Fisherman’s Friends: Booked for York Barbican return in November 2024
CORNISH “buoy band” Fisherman’s Friends will play York Barbican on November 8 2024 on their Rock The Boat Tour.
Tickets will go on sale on Friday at 10am at yorkbarbican.co.uk or gigsandtours.com/tour/fisherman-s-friends.
The 26-date itinerary will span next January to November, taking in a second Yorkshire gig at Bridlington Spa on February 10.
For more than 30 years, Fisherman’s Friends have gathered on the Platt of their native Port Isaac to sing the songs of the sea; songs that in some cases have been handed down for hundreds of years; songs that connect them to generations of Cornish fishermen.
The poster for Fisherman’s Friends’ Rock The Boat Tour
A decade ago, they signed a million-pound record deal that saw their album Port Isaac’s Fisherman’s Friends go gold as they became the first ever traditional folk act to land a British top ten album.
Fisherman’s Friends now have nine albums to their name, two feature films, a stage musical, a book and a television documentary, along with playing for royalty and to tens of thousands of fans in sell-out tours year in, year out. Fisherman’s Friends: The Musical broke box-office records, selling over 250,000 tickets in the UK and Canada
In the line-up are lobster fishermen Jeremy Brown and Jason Nicholas, writer and shopkeeper Jon Cleave, smallholder and engineer John ‘Lefty’ Lethbridge, builder John McDonnell, filmmaker Toby Lobb and potter Bill Hawkins.
This summer, Fisherman’s Friends’ festival diary will include a sixth appearance at Glastonbury. For more details, go to: thefishermansfriends.com/tickets.
Rob Auton (self portrait): Seeking a crowd in Pocklington and Leeds
WHICH shows will draw the crowds? Charles Hutchinson prepares to join the merry throng across the summer beyond the Bank Holiday sunshine.
Crowd pleaser: Rob Auton, The Crowd Show, Pocklington Arts Centre, tonight, 8pm; Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds, June 5, 7.30pm
CHARMINGLY offbeat Pocklington-raised poet, stand-up comedian, actor, author, artist and podcaster Rob Auton heads back north from his London abode on his 2023 leg of The Crowd Show tour to play Pock and Leeds.
After his philosophical observations on the colour yellow, the sky, faces, water, sleep, hair, talking and time, now he discusses crowds, people and connection in a night of comedy and theatre “suitable for anyone who wants to be in the crowd for this show”. Box office: Pocklington, 01759 301547 or pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk; Leeds, hydeparkbookclub.co.uk.
Antler alert: Comedian Tim Vine in his alarming headwear for Breeeep! at the Grand Opera House, York
“Witness the stupidity” comedy gig of the week: Tim Vine: Breeeep!, Grand Opera House, York, tonight, 7.30pm
EXPECT a mountain of nonsense, one-liners, stupid things, crazy songs and wobbly props, plus utter drivel, advises punslinger Tim Vine.
“Tim’s like the manager of a sweet shop where all the sweets are replaced by jokes, and he serves them in a random order,” says the show blurb. “So it’s like a sweet shop where the manager just throws sweets at you. Enjoy the foolishness and laugh your slip-ons off.” Sold out; for returns only, check atgtickets.com/york.
Amy May Ellis: North York Moors singer-songwriter promotes her debut album at The Crescent
Homecoming of the week: Amy May Ellis, The Crescent, York, tomorrow, 8pm
NOW moved to Bristol, singer-songwriter Amy May Ellis was raised on a remote dale on the North York Moors, playing her early gigs at The Band Room, Low Mill, Farndale.
Steeped in the culture, scenery, folklore and wildlife of the countryside that surrounded and shaped her as a child, she wrote her debut album Over Ling And Bell – named after two types of heather – in a secluded moorland farmhouse, mostly alone but sometimes with friends. Released on Lost Map Records on May 12, it is available on digital platforms and limited-edition vinyl. She will be joined by her new band for tomorrow’s gig, when North Yorkshire-London combo Wanderland support. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
Ryan Addyman as Jamie New, right, in York Stage’s Everybody’s Talking About Jamie
Musical of the week:York Stage inEverybody’s Talking About Jamie, Teen Edition, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Monday to Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Wednesday and Saturday matinees
JAMIE New lives on a council estate in Sheffield with his loving mum. At 16, he doesn’t quite fit in. He may be terrified about the future, but Jamie is going to be a sensation.
The Feeling’s Dan Gillespie Sells and Tom MacRae’s coming-of-age musical follows the true-life story of Sheffield schoolboy Jamie Campbell as he overcomes prejudice and bullying to step out of the darkness to become a drag queen. York Stage artistic director Nik Briggs directs. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Sarah Dean: Plucking strings at the City of York Roland Walls Folk Weekend at the Black Swan Inn
City of York Roland Walls Folk Weekend, Black Swan Folk Club, Black Swan Inn, Peasholme Green, York, June 2 to 4
TOM Bliss and The Burning Bridges open the three-day folk fiesta at the Black Swan on Friday night, to be followed by afternoon and evening sessions on Saturday and Sunday.
