FRIDAY 15TH JANUARY 2010 STRAUSS “ELEKTRA” London Symphony Orchestra/ Gergiev Barbican Hall Watching and hearing Valery Gergiev conduct Strauss’ Elektra was truly an unholy collusion of neurotic natures. The overwhelming exposure of the London Symphony Orchestra across…
Abba’s Swedish Folk Opera
They tried to sneak in unnoticed but adoring fans had engaged their Abba-spotting radar and a prolonged ovation was inevitable. Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus are, of course, pop legends but it’s good to be reminded of…
Let the Sunshine In
You could probably feel the good vibrations all the way down Shaftesbury Avenue. The entire New York “tribe” which made Diane Paulus’ revival of Hair such a Tony Award winning triumph on the other side of the…
Love Never Dies – the verdict (and at last some constructive criticism)
After roughly two weeks of previews and two weeks of internet bickering it’s almost refreshing to scour the morning papers in search of constructive comment on Andrew Lloyd Webber’s much discussed and long awaited sequel to “The…
Kate Baldwin sings Lane & Harburg
She collected great notices for the recent Broadway revival of “Finian’s Rainbow” (which regretfully I missed) and I’ve just been sampling her delightful new album from PS Classics. What a sunny open personality Kate’s voice has –…
Is that Block or Blockbuster?
Only the terminally intrepid Broadway songstress would begin and end her cabaret set with two Streisand classics. But Stephanie J. Block has both the voice and (figuratively speaking) the cajones for it. She only managed the first…
The Age of Aquarius Dawns Again
It’s been pretty scary returning from the Big Apple eager to share one’s excitement over the glorious revival of the ‘American Tribal Love-Rock Musical’ “HAIR” and finding yourself confronted with a series of puzzled faces – “What’s…
A Florentine Romance in Leicester?
Something extraordinary is happening in Leicester. The newly opened Curve Theatre – so high-tec, high-spec that it appears somehow to have “materialised” rather than been built in what was the scrag-end of Leicester’s town centre – is…
