Tag: York Barbican

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What’s On in Ryedale, York and beyond when Christmas shows abound. Here’s Hutch’s List No. 45, from Gazette & Herald

Jools Holland: Boogie woogie pianist returns to York Barbican tonight

SEAGULLS, a rabbit, a winter sprite and The Animals, plus another solo version of A Christmas Carol, are among the highlights of the festive week ahead, recommends Charles Hutchinson.

No year would be complete without…Jools Holland and His Rhythm & Blues Orchestra, York Barbican, tonight, 7.30pm

BOOGIE woogie pianist supreme Jools Holland makes his obligatory winter outing to York in the company of his top-notch rhythm & blues players and vocalists Ruby Turner, Louise Marshall and Sumudu Jayatilaka.

His special guests will be Soft Cell singer Marc Almond, who previously toured with Holland in 2018, and blues guitar prodigy Toby Lee, his guest on last year’s tour too. Holland will be performing songs from the former Squeeze keyboardist and television presenter’s long-running solo career. Box office for returns only: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

The Animals: 60 years of rhythm & blues celebrated at Selby Town Hall

60th anniversary concert of the week: The Animals & Friends, Selby Town Hall, tomorrow, 7.30pm

THIS year marks the 60th anniversary of Newcastle rhythm & blues icons The Animals’ self-titled debut album and their seminal crossover hit The House Of The Rising Sun. Still in the line-up is drummer, founding member and Rock And Roll Hall of Fame inductee John Steel, who will be joined by Danny Handley on guitar and lead vocals, Milltown Brothers’ Barney Williams on keys and Norman Helm on bass.

The set list can draw on such favourites as We Gotta Get Out of This Place, Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood, Baby Let Me Take You Home, Boom Boom, Around And Around and The Right Time. Box office: 01757 708449 or selbytownhall.co.uk.

Pocklington Arts Centre cast members Levi Payne, left, Caitlin Townend and Dylan Allcock in Jack Frost’s Christmas Wish

Ryedale Christmas play of the week: Jack Frost’s Christmas Wish, Pocklington Arts Centre, tomorrow to December 24

ELIZABETH Godber’s second Christmas show for Pocklington Arts Centre invites everyone aged three to 103 to join Jack Frost (Levi Payne) and his friends Oslo the Rabbit (Dylan Allcock) and Blue the Winter Sprite (Caitlin Townend) as they race across the world to make his one wish come true: to be home for Christmas. Could that home be in East Yorkshire?

Wrap up warm for a frosty adventure from the team who delivered The Elves And The Shoemaker: Save Christmas last winter, steered by director Jane Thornton. Box office: 01759 301547 or pocklingtonartscentre.co.uk.

Stephen Brailsford: Playing Captain Cliff in the CU Scarborough cast for Captain Cliff & The Seagull Squad at Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough

Coastal children’s play of the week: Captain Cliff & The Seagull Squad, The McCarthy, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, tomorrow to December 21

ON a busy day at Scarborough’s South Bay, judges from Britain’s Best Beach are soon to arrive, but after a big rush of tourists, the bins are overflowing with rubbish in a play for children aged up to six, written and directed by Rob Salmon for the SJT and CU (Coventry University), Scarborough.

Faced by litter everywhere and a pile of something sticky by the rock shop, who can save Scarborough? Step forward Captain Cliff and the Seagull Squad, but can they clear up all the mess in time as they seek to complete four missions, one for each season? Cue a rescue adventure full of songs, silliness and festive fun. Box office: 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com.

Ryedale School musicians: Performing at Kirk Theatre, Pickering, on Friday

School performance of the week: Ryedale School Music Concert, Kirk Theatre, Pickering, Friday, 7pm

THIS night of music performed by Ryedale School musicians features Ryedale Concert Band Shining Brass and Ryedale Stray Notes. Proceeds will go to Ryedale School Performing Arts and Rotary funds. Tickets are on sale on 01751 474833 or at kirktheatre.co.uk.

Mat Jones: Solo rendition of A Christmas Carol for two nights at Friargate Theatre, York. Picture: Vintage Verse

Solo show of the week: Mat Jones in A Christmas Carol, Friargate Theatre, York, Friday and Saturday, 7.30pm

RING in the Christmas season with Mat Jones’s spellbinding rendition of Charles Dickens’s Victorian festive classic, brought to life in vivid detail from Dickens’s original performance text as Scrooge encounters the Spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet To Come en route to the redemption of London’s most miserable miser. 

“A Christmas Carol is not just a story; it’s a celebration of the human spirit and the power of kindness,” says Jones. Box office: 01904 613000 or friargatetheatre.co.uk.

Jo Walton setting up her exhibition at Bluebird Bakery, Acomb, York

Exhibition of the week: Jo Walton, Steel, Copper, Rust, Gold, Verdigris, Wax, Bluebird Bakery, Acomb Road, Acomb, York, until January 23 2025

WHEN Rogues Atelier artist, interior designer, upholsterer and Bluebird Bakery curator of exhibitions Jo Walton asked poet Nicky Kippax to put words to images she had sent her, she responded with “The heft of a cliff and a gathering of sea fret”. Spot on, Nicky.

Into the eighth month of recovery from breaking her right leg, Jo is exhibiting predominantly large works that utilise steel, copper, rust, gold, verdigris and wax in the bakery, cafe and community centre, whose interior she designed in 2021.

Kate Rusby: Winter Light tour arrives at York Barbican on December 17

Christmas concert of the week: Kate Rusby, Winter Light Tour, York Barbican, December 17, 7pm

BARNSLEY folk songstress Kate Rusby draws on her seven Christmas albums – she released her latest, Light Years, in 2023 – for her annual celebration of South Yorkshire carols sung in pubs through the winter months.

Spreading Yuletide joy, Kate will be joined by her regular band, featuring her husband, producer, guitarist and banjo player Damien O’Kane, and the Brass Boys quintet. Look out for the fancy-dress finale. Tickets update: Closing in on a sell-out; hurry, hurry to yorkbarbican.co.uk.

The Corrs: Heading to the Scarborough coast next summer

Gig announcement of the week: The Corrs and Natalie Imbruglia, TK Maxx presents Scarborough Open Air Theatre, June 11 2025

THE Corrs, Irish sibling purveyors of sleek pop rock, lush harmonies and Celtic folk trimmings, will line up as ever with Andrea on lead vocals, piano and  tin whistle, Sharon on violin, piano and vocals, Caroline, on drums, piano and vocals, and Jim on guitar, keyboards and vocals.

Former Neighbours soap actress, Torn hit-maker and The Masked Singer 2022 winner Natalie Imbruglia will support. The Corrs join Shed Seven, Gary Barlow, Basement Jaxx, Pendulum, Rag’n’Bone Man, Blossoms, Texas, UB40 featuring Ali Campbell and The Script among next summer’s Scarborough OAT headliners. Tickets go on general sale at 9am on Friday at ticketmaster.co.uk.

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Matt Goss to play York Barbican on April 25 on Hits And More Tour. Sheffield, Hull and Leeds await. When do tickets go on sale?

Matt Goss: The Hits And More at Sheffield Oval, York Barbican, Hull Connexin Live and Leeds Grand Theatre in Spring 2025. Picture: Paul Harris

THE “New King of Las Vegas”, Matt Goss will play four Yorkshire venues on his 2025 tour, The Hits And More, including York Barbican on April 25.

