REVIEWS Archives - Page 8 of 612

Salty Brine: How Strange It Is – Summerhall

13Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Salty Brine: How Strange It Is – Summerhall

Weird, uplifting, heartfelt. Salty Brine does not simply perform an album. He takes it apart, rummages around inside it, follows its obsessions down unexpected rabbit holes, then somehow puts the whole thing back together again in front of us. And this particular concoction is no overnight creation, this one has been marinating in Brine for the best part of a decade, part of Salty’s long-running Living Record Collection, in which numerous albums become the starting point for something altogether more theatrical, personal and peculiar. The album at the heart of this one is Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, released in 1998, a record whose strangeness and relative unfamiliarity turn out to be one of the show’s great strengths. Unless you are already a...

13Aug

By Jessie MartinNo Comments

Scotland

JLCO Plays Duke Ellington – Usher Hall

The Jazz at Lincoln Centre Orchestra Residency brought us a night of Duke Ellington’s greatest compositions, directed by esteemed trumpeter and founder of JLCO, Wynton Marsalis. Seeing as the theme of this year’s Edinburgh International Festival is ‘All Rise’ – tied to the 250th anniversary of America’s independence – an American ensemble playing the works of one of the most prolific American composers seems only fitting. Especially when we get to the second act of the performance where the sole focus is on Ellington’s Black, Brown, and Beige, conducted by Chris Crenshaw. This suite tells the story of the hardships of the Black American, from slavery to segregation, and eventually emancipation. Alongside the JLCO, musical guests were invited to perform, including EIF’s dire...

House of Life – Underbelly, George Square

13Aug

By Torya HughesNo Comments

Scotland

House of Life – Underbelly, George Square

Billed as “one part sermon, one part purge, three parts party”, House of Life delivers a joyous immersive experience with plenty of glitter. Led by the RaveRend and his straight-faced sidekick Trev, the audience are encouraged to participate in a multi-level guide to ascension. The experience starts in the queue outside, where Ben Welch’s RaveRend anoints the waiting audience with glitter. Once in the venue, he hurls multi-coloured egg shakers into the crowd, while Trev (played by Lawrence Cole) awkwardly checks the loop machine and sound equipment in the corner. The two characters are direct opposites, RaveRend clad from head to toe in sparkly vestments, while Trev sports a grey suit and tie. This makes for quite a few comedy moments, and allows Trev to go on the journey of ascen...

Calendar Girls the Musical – Theatre by the Lake

12Aug

By Karen Morley-ChesworthNo Comments

North West

Calendar Girls the Musical – Theatre by the Lake

Theatre by the Lake has brought the best feel-good production to the heart of the Lake District. Written by Take That’s Gary Barlow and Tim Firth, Calendar Girls the Musical tells the well-known, true story of a Women’s Institute in Yorkshire that produced a saucy nude calendar to raise money for a local hospital – and in doing so created a story that went around the world. This cast of 15 excellent singers, musicians and actors is so strong that when the young actor Sol Taibi, who plays Tommo, son of one of the WI members, was injured, the show went on with gusto, with 14 members of the cast, and the Musical Director, Alex Weatherhill, reading the part, as well as being on stage bringing together the actors as they created the soundtrack. Sarah Groarke, the Chairwoman of ...

12Aug

By Jessie MartinNo Comments

Scotland

The Global Ideas Stage – Kings Theatre

A trumpet cuts through the audience’s murmuring – Wynston Marsalis stands at the back of the auditorium playing Amazing Grace, and amazing it absolutely was. The Global Ideas Stage began as it intended to go on. Featuring Edinburgh International Festival’s Director, Nicola Benedetti as host, alongside Harvard Art and Culture Historian, Sarah Lewis. Last year’s festival also featured a talk from Sarah Lewis, but this year the structure followed a more interview-based approach. Six guests were chosen to discuss the connection between Scotland and America and its Declaration of Independence. As well as discussing how culture and media allows for minds to be changed and hope to be given. Our panel consisted of Adam Dixon, Amy Goodman, Gordon Brown, Bryan Stevenson, Ken Burns, Lewis and B...

