Wuthering Heights
High Street Exhibition Gallery
A half naked man, pretending to be a horse, neighs and prances about. Watching him, the audience shuffle in and take their seats around the stage. This is how Wuthering Heights begins.
On a bare stage director Peter McMaster acts with Nick Anderson, Gary Gardiner and Murray Wason in a zany exploration of Emily Bronte’s tale of love and destruction.
Bouncing off each other’s energy the actors transform themselves into Victorian men, horses and laddish versions of themselves. Just like Heathcliff, the mood of the performance changes from upbeat to gloomy and downcast and back again. I kept getting confused as to whether the testosterone aggression between the four actors was deliberately staged or organic and real.
Stories of childhood, loss and celebration are narrated in turn by each actor. They dance and pirouette to Kate Bush’s song Wuthering Heights. Two strip and change into dresses, one wearing a long white nightdress to mark him out in the part of Cathy. A violent wrestling match between Cathy and Heathcliff captures their anger and frustration.
Extracts of their doomed love story are played with a contemporary twist. Cathy’s menacing ghost stalks a dying Heathcliff in a scene so creepy I wanted to run away. The psychology behind the anguished Heathcliff is painstakingly dissected during an intense discussion.
Watching Wuthering Heights is like being at the centre of a whirlwind. I did not know what was going to happen from one moment to the next. This uncertainty kept me interested in what was happening on stage. I would like to see more of McMaster’s works.
Karen Harradine
Dowry
Ipswich Art School Gallery
The word ‘immersive’ is often applied to performance art and in Stephanie Elaine Black’s one-to-one work this description is fully deserved.
Black is from a white, Western background but lived in the United Arab Emirates from four to eighteen, witnessing the marriages of close friends at a young age in ceremonies to which the place of a dowry is central. This consists of a sum and/or goods paid by the groom to the bride’s family and can be subject to extensive bartering in which the woman’s part is reduced to that of a commodity.
The performance takes place in a blacked out room. The audience member enters with a gift of a small bowl and is directed to sit by a single light then waits in silence. Slowly light lifts at the opposite end of the room where Stephanie sits with her back to you, facing a mirror; she beckons you to join her and present your offering.
Stephanie as ‘bride’ in this ‘marriage’ controls the ritual, taking your hand directing it to her soft, warm leg. She adorns you with a bracelet and applies perfume to your face, holding your eyes with hers, searching for a response. These were incredibly intense moments, for me as a man both arousing and very unsettling. The bride offers herself and her gifts but as groom should you return these or refuse ?
You both rise and stand by a mirror where you’re not sure where to look: at yourself, at Stephanie’s face, at her mostly naked body ? This is when one begins to understand how as groom are imposing yourself on your bride’s most private, intimate identity. In such actual ceremonies of course, the bride and groom are often as much strangers as you are here with Stephanie.
The whole of Dowry takes no more than fifteen minutes but time is the least of your concerns while the performance takes place, and when you return to the light and white walls outside there is a feeling of liberation, escape even, but the memory of oppression and your part in it lingers long after.
Doug Coombes
The Poetics of Trespassing
Ipswich Police Station
The airless rectangular basement of the old Police Station is a perfect place for the intense theatrics of The Poetics of Trespassing. Keijaun Thomas, a MA graduate in Fine Art from the School of The Art Institute of Chicago, performs a wordless exploration of black identity and non-conformity.
Starting the show dressed in a chocolate brown leotard, Thomas roams the room like a cat, moving between three art installations. The audience crouch around him, watching silently. Thomas throws a bag of flour on the floor, which he sweeps around with an oversized brush. He perches on top of a wooden stool, holding the brush in his mouth and shakes his head slowly from side to side. This hypnotic movement has a bonding effect with the audience and seems to represent a downtrodden domestic worker.
Thomas then switches to stalking around the audience again. He stares into the face of each person there. He has such penetrating eyes that when it is my turn I have to look away from his gaze to scribble into the comfort of my notebook.
Envelopes with hidden messages are given to selected audience members. Some stand on pieces of blue paper that Thomas has placed in front of them. One whispers a prose on black identity. All do as they are bidden. In this way, the audience becomes part of the performance.
After stripping off his clothes, Thomas mixes up honey and white paint in a bowl. He glues pieces of a black wig into his chest while wearing a pair of plastic yellow work boots. Thomas proceeds to blindfold and gag himself with thick string. An audience member pours white flour all over his body and face. Writhing in some sort of ecstasy Thomas smears honey onto his skin. He then creates a protest sign by painting the words “I am a man” onto glass with glue and coffee grounds. Thomas concludes by crawling around in the dirt, blind and speechless.
After watching Thomas for a while I felt my initial smugness on understanding his symbolic gestures evaporate. I had to go deep within myself to try to figure out what each carefully crafted movement meant. Thomas has an unspoken charisma and radiates both vulnerability and strength. The Poetics of Trespassing is an esoteric experience.
Karen Harradine
]]>
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]]>Spill Day Four – November 1st
Tanuja Amarasuriya @Tanuja_A
So happy at last to have seen @mcmaster_peter’s Wuthering Heights. It’s wonderful.
Wuthering Heights
High Street Exhibition Gallery
A half naked man, pretending to be a horse, neighs and prances about. Watching him, the audience shuffle in and take their seats around the stage. This is how Wuthering Heights begins.