The 21-date itinerary also will take in Sheffield Oval on March 14, Hull Connexin Live on April 24 and the tour’s closing night at Leeds Grand Theatre on April 28.

Pre-sale tickets will be available via on Wednesday (11/12/2024) at ticketmaster.co.uk; general sale from Friday at mattgossofficial.co.uk.

The Hits & More will be a “celebration of all Matt has achieved in his music career and beyond”, from pop pin-up days in Bros to Las Vegas, not forgetting the 2022 series of Strictly Come Dancing.

Initially he headed to Palms Casino for one year only, but the South Londoner has been performing in the United States for more than 11 years now after his show became an instant success.

He moved to Caesars Palace for the remainder of his Vegas residency and has since played such iconic New York venues as Carnegie Hall and Madison Square Garden. He even hailed August 8 as “official Matt Goss Day” in Las Vegas.

“Trust me, what I’ve learnt over the years, being on countless stages around the world, this will be your best night of the year!” says Matt Goss. Picture: Paul Harris

Next spring’s tour will mark Goss’s return to the UK concert stage after his hit tour in 2023, when the Matt Goss Experience, with the MG Big Band and Royal Philharmonic, played York Barbican on April 23.

“Trust me, what I’ve learnt over the years, being on countless stages around the world, this will be your best night of the year!” says Goss, who promises sensational songs and an electric atmosphere.

In his Bros days, frontman Matt and drummer brother Luke  played to 77,000 fans as the youngest ever band to headline Wembley Stadium in August 1989, with support from Salt’n’Pepa and Debbie Gibson on the Bros In 2 Summer bill.

Bros also played 19 shows at Wembley Arena between 1987 and 1992, later re-uniting for two concerts at the O2 Arena, London, in 2017, when the 40,000 tickets sold out in seven seconds, the fastest ever sell-out for any Live Nation show there. 

Best known for their November 1987 number two When Will I Be Famous?, Bros split up in 1992 after releasing their third and final album, Changing Faces. 

In 2018, the BAFTA-winning documentary film about Matt and Luke’s lives together and apart, After The Screaming Stops, became that year’s most downloaded BBC production.

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Guitarists Joe Satriani and Steve Vai to launch The SATCHVAI Band’s Surfing With The Hydra tour at York Barbican on June 13

The SATCHVAI Band: Joe Satriani, left, and Steve Vai. Picture: Jon Luini

FOR the first time in nearly 50 years of musical friendship, guitarists Joe Satriani and Steve Vai have united to form The SATCHVAI Band.

Next summer, they will kick off the British leg of their Surfing With The Hydra 2025 Tour at York Barbican on June 13. Tickets will go on general sale at 10am on Friday at https://www.yorkbarbican.co.uk/whats-on/satchvai-band/. Further shows will follow in London, Glasgow, Wolverhampton and Manchester.

Satriani, 68, and Vai, 64, initially joined forces for their first tour together, performing with their respective bands in American cities in Spring 2024, whereupon they decided it was time to form a band together.

Satriani and Vai debuted their collaboration in March with The Sea Of Emotion Pt 1, highlighting their synergy as they traded solo sections throughout the six-minute opus. Their second collaboration is set for release just before the European tour.

“Satch” and Vai’s careers have been intertwined since their early days. Satriani served as Vai’s guitar teacher during their teenage years on Long Island, New York. Their connection has continued to evolve over the years, even sharing record labels, starting at Relativity Records in the late-1980 and then both calling Sony/Epic Records their home in the 1990s.

The poster for The SATCHVAI Band’s Surfing With The Hydra 2025 Tour, visiting York Barbican on June 13

Together, they have teamed up with a third guitarist on multiple occasions through three decades, participating in the G3 tours, both in the USA and overseas.

“The SATCHVAI Band Tour is happening! I’m so looking forward to sharing the stage with Steve again,” says Satriani. “Every time we play together, it takes me back to when we were teenagers, eating and breathing music every second of the day, pushing, challenging and helping each other to be the best we could be. I guess we’ve never stopped.”

Vai adds: “Touring with Joe is always a pleasure and an honour. He is my favourite guitarist to jam with, and now we have another opportunity to take it to the stage. I feel as though we are both at the top of our game, and the show will be a powerful celebration of the coolest instrument in the world, the electric guitar.”

Satriani has had a packed schedule with the Sammy Hagar-led Best Of All Worlds Tour, while Vai has been playing shows across America as part of the BEAT tour, following the conclusion of the Satch/Vai tour earlier this year.

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More Things To Do in York and beyond, come snow or Storm Darragh’s high winds. Hutch’s List No. 50, from The Press, York

Ensemble Augelletti: BBC Radio 3’s New Generation Baroque Ensemble present their new Christmas programme, The Morning Star, at the NCEM on December 13 at 7pm

CHRISTMAS festivities gather pace with a community pantomime, Early music festival, cabaret, Strictly dance king and a Muppet movie, as Charles Hutchinson reports.  

Festival of the week: York Early Music Christmas Festival, National Centre for Early Music, Bedern Hall and Sir Jack Lyons Concert  Hall, University of York, until December 15

YORK Early Music Christmas Festival 2024 is under way, presenting 12 concerts and one (sold-out) choral workshop led by I Fagiolini founder Robert Hollingworth in a celebration of the winter season, its festivities, traditions, darkness and light, mulled wine and mince pies.

Concerts by Solomon’s Knot (Sunday), Stile Antico (December 12), Intesa (December 15) and Awake Arise (December 15) have sold out but tickets are available for Love And Melancholy with soprano Emilia Bertolini (today, 12 noon); Siglo de Oro (today, 6.30pm); Sean Shibe & Aidan O’Rourke (December 9, 7.30pm); Green Matthews (December 11, 7.30pm); Ensemble Augelletti (December 13, 7pm); Contre le Temps (December 14, 12noon) and Yorkshire Bach Choir (December 14, 7.30pm). Box office: 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk.

Micklegate Singers: A White Christmas lunchtime concert for York Late Music at Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York

Christmas concert of the week: York Late Music presents Micklegate Singers, A White Christmas, Unitarian Chapel, St Saviourgate, York, today, 1pm

MICKLEGATE Singers chart a journey from Joanna Marsh’s In Winter’s House through wintry landscapes to arrive at a Christmas prelude courtesy of Poulenc, Tallis, Vaughan Williams and more, including the world premiere of York composer James Else’s A Little Snow.

Among further works will be Holst’s Bring Us In Good Ale; Oliver Tarney’s The Waiting Sky and John Harle: Mrs Beeton’s Christmas Plum Pudding (Average Cost 3 Shillings And 6d). Box office: latemusic.org.

Rowntree Players’ principal panto players in Mother Goose, opening today at the JoRo

Let the egg puns get cracking: Rowntree Players in Mother Goose, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, Saturday, 2pm and 7.30pm, Sunday, 2pm and 6pm; December 10 to 13, 7.30pm; December 14, 2pm and 7.30pm

MEET Jack (Gemma McDonald), head of hens at Chucklepatch Farm, with its newest addition to the coop, Priscilla the goose (American Abbey Follansbee). Joined by mum Gertrude Gander (alias Mother Goose, Michael Cornell) and his sister Jill (Laura Castle), they head out on their panto adventure. 