Allaster McKallaster (An unbiased afternoon with) – Gilded Balloon Museum

12Aug

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

Allaster McKallaster (An unbiased afternoon with) – Gilded Balloon Museum

If you’re English, this show is a must. Pete Reid’s McKallaster has been purveying his intelligent, keenly-observed - crucially impartial - views on football for years. Specifically, the English variety. However, today Hugh McHugh (Vic Galloway), an Englishman, wishes to contest the neutrality of the self-proclaimed ‘Favourite Unbiased Scottish Commentator’ of Andy Robertson and ‘close personal friend’ of Archie Gemmill. Resplendent in seven types of tartan (six of them visible), McKallaster’s ready to defend his reputation. With a name like McHugh, you might be concerned his opponent qualifies as a Scot, but fear not, he’s from Edinburgh. It’s an opportunity to watch (or re-watch in many cases) the Instagram clips we’ve become so fond of @mckallaster. And they are side-splittingly,...

Around The World in 80 Toys – Edinburgh Summerhall (Anatomy Lecture Theatre)

12Aug

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

Around The World in 80 Toys – Edinburgh Summerhall (Anatomy Lecture Theatre)

Wow. Take a breath… prepare to be humbled by a surfeit of inventiveness and ingenuity… in a venue the performer admitted he wasn’t initially happy with! It’s a wonderful tribute to, a celebration of – using many of the same techniques employed by – French cinema pioneer Georges Melies. Born in Paris just before Christmas in 1861, he’s what might today be described as an early adopter of the then burgeoning film technology. He was also a magician, actor and toymaker – in common with today’s creator and performer Thaddeus Phillips. With an understanding of perspective, props, effects and an appreciation of the camera’s possibilities he created hundreds of films, A Trip To The Moon (1902) and The Impossible Voyage (1904) both having stood the test of time to the extent they inspired – and wer...

Jenny Gorelick: SORRY – Monkey Barrel Comedy

12Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Jenny Gorelick: SORRY – Monkey Barrel Comedy

Having interviewed Jenny Gorelick earlier in the month, I was interested to see whether the engaging, quick witted comedian I had met would translate into her debut Fringe hour, SORRY. The premise is straightforward enough, bad dates, worse decisions and an apology, in advance, to the men Gorelick has dated, or might yet date. It is territory firmly rooted in the experience and language of dating as a younger woman and, perhaps inevitably, it talks most directly to a younger and predominantly female audience. My curiosity was whether Gorelick could pull those of us outside that demographic into her orbit. The truth is, not quite. There is actually another layer of comedy available here. What happens when an older man simply does not understand the joke? Stop, look at him,...

12Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Julius Caesar Variety Show – Summerhall

There is a lot packed into the short running time of Joy Nesbitt’s Julius Caesar Variety Show. It is energetic, well acted, frequently funny and undoubtedly clever. My reservation is that clever and particularly interesting are not necessarily the same thing. The premise gives Nesbitt plenty to play with. Three actors arrive to audition for Julius Caesar, while outside the theatre an increasingly angry mob protests against plans to convert the building into an asylum hotel. Inside, questions of casting, identity and theatrical power begin to collide as the director pushes his performers in search of something authentic. It is certainly current. The mob outside inevitably carries echoes of recent protests around asylum accommodation, while Shakespeare supplies another mo...

You and Me (and whoever comes next) – Summerhall

12Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

You and Me (and whoever comes next) – Summerhall

One day someone can be the most important person in your world. The next, they can simply disappear. For them, it was a job. For you, it was your life. That asymmetry sits at the heart of You and Me (and Whoever Comes Next), a funny, clever and ultimately moving autobiographical piece from Keron Day, playing himself alongside Lauren Koster as Dani, his new personal assistant. Keron has cerebral palsy and requires 24-hour support. Dani is the latest in a succession of PAs, and Keron takes us entertainingly through some of her predecessors. "Christine is what you get when you order your PA on Temu," he tells us. It also starts to sound remarkably like dating. There are the introductions, the getting to know one another, the irritating habits, the arguments and, eventu...