On a bare stage director Peter McMaster acts with Nick Anderson, Gary Gardiner and Murray Wason in a zany exploration of Emily Bronte’s tale of love and destruction.
Bouncing off each other’s energy the actors transform themselves into Victorian men, horses and laddish versions of themselves. Just like Heathcliff, the mood of the performance changes from upbeat to gloomy and downcast and back again. I kept getting confused as to whether the testosterone aggression between the four actors was deliberately staged or organic and real.
Stories of childhood, loss and celebration are narrated in turn by each actor. They dance and pirouette to Kate Bush’s song Wuthering Heights. Two strip and change into dresses, one wearing a long white nightdress to mark him out in the part of Cathy. A violent wrestling match between Cathy and Heathcliff captures their anger and frustration.
Extracts of their doomed love story are played with a contemporary twist. Cathy’s menacing ghost stalks a dying Heathcliff in a scene so creepy I wanted to run away. The psychology behind the anguished Heathcliff is painstakingly dissected during an intense discussion.
Watching Wuthering Heights is like being at the centre of a whirlwind. I did not know what was going to happen from one moment to the next. This uncertainty kept me interested in what was happening on stage. I would like to see more of McMaster’s works.
Karen Harradine
lyngardner @lyngardner
Transference, identity & ritual all play part in Stephanie Elaine Black’s powerful Dowry. #SPILL2014
Dowry (pictured top)
Ipswich Art School Gallery
The word ‘immersive’ is often applied to performance art and in Stephanie Elaine Black’s one-to-one work this description is fully deserved.
Black is from a Western background but lived in the United Arab Emirates between four and eighteen, witnessing the marriages of close friends at a young age in ceremonies to which the place of a dowry is central. This consists of a sum and/or goods paid by the groom to the bride’s family and can be subject to extensive bartering where the woman’s part is reduced to that of a commodity.
The performance takes place in a blacked out room. The audience member enters with a gift of a small bowl and is directed to sit by a single light then waits in silence. Slowly light lifts at the opposite end of the room where Stephanie sits with her back to you, facing a mirror; she beckons you to join her and present your offering.
Stephanie as ‘bride’ in this ‘marriage’ controls the ritual, taking your hand and directing it to her soft, warm leg. She adorns you with a bracelet and applies perfume to your face, holding your eyes with hers, searching for a response. These were incredibly intense moments, for me as a man both arousing and very unsettling. The bride offers herself and her gifts but as groom are you expected to return these or refuse ?
You both rise and stand by a full length mirror where you’re not sure where to look: at yourself, at Stephanie’s face, at her mostly naked body ? Only you can answer this. Now one begins to understand how as the groom you are imposing yourself on your bride’s most private, intimate identity, even though your role is essentially passive. In such actual ceremonies of course, the bride and groom are sometimes as much strangers as you are here with Stephanie.
The whole of Dowry takes no more than fifteen minutes but time is the least of your worries during the performance, and when you exit to the light and white walls outside there is a feeling of release, almost an escape. The memory of oppression and your part in it lingers long after.
Doug Coombes
The Poetics of Trespassing
Ipswich Police Station
The airless rectangular basement of the old Police Station is a perfect place for the intense theatrics of The Poetics of Trespassing. Keijaun Thomas, a MA graduate in Fine Art from the School of The Art Institute of Chicago, performs a wordless exploration of black identity and non-conformity.
Starting the show dressed in a chocolate brown leotard, Thomas roams the room like a cat, moving between three art installations. The audience crouch around him, watching silently. Thomas throws a bag of flour on the floor, which he sweeps around with an oversized brush. He perches on top of a wooden stool, holding the brush in his mouth and shakes his head slowly from side to side. This hypnotic movement has a bonding effect with the audience and seems to represent a downtrodden domestic worker.
Thomas then switches to stalking around the audience again. He stares into the face of each person there. He has such penetrating eyes that when it is my turn I have to look away from his gaze to scribble into the comfort of my notebook.
Envelopes with hidden messages are given to selected audience members. Some stand on pieces of blue paper that Thomas has placed in front of them. One whispers a prose on black identity. All do as they are bidden. In this way, the audience becomes part of the performance.
After stripping off his clothes, Thomas mixes up honey and white paint in a bowl. He glues pieces of a black wig into his chest while wearing a pair of plastic yellow work boots. Thomas proceeds to blindfold and gag himself with thick string. An audience member pours white flour all over his body and face. Writhing in some sort of ecstasy Thomas smears honey onto his skin. He then creates a protest sign by painting the words “I am a man” onto glass with glue and coffee grounds. Thomas concludes by crawling around in the dirt, blind and speechless.
After watching Thomas for a while I felt my initial smugness on understanding his symbolic gestures evaporate. I had to go deep within myself to try to figure out what each carefully crafted movement meant. Thomas has an unspoken charisma and radiates both vulnerability and strength. The Poetics of Trespassing is an esoteric experience.