Desperate for showbiz, Gertrude gives up the Wolds for the bright lights of Doncaster. However, ever-nasty landlord Demon Darkheart (Jamie McKeller) and his assistant Bob (Laura McKeller) will stop at nothing to collect rent, but dishy farmer Kev, the King of Kale (Sarah Howlett) and Fairy Frittata (Holly Smith) will not let the dark side rule in a rollicking romp directed by co-writer Howard Ella. Tickets update: Down to last few tickets or limited availability for most performances on 01904 501935 or josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk.

Velma Celli: Xmas Roast cabaret songs, comedy and festive fruitiness at Impossible York

Christmas cabaret of the week: Velma Celli’s Xmas Roast, Impossible York, St Helen’s Square, York, Sunday 6pm, doors 5pm

YORK’S international drag diva deluxe, Velma Celli, hosts a fabulous evening of music, comedy and festive frolics. “Come and have yourself a merry Christmas,” says Velma, the Best Cabaret at Perth Fringeworld 2024 award-winning alter ego of West End musical actor and Atlantis Gay Cruises headline act Ian Stroughair, who promises “cabaret meets a partaaaaaay”. Box office: ticketweb.uk/event/velmas-xmas-roast-impossible-york-tickets/13855143.

The Hollywood Sisters: Cat Foster, left, Rachel Higgs, Henrietta Linnemann and Helen “Bells” Spencer

Fundraising festive concert of the week: The Hollywood Sisters & Friends, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, Sunday, 7pm

THE Hollywood Sisters, the York vocal harmony group with vintage Hollywood vibes, have added extra tickets after selling out Sunday’s show. Expect a cabaret evening of music, song and a sprinkle of festive cheer featuring the luscious close harmonies of Helen “Bells” Spencer, Cat Foster, Rachel Higgs and Henrietta Linnemann and guest appearances by The Rusty Pegs, Mark Lovell, Phoebe Breeze and Anthony Sargeant.

All profits will go to the fundraising campaign for a new sensory room for dementia patients at Foss Park Hospital, in Haxby Road, York. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Anton du Beke: Christmas song and dance with the Strictly Come Dancing judge and Friends at York Barbican

Dance show of the week: Anton du Beke in Christmas With Anton & Friends, York Barbican, December 10, 7.30pm

STRICTLY Come Dancing judge and dashing dancer Anton Du Beke glides into York in his new festive tour show, joined as ever by elegant crooner Lance Ellington, a live band and a company of dancers for an evening of song and dance with added Christmas dazzle.

“I’ve always dreamed of doing a big Christmas show as it’s the best time of the year, so this is a real treat for me,” says the ballroom king. “It’s the show I’ve always wanted to do with some old faces and some new!” Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Jools Holland: Playing to a full house at York Barbican

No year would be complete without…Jools Holland and His Rhythm & Blues Orchestra, York Barbican, December 11, 7.30pm

BOOGIE woogie pianist supreme Jools Holland makes his obligatory winter outing to York in the company of his top-notch rhythm & blues players and vocalists Ruby Turner, Louise Marshall and Sumudu Jayatilaka.

His special guests will be Soft Cell singer Marc Almond, who previously toured with Holland in 2018, and blues guitar prodigy Toby Lee, his guest on last year’s tour too. Holland will be performing songs from the former Squeeze keyboardist and television presenter’s long-running solo career. Box office for returns only: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

Marc Almond: Jools Holland’s special guest at York Barbican. Picture: Mike Owen

Christmas film double bill: Friargate Theatre, York, presents The Muppet Christmas Carol (U), today, 2.30pm, and Die Hard (15), today, 8pm

FRIARGATE Theatre serves up a double dose of holiday cheer and action-packed excitement, opening with Kermit, Miss Piggy and the Muppet gang being joined by Michael Caine’s Ebenezer Scrooge as they re-tell the Dickens tale with a whimsical and heart-warming twist.

Let’s leave the debate over whether John McTiernan’s Die Hard is or is not a Christmas film to another day. Instead, revel in Bruce Willis’s John McClane battling with terrorists in a high-rise building on Christmas Eve. Box office: 01904 613000 or friargatetheatre.co.uk.

Christmas Cinema at St Saviourgate

Pop-up film event of the month: City Screen Picturehouse presents Christmas Cinema at Saint Saviourgate, The Great Hall, Central Methodist Church, St Saviourgate, York, December 12 to 23

CITY Screen Picturehouse, York, is setting up a pop-up screen at Central Methodist Church for the Christmas season, kicking off on December 12 with The Muppet Christmas Carol (U) at 4pm and Bridget Jones’s Diary (15) at 7PM.

Next come Home Alone (PG) at 4pm and Love Actually (15) at 7pm on December 13; Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone (PG) at 4pm and Elf (PG) at 7.20pm on December 14, then Ali Plumb’s Untitled Christmas Film Quiz Project at 5pm and The Nightmare Before Christmas (PG) at 8.30pm on December 15.

Paddington In Peru (PG) will be shown at 4pm on December 16; Die Hard (15) at 7pm that night; The Polar Express (U) at 4pm and It’s A Wonderful Life (U) at 7pm on December 17; The Muppet Christmas Carol (U) at 4pm and Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone (PG) at 6.45pm on December 18, then Home Alone (PG) at 4pm and Wonka (PG) at 7pm on December 20.

Paddington In Peru (PG) returns at 4pm on December 22, followed by Elf (PG) at 7pm, before the season concludes with The Polar Express (U) at 4pm and  It’s A Wonderful Life (U) at 7pm on December 23. Box office: picturehouses.com/YorkXmas.

Mat Jones in A Christmas Carol for two nights at Friargate Theatre. Picture: Vintage Verse

Solo show of the week: Mat Jones in A Christmas Carol, Friargate Theatre, York, December 13 and 14, 7.30pm

RING in the Christmas season with Mat Jones’s spellbinding rendition of Charles Dickens’s Victorian festive classic, brought to life in vivid detail from Dickens’s original performance text as Scrooge encounters the Spirits of Christmas Past, Present and Yet To Come en route to the redemption of London’s most miserable miser. 

“A Christmas Carol is not just a story; it’s a celebration of the human spirit and the power of kindness,” says Jones. Box office: 01904 613000 or friargatetheatre.co.uk.

York artist Jo Walton setting up her exhibition at Bluebird Bakery, Acomb

Exhibition of the week: Jo Walton, Steel, Copper, Rust, Gold, Verdigris, Wax, Bluebird Bakery, Acomb Road, Acomb, York, until January 23 2025

WHEN Rogues Atelier artist, interior designer, upholsterer and Bluebird Bakery curator of exhibitions Jo Walton asked poet Nicky Kippax to put words to images she had sent her, she responded with “The heft of a cliff and a gathering of sea fret”. Spot on, Nicky.

Into the eighth month of recovery from breaking her right leg, Jo is exhibiting predominantly large works that utilise steel, copper, rust, gold, verdigris and wax in the bakery, cafe and community centre, whose interior she designed in 2021.

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Strictly judge Anton du Beke steps into Christmas in night of festive song and dance dazzle with friends at York Barbican

Anton Du Beke: Christmas dazzle on the dancefloor

STRICTLY Come Dancing judge and dashing dancer Anton Du Beke glides into York Barbican next Tuesday in his new festive tour show, Christmas with Anton & Friends.

Anton, 58, will be joined as ever by elegant crooner Lance Ellington, a live band and a company of dancers to create an evening filled with song and dance with added Christmas dazzle.

