, not by the composer). There was plenty of
violence, as there should be, in the opening movement. But the players seemed
to be ploughing their own furrows and ensemble was not always as exact as it
might have been.
It
was just as well that Philippa Harrison kept her piano lid on the short stick
rather than wide open: she was in forceful mood all evening. Indeed, she was
regularly more characterful than her colleagues, who laboured very competently
but with intermittent ardour. But all three found the requisite ferocity for
the coda.
The
unnerving variations of the eerie slow movement were a little apologetic.
Beethoven does not hold back here, neither should performers. But its demons
were revived in the finale, thanks to the piano’s strong accents. They were
finally driven out by high cello and low violin – after some skeletal
pizzicatos – as the composer’s sardonic humour turned friendly at the close.
Victorian
“orchidelirium” – a mania for discovering and collecting orchids – inspired
Judith Bingham’s The Orchid And Its Hunters, an Albany commission that the trio
premiered in 2016. Its five brief sections are vignettes evoking dangerous
journeys to garner these exotic flowers from remote locations worldwide.
Their
diffuse colourings suggested impressionistic water-colours rather than
full-blown oils. They became gradually brisker as wide intervals and splashy
piano chords became smoother and, eventually, more urgent, as if the flowers
were under threat. The Albany were surefooted throughout, taking the changes in
their stride.
Swiss
by birth, Bloch wrote his only work for piano trio in 1924, the year he became
an American citizen. His Three Nocturnes proved rather engaging, largely
romantic and lyrical, though the percussive syncopation of the last one hinted
at modernity.
The
first movement of Ravel’s Piano Trio was the Albany’s best moment, its jumpy
rhythms clean and its acceleration finely calibrated. Pantoum, which follows,
became a volatile, piano-drive harlequinade, sharply contrasted with the
chorale-like Passacaille. Vigorous piano in the finale suggested fountains
spraying wildly in a gusty wind. This was all but a full-blown piano concerto.
The
Albany did enough to show that they are capable of considerable finesse. Not
enough of it was on show here, however. And they would be well advised to let
their fingers do the talking in place of under-prepared, under-projected spoken
intros. The Lyons is not a good place for speech.
Cellist Jamie Walton: “skill of a practised magician”. Picture: Wolf Marloh
REVIEW: York Guildhall Orchestra,
40th Anniversary Concert, York Barbican, February 15 *****
HAD I not been there myself, I
would have hardly believed that the Guildhall Orchestra (as it was then known
and is still popularly described) first saw the light of day 40 years ago.
It has been a marvellous four
decades. And still there is a sense of excited anticipation before its every
performance. We know we are in for something special.
Saturday’s
celebration, conducted by Simon Wright, was no exception. A Ravel suite, an
Elgar concerto and a Brahms symphony were leavened by a birthday cake of Celebratory
Fantasy Variations baked by the founder himself, John Hastie.
His tasty pastiche wove myriad
musical allusions – including Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Ravel, Vaughan Williams,
Britten, even a samba – into variations on Happy Birthda’. As the piece finished,
the audience even got to join in with the song’s last line (wisely, after a
rehearsal). Good fun.
Ravel’s
Mother Goose featured on the opening night in 1980. Here it was again in all
its gentle finery, giving us a chance to admire again the nicely controlled
talents of the woodwinds: sinuous oboe for Tom Thumb’s walk, for example, and
clarinet and contrabassoon representing Beauty and the Beast, not forgetting
nifty xylophone (Janet Fulton) and rippling harp (Georgina Wells).
We
are fortunate indeed to have a cellist of international standing living right
on the edge of the North York Moors. Jamie Walton must have played Elgar’s
concerto countless times, but surely never as spellbindingly as this.
He achieved his intensity,
paradoxically, through subtle understatement, drawing in his audience with the
skill of a practised magician. The opening was steeped in a very English
melancholy. The jagged figure at the start of the Allegro spoke volumes about
the scherzo to come and Walton’s clarity at the top of his range was startling.
The
slow movement was beautifully, mouth-wateringly, spacious. Every rest was made
to count, delicately caressed. This kind of playing is risky: it can easily
backfire. Not here. Walton was exactly on Elgar’s wavelength, finding solace in
an elegant cantilena.
Fireworks, such as they were, came
in the finale, but nostalgia was never far from the surface, not least when the
work’s opening motto was rekindled just before the close. All the while, the
orchestra kept in very crisp attendance, typified by the brass interjections in
the finale. I have heard this work dozens of times, but was never quite
persuaded of its logic. Until now. The conjunction of two such intelligent
musicians as Simon Wright and Jamie Walton delivered an intricate precision
that is extremely rare. It will live in the memory.
Inevitably,
perhaps, Brahms’s Second Symphony was not going to reach quite this level. But
it brought catharsis of a kind, while showcasing the orchestra’s three choirs:
strings, winds and brass. Violin ensemble in the first movement had a wonderful
sweep, conjuring pastoral moods; they were enhanced by Jonny Hunter’s solo
horn. The cumulative effect of this huge movement was majestic. Not to be
outdone the cellos, who are in equally fine fettle, took centre stage in an
introspective Adagio.
The
paint-box of the orchestra, the woodwinds, enjoyed their moment in the
spotlight in the Allegretto, sparkling into a sunlit momentum and recapturing
it again at the finish after several distractions. Showing admirable stamina,
the whole orchestra combined for a finale of exuberant brilliance, reaching a
peak when the trombones returned in the coda.
This
orchestra is one of the treasures that makes living in York such a delight.
Roll on its half century!
ROMEO Stodart, lead singer and principal songwriter for The Magic Numbers, will play as a one-man band at The Basement, City Screen, York, tomorrow night (February 17).
“I’ve decided to do a few solo shows mainly because I’ve never done them before, so it’ll be a very different and new experience for me,” says Romeo, 43.
“I’ve got so many pieces of music that haven’t yet found a home, as they’re not necessarily Magic Numbers songs, and I think it’d be a great opportunity to play them and bring them to life in front of people.”
Romeo wants his solo gigs to be unique, liberating, intimate and engaging. “I need you to be there for them with an open mind and open heart,” he says. “There’s nothing to fear as our band is forever, but I’m really excited by these dates. Hope you are too.
“You can hear what some of our songs sound like in the way that they were first conceived or a new interpretation, but the main emphasis will be on the new and the journey of the night.”
Formed in Ealing in 2002, The Magic Numbers have five albums to their name: 2005’s million-selling, Mercury Music Prize-nominated, self-titled debut; 2006’s Those The Brokes; 2010’s The Runaway, 2014’s Alias and 2018’s Outsiders.
Making up the Numbers are two pairs of brothers and sisters: Sean and Angela Gannon and Romeo and Michele Stodart, who were born to Scottish father and Portuguese mother on the Caribbean island of Trinidad and Tobago, where their mother was an opera singer with her own TV show.
Tomorrow’s 8pm concert is presented by York promoters Under The Influence; tickets for An Evening With Romeo Stodart cost £14 on 0871 902 5726, at thebasementyork.co.uk/romeo-stodart or on the door.