Karen Harradine
Spill Day Three – October 31st
Yael Claire Shahmoo
Ipswich Police Station
Spiritwo is my first experience of Spill and I am still slightly shaken from it. Yael Claire snarled, sung and wailed through eight pieces of original works in just under an hour. Born in Israel and now living in London, Claire showed off skills garnered from performing in the underground scene in Tel Aviv and the clubs of Berlin. She blends electric pop, punk, Middle Eastern music and cabaret into a manic and intense experience for the audience.
Standing alone on a sparse stage Claire sings and chants her stories. Animation, which Claire has drawn herself, appears on the white screen behind her. Drawings such as pulsating white dots and bleeding jagged teeth are used as a visual representation to accompany her singing story telling.
The first piece, performed in Arabic music style, is a mythic tale of two brothers, one a king and the other a sad loser. The ear piecing howling in this song is cast aside when Claire moves into an energetic punk rock number.
Claire shifts easily from one style of music to another. Her music invokes dark fables told at midnight and anguished conversations on love and human dilemmas. She shows off her incredible vocal range by oscillating between growling masculine sounds and high-pitched feminine squeals. Minimal props are used well. An eccentric wig is turned into a baby and a red-sequined jackets is transformed into a nun’s habit.
Claire’s performance is both hilarious and sinister. She laughs as she mocks social niceties and then screams as if she is in great spiritual pain. Spiritwo is captivating. It left me feeling a little bit emotionally bruised but grateful that Claire had given me a glimpse into the dark and enigmatic elements of her soul.
Karen Harradine
Angela Wright @LALALAWRIGHT
@SPILL_Festival #KINBAKU intense performance #liveart @IpswichArtSch #daretobebrave #onsurrender
Kinbaku – Esteban Fourmi and Aoi Nakamura
Ipswich Art School Gallery
Much live performance art is about freedom in various forms, breaking down identities and pre-judgements as well as the ‘normal’ boundaries between artist and audience.
This process can give rise to many new creative impulses and desires but these too come with their own restrictions, dogmas and disappointments, just as political revolutions are frequently followed by reactionary counter revolutions.
Of the work I’ve seen at this year’s Spill, Kinbaku made the most rigorous attempt to confront this dilemma with performer Aoi Nakamura bound and unbound by a bundle of ropes that resembled a nest of snakes, her tense, focused body, naked and clothed, meshed with webs like a post-modern Miss Haversham. But this was voluntary bondage – ‘liberation in limitation’ to use the artists’ own words.
Relentless strobe lighting in a dark room, a heavy pulsing soundtrack and the roping in of audience members (literally in this case) are hardly new effects but here they felt like that and made up a strikingly original creation. Kinbaku had an clean, bright intelligence behind its concept and a depth of emotional and physical commitment in its execution that lesser works with similar ingredients at this year’s Spill could learn from.
Bone Library – Sarah-Jane Norman
Think Tank
Bone Library is Spill’s longest durational work, ongoing from Thursday until Sunday when it ends with a special Ceremony from 11.3oam.
Throughout these days Sarah-Jane Norman has occupied a room at Think Tank where by hand she has engraved an entire dictionary of words used by the pre-colonial people who lived in the area we now know as Sydney, Australia.
She puts these words onto smallish bones from sheep and cattle, the livestock which the European colonists brought to Australia to establish their dominant economy. The bones were once as full of life as these lost languages so this is a double restoration/preservation which evokes a multitude of reflections on pre and post colonial rituals and collective memorial.
The simple layout of the labelled bones (which you could pick up) on tables and the repetitive nature of Norman’s engraving belies the complexity of these ideas that are explored in an excellent short, free pamphlet. Not long after seeing Bone Library for the first time I was drawn back there, and again the next day.
In a festival strong in exuberant live performances this was a welcome corrective to exhibitionism, a show of how quiet contemplation can be just as compelling a form of performance when built around vital questions surrounding memory and death. A slight shame it couldn’t have been based among the Victorian artifacts in Ipswich Museum next door, though.
andrew ellerby @instamatik
@GETINTHEBACK last nights community live arts musical was frantic, joyous & wonderfully riotous #SPILL2014
The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
New Wolsey Theatre
The Best Little Whorehouse…was a big hit on stage and on film (Dolly Parton and Burt Reynolds starring) in the US but is less known here, which was maybe part of its appeal to live art company GETINTHEBACKOFTHEVAN as they set about ripping it up and piecing it back together with their cast of volunteer ‘misfits’ who’d prepared for this Community Musical after four days of intensive rehearsal.
These included comics, artists, lawyers, teachers, caretakers and more, transformed at the Wolsey into the residents of the Chicken Ranch, a long standing illegal but tolerated Texan brothel run by Miss Mona. The establishment is so named because rural visitors used to pay for sex with chickens. That’s chickens as payment, obviously.
On their website GETINTHEBACKOFTHEVAN describe the original musical as ‘a landscape of stereotype’ (although it was based quite closely on real events) and they used energetically choreographed chaos and a jumble of satire, sarcasm and sincerity to light fires under these perceived cliches.
It was fascinating to see how resilient the source material was to these onstage assaults and how the traditional musical form imposed itself on this daring performance art production as much as the other way round.
The volunteer cast all had a chance to shine and there were multiple stand-out turns (with InSuffolk’s own Jackie Montague as Doatsy Mae among them). Such a mix of personalities and talents inevitably pulled the show in all sorts of unexpected directions at different times, which was probably the intention.