“I’ve always dreamed of doing a big Christmas show as it’s the best time of the year, so this is a real treat for me,” says the king of the ballroom. “It’s the show I’ve always wanted to do with some old faces and some new!

“Don’t forget to bring your voices for a mega sing-a-long with some of my favourite Christmas songs. It’s going to be lots of fun and full of Christmas cheer.”

In the past few years, Anton has been appearing in pantomime over the winter months, making his debut as Buttons in Cinderella at Richmond Theatre in 2021-2022, followed by protagonist Jack in Jack & The Beanstalk at Churchill Theatre, Bromley, in 2022-23 and Smee alongside Paul Chuckle’s Starkey in Peter Pan at the New Victoria Theatre, Woking, in 2023-24. “Only goodies! I can only play goodies,” he says. “It’s fun but it’s a lot of time to spend away from my children.”

Hence his decision to launch Christmas With Anton & Friends, whose tour runs from November  24 to December 21, hot on the heels of his autumn terpsichorean travels in Showman: An Evening With Anton Du Beke.

The tour poster for Anton Du Beke’s Christmas show

He was still on that song, dance and chat tour when conducting this interview on November 19, on top of his Strictly judging commitments for the BBC.

“I’m on the road at the moment, and then we’ll do four weeks of the Christmas show,” he said at the time. “So we’ve been rehearsing the Christmas show in the day and doing the Showman show at night.”

Exit the Showman, enter the snow man. “I used to do Christmas shows at the Royal Albert Hall and loved it,” says Anton. “Now I’m doing this new tour. It’s all Christmas songs, and it’s going to be such fun. Lance Ellington is with me again, the band, and I’ve got my wonderful dancers and a female singer too.

“This one has been done with the team: Kelly Chow, our dance captain, has sort of put it together choreographically; my musical director, Clive Dunstall, has done all the arrangements, writing all this stuff while being on tour with me. It’s been quite the task but so exciting!

“There’ll be Christmas trees on stage and everyone in Christmas jumpers and hats. We’ll have a big medley at the end, about nine minutes long, starting with Mariah Carey [All I Want For Christmas Is You] and ending with Slade [Merry Xmas Everybody]. Six songs in all.”

The show will span Christmas classics to more contemporary numbers, from It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year to Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire. “There’s a lovely song called [Everybdody’s Waiting For] The Man With The Bag. It’s a classic, not that new, but rarely played…so Lance and I will be doing it as a duet,” says Anton.

“I’ve always dreamed of doing a big Christmas show as it’s the best time of the year,” says Anton Du Beke. Picture: Bev Comboy/Plank PR

Summing up the show, he says: “I love Christmas so much and everyone in the show is so looking forward to doing these shows. If you love Christmas as much as I do, you will have a great time.

“I love Christmas songs! My producer doesn’t entirely love them and my wardrobe mistress is much more into Halloween than Christmas, but I love Christmas much more than Halloween.”

Showman, now Christmas With Anton & Friends and Strictly, of course: Anton is busy, busy, busy. “Yes, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Strictly is great because I don’t have to do anything now other than turn up, judge and leave! I’m not choreographing, like when I was one of the professional dancers.  I just turn up on Saturdays and that’s lovely,” he says. 

“I just feel like everyone else is doing the work and I do my bit with the other judges, and it’s a very exciting series this year. The standard is so good that I’m at the stage where I’m waiting for a mistake because you don’t expect someone to do something wrong.

“It’s difficult to say who’ll win. The great thing is that the winner is not decided by the judges but by the public.”

How does judging contrast with dancing with a celebrity partner each year? “I’m enjoying it enormously because I can make the joke that I now make the final every time!” says Anton.

Together again: Anton Du Beke and Giovanni Pernice will reunite for 2025 tour, visiting York Barbican on July 18. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk

“That’s the big thing: I’m now involved for the whole series, even if it’s only 25 seconds of chat per couple, not dancing. That’s the joy for me, always being involved, whereas I never wanted to be voted off when competing because I loved being in it.

“Not one of those couples would rather be out than in, regardless of the circumstances, even if they know a dance has not been great, because the best thing is to be in it. There’s no fun when you’re out.”

His 2025 diary is filling up. “Next year is working out already,” he says. “I’m doing the Strictly tour, January into February, then a spring tour, Anton: The Musicals, a celebration of big musicals with great numbers from the shows and a lovely combination of old and new.”

Look out too for Anton & Giovanni  Together Again, The Live Tour, when Du Beke and Pernice play York Barbican on July 18 2025 at 7.30pm.

Anton Du Beke in Christmas With Anton & Friends, York Barbican, December 10, 7.30pm. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

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Velma Celli to deliver festive frolics in Xmas Roast cabaret at Impossible York with tour dates to follow in 2025 for Show Queen!

Velma Celli: Chestnuts toasted cabaret style at the Xmas Roast

YORK’S international drag diva deluxe, Velma Celli, hosts a fabulous evening of music, comedy and festive frolics in  the Xmas Roast at Impossible York, St Helen’s Square, York, on Sunday at 6pm.

 “Come and have yourself a merry Christmas,” says Velma, the Best Cabaret at Perth Fringeworld 2024 award-winning alter ego of West End musical actor and Atlantis Gay Cruises headline act Ian Stroughair, who promises “cabaret meets a partaaaaaay” with sing-alongs too.

“It’ll be a Xmas Roast with all my favourite chestnuts. Very exciting!” he says. “My costume is being made Chloe Moore, who made the black costume for my Show Queen! show at York Theatre in May. I asked her if she could now make one in red and it looks fabulous.”

Velma Celli in the Show Queen red dress designed by Chloe Moore

Velma also will host Drag Brunch afternoons at Impossible York on December 7 and 14 at 4pm. Bookings can be made by emailing stroughair2@hotmail.com or reservations@impossibleyork.com.

Meanwhile, Velma is releasing a festive album, A Velma Celli Christmas, available to download on Spotify from today at: https://open.spotify.com/album/6jyEoguMVGkG3ajEE6hody?flow_ctx=43be02d0-6123-43f9-b9ed-c4aa84ccbb83%3A1733510690#.

Recorded in Woodthorpe, York, with The Dandys’ Andy Firth – who also produced fellow York singer and good friend Jessica Steel’s 2022 album Higher Frequencies – it features piano arrangements by Scott Roberts of It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas, The Christmas Song, Last Christmas, Joni Mitchell’s River and Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.

Looking ahead, Velma will be heading out  on the road in 2025 for regional and West End dates. These include: March 14, Velma Celli’s God Save The Queens!, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarbough, tickets from https://shorturl.at/JwAHA; March 15, Show Queen!, Skipton Town Hall, tickets from https://shorturl.at/MJVaO; March 29, Show Queen, The Welsh Millennium Centre, Cardiff, tickets from https://shorturl.at/Fv0LR; April 4, A Brief History Of Drag, The Playhouse, Sheffield , tickets from https://shorturl.at/hDDiv, and April 18, Show Queen!, The Beggars Theatre, Millom, Cumbria, tickets from  https://shorturl.at/U4W9J.