Among the weekend’s acts will be: Stan Graham; Eddie Affleck; The Barbarellas; Blonde On Bob; Clurachan; Union Jill; White Sail; Edwina Hayes; Minster Stray Morris; Caramba; The Old Humpy Band; Tommy Coyle; Paula Ryan; Judith Haswell; Sarah Dean; Chris Euesden and Ramshackle. Full details at: blackswanfolkclub.org.uk/programme.cfm.
Alexander Ashworth: Baritone soloist for Elgar’s Dream Of Gerontius at York Minster. Picture: Debbie Scanlan
Purgatory awaits: University of York Choir and Symphony Orchestra, Elgar’s Dream Of Gerontius, York Minster, June 14, 7.30pm
THE University of York Choir and Symphony Orchestra perform Edward Elgar’s Dream Of Gerontius with soloists Joshua Ellicott (Gerontius), Kitty Whately and Alexander Ashworth, conducted by John Stringer.
Elgar dramatically sets to music Cardinal Newman’s poem depicting the journey of Gerontius’s soul from his deathbed to judgement before God. On his way, he encounters angels and demons, colourfully portrayed by the chorus, before settling finally in purgatory. Box office: 01904 322439 or yorkconcerts.co.uk.
The poster for City Screen Picturehouse’s outdoor cinema season, Movies In The Moonlight, at York Museum Gardens in July
Outdoor cinema: City Screen Picturehouse presents Movies In The Moonlight, York Museum Gardens, Museum Street, York, July 14 to 16, from 7.30pm
MUSEUM Gardens play host to City Screen Picturehouse for three nights of summertime open-air film action, opening with The Super Mario Bros. Movie, starring Chris Pratt and Anya Taylor-Joy on July 14. Next come Mamma Mia!, featuring Meryl Streep and Amanda Seyfried, on July 15 and Steven Spielberg’s 1975 shark attack classic Jaws on July 16.
All these outdoor cinema events start at 7.30pm. Films will be shown at sundown; drinks and snacks will be on offer but guests can bring picnics. Box office: picturehouses.com/outdoor.
Ruby Wax: Presenting the latest Wax work, I’m Not As Well As I Thought, at the Grand Opera House, York, this autumn
Looking ahead: Ruby Wax: I’m Not As Well As I Thought, Grand Opera House, York, September 28, 7.30pm
AFTER four years, American-British actress, comedian, writer, television personality and mental health campaigner Ruby Wax, 70, follows up her How To Be Human show with a stage adaptation of her May 11 book, I’m Not As Well As I Thought, promising her rawest, darkest, funniest show yet.
In 2022, Wax began a search to find meaning, booking a series of potentially life-changing journeys: swimming with humpback whales in the Dominican Republic; joining a Christian monastery; working in a Greek refugee camp; undertaking a silent 30-day mindfulness retreat in California. Even greater change marked her inner journey. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Tom Allen: Completely and utterly at York Barbican
Recommended but too late for tickets
ACERBIC comedian Tom Allen’s Completely gig at York Barbican on Sunday at 8pm has sold out. Completely.
Under discussion will be Allen’s life updates, his vegetable patch and the protocol for inviting friends with children for dinner.
Ah, that Technicolor Dreamcoat moment as colours spread across the Joseph Rowntree Theatre stage. Picture: Lucy Baines, Joy Photography
COLET Court School in London has its place in British musical theatre history.
It was at this Barnes prep school that Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice – whatever became of them? – first staged Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, performed by the school choir as a 15-minute pop cantata.
The original West End production opened in February 1973 at the Albery Theatre; the soundtrack LP followed in 1976, and many a revival and tour since then. Jason Donovan, Donny Osmond, Phillip Schofield, Joe McElderry, Gareth Gates, Steps’ Ian H Watkins and Lee Mead have all donned that famous coat on the London stage.
Some things change – Colet Court School became St Paul’s Juniors in 2016 – but some things don’t. School choirs (from Knavesmire Primary and Wiggington Primary Singstars) still feature in York Musical Theatre Company’s Joseph.
This week’s run is selling well, very well. No change there. Go, go, go, Joseph ticket seekers; there’s not a second to be wasted. Saturday’s matinee has sold out and only the last few tickets are available for the evening performances.
Red is the dominant colour in this scene in Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Picture: Lucy Baines, Joy Photography
One significant change to report in this 50th anniversary production: Songs still refer to Egypt, but director-choreographer Kathryn Addison has switched the setting to the Yorkshire farming community of the 1920s/1930s with a “Peaky Blinders vibe” to Joseph’s brothers. “They were a nasty bunch,” she reasons, as waistcoats and caps flatter than Yorkshire vowels adorn the stage.