I bet it was as anarchically entertaining to perform in as it was to watch. Way over the top, full of knowing artifice then closed with a Texan torch song. It did Dolly proud.
If the New Wolsey ever decide to give their Rock ‘n Roll pantomime a year off they could do much worse than re-unite this cast and crew. Their take on Cinderella or Jack and the Beanstalk would have queues down Civic Drive.
Doug Coombes
Spill Day Two – October 30th
Matthew Linley @MatthewLinley
Rituals, beauty in extemis, pain and futility seem to be weaving their way through day 2 @SPILL_Festival….oh and lots of blood!
Animate Objects in Sonic Action
Jerwood DanceHouse
To Ipswich Waterfront for a Spill World Premiere from dancer/choreographer Mehmet Sander and sound artist John Bowers, their first collaboration.
Animate Objects in Sonic Action opens in silence, the two performers and Bowers entering in adidas black, more uniform than leisure wear. Bowers takes his place by his machinery and set a pulse going, the other two stand on the edge of a bland square.
Silence longer than you were expecting. Funny, then worrying. GO ! shouts Bowers and they do. They always do as they’re told, that much is clear: forward, backwards, quick, slow, quick slow. A military parade ground, a prison yard, a school gym, it all adds up to the same. A man’s world of instruction and obedience. Rational and confined. Exercise without enjoyment.
Bowers’ deceptively complex ‘sonic action’ is very, very loud and unrelenting, just the sort of thing they’d love down at Guantanamo. For half an hour it was performance, for twenty four hours it would be torture.
The rapid back projection of random numbers adds to the order/chaos. Is this what it is like under fire ? Memories of seeing Kubrick’s classic war film Paths of Glory only a couple of weeks ago.
The two performers run at each other, although not as hard as they could have, and then they’re gone and its quiet again, which I was glad of, not least for the space to digest such strong stuff.
Disquieting, minimal and raw. Glad to be a spectator and not a participant.
Mark Offord @MarkOfford
Hardcore aural assault at the hands of John Bowers @SPILL_Festival tonight. Tense stuff.
Weird Seance
Ipswich Police Station
Daniel Oliver’s audience participation heavy work came in two parts upstairs at the former cop-shop, located on a floor marked ‘Crime Management’. Was this part of Spill or a brilliant accident ?
Part One was Reconstruction where Oliver and half a dozen audience members recreated the terrible events of October 30th 2014 where something went terribly wrong at the ‘last ever Spill.’
Part Two was Return with Oliver leading Adam and Shona into and out of the woods to cleanse their memories and reconcile themselves with the departed. Somewhere along the way he got naked.
The spiritualism was consciously phony and the tone irreverent with a few good laughs. It was good to see a performance with no pretense to polish and the rough edges sat well with the crumbling interior of the room where Weird Seance was staged.
The deconstruction of the audience’s role could have been pushed further; everyone seemed to enjoy it far too much. Oliver is an affable performer and he could employ that to spread some discomfort around. And not for the first, or I’m sure last, time at Spill I thought, ‘can’t you do this with your bloody clothes on ?’
What the ghosts of Ipswich Special Branch made of it was not recorded.
Scout Niblett / Nathaniel Robin Mann
Ipswich Corn Exchange
This always promised to be one of the highlights of this year’s Spill Festival, and the promise was met and then some.
Nathaniel Robin Mann performed at last year’s Pulse with the Dead Rat Orchestra trio but sang here alone, sweet and strong. He can’t be confined by folk, although he has deep roots there. Madrid and the Caribbean were on his map tonight too.
It’s Up To Emma is Scout Niblett’s seventh solo album and made up most of her Spill set. Where Mann was magic, Niblett was hypnosis, coming onstage quietly with her Fender and going straight into the first unannounced songs, single blues notes and crashed chords the basic blueprint for the uninhibited autobiography of spare lyrics. Her shy stage presence makes these personal revelations even more striking and true.
What Can I Do ? has been described as a key song on the new album (which it closes) and it felt like that here, an extended question with no answer.
This was Niblett’s only UK show this year, another Spill coup, and if you can’t wait for her return then It’s Up to Emma is a compulsory purchase in the interval.
Doug Coombes
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]]>Performed by Bishi; Conceived and Directed by Matthew Glamorre
Corn Exchange, Ipswich
Wednesday 29th October
Albion Voice’s place on the opening evening of Spill was a mark of how highly the festival is now regarded by contemporary artists and the ambitious scale of the event. If Lady Gaga is ever booked for Ipswich Town Hall she’ll do very well to match this dazzling performance.
Bishi’s profile and reputation as singer, musician and artist and been on a sharp rising curve for the the last decade or so with a long list of high-profile collaborations on her CV. Her second record, Albion Voice, unites a broad reach of inspirations and concerns, focused on her dual identity: born in England to a Bengali family. The songs are drawn from Chaucer and Tagore, Derek Jarman and Leigh Bowery, Indian classical music and English folk, rock and almost-pop.
She sung Albion Voice in its entirety at Spill (plus some new material) performing before a huge screen onto which a vivid freefall of imagery, produced and directed by Matthew Hardern, was projected, immersing Bishi in its detail, humour and beauty. This was proper 3D filmaking- no glasses necessary – as Bishi appeared to step in and out of the visuals and performed with on-screen versions of herself and in one case (Gram Chara) her mother.