Velma Celli’s Show Queen tour poster

Further shows follow on May 24,  Show Queen!, Cowes Fringe, Cowes, Isle of Wight, tickets on sale in the New Year; May 23, Show Queen, The Stage Door, Southampton, tickets from https://thestagedoor.org.uk/product.php/950; June 2, Show Queen!, The Duchess Theatre, West End, London, tickets from https://shorturl.at/XbL27; June 13, A Brief History Of Drag!, Hull Truck Theatre,  tickets from https://shorturl.at/2saW5, and June 20, Show Queen!, Dudley Town Hall, tickets from  https://shorturl.at/rnCQX.

In 2024, for a fourth year, Velma participated in Yorktoberfest  in the Clocktower Enclosure at York Racecourse, playing to 600 to 1,000 revellers at each party. “It’s chaos but it’s great fun,” says Ian.

Unlike in 2022 and 2023, however, he will not be hosting Castellana in the Sophia Gardens spiegeltent in Cardiff this Christmas season. “I travelled back and forth to Wales for two years for these Christmas shows but there’s only so long you can do five-hour commutes to Cardiff, so I’m not doing Castellana this year,” he reasons.

Ian Stroughair

Did you know?

IAN Stroughair will be performing at York’s Annual Community Carol Concert at York Barbican on December 15 at 2pm. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.

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Graham Nash to play York Barbican on More Evenings Of Songs & Stories tour next October. When do tickets go on sale?

Graham Nash: Set spanning 60 years of songwriting. Picture: Ralf Louis

GRAHAM Nash will play York Barbican on October 5 2025 on the second night of his 11-date More Evenings Of Songs & Stories tour.

The Blackpool-born two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee and Grammy award winner will perform songs spanning his 60-year career, from The Hollies to Crosby, Stills and Nash, CSNY and his solo career.

Nash, 82, will be joined on stage by Todd Caldwell, keyboards and vocals, Adam Minkoff, bass, drums, guitars and vocals, and Zach Djanikian, guitars, mandolin, drums and vocals.

Nash’s set will be preceded by a performance from special guest and long-time friend Peter Asher.

The poster for Graham Nash’s October 2025 tour

York Barbican will be his only Yorkshire date. Tickets go on sale on Friday at 10am at http://myticket.co.uk/artists/graham-nash.  

Nash’s body of songwriting began with his contributions to The Hollies from 1964 to 1968, such as Stop Stop Stop and On A Carousel. The union of Crosby, Stills & Nash (and later & Young) yielded Marrakesh Express, Pre-Road Downs  and Lady Of  The Island, from the first Crosby, Stills & Nash album and Teach Your Children and Our House from CSNY’s Déjà Vu. His further contributions to CSN included Just A Song Before I Go and Wasted On The Way.

Nash’s career as a solo artist took flight in 1971, beginning with two landmark albums, Songs For Beginners and Wild Tales, featuring such favourites as Chicago/We Can Change The World and Military Madness. His latest album, Now, was released in May 2023.

Peter Asher’s 1964 debut single with Peter & Gordon was a cover of Lennon & McCartney’s A World Without Love. He moved in to record production in the late-1960s as head of A & R at The Beatles’ Apple Records and then at his own company, working for decades with James Taylor, Linda Ronstadt and others. His performance will share music and stories from those heady days to the present era.

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More Things To Do in York and beyond the first Christmas show of the season already. Here’s Hutch’s List No 46, from The Press

Brushing up on her art: Lindsey Tyson, one of the Wednesday Four exhibiting at Pyramid Gallery, York

FROM the Wednesday Four to the sold-out Barbican four, a Sondheim musical to John Godber making history, Charles Hutchinson puts the ‘yes’ into November’s calendar.

Last chance to see: The Wednesday Four, Pyramid Gallery, Stonegate, York, today and Monday, 10am to 5pm

THE Wednesday Four, a group of four artist friends who gather in Scarborough each week – busy schedules permitting – are exhibiting together for the first time in York.

Shirley Vauvelle (ceramic sculpture and paintings), Gillian Martin (paintings and prints), Katie Braida (ceramics) and Lindsey Tyson (paintings) have been meeting for three years but have known each other much longer.

Tarot: Performing sketches in nighties in Shuffle at Theatre@41, Monkgate, York. Picture: PBJ Management

Sketch show of the week: Tarot: Shuffle, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, tonight, 8pm

“THEY (our parents, partners, children) say ‘sketch is dead’, but if it’s dead then where’s all our money going?” ask Tarot, a sketch troupe featuring members of Gein’s Family Giftshop and Goose, Adam Drake, Ed Easton and Kath Hughes.

What lies in store in Shuffle? “Joyously silly and uproariously live and in-the-room, we would call it ‘improv’ but we’ve got some self-respect: this is sketch in nighties. Come watch a new tour of big, daft and, above all, live comedy being conjured up in front of your very eyes.” Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

Rise Up To Empower Women: Fundraiser for York charity IDAS at the Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York

Fundraiser of the week: Rise Up To Empower Women, Joseph Rowntree Theatre, York, tomorrow, 7.30pm

YORK and Leeds  performers come together to “raise the roof to end gender-based violence”, sharing inspiring and moving stories of female survivors of abuse in a night of musical theatre organised by Hannah Winbolt-Lewis. Proceeds will go to IDAS, the Blossom Street, York-based domestic abuse and sexual violence support charity, and to aid the recovery of Leanne Lucas, a survivor of July’s Southport stabbings.

Performing arts student Daisy Winbolt-Robertson

Performing arts students Kate Lohan, Daisy Winbolt-Robertson, Sara Belal, Rose Scott, Chloe Amelie Lightfoot, Erin Childs, Annie Dunbar, Jasmine Lowe, Declan Childs and Oliver Lawery will sing songs from shows that depict survivors’ stories: Heathers, Spring Awakening, Waitress, The Color Purple, SIX The Musical and the newly premiered SuperYou. Donations can be made via idas.co.uk. Box office: O1904 501935, josephrowntreetheatre.co.uk or bit.ly/RiseUpToEmpowerWomen.

Simon Brodkin:  Ripping into celebrity culture, social media, the police, Putin, Prince Andrew and God in Screwed Up

Comedy gig of the week: Simon Brodkin, Screwed Up, Grand Opera House, York, tomorrow, 8pm

SIMON Brodkin, world-famous prankster, Lee Nelson creator and most-watched British stand-up comedian on TikTok, brings his outrageous stand-up show back to York.

In Screwed Up, Brodkin rips into celebrity culture, social media, the police, Putin, Prince Andrew and God. Nothing is off limits, from his own mental health and family to his five arrests and how he once found himself at an underground sex party. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Irish Christmas celebrations in song and dance in Fairytale Of New York

What? Christmas in old York already : Fairytale Of New York – The Ultimate Irish-Inspired Christmas Concert, Grand Opera House, York, November 11, 7.30pm

FROM the producers of Seven Drunken Nights – The Story Of The Dubliners comes a rich tapestry of Irish singers, musicians and dancers performing Driving Home For Christmas, Step Into Christmas, Oh Holy Night, Fairytale Of New York and Irish sing-along favourites The Galway Girl, The Irish Rover, Dirty Old Town and The Black Velvet Band. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.

Sarah Millican: “Lots of stuff about dinners and lady gardens” at York Barbican

Recommended but sold out alas: next week’s shows at York Barbican

BBC Gardeners’ World presenter Monty Don kicks off a particularly busy week at York Barbican when he shares his passion for gardens and the  role they play in human  inspiration and wellbeing on Monday night (7.30pm).  Jazz pianist, songwriter and BBC Radio 2 presenter Jamie Cullum will be supported by Northampton pianist  and singer Billy Lockett on Tuesday (doors 7pm).