Antony Gardner’s Pharaoh is still the expanding Elvis Presley of the Las Vegas rhinestone years, albeit more of an Elvis tribute act on the Scarbrough sea front, where he rules the roost from his casino.
Always in shades, but never one for the shadows, his Song Of The King is a gloriously daft Presley pastiche, thank you very much, typical of the joy that percolates through Lloyd Webber’s plethora of musical magpie styles and Rice’s witty, storytelling lyrics.
Egypt, Yorkshire, wherever! Lloyd Webber and Rice take in Parisian chanson for Those Canaan Days, sung with a wonderfully exaggerated French cabaret accent by Anthony Pengelly, who also makes his mark as Potiphar, lounging like Jacob Rees-Mogg in the House of Commons. Later they veer wildly to the Caribbean for Adam Gill’s Benjamin Calypso (a kind of forerunner of 10CC’s reggae chart topper Dreadlock Holiday).
Dreamcoat dreamboat: Jonathan Wells’s all-in-white Joseph with Jennie Wogan-Wells’s Narrator and the Wiggington Primary Singstarschoir. Picture: Lucy Baines, Joy Photography
Any other changes? Joseph, son of Jacob (Rob Davies), is one of ten, rather 12 brothers, two of them strictly sisters as they are played by Lauren Charlton-Mathews and Rachel Higgs but credited as brothers and looking the part in their Great Yorkshire Show farming gear.
The leads are new to York Musical Theatre Company but not new to the musical theatre scene: husband and wife Jonathan Wells and Jennie Wogan-Wells, living their dream theatrical life in their dream roles as Joseph and the Narrator respectively.
The bearded Wells looks more like the Bee Gees of the Saturday Night Fever Seventies era all in white, later adding shades and a red waistcoat, rather than stripping down in Joseph and his amazing bare chest tradition.
He has the toothpaste smile, the twinkle in the eye, the handsome swagger, for the Dreamcoat dreamboat, and he sings with warmth and boy band appeal, if a little diffidently in his first rendition of Close Every Door. Go, go, go, for it, Joseph! Don’t hold the drama in check!
Kathryn Addison: Director-choreographer for York Musical Theatre Company’s Joseph And The Technicolor Dreamcoat
Since childhood days of listening to the soundtrack LP, Knavesmire Primary teacher Wogan-Wells has craved playing the Narrator. Aside from opening the show on her laptop, with pupils on screen on Zoom, this is not an Are You Sitting Comfortably, Then I’ll Begin narrator. She is on her feet, dancing, singing, even fitting in a cameo as Mrs Potiphar, and no-one sings more through this sung-through musical than her. Her singing is top notch throughout, full of personality and power.
The set is a familiar construction: a scaffolding edifice with a mezzanine level and stairways either side, populated by the young choir, the rest left empty to accumulate the ensemble work of the 23-strong adult cast.
Musical director John Atkin has fun with Lloyd Webber’s chameleon ability for constant change, from ballad to pop anthem and more besides. Director Kathryn Addison has even more fun, sheep puppets, megamix finale and all. Rehearsals were a delight, and it shows in this radiant show, one that captures the innocence of Lloyd Webber and Rice’s bygone days and puts summer rather than a spring in your step.
Now, go, go, go for those last few tickets before they’re gone, gone, gone.
Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, York Musical Theatre Company, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York. Performances at 7.30pm tonight and tomorrow; 2.30pm and 7.30pm on Saturday. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Lars Pluto and Luke Wilson as The Everly Brothers in Walk Right Back
WALK Right Back, the Everly Brothers tribute show, is back on tour, playing the Grand Opera House, York, on June 12.
From the producers of That’ll Be The Day, it tells the story of the most successful close-harmony duo of all time: country-rock pioneers Phil and Don Everly, from Knoxville, Tennessee.
Bye Bye Love, All I Have To Do Is Dream, Cathy’s Clown, Wake Up Little Susie, Bird Dog, Crying In The Rain, Walk Right et al feature in this concert-based musical that “entwines the wonderful, sad yet glorious story of The Everly Brothers around those trademark harmonies from heaven”.
Performed by Lars Pluto and Luke Wilson, Walk Right Back – The Everly Brothers Story follows the American brothers’ rise to fame, through their decade-long feud, to the reunion that gave them back to the world and back to each other.
Accompanied by steel-string acoustic guitar, The Everly Brothers influenced The Beatles, who referred to themselves as “the British Everly Brothers” when Paul McCartney and John Lennon went hitchhiking south to win a talent competition.
The Fab Four based the vocal arrangement of Please Please Me on Cathy’s Clown. McCartney later referred to “Phil and Don” in the lyrics to Let’Em In, from the 1976 album Wings At The Speed Of Sound.
Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards called Don Everly “one of the finest rhythm [guitar] players”. Paul Simon, who worked with the Everlys on the song Graceland, said on the day after Phil’s death: “Phil and Don were the most beautiful-sounding duo I ever heard. Both voices pristine and soulful. The Everlys were there at the crossroads of country and R&B. They witnessed and were part of the birth of rock’n’roll.”