The sound quality in the Corn Exchange has sometimes been an issue for music events held there but not on this occasion when all of Albion Voice’s layers were clear and equally distinct.
The combined effect was to brilliantly interpret a vision 0f an England of multiple-identities with multiple voices, not necessarily in harmony but challenging and enhancing each other rather than competing to be heard. A chorus, not a cacophony.
(And if there was any disappointment with Albion Voice it wasn’t in the performance, but in the relative lack of multi-cultural representation in the audience.)
Bishi’s saved the most surprising element of Albion Song for last with an ethereal recording of the late Tony Benn talking passionately about the twin poles of hope and anger that fuel political change. It wasn’t hard to see why she felt such empathy with these words and the creative duality they suggest.
Anyone who doubts whether Spill is for them should have been at Albion Voice where few could have resisted the coupling of Bishi’s down-to-earth personality with her larger than life persona or the sense of pure enjoyment and fun behind her serious intent, never better conveyed than in the autobiographical Ship of Fools.
This was a great choice for Spill’s first night and a pointer to the diversity of voices which the rest of the festival brings to Ipswich in the next few days.
Doug Coombes
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]]>Award-winning theatre company Red Rose Chain have announced their new season of work, a dynamic mixture of professional and community based productions, which will be the first to take place in their new Heritage Lottery Fund supported venue The Avenue Theatre in Ipswich, starting in February 2015.
Artistic Director Joanna Carrick’s new play kicks off the season, a piece specially written for the opening of the theatre, called Progress. Progress follows a spirited and determined young Queen Elizabeth I as she visits Ipswich on a “progress” in 1561, heralding a new age of hope and tolerance at the age of just 27.
Set against the harsh backdrop of the story of the Ipswich martyrs and based on factual accounts of real events, Progress is a play for anyone who would like to know why Ipswich is such an extraordinary place. The play also acts as the follow up to Joanna’s critically acclaimed Fallen In Love which recorded the rise and fall of Anne Boleyn and was performed to audiences in Ipswich and The Tower of London in 2013. Progress runs from 3rd to 28th February.
March 2015 will see the return of the powerful and thought-provoking Different Buttons (10th-28th). Ruth, a modern young woman, is waiting for a psychiatric appointment when she encounters ghosts from the asylum’s past. Back by popular demand, the play delves into the rich history of Ipswich’s former Victorian asylum St Clements hospital where it was first performed, interweaving powerful stories of several former residents over the course of its 140 year history.
Later in the Spring Red Rose Chain continues to present art that is accessible to all with an innovative new piece of sensory theatre funded by Arts Council England and East of England Co-op. Inspired by the famous local myth, The Green Children explores our ideas of integration of different worlds, how we communicate with each other and the relationships we develop with nature. The inspirational new show has been developed for an audience of young people with disabilities and additional needs that can be enjoyed with their family and friends.
Created by Community Director Kirsty Thorpe, the piece has been researched with members of Red Rose Chain’s inclusive youth theatre and special schools in Ipswich, in association with Cambridge Junction. Who are they? Where did they come from? Why are they green? Venture into the wilderness at The Avenue Theatre from the 23rd to the 25th April to find out.
In May Red Rose Chain is staging two new adaptations of Hans Christian Andersen tales. Beginning with Shattered, a play for schools about e-safety and cyber bullying based on the fairytale of The Snow Queen, and followed by The Red Shoes, based on the story of the same name, but retold by Red Rose Chain’s youth theatre with a modern day twist… where temptation is just too much to resist!
All this new work at The Avenue Theatre leads up to Red Rose Chain’s annual summer spectacular, Theatre in the Forest – the region’s largest outdoor theatre event,- which will be performed within the woodland clearing at Jimmy’s Farm, Ipswich for the third year. In 2015 the woods will transform into a fantastical fairy land for Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, directed by Joanna Carrick and designed by Jimmy Grimes, Red Rose Chain regular and Warhorse Puppetry Director.
For all dates and times and to book tickets please visit www.redrosechain.com or call Red Rose Chain’s Box Office on 01473 603388.
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]]>World Premiere of Colin Matthews’ Spiralling
Snape Maltings Concert Hall
Sunday October 26th
A world premiere is, by definition, something special and I have always envied those lucky (or perhaps unlucky) enough to have attended significant musical premieres, a Beethoven symphony, Tristan or the Rite of Spring. Fortunately, Sunday’s premier of Colin Matthews’ ‘Spiralling’ was a much more successful and well-mannered occasion than the disturbances that greeted The Rite in Paris a century ago.
Spira mirabilis is unique and something of a phenomenon. A group of elite young musicians based in northern Italy, they play without a conductor in the spirit of a large chamber group and work intensively and cooperatively on a single work for their concerts. Their performance of Beethoven’s fourth symphony at Aldeburgh three years ago was a vivid demonstration of their shared musical understanding and sense of purpose.
Colin Matthews, who worked as Britten’s assistant for the last four years of the composer’s life, was commissioned by Aldeburgh Music to write Spiralling for Spira Mirabilis and he was able to work intensively with the group in the period leading up to the premiere. The title has an obvious connection to the group but it is more than that; the music does indeed twist, turn and spiral (but never out of control).