On Thursday (8pm), in her Late Bloomer show, South Shields comedian Sarah Millican mulls over her transition from being quiet at school with not many friends and an inability to say boo to a goose to being loud with good friends and goose-booing outbursts aplenty, “plus lots of stuff about dinners and lady gardens,” she says. On Friday (doors 7pm), in her Rockin’ On show, queen of rock’n’roll Suzi Quatro rolls out Can The Can, Devil Gate Drive, Stumblin’ In, 48 Crash, The Wild One et al. “It’s my 60th year in the business and it still feels like I’ve just started,” she says.

The York Stage poster for their “new version” of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s American musical comedy Company

Musical of the week: York Stage in Company, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, November 13 to 16, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee

ON Bobby’s 35th birthday, his friends all have one question on their mind. Why is he not married? Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s bold , sophisticated and insightful  revolutionary musical comedy follows Bobby as he navigates the world of dating and being the third wheel to all of his now happily (and unhappily) married friends as he explores the pros and cons of settling down and leaving his single life behind.

Nik Briggs directs a York Stage cast featuring Gerard Savva as Bobby, Florence Poskitt, Julia Anne Smith, Alexandra Mather, Joanne Theaker, Dan Crawfurd-Porter and Jack Hooper, among others. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.

The Highwayman cast of Dylan Allcock, left, Emilio Encinoso-Gil, Matheea Ellerby and Jo Patmore in John Godber’s new historical play. Picture: Ian Hodgson

New play of the week: John Godber Company in The Highwayman, York Theatre Royal Studio, November 14 to 16, 7.45pm plus 2pm Friday and Saturday, sold out

AFTER more than 70 plays reflecting on modern life, John  Godber goes back in history for the first time in The Highwayman. “It’s 1769 and Yorkshire’s population has exploded, the races at York are packed, the new theatre in Hull is thriving, and the Spa towns are full,” he says.

“Everyone is flocking north. Yorkshire is the place to be; a region drunk on making money, social climbing, gambling and gin, but with wealth in abundance, the temptation is great.” Enter the highwayman, John Swift and his partner, Molly May. Box office for returns only: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

In focus: Paterson Joseph, Sancho & Me, York Theatre Royal, November 14, 7.30pm, with post-show discussion

Paterson Joseph and Charles Ignatius Sancho: Storyteller and subject in Sancho & Me at York Theatre Royal

CHARLES Ignatius Sancho, born on a slave ship on the Atlantic Ocean in 1729, became a writer, composer, shopkeeper and respected man of letters in 18th century London – the first man of African heritage to vote in Britain.

Actor, author and Chancellor of Oxford Brookes University Paterson Joseph tells his story, accompanied by co-creator and musical director Ben Park, built around Joseph’s book The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho.

Joseph explores ideas of belonging, language, education, slavery, commerce, violence, politics, music, love and where these themes intersect with his own story of growing up Black and British

Joseph says: “Ignatius Sancho (1729-1780) had a most extraordinary life. Born of enslaved African parents, he rose to a position of great influence in British society. A polymath with a talent for music, his vote in 1774 and 1780 made him the first person of African descent to vote in a British Parliamentary election.

“I first came across Charles Ignatius Sancho in 1999. Born and raised in London, by my mid-thirties I had no idea there were thousands of Black Britons in the UK long before the famous ‘Windrush Generation’ who arrived in the 1940s, ’50s and ’60s. I cannot overstate the powerful sense of belonging this knowledge brought me.

“My desire is to spread that sense of rootedness through spreading the word far and wide: Britain has always been a multi-ethnic country and Black people have been a major part of that story.”

The show incorporates Sancho’s compositions and original music by composer and musician Ben Park. In the words of Sancho: “Friendship is a plant of slow growth, and, like our English oak, spreads, is more majestically beautiful, and increases in shade, strength and riches, as it increases in years.”

Paterson Joseph: the back story

Born: Willesden, London on June 22 1964 to parents from St Lucia. Educated at Cardinal Hinsley RC High School. Worked briefly as catering assistant. Trained at Studio ’68 of Theatre Arts, London (South Kensington Library), from 1983 to 1985, later attending London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA).

Theatre roles: Oswald in King Lear, Dumaine in Love’s Labours Lost and Marquis de Mota in The Last Days Of Don Juan, Royal Shakespeare Company, 1990. Title role in Othello, Royal Exchange, Manchester, 2002. Lead roles in The Royal Hunt Of The Sun and The Emperor Jones, Olivier Theatre, National Theatre, London, 2006. Brutus, in Royal Shakespeare Company’s Julius Caesar, set in Africa, 2012. Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, Old Vic Theatre, London, 2019 into 2020.

Undertook documentary project My Shakespeare, filmed for Channel 4 in 2004, directing version of Romeo & Juliet that used 20 young non-actors from deprived Harlesden area of London.  

On television: Mark Grace in Casualty (1997–1998); Alan Johnson in Channel 4 sitcom Peep Show (2003–2015); Lyndon Jones in Green Wing (2004–2006); Greg Preston in Survivors (2008–2010); DI Wes Layton in Law And Order: UK (2013–2014); “Holy Wayne” Gilchrest in The Leftovers (2014–2015); DCI Mark Maxwell in Safe House (2015–2017); Connor Mason in Timeless (2016–2018); Home Secretary, then Prime Minister Kamal Hadley in Noughts + Crosses (2020-2022); Commander Neil Newsome in Vigil (2021); Samuel Wells in Boat Story (2023).

Films include: Benbay in In The Name Of The Father (1993); Keaty in The Beach (2000); Greenfingers (2001), Giroux in Æon Flux (2005), The Other Man (2009) and Arthur Slugworth in Wonka (2023).

His debut play as a writer, Sancho: An Act Of Remembrance, was first co-produced and performed at Oxford Playhouse in 2015, then twice toured United States of America, including Kennedy Center in Washington and Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York. Performed by Joseph in London in 2018 at Wilton’s Music Hall; published by Bloomsbury.

Debut novel The Secret Diaries Of Charles Ignatius Sancho was published in 2022 by Dialogue Books in UK and Henry Holt in USA, charting Sancho’s life through fictionalised diary entries, letters and commentary. Nominated for six literary awards, winning Royal Society of Literature’s Christopher Bland Prize and Historical Writers Association Debut Novel Prize in 2023.

First book, Julius Caesar And Me: Exploring Shakespeare’s African Play, published by Bloomsbury.

Appointed Chancellor of Oxford Brookes University in 2022. Installed in May 2023.

Paterson Joseph, Me & Sancho, York Theatre Royal, November 14, 7.30pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

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‘It’s my 60th year in the business, and it still feels like I’ve just started,’ says Suzi Quatro as American rock queen sells out Barbican

Suzi Quatro: Using this iconic image from her first photographic session with Gered Mankowitz in 1973 to promote her 60th anniversary tour. York Barbican awaits

SUZI Quatro is marking the 60th year of her reign as “the Queen of Rock’n’Roll” by embarking on a five-date autumn tour.

On November 15, Suzi, 74, plays York Barbican, her only Yorkshire show and the first on the tour to sell out.

“It’s my 60th year in the business, and it still feels like I’ve just started,” she said, when announcing the tour. “Devil Gate Drive, number one, 51 years ago. Are you ready now? Let’s do it one more time for Suzi.”

