Theatre, arts and culture

Theatre, arts and culture are under attack. Creatives, artists, institutions and structures which foster theatre, arts and culture are facing down the immediate effects of the Coronovirus pandemic while furloughed, without income or closed to the public. The delicate and fragile fabric of our national culture is unravelling to reveal a bleak future. Or is […]

The Moon Shines Bright

Sam Lee is a celebrated folk singer, collector, interpreter and revivalist of old folk songs. With ‘The Moon Shines Bright’, Sam borrows from the Gypsy and traveller tradition a song which asks us to stop and see what our increasingly standardised world is doing to us. On ‘The Moon Shines Bright’ Sam’s joined by Elizabeth […]

Natacha Atlas – Strange Days

I heard a live preview of Natacha Atlas’s album STRANGE DAYS at an intimate gig in Blackheath earlier this summer. It was an extraordinary experience, hypnotic, transporting, musically accomplished, and unsettling too – a perfect metaphor for the times we live in. The album is out now, and its title – STRANGE DAYS – perfectly […]

Happiness

Happiness (below) is a short film made by Steve Cutts. It’s a masterpiece. We live in a society where the focus on well being and mindfulness is in the ascendant. It’s the natural corollary to lives lived in the shadow of an exploitative system – where what we buy is, we are told, what defines […]

Clarion Call

Clarion Call was a large scale sonic artwork along Ipswich Waterfront in October 2018.

Rent Parties

Harlem. The 1920s. ‘The Hustle’ was all that was on people’s minds because money was, literally, too tight to mention.

Aretha Franklin Almighty Fire (Woman of the Future)

Aretha. Sublime.

Swirl by debbie tucker green

A soaraway vocal provides the backdrop to a sweet, tender story of friendship

Don’t Bother Calling

A lament? A song of victory? A passionate plea? It’s probably a mix of all these and more – and it is enigmatic and remarkable. Moses Sumney: Don’t Bother Calling … and yes, those are his high notes.

Elizabeth Fraser: Voice & Magic

For me, few voices are as magical as Elizabeth Fraser’s. The former Cocteau Twins vocalist has also worked with Massive Attack, Future Sound of London, Craig Armstrong and others. In each collaboration the curiously liminal quality of her vocals add a sense of mystery; of belonging and immersion, yet also of separation and something otherworldly, […]