Matthews gave a perfectly pitched introduction to his composition, no big technical words but a model of clarity for the non-specialist. With some themes played by the orchestra and the various sections explained, both performers and audience were primed and prepared.
The opening unison is a sturdy, simple theme, that gradually dissolves and fragments are subjected to varying degrees of elaboration. A scherzo-like section follows, the rustling strings, wind interjections and brass crescendos reminiscent of Sibelius and highly effective. The slow section has an important part for harp and there is a profound stillness and calm at the centre of the music. The scherzo material returns and leads into the final, busy section which concludes with several spaced and sustained chords. It is an interesting and absorbing work, modest in resources (classical orchestra, harp and double bassoon) and timescale (about 25 minutes) but certainly not in achievement. It has a symphonic and organic feel to it, is expertly orchestrated and deserves repeated future hearings.
To give the world premiere of such a work without a conductor and with complete success tells you all you need to know about this remarkable ensemble. They watch and listen to each other, closely and continually, during the performance, they love and believe in the music that they are playing and, as emerged in a post-performance discussion, they really do like each other as well! It all added up to a unique and remarkable experience.
Gareth Jones
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]]>The post Theatre In Suffolk – November Preview appeared first on InSuffolk.
]]>Panto-phobes be warned: there’s just a few weeks left before the seasonal spectaculars begin to take up their residencies at the county’s theatres but before then there’s a healthy mix of alternatives coming to a Suffolk stage near you in November.
The Theatre Royal in particular has a strong line-up this month that includes in top-class dance and opera as well as comedy and drama.
Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake is a popular classic and Ballet Theatre UK’s version is at the theatre from November 17th-19th while the Irving Stage Company’s Jesus Christ Superstar has a five day run from the 4th to 8th.
Mid Wales Opera got great reviews for their production of Britten’s Albert Herring last year and they bring a Jonathan Miller-directed Carmen to Bury St Edmunds on November 10th and 11th. Georges Bizet’s opera is always a crowd-pleaser and a sell-out is likely.
LipService Theatre was founded by Maggie Fox and Sue Ryding almost thirty years ago and they’ve been described by the Guardian as the ‘Laurel and Hardy of literary deconstruction’ ! Their latest parody/pastiche is The Picture of Doreen Gray, the story of media star Doreen and her mysterious youthfulness, on 13th and 14th.
Clive Francis’s A Christmas Carol (above) on the 16th will hopefully be a more faithful interpretation of classic English literature with the actor performing in the character of Ebenezer Scrooge, based on Charles Dickens’ own famous public readings. And there’s an equally inspired one-man show the night before as Radio 4’s resident raconteur John Shuttleworth sets up his electric organ at the Theatre Royal and recalls A Wee Ken to Remember.
East Anglia is blessed with many excellent smaller theatre companies and two of these take their new productions around Suffolk this month in the form of Rough Cast’s Julius Caesar and Open Space Theatre’s Separate Tables (left) by Terence Rattigan, which they’re performing to mark the play’s 60th birthday.
You can find Julius Caesar’s Shakespearean intrigue at the following places: November 13th – The Seagull Theatre, Lowestoft; 14th – Garboldisham Village Hall; 15th – The Fisher Theatre, Bungay; 20th – Corn Hall, Diss; 22nd – The Cut, Halesworth; 28th – Laxfield Village Hall; 29th – St Edmunds Hall, Hoxne.
The Separate Tables tour is: November 14th – Diss Corn Hall; 15th – The Cut, Halesworth; 18th – Seagull Theatre, Lowestoft; 20th – Fisher Theatre, Bungay; 22nd – Hoxne Village Hall; 26th – Beccles Public Hall; 29th – Botesdale Village Hall.
The Sudbury Quay hosts regular productions by two local amateur groups and they’ve both got new shows this month. Sudbury Dramatic Society bravely takes on Beckett’s Waiting for Godot from 4th to 8th and the Sudbury Musicals Society marks the WW1 centenary with the biting anti-war satire, Oh ! What A Lovely War from 19th to 22nd. Oh ! What A Lovely War was developed by director Joan Littlewood and her ground-breaking Theatre Workshop in the early sixties (from a radio play by Charles Chilton) and Littlewood herself was born in 1914 so this year is her centenary too, and it’s a real shame that this landmark and her legacy have received so little attention.
November of course includes Remembrance Sunday (on the 9th) and there’s another couple of wartime plays to look out for. Just Another Blooming Day, performed by the Fisher Youth Theatre, is a play with music set in the London Blitz that’s at the Fisher Theatre, Bungay from 27th to 29th; A Farewell to Arms (pictured top) from the 4th to the 8th at the New Wolsey. Ipswich is imitating the dog’s multi-media adaption of Ernest Hemingway’s novel which was closely based on his own experiences as an 18 year old ambulance driver in World War One Italy.
Finally, the New Wolsey’s has a second main production this month that charts more domestic conflicts. This is My Family (left) is written by Tim Firth of Our House and Calender Girls fame and revolves around 14 year old Nicky who lies her way to win a ‘dream holiday’ for her family. Except the holiday she chooses isn’t quite what the rest of her clan were dreaming of…This is My Family won the UK Theatre Award for Best Musical in 2013 and makes the Wolsey its home from November 11th to the 15th.