Sixty years? Yes, Michigan-born singer, songwriter, bass guitarist, actress, poet novelist and radio presenter Suzi started out in bands in Detroit, playing concerts and teen clubs with Ted Nugent, Bob Seger and others, having first played bongos with her father Art’s jazz trio when she was eight.

 “I started a band at 14,” she recalls. “I was in ninth or tenth grade. We worked the whole summer, going to New York.

“I talked to my dad about not going back to high school. He was on the phone, saying ‘is there anything I can say to change your mind?’.He quietly put the phone down and that was clever. It gave me time to pause and think about it. I made my choice: I would be in music for life.”

In May 1964, her sister Patti formed the group The Pleasure Seekers with Suzi on bass, leading to their first single coming out on the Hideout Records label in 1965, when Suzi was 15, Patti, 17.

Further singles Never Thought You’d Leave Me and Light Of Love followed in 1966 and 1968 respectively.

In 1971, Suzi flew to England to work with songwriting hit factory Chinn and Chapman after producer Mickie Most saw her perform live at the East Town Ballroom when in Detroit to record Jeff Beck at Motown.

Suzi expected to be in the UK for three months, but stayed. “I go back to America a lot but I haven’t lived there since 1971,” she says. The story goes that she did not take even a coat with her when first leaving.

Significantly, Suzi has used an iconic image from her first photographic session with Gered Mankowitz in 1973 to promote her 60th anniversary tour. The definitive one in the leather jump suit, as memorable as Mankowitz’s portrait of a teenage Kate Bush. 

“I’ll try to make a long story short,” says Suzi, explaining how that look was born. “We’d recorded Can The Can and Mike [Chapman] said, it’s going to be number one’. I said, ‘we need to discuss the image’. I said ‘leather’; he said ‘No’, but I got my way.

“Then he suggested a jump suit, and he was right. People thought of it as very sexy, though I didn’t realise that at the time.”

The poster for Suzi Quatro’s 60th anniversary Rockin’ On tour

At the photo session, Mankowitz said, ‘OK, give me that Suzi Quatro look’. “I gave ‘the look’, and that’s when the Suzi Quatro look was created. It was new,” she says.

“I have finally, at the age of 74, accepted it. I didn’t know it at the time. I was just being who I am. I didn’t think it was unusual. I’d played bass since I was 14 but Mike kept saying I was unique.”

Chapman’s prediction was right: Suzi topped the UK charts in 1973 with the 2.5 million-selling Can The Can and had further hits that year with 48 Crash, Daytona Demon and the chart-topping Devil Gate Drive.

More UK hits would follow with Too Big, The Wild One, Your Mamma Won’t Like Me, Tear Me Apart, If You Can’t Give Me Love, She’s In Love With You and Mama’s Boy, her last UK Top 40 entry in 1979, peaking at number 34.

Her native United States was slower to catch on. “There were a lot of things happening on the other side of the world that America didn’t get then, but I did start touring in America in ’74. Happy Days was the thing that catapulted me to success there: the number one TV show. Suddenly they discovered me.”

Suzi made her first of seven appearances on Happy Days, playing Leather Tuscadero, the little sister of Fonzie’s ex-girlfriend Pinky, in 1977. “I then had a number four hit in the American Billboard Hot 100 with Stumblin’ In [her duet with Smokie’s Chris Norman] in 1978,” she says. Ironically, the song reached no higher than number 41 in the UK.

She may live between her Essex manor house and her husband’s German house, but America continues to play its part in her career. “I was in Detroit in September recording with Alice Cooper for my next album. I haven’t got a title yet but it’s got 14 songs, writing with Alice, and I’ve covered MC5’s Kick Out The Jams out of respect,” says Suzi.

“The next night Alice asked me to do School’s Out with him, on bass, which I’d never done before and had to learn real quick to play to 12,500 people at Pine Knob [Music Theatre], just outside Detroit. I was just grinning from ear to ear.

“I’ve known him since I was 15 years old. I did the Welcome To My Nightmare Tour with him in 1975 in America, and it really was a nightmare tour, though I loved it! It was a long tour, doing a couple of flights a day sometimes.”

As well as selling more than 55 million records – she featured in the UK charts for 101 weeks between 1973 and 1980 – Suzi has branched out into acting, writing novels and poetry, broadcasting, making her documentary film Suzi Q and presenting her autobiography Unzipped live in a one-woman show.

Suzi has been a ground-breaker. “Chrissie Hynde, Debbie Harry, Joan Jett, they all said , ‘none of us would have done what we did without Suzi Quatro’, which made me cry, as I didn’t realise what I’d done, but I can now accept it,” she says.

“It had to fall on someone like me because I didn’t know I was doing it, and if I had known, it would have looked manufactured. That’s why I’m still here because whatever you see, it’s real.

“It’s funny. When I’ve done big shows with other acts, you end up talking in the bar and usually the conversation gets round to me and how different I was. ‘But did it look like I was I was just being me,’ I asked, and they said ‘yes’.”

York pantomime dame Berwick Kaler: Suzi Quatro wrote a song for her best friend, The Queen Mother Of Rock’n’Roll

She describes herself as “really stubborn”, giving the example of make-up artists asking if they could make her “bushy” eyebrows smaller. “I said, ‘you can enhance them, but don’t change them, this is me’.”

In 2019, Liam Firmager directed the documentary Suzi Q. “I said yes as I’d always wanted to do one. When we met, he said, ‘I’m not a fan, but I like your music’. I said ‘OK, but why do you want to do a documentary about me?’,” Suzi recalls.

Firmager said he had been fascinated by her. ”I knew that as a ‘non-fan’, you’re going to get the truth, even the ‘cringe’ moments, and he did stick to that,” says Suzi.

“It’s great documentary. There’s nothing I didn’t know, but it brought it to the fore that I’m very family orientated, very soft inside. There’s little Suzi from Detroit and there’s Suzi Quatro, who strides out on stage.”

Suzi says she has a sharp tongue when she is pushed. “Don’t mess with me. I’m a deep thinker.”

How does she feel she has been treated in a male-dominated industry that has had its stories of women being exploited? “Absolutely fine, because I demand that,” says Suzi. “It’s all about my attitude. I’m from Detroit. I’ve got a quick mind. I’ve got a quick mouth. If you touch me inappropriately, you will have a soprano voice.

“My father brought me up to have balls and my mother’s teaching, as a  strict Catholic girl, gave me my morals. There’s an invisible line [not to be crossed], but I can play the softer side too.”

What is her advice to women in the business? “You can be tough but don’t lose your femininity,” she says.

Next Friday’s show will be a two-hour set with an interval. “I’ll be taking you on a journey through my life, with a song from every album, two from the album I did with K T Tunstall [2023’s Face To Face], an eight-minute bass solo – it’s not boring! – and some clips on the screen.”

The Wild One will rock on, she vows. “I will retire when I go on stage, shake my ass, and there is silence,” she says. “I’ve always been the same and I will always be the same. I’ve never coasted and I never will.”

Looking forward  to playing to a sold-out York audience, Suzi says: “My overall feeling is that I am grateful and I am so happy that people want to see me. I take it very seriously.”

Performing in York brings back memories of working with Berwick Kaler, the legendary, newly retired pantomime dame. “We worked together for about a year in Annie Get Your Gun. We’ve been friends ever since. He was the best man at my second wedding [to German concert promoter Rainer Haas]. He’s my best friend.