Tickets for next month’s 7.30pm performance are on sale at atgtickets.com/york.
Siva Kaneswaran: Theatreical debut in La Bamba! – A Musical. Picture: Twisty
THE Wanted’s Siva Kaneswaran will make his theatrical debut in the 2023 tour of new musical La Bamba!, appearing at the Grand Opera House, York, from November 7 to 11.
Dublin-born boyband singer and songwriter and Dancing On Ice contestant Kaneswaran, 34, will play Mateo alongside Strictly Come Dancing champion Pasha Kovalev and rising star Inês Fernandez in the lead role of Sofia.
La Bamba! – A Musical tells the story of how the power of music can transform a generation and celebrate a community.
Sofia, 17, from Los Angeles, has music in her blood. From the moment her father handed her a guitar, her dream was to become a superstar. Inspired by her musical heroes and with the help of her family, Sofia discovers that even the longest journey begins with a single step.
As she mixes the music from her roots with the music in her heart, Sofia dreams of bringing together a community that has never felt more divided.
La Bamba! combines Latin, R&B and timeless rock and pop to tell “the ultimate feel-good story of a young girl with a big voice, big dreams, and an even bigger heart”.
The full company will include Bethan Mitchell, Stefani Ariza, Julia Ruiz Fernandez, Nicolle Matheu, Gabriella Rose-Marchant, Alex Sturman, Tristan Ghostkeeper and Luke Jarvis.
La Bamba! is directed by multi-award-winning American director Ray Roderick and features choreography by Graziano Di Prima, Erica Da Silva and associate choreography by Giada Lini.
The soundtrack will span the Latin genre from traditional folk songs to chart-topping pop anthems, all arranged by award-winning Alfonso Casado-Trigo for “a fiesta of a lifetime”.
Tickets for the 7.30pm evening shows and 2.30pm Wednesday and Saturday matinees in York are on sale at atgtickets.com.york.
Sarabeth Tucek (SBT) and her band: Performing on the road after only one rehearsal
SELBY Town Hall is marking itself out as a great place to watch live music. Pushing the envelope last Saturday was Sarabeth Tucek; a critics’ favourite from New Jersey who unveiled her new double album, gestating for nearly a decade.
Tucek wasn’t big on small talk, letting her music do the revealing. As the lyrics pulled out from the CD inlay put it: “I put my life in the centre of the room. I dim the lights on parts of the truth.”
This more adventurous note was struck from the off with Kiran Leonard and dbh (actual name Nick Jonah Davis) sharing opening duties. The pair were very different beasts, the rich air of English pastoral swirling around dbh’s acoustic guitar instrumentals. Of the possible reference points, Bert Jansch and John Renbourn were perhaps the most obvious.
It’s always a good sign when the main act comes out and watches, and you could see Tucek’’s band really appreciating both supports. In other hands, Kiran Leonard’s set could also have oozed bucolic ease, but his contributions were much more challenging.
This was the sound of a man trying to appeal to all our senses simultaneously, seemingly striving for something always just out of reach. Leonard displayed a formidable musical intelligence and ambition – as well as an admirable lack of self-consciousness in giving himself up to the songs.
“Tucek was the still centre, weaving her stories in her distinctive conversational, emotionally direct way, while her band provided energetic support,” says reviewer Paul Rhodes
Ten songs into her 15-song set, Tucek sang “Am I happy?” (from Happiness). Her stage armour made it difficult to tell. Like Kristin Hersh whose music she shares some similarities with, Tucek’s has a serious, almost intimidating stage presence.
It’s been an intense experience for her band too. The three musicians had just one rehearsal together before their opening show in Manchester two days before. Selby was third in line. They did an amazing job recreating the twists of Joan And All, newly released under Tucek’s new SBT moniker, especially when casting minor key magic on Unmade/The Dog.
Tucek was the still centre, weaving her stories in her distinctive conversational, emotionally direct way, while her band provided energetic support, the guitarist Luther Russell, who also produced the album, leading from the front.
Joan Of All is a double album that listeners need to live with for a while (particularly more challenging sides 3 and 4, some of which could have been cut for this concert), but it is already being heralded as a masterpiece by those qualified to know.
Discovering its depths live was arguably the best introduction. You could hear some of Lou Reed in songs like the memorable 13th Street #1 and in titles like Cathy Says (the emotional highlight of both the record and the show). The spirit of the Velvet Underground also infused the instrumentation.
Tucek and band more than fulfilled their promise to go all out, and it felt like we’d been on an emotional journey together. We parted friends.
Jennie Wogan-Wells: Teacher and Narrator, in rehearsal for York Musical Theatre Company’s Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
KATHRYN Addison directs York Musical Theatre Company in Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s ever popular, ever colourful 1968 debut musical at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, from tonight.