Next month we’ll be previewing the traditional and alternative theatrical offerings in December and January but until then look out for our reviews of many of the productions mentioned here, and if you’ve seen something you’ve loved or loathed then let us know on twitter @insuffolk
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]]>Spinning Wheel Theatre
John Peel Centre, Stowmarket
24th October 2014
A crime writer visits an asylum, apparently to interview a serial killer but it is clear from the very beginning that things are not quite what they seem. Perfectly timed for the darkening days, Spinning Wheel Theatre’s production of Anthony Horowitz’s Mindgame wraps coils of plot around the audience in an enthralling constriction which unnerves as much as it entertains.
A tale set within a single space and time frame may suggest a plot which slowly builds to a single crescendo but Mindgame is built on shifting sands which constantly deceive and mislead the audience. The performances of Joe Leat as the writer Styler, and Tom Leeper as Dr Farquhar gripped from the start, the tension they created garotting terror from the narrative and enthralling the near capacity John Peel Centre audience. The mental and emotional struggle which developed between them was brutal, despite rarely becoming physical, and Leat’s humiliating disintegration from terse, swaggering author to shambling, confused chaotic was an engrossing reduction, provoked by Leeper’s chilling switches from leering banter to psychotic confrontation.
There was a feeling of ambition to this production in which the use of jarring, unsettling music felt more like a movie soundtrack than a theatrical score. It worked equally well whether pointing the emotional direction of the action or counterpointing what was being said. Similarly having Leat wait on stage for fully ten minutes before the house lights went down and then, even when they had, having him not speak for several minutes more, was a brave choice by Director Amy Wyllie but one which prompted the unsettling atmosphere of expectation which made this production so enjoyable.
Whilst when reviewing a production of this type it might normally be considered impolite to include plot spoilers in the case of Mindgame this is not strictly necessary as such were its strengths and pace that even a thorough knowledge of the plot would barely detract from the enjoyment. Nevertheless I will limit myself to saying that the twists are difficult to spot until they are upon you and the finale deliciously ambiguous. A genuine thriller and perfect theatrical fare for this time of year.
Steve Hawthorne
Mindgame continues its tour at: Tues 28th Oct (Samuel Ward Academy, Haverhill) Wed 29th Oct (Newmarket Memorial Hall)Thur 30th Oct (Felsham Village Hall)Fri 31st Oct (Mildenhall Village Hall)Sat 1st Nov (Bardwell Tithe Barn). Details at www.spinningwheeltheatre.com
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]]>Two Bit Classics
Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds
Thursday 23rd October
When I saw that this production of Pride and Prejudice consisted of a two-person cast I felt a pang of worry for my bibliophobe father. He was coming with me and had never seen an adaption of Austen’s most famous novel. Knowing it has at least fifteen central characters we did both wonder how well he’d keep up.
We needn’t have worried for a second. The diminutive cast do a beautiful job of conjuring up the well-loved characters; each so unique and acted with such consistency that there could be twenty actors on stage.
That’s no mean feat, considering the actors have very little in the way of costume changes to help them distinguish between characters but props do add a degree of clarity; Mrs Bennett flaps her handkerchief at whoever aggrieves her and Caroline Bingley peers with disdain over her fan at pretty much everyone.
At no point though does any of the characterisation seem forced or ridiculous, not even when Joanna Tincey plays Mr Bingley, and Nick Underwood Jane Bennett. The audience believes in their love as much as they do Elizabeth and Darcy’s. Tincey’s Regency dress which converts to a frock coat and jodhpurs with the flick of a button when she plays a male character is a particularly clever touch.
As well as performing, Joannah Tincey adapted the novel for the stage, and an excellent job she has done too. The play is crammed full of lines and phrases from the novel (as any good adaptation should be) but at no point does it seem contrived. Even Austen purists would struggle to pick fault with this adaptation.
In fact, forcing the characters to narrate the scenes cleverly mimics Austen’s biased style of narration. The opening line “It’s very clear that a single man’s desperation to find a wife is a truth personally, not universally, acknowledged”, delivered by Mrs Bennett, signals that the subtle humour of the novel is to become laugh-out-loud comedy.
Like the cast, the set is also pared-down. Disjointed, whitewashed pillars and beams, and a wonky fireplace represent both the tumbledown domesticity of the Bennetts’ home and the ancient grandeur of Pemberley.
Underwood’s Mr Darcy embodied all the ancient grandeur of his ancestral home. It was delightful to see his haughty obnoxiousness melt away to reveal a man who’s simply awkward and unconcerned with the niceties expected of him. I’d venture a guess that Underwood has watched the 1995 TV adaptation a few times for ‘research’, as he seems to channel Colin Firth rather noticeably. Not that that’s a criticism, of course.
As much as we love seeing Darcy spar with the sharp Elizabeth Bennett, what the audience is really waiting for is the moment they realise they’ve been wrong about each other; that he’s been blinded by pride and her by prejudice. The moment did not disappoint when it arrived.
This adaptation is moving, funny, and has a happy ending guaranteed: what more could an audience want?
Melissa Taylor
Pride & Prejudice for Two Actors is at the Theatre Royal until Saturday 25th October
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]]>The post Win Tickets to see The Animals & Steve Cropper ! appeared first on InSuffolk.