“He once asked me to write a song for the panto – I’ve been to his shows many times – and wrote The Queen Mother Of Rock’n’Roll for him.”

Suzi Quatro, Rockin’ On, York Barbican, November 15, doors 7pm, SOLD OUT. Box office for returns only: ticketmaster.co.uk/event/360060579D80156E

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What’s On in Ryedale, York and beyond in the season of ghosts in gardens. Here’s Hutch’s List No. 41, from Gazette & Herald

Livy Potter as Katy, left, and Alice Rose Palmer, as mum Natalie, in Louise Beech’s How To Be Brave at Gilling East Village Hall and Helmsley Arts Centre

FROM a devilish yet dotty canine musical to comedians having their moment, a film festival to glowing ghosts, Charles Hutchinson spots plenty to light up dark days ahead.

Touring play of the week: Other Lives Productions in How To Be Brave, Gilling East Village Hall, tomorrow, 7.30pm, and Helmsley Arts Centre, Friday, 7.30pm

IN 1943, Merchant Seaman Colin Armitage’s cargo ship was torpedoed by an Italian Navy submarine in the South Atlantic. He scrambled aboard a life raft. Fifty days later, HMS Rapid rescued him.

Colin was the grandfather of How To Be Brave playwright Louise Beech. Sixty-four years after his ordeal, Louise’s daughter, Katy, was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. In order to distract her during insulin injections Louise began to tell the story of Colin’s bravery and determination to survive. 

Scenes in this resulting play alternate between the life raft and a house in Hull as York actors Jacob Ward and Livy Potter take the lead roles in Kate Veysey’s production. Box office: Gilling East, gillinjgeastevents@hotmail.co.uk; Helmsley, 01439 771700.

Man of The Moment: Ali Woods, playing York Barbican on his debut stand-up tour

Comedy men of The Moment:  Mo Gilligan, In The Moment, York Barbican, tomorrow,8pm; Ali Woods, At The Moment, York Barbican, Friday, 8pm

THE moment has arrived for two comedy tour dates with similar show titles, first up the host of Channel 4’s The Lateish Show With Mo Gilligan, Londoner Mo Gilligan, on his In The Moment World Tour 2024.

The following night, half-English, half-Scottish comedian, podcaster and content creator Ali Woods plays York on his debut stand-up tour. At 30, this viral online sketch sensation has finally fallen in love with an amazing lady. “Come on an embarrassing and cathartic journey of teenage angst, relationship fails and learning how to live in the moment,” he says. Tickets update: available for both shows, whereas An Audience With Monty Don (November 11), Jamie Cullum (November 12), Sarah Millican: Late Bloomer (November 14) and Suzi Quatro ( November 15) have sold out already. Box office: yortkbarbican.co.uk.

Artist CJP with his work The Majestic Oak at Art Of Protest Gallery, York

Exhibition of the week: From Little Acorns Grow Mighty Hopes: An Exhibition of Hand-drawn Natural Wonders, Art of Protest Gallery, Walmgate, York, until November 16

ART Of Protest is the first gallery to show CJP’s work The Majesty Oak in an exhibition of original and rare limited-edition artwork. Look out for the Art Of Protest York Special Edition, only available to be ordered until November 16, featuring the River Ouse-dwelling Tansy Beetle, an elusive insect featured on a resplendent mural near York railway station.

“This is an amazing opportunity to own a truly unique celebration of British fauna with a very special York twist,” says gallery owner Craig Humble. “CJP will add a Tansy Beetle to each piece, along with the gold leafing of the branches.”

Very definitely Pride Of Prejudice * (*Sort Of), sending up Jane Austen affectionately in Isobel McArthur’s play at York Theatre Royal

Theatrical flourish of the week: Pride And Prejudice* (*Sort Of), York Theatre Royal, until Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2pm Thursday and 2.30pm Saturday matinees

MEN, money and microphones will be fought over in Pride And Prejudice* (*Sort Of), the audacious retelling of a certain Jane Austen novel, where the stakes couldn’t be higher when it comes to romance but it’s party time, so expect the all-female cast to deliver such emotionally turbulent pop gems as You’re So Vain and Young Hearts Run Free.

Writer Isobel McArthur directs this new production of her West End hit, Olivier Award winner for best comedy. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.

In the driving seat: Kym Marsh’s Cruella De Vil in 101 Dalmatians The Musical. Picture: Johan Persson

Dog show of the week: 101 Dalmatians The Musical, Grand Opera House, York, until Saturday, 7pm plus 2pm today, Thursday and Saturday matinees

KYM Marsh’s Cruella De Vil leads the cast for this musical tour of Dodie Smith’s canine caper 101 Dalmatians. Written by Douglas Hodge (music and lyrics) and Johnny McKnight (book), from a stage adaptation by Zinnie Harris, the show is re-imagined from the 2022 production at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre, London. 

When fashionista Cruella De Vil plots to swipe all the Dalmatian puppies in town to create her fabulous new fur coat, trouble lies ahead for Pongo and Perdi and their litter of tail-wagging young pups in a story brought to stage life with puppetry, choreography, humorous songs and, yes, puppies. Box office: atgtickets.com/york. 

3 Missing 10 Hours, directed by Fanni Fazakas, showing in the Animation programme at Aesthetica Short Film Festival 2024

York festival of the week: Aesthetica Short Film Festival, York city centre, today to Sunday, and UNESCO City of Media Arts EXPO, Guildhall, York, Thursday to Saturday

THE BAFTA-Qualifying Aesthetica Short Film Festival returns for its 14th year under the direction of Cherie Federico, this time integrating the tenth anniversary of York’s designation as Great Britain’s only UNESCO City of Media Arts. Fifteen venues will play host to 300 film screenings in 12 genres, Virtual Realty and Gaming labs, plus 60 panels, workshops and discussions. For the full programme and tickets, head to asff.co.uk.

The UNESCO EXPO will showcase the region’s creative sector, working in film production, games development, VFX (visual effects), publishing and design, with the chance to try out new projects and speak to creatives. Entry to the Guildhall is free.

Ghosts After Dark: New nocturnal complement to the Ghosts In The Gardens installation in York Museum Gardens

Nocturnal event of the week: Ghosts After Dark, York Museums Gardens, tomorrow to Sunday, 6.30pm to 9.30pm; last entry, 8.30pm

YORK Museums Trust and the York BID present the inaugural Ghosts After Dark, showcasing York’s rich tapestry of historical figures with light, sound and storytellers for four nights only.

Ticketholders will have the exclusive chance to experience York Museum Gardens like never before, by choosing their own path to explore 46 ghostly sculptures, hidden around the gardens and lit dynamically against an atmospheric background of smoke and sound. Box office: yorkshiremuseum.org.uk/ghosts-after-dark/.

Fishermen’s Friends: Playing York Barbican this week, then returning next October

Gig announcements of the week: Fisherman’s Friends, York Barbican, October 3 2025

IN celebration of performing sea shanties for more than 30 years across the world, Fisherman’s Friends will head out from the Cornish fishing village of Port Isaac to play a British tour split between 2025 and 2026.

York will come early, booked for night number two next October on a 32-date itinerary announced even before they have played their sold-out Barbican gig on Friday this week on their Rock The Boat tour, promoting fifth album All Aboard. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.