From the book of Genesis to the musical’s genesis as a cantata written for a London school choir, Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat has grown into an iconic musical theatre staple with its story of the biblical journey of Joseph, son of Jacob and one of 12 brothers, and his coat of many colours.
Here husband and wife Jonathan Wells and Jennie Wogan-Wells lead the cast as Joseph and the Narrator respectively.
“I directed it in 2015 with my Year 3 and 4 pupils at Knavesmire Primary School, where there are 120 children in those classes – and they knew all the words,” recalls Jennie of her past involvement at the helm of Joseph.
“Now I’m playing the Narrator – a very important role! – who knits the whole show together. It’s a bit of a dream role for me as my parents had the LP and I remember spinning round and round to Potiphar with my brother in the front room because it gets faster and faster.
“Now I get to play the Narrator, indulging in my childhood dream to be in the show.” What’s more, the choir from Jennie’s school will be singing at the Thursday evening and Saturday matinee performances. (Wigginton Primary School will provide Years 4 to 6 pupils to perform tonight, Friday and Saturday night.)
“They’re obsessed with it! We practise every lunchtime, and yes, they’ve learnt all the colours in the dreamcoat! It’s nice because parents and teachers remember it from their own childhood, and now, for the children, it will be the first time they’ve been on a stage away from the school.”
Director-choreographer Kathryn Addison was born in the year that Joseph made its debut (1968). “It started as a 15 to 20-minute school musical, so look how it’s grown since then,” she says.
Passion project for Kathryn Addison: Directing York Musical Theatre Company’s production of Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
It changes again in her hands: rather than 12 brothers, it becomes a story of a family: brothers and two sisters (although credited as brothers). “It’s not an issue. We still acknowledge the brothers who have ‘not turned up’ – and we’ve been really lucky in the casting. We’ve neither had to drag people in and nor would we have wanted to,” she says.
“I was in York Shakespeare Project’s all-female Henry V, and it isn’t about gender. It takes gender out of it. It’s not about male/female but who’s right for a role and what can they bring to it?”
Kathryn is “staying true to the spirit of Joseph”. “That’s really important,” she says. “I think Lloyd Webber is a bit ‘Marmite’, but like every writer or composer, there are things you like, things you don’t.
“I feel this musical has an innocence that allows people to really enjoy it as a company show, and it’s felt like a company in rehearsal. It feels tight and there’s a collective will. There’s been no egos in the rehearsal room and nor will there be any on stage.”
The cast of 23 will be complemented by 21 children from Knavesmire Primary and 17 from Wigginton Primary at this week’s performances. “It’s just fun for all of us,” says Jennie.
“If you’re enjoying it on stage, then the audience are going to enjoy it too. Rehearsals have been great fun and I’ve really looked forward to them.”
Nothing delights more than Pharaoh’s Song Of The King: the Elvis one, performed this week by newly married Anthony Gardner. “There’s no point trying to make it anything else than it is: some Elvis impersonator going down to sing on the Scarborough sea front!” says Kathryn. “So you recognise that and crack on with it! Let’s bring out that style as director/choreographer.”
Jennie says: “Kathryn has a clear vision, with room for nice little mood changes and quirks, and it’s great to have that freedom within it. It’s got great balance.”
It all adds up to a show that appeals to children and adults alike. “Everyone enjoys themselves, and it’s rare in being a show that brings people to the theatre that don’t normally go. It’s always nice to do that, for people to realise that theatre is open for them.”
A contemplative moment for Jonathan Wells’s Joseph in the reherarsal room
Jennie is enjoying performing alongside husband Jonathan’s Joseph. “It’s been lovely to do the show together, though we’ve done that before, but we’ve never been principals together before,” she says.
“The Narrator is the framework of the show. It’s that whole thing of me telling the story to the children, so it’s a busman’s holiday really.
“During the rehearsal weeks, I can switch off more than him. He’s always humming the tunes, singing in the car, but it’s very much our life at the moment. We’re going to be bereft when it finishes, but it’s been really lovely as I’ve been able to rehearse at home with him.”
Kathryn has her own fond memory of bygone Joseph performances. “I did the show with my dad, playing Jacob, more than 30 years ago. That really tugs at my heartstrings, but also I’m at the stage when being on stage is quite hard work, and I’ve done a lot of directing and choreographing, though this show is much harder to direct than I’d first given it credit for because it’s sung through,” she says.
“But I love the show. It’s a passion project, and to be able to work with a group of people on a community project, where it’s all about the whole company working together, has been a really positive process for me.
“From the start, I’ve seen this story as being based in Yorkshire; these farmers in the 1920s/1930s, with a bit of a Peaky Blinders vibe to it. They were a nasty bunch to their brother! So we travel from the Yorkshire farms to Scarbados and that sea front, our Las Vegas!
“When I think of Joseph and Scarborough, I think of Mark Herman’s film of Little Voice, with the lights on the sea front at night. And a casino; that’s where I see Pharaoh.”