]]>On November 11th at the Apex in Bury St Edmunds you’ll have the chance to see several living legend on a Suffolk stage at the same time, as the Animals & Friends come to town – the ‘Friends’ in this case including the great Southern soul man, Steve Cropper.
The Animals were the second British band to top the American charts after The Beatles with the now multi-million selling and legendary anthem, ‘House of the Rising Sun’. The band subsequently achieved over twenty global Top Ten hit records, many of which gained the Number One slot in various parts of the world. In Britain alone, the band had no less than twelve chart entries.
As a guitarist, producer, song writer and founding member of both Booker T and the MGs and The Mar-Keys, Steve Cropper was involved in virtually every record issued by Stax Records in its 1960’s heyday. As co-writer of (Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay, Knock on Wood and In the Midnight Hour, Cropper is assured of an honoured place in the soul music hall of fame.
Thanks to our friends at The Apex you can win a pair of tickets to this unmissable musical evening. Simply answer the following fiendish question:
Where did Stax Records have its studios ?
1. Memphis, Tennesse
2.Mansfield, Notts
3. Melbourne, Victoria
Send your answer to [email protected] by midnight on Saturday November 8th – the winner will be notified by e-mail the following day. You can see our competition terms and conditions here.
And if you’d like to book tickets to this or any other event at The Apex see the venue’s website here.
Good luck !
Photo by Alan White
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]]>On the 10th of October, Suffolk One hosted the East Anglian Student Film Festival. With a collection of eager and passionate students coming from Stoke High School, Anglia Ruskin University, West Suffolk College and Norwich University of the Arts, the college was filled with an excited and lively atmosphere. Some students and teachers embraced the film-related theme and dressed up as a variety of characters like: Jaws, a Jedi, Superman, Lois Lane and even a few bees. For those who had not dressed up, there was still a way to get involved as makeup artist, Clive Double had been brought in to turn students into terrifyingly realistic zombies. The day was all about the fun and everyone, even non-film students, could join in with a giant sing along of movie soundtracks during the lunchtime.
The main point of the day, however, was for the media and film students to meet experienced individuals that work within the film and media industry. The day was split into a variety of workshops, each having 30-40 students in attendance. The first workshop, and the most popular, was a storyboard workshop with John Williams. He assisted the students with their storyboards and actively provided feedback. Advice from professionals is very valuable to students, a student commented that it “helps you see things a different way” and that was the entire purpose. He inspired students to “break the rules” and to just go with their ideas, nothing was turned away and their ideas were only developed further. Also assisting with their coursework was a more practical workshop which involved the students going off in small groups to film their own short films, further developing team working skills and allowing for the students to become more confident in their own skills.
Students were able to meet with university students in order to find out about the types of courses available and the quality of work required at that level. The student Ambassador from Norwich University of the Arts, Charlotte, led a vibrant and active workshop about the creation of a story and, most importantly, a protagonist. Creativity was always inspired; every contribution was valued no matter how abstract it may have been. The atmosphere was light hearted and comedic, teaching the students how character creation doesn’t have to be a gruelling task and can lead to a lot of debate within themselves and their groups. It wasn’t all just for fun, however, as it taught the students the importance of fully developing their characters in order to create a successful story and allowed for them to see the process which university students go through when creating their own characters.
The Q&As in the afternoon were very popular with the students. A student from Anglia Ruskin University, Jack, presented his own final production, a sophisticated documentary about otters. Jack used his documentary as an example to show how there is a lot more to media and film than just short films, inspiring students to go and do what they really want to do. He also gave the students useful tips about the industry, telling them that “the industry is always changing” and that the students “need to adapt” in order to get the most out of the industry. A lot of students found this incredibly useful as they were then able to know exactly what the industry will ask of them, getting an insight into what they could grow up to be and what they could learn if they chose to attend university.
There was one final Q&A with two professionals from the film business, Adeela and Dominique. Adeela is a script consultant and editor who has to work with ideas and build them up into the final project, she told the students about the work she has done with celebrities like Mel Gibson in his film company and Dominique is a producer who has the incredibly importance task of dedicating money and choosing the correct people for each job. To start, Adeela and Dominique presented their own film, a controversial short film about the role of females and of the corruption of religion. Both women emphasised the importance of equality in the film industry and that women are more than capable of doing the careers that are mostly dominated by men. The controversial and thought-provoking arguments inspired many young students into considering the roles they would be able to do, letting them start discovering their own place in the film industry… As Dominique wisely said, “How can you make it work for you?”
The event continued on into the evening, moving over to Cineworld, Ipswich where local and international films were screened, all produced by winning students from all over the world and the winner of the East Anglian Rising Star was, Tyler Livingstone from West Suffolk College. The event took place from 6pm until 8pm and it was completely sold out. EASFF director, Darren Meitiner-Harvey said, ‘the standard has been especially high this year. It is encouraging to see so much local talent; hopefully this event will continue to encourage local filmmakers.’
The day ended on a lively and informative note, the students having learnt a lot about the film industry and the sort of films they could potentially make. We can easily say that these students will take a lot from this experience and will hopefully become part of the large, exciting and ever-expanding film industry.
Kathryn Philpot
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