The Marriage of Figaro. Review by Julia Pascal. In The Marriage of Figaro, director Joe Hill-Gibbins sets the comic opera in a contemporary décor which pulls the 18th century critique of misogyny into our own time.
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THE GOBLIN BAND: Jenny Vuglar reviews a performance at Cecil Sharp House on 4 December 2024
Wagner and the Bayreuth Festival. Review by Graham Buchan. Wagner divides opinion. Even amongst opera lovers there are those who cannot abide his works, whilst others elevate him to almost God-like status.
Rigoletto. Review by Julia Pascal. Concept is all. And director Jonathan Miller’s decision to set Verdi’s disturbing melodrama in 1950s New York Little Italy is genius.
Poetry review – THE POINT OF THE STICK: Thomas Ovans enjoys Neil Fulwood’s poetic sketches of famous conductors
Jazz Conversations. Review by Barbara Lewis. Choreographer Dollie Henry and jazz composer Paul Jenkins have for more than a quarter of a century led the Body of People Jazz Theatre Company (aka BOP) on the basis jazz is a life-affirming, always-contemporary, ever-adapting, all-inclusive, forgiving form.
Plantation A. Review by Barbara Lewis. In 1957 Alain Robbe-Grillet reinvented the novel with an almost abstract, almost plot-less narrative and a central character named only as A… Now composer Edward Jessen has reinvented opera with “an experimental sonic theatre work” and a lone soprano (A…) singing words whose meaning we can only guess at.
State Ballet of Georgia – Swan Lake. Review by Julia Pascal. How thrilling to see the state Baller of Georgia in London for the first time. The Company is lucky enough to have mega star Nina Ananiashvili as Artistic Director.
Swan Lake in the Round. Review by Julia Pascal. This is the most famous of classical ballets and it was conceived for the proscenium arch Italianate style theatre of Imperial Russia when it opened with Marius Petipa’s choreography to Peter Tchaikovsky’s composition at Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet in 1895.
Stephen Sondheim Society. Review by Barbara Lewis. The SSSSPOTY, as it is known in Sondheim circles, technically is a competition, but, like Bonnie Langford, compere of this year’s 16th edition, you may prefer to see it as a celebration.
Poetry review – MUSIC, AWAKE HER: Edmund Prestwich admires both musicality and mutually illuminating images in a new collection by Martha Kapos
Cry-Baby, The Musical. Review by Barbara Lewis. “Cry-Baby” may be set in 1950s Baltimore, but lyrics that at once celebrate and satirise the democratic checks and balances of the “nifty country” that is the United States of America make it tailor-made as a tonic for our times.
By Barbara Lewis • music, musicals, theatre, year 2025 • Tags: Barbara Lewis, music, musicals, theatre