As for the Technicolor Dreamcoat of the title: thank you to Ripon Amateur Operatic Society for providing wardrobe services.
York Musical Theatre Company in Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, 7.30pm tonight until Saturday plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee (sold out). Ticket update: limited availability for tonight and tomorrow; last few for Friday and Saturday.Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Hamish Brown as Nemorino and Ian Thompson-Smith as Dr Dulcamara in York Opera’s The Elixir Of Love
WITH spring in the air, a young man’s thoughts turn to love. Nemorino is the love-lorn peasant in Donizetti’s melodramma giocoso – let’s call it a witty farce – and the course of his true love is bound to run less than smoothly. So he looks to a love potion to fix his problems and finds himself in even deeper water.
That is the essence of Romani’s libretto, sung here in Ruth and Thomas Martin’s English translation. York Opera’s new production, in the hands of Chris Charlton-Mathews, making his directing debut with the company, provides just the tonic we all need as the sap begins to rise again post-pandemic.
The focus here is the con artist who supplies the potion (actually alcohol), the travelling medicine-man Dulcamara. Ian Thompson-Smith makes the role his own. Smarmy and smug, self-assured and spivvy, he is just what this production needs, given that it has been updated to the 1940s, with Italy desperately seeking to rehabilitate itself after the war. His baritone is firm, his diction is clear and his charisma never deserts him.
David Valsamidis’s Sergeant Belcore and Alexandra Mather’s Adina
Naturally he has the down-trodden peasantry eating out of his hand; they have been through hard times. This includes Hamish Brown’s Nemorino, whose journey from self-doubt to amatory success is neatly managed.
Over the years, Brown has gradually acquired a confident stage presence and this is his best character yet. He provides the greatest pathos of the evening in his last aria – Una Furtiva Lagrima (A Furtive Tear) in the original – with eloquent phrasing.
The target of his affections is the Adina of Alexandra Mather, who makes an engaging transition from standoffishness to tenderness. Her coloratura is in good nick and at its best in the finale. Oddly enough, she is less well-focused in easier passages earlier in the show. But talent will out and she surmounts her difficulties.
Emma Burke in her York Opera debut as Gianetta
David Valsamidis brings a strong baritone to the role of Sergeant Belcore, leading a rag-tag platoon of GIs and posing as saviour of the wretched villagers. His acting is less fluent but he has potential. So too has Emma Burke, who makes the very most of her cameo as Giannetta. We may look forward to their return in future productions.
The chorus is relentlessly enthusiastic and brimming with bonhomie. They certainly take Donizetti’s catchy tunes to heart and sing as if their lives depended on it. Two cautions, however. There were several occasions on the first night when they raced ahead of conductor Steve Griffiths.
His beat was perfectly clear from within the auditorium, but perhaps his proximity to the stage makes his baton hard to see on stage. If so, he should raise his arms a little; if not, the chorus must pay more attention.
York Opera in Donizetti’s witty farce The Elixir Of Love
Secondly, it is an error on the right side to be involved, but when a soloist is performing, individual members of the chorus should not be reacting as characters in their own right. Group chorus reactions are fine, solo ones are distracting. The exception of course is when the chorus itself is in the spotlight, when choreographed unity is to be encouraged.
Griffiths keeps his small orchestra on its toes and it answers his every call. Highlights include some notable flute passagework, and a mellow bassoon accompanying Nemorino’s last aria. Rhythms are strong throughout and the spirit of the dance is infectious. Maggie Soper’s costumes, as always, are right in period: we know at once where we are without being told.
In general, Charlton-Mathews does an excellent job of marshalling his forces on this small stage. He just needs a touch more discipline in his chorus. But this is a company whose morale is definitely back in high gear, suiting the season perfectly.
Violinist Nicholas Wright: Soloist for Erich Korngold’s Violin Concerto in D major
TELL a potential audience that you were giving a 20th-century programme and it used to be a large-scale turnoff. No longer, fortunately.
This attractive and imaginative one had everything you could wish for: good tunes, excitement and virtuosity, delivered with spell-binding discipline.
Its author and the man of the evening was Simon Wright, now into his fourth decade as musical director of this orchestra. He has shaped it into a formidable instrument. If there is a mainly amateur orchestra in this country that plays better than this, I have yet to hear it.
He chose Bernstein, Korngold and Rachmaninov, an unlikely-sounding trio but convincing bedfellows here. The overture to Bernstein’s comic operetta Candide was immediately effervescent, its rhythms tautly organised and confidently delivered. No-one controls a gradual crescendo more skilfully than Wright and the race to the tape was breath-taking.
How does he manage this? His attention to detail is phenomenal. Not that he is over-fussy, far from it. But he makes every section of the orchestra, indeed every individual within that section, know that he has their best interests at heart. He gives them all the signals they could wish for, but he does it without histrionics. It gives them the confidence to deliver.
Erich Korngold was pigeonholed for a long time by his music for stage and screen. But in the dozen years left to him after the Second World War, he turned to concertos and symphonic music, and these have brought him back into the spotlight in our neo-Romantic age.
The Violin Concerto in D major (1945), which was premiered by Jascha Heifetz, is an excellent example. The soloist here was Nicholas Wright, who happens to be the son of Simon Wright. But his presence owed little or nothing to nepotism. For he is carving out a significant career in his own right, as leader (‘concertmaster’ in North America) of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.
He played as to the manner born. In the opening movement, he steered well this side of sentimentality and turned in an aggressive cadenza, littered with double-stopping and lingering delightfully before its final trill.
In the ensuing Romance he managed to make sense of the composer’s ramblings, much helped by the conductor maintaining a near-perfect balance with the orchestra, leading to an effective diminuendo towards the lower strings.
The high-speed alternating pizzicato and staccato at the start of the finale held no terrors for him and he then brought out its main melody superbly. He became a veritable crackerjack in a whirlwind finish. Having briefly reminisced about his start in York, he tenderly offered John Williams’s theme from Schindler’s List as an encore.
This might have been a very hard act to follow. But Simon Wright had cards up his sleeve for Rachmaninov’s Second Symphony after the break. The problem with much of Rachmaninov is that there is often a slushy melody lurking in the offing and his romanticism needs to be tamed, especially if you are doing this symphony without cuts, as here.
Wright was never self-indulgent. After the slow Russian Orthodox-style motto theme, he kept the opening Allegro moving, managing a fine overarching crescendo and diminuendo, with snarling trombones at its peak. There was an underlying urgency to the Scherzo, even in its second theme with violins at the top of their range. The fugue-style trio was a pleasingly screechy contrast.
When you come to the slow movement, you have to relent and admire the composer’s ability to write a seemingly endless ‘big tune’. Following the example of the solo clarinet, the full orchestra sustained it beautifully; it was good to see the violins, right to the back desks, using the full length of their bows.
The finale got off to an explosive start, its triplets positively balletic. The descending scales at the movement’s centre rang out like bells. The woodwind had set the early pace. By the end the brass had asserted themselves too. Wright had them all eating out of his hand. They responded hungrily. This is an orchestra fashioned in his own image and it has never played better.
A study of people studying People We Love’s digital portraits in the Chapel at Castle Howard. Picture: Charlotte Graham
LOVE lost and found is all around in Charles Hutchinson’s picks from the shelf marked culture.
Goin’ to the chapel of love: People We Love, Castle Howard, near York, until October 15, 10am to 4pm
AFTER gracing York Minster twice, Pittsburgh, USA, Viborg, Denmark, and Selby Abbey, North Yorkshire, KMA’s latest contemplative digital art installation takes over the Chapel at Castle Howard, a setting that provides a contrast between portraiture old and new. Produced by York-based Mediale and designed by Kit Monkman, People We Love explores “the invisible transaction between a person, a piece of art and the emotion which bonds us all: love”.
A quintet of high-definition screens display portraits of estate staff and volunteers, Castle Howard visitors and Ryedale residents, filmed in March, as they gaze at a picture of someone they love. A picture you never see, but you will feel each unspoken story as the faces tell the tale of a person they love.
Alexandra Mather’s Adina, left, in York Opera’s The Elixir Of Love
Opera of the weekend: York Opera in The Elixir Of Love, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, today at 7.30pm
WILL Nemorino, a simple village farm lad, ever find love without the help of a magic potion? Discover the answer in Donizetti’s comic opera L’Elisere d’Amore, packed with light-hearted music sung in an English translation by Ruth and Thomas Martin with orchestral accompaniment.
Under the direction of Chris Charlton-Mathews, principal roles go to Hamish Brown as the lovelorn, lovable Nemorino; stalwart Ian Thompson-Smith as opportunistic Doctor Dulcamara; David Valsamidies as the boastful Belcore; Alexandra Mather as the intelligent, beautiful Adina and Emma Burke in her York Opera debut as the flirtatious Giannetta. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Harvey Badger, Eddie Ahrens, Hannah Baker and Rachel Hammond in Mikron Theatre Company’s Twitchers
Bird song of the week: Mikron Theatre Company in Twitchers, Scarcroft Allotments, Scarcroft Road, York, Sunday (21/5/2023), 2pm, and on tour until October 21
IN Mikron Theatre Company’s premiere of Poppy Hollman’s Twitchers, Springwatch is coming to RSPB Shrikewing nature reserve, home to raucous rooks and booming bitterns.
Can Jess take inspiration from the RSPB’s tenacious female founders and draw on its history of campaigning to save them? Can she find her own voice to raise a rallying cry for nature in Mikron’s flight through RSPB and birdwatching history, feathered with bird song and humour. No reserved seating or tickets are required, and instead a ‘pay what you feel’ collection will be taken after the show.
Kate Rusby: On song at Harrogate Royal Hall on Monday
Folk gig of the week: Kate Rusby, Harrogate Royal Hall, Monday, 7.30pm
BARNSLEY folk nightingale Kate Rusby rounds off a year of 30th anniversary celebrations with an 18-date spring tour, in the wake of releasing her 30: Happy Returns compendium last May to acknowledge three decades as a professional musician.
Coming later this year will be Kate’s Established 1973 Christmas Tour, visiting York Barbican on December 7, three days after she turns 50: a landmark she will mark with her sixth album of South Yorkshire pub carols and winter songs. Box office: Harrogate, 01423 502116 or harrogatetheatre.co.uk; York, yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Beware the Green Fingers: Fladam’s Flo Poskitt and Adam Sowter launch their debut children’s show at York Theatre Royal
Children’s show of the week: Fladam, Green Fingers, TakeOver Festival, York Theatre Royal, May 27, 3pm
GREEN Fingers is a work-in-progress performance to test out madcap York musical comedy double act Fladam’s first foray into family theatre ahead of its full debut at this summer’s Edinburgh Fringe.
Flo Poskitt and Adam Sowter present a deliciously Roald Dahl-style musical storytelling show for children aged five to 12 about a boy born with bright green hands. Is he really rotten or just misunderstood? Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Amy May Ellis: Back at The Band Room
Homeward bound: Amy May Ellis, The Band Room, Low Mill, Farndale, May 27, 7.30pm
BEWITCHING ambient Yorkshire rose folkster Amy May Ellis makes an overdue return to her “local” moorland venue, where she has opened for Hiss Golden Messenger, Willy Mason, Michael Chapman, Ryley Walker and Howe Gelb since teen days…and always brought the house down.
This time she is touring her debut album, Over Ling And Bell, released on Isle of Eigg’s cult Lost Map Records, home of Pictish Trail and one-time Lost Map Sessions singer and songwriter James Yorkston, with whom Amy has toured. Wanderland and Nessy Williamson support. Box office: thebandroom.co.uk.
Awaiting his coat of many colours: Jonathan Wells in rehearsal for his title role in York Musical Theatre Company’s Joseph And The Technicolor Dreamcoat
Musical of the week: York Musical Theatre Company in Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Wednesday to Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee
KATHRYN Addison directs York Musical Theatre Company in Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s 1968 debut musical: the biblical journey of Joseph, son of Jacob and one of 12 brothers, and his coat of many colours.
From the book of Genesis to the musical’s genesis as a cantata written for a school choir, Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat has grown into an iconic musical theatre staple. Here husband and wife Jonathan Wells and Jennie Wogan-Wells lead the cast as Joseph and the Narrator. Box office: 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.
Richard E Grant: Reflecting on love and loss at the Grand Opera House, York
Talk show of the week: An Evening With Richard E Grant, Grand Opera House, York, Friday, 7.30pm
ACTOR Richard E Grant tells stories from his life, entwining tales from his glittering career with uplifting reflections on love and loss, as told in last September’s memoir, A Pocketful Of Happiness.
Grant will be considering the inspiration behind the book – how, when his beloved wife Joan died in 2021 after almost 40 years together, she set him a challenge of finding a pocketful of happiness in every day. The book and now the tour show honour that challenge. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Leon Francois Dumont’s Ring Of Fire: Not one of the “life drawings” but featuring in the Donderdag Collective exhibition nonetheless at Pyramid Gallery, York
York exhibition launch of the week: The Donderdag Collective, Artists And The Human Form, Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, York, today, from 11am, until June 25
FOUNDED in 2011 by a group of artists in York, The Donderdag Collective members – both professionals and keen amateurs – meet at St Olave’s Church Hall, in Marygate Lane, on Thursday evenings to sketch or paint from a life model (‘Donderdag’ being Dutch for ‘Thursday’).
Taking part in this resulting show are: Julie Mitchell; Rory Barke; Bertt deBaldock; Diane Cobbold; Carolyn Coles; Leon Francois Dumont; Jeanne Godfrey; Anna Harding; Adele Karmazyn; Michelle Galloway; Andrian Melka; Kate Pettitt; Swea Sayers; Barbara Shaw and Donna Maria Taylor.
Dame Joan Collins: Going Behind The Shoulder Pads at the Grand Opera House in October
Show announcement of the week: Dame Joan Collins, Behind The Shoulder Pads, Grand Opera House, York, October 2, 7.30pm
TO coincide with the release of her memoir Behind The Shoulder Pads, Hollywood legend, author, producer, humanitarian and entrepreneur Dame Joan Collins, who will turn 90 on May 23, will embark on a tour with husband Percy Gibson by her side.
Returning to the Grand Opera House, where they presented Unscripted in February 2019, they will field audience questions and tell seldom-told tales and enchanting anecdotes, accompanied by rare footage from Dame Joan’s seven decades in showbusiness. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
