Stan Graham's Leisure Guide for North and West Yorkshire
Lord of the Flies is a novel by William Golding set firmly in its time. It was published in 1954 although written a couple of years earlier and rejected by several publishers. It was Golding’s response to a novel he had read, The Coral Island: A Tale of the Pacific Ocean by R M Ballantyne…
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After a break in proceedings I returned to the fold to see the touring production of Sister Act. As it happens, the musical has also had an enforced hiatus so we both resumed normal service together. Actually, it wasn’t quite normal service for either of us as the show began, and ended, 20 minutes late…
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In the programme the director, Radula Gaitanou, says she wishes that opera were more like football, with the audience not knowing the outcome until the end. Well, she certainly walked the walk in this production, turning it into a game of two halves and, not until the penalty shoot-out at the end, do we find…
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Some months ago a good friend of mine asked if I had seen the film The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. I replied in the negative and he said that he highly recommended it so, as we seem to share the same taste in quite a few things, especially red wine, I caught it the next…
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It had to happen, I have at last seen a modified version of a Shakespeare play that I actually enjoyed. Although I still feel that, if the Trade Descriptions Act applied to the theatre, saying that what we saw was written by the Bard of Avon would be pushing it to the limits, the way…
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RIOPY, birth name Jean-Phillippe Rio-Py, like a lot of the performers I have seen at Howard Assembly Room, was someone I had not heard of before my visit. He is a French pianist and composer who has the most amazing back story. He was raised in a secular cult in France and taught himself to…
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I think that I have discovered a new hero, Leoš Janáček, the man responsible for the work currently being performed by Opera North at Leeds Grand Theatre. He has made my list of good guys on two counts; firstly he has broken the mould when it comes to the practice of anthropomorphism, and secondly, he…
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On Friday 27th January Phoenix Dance Theatre held a presentation to celebrate the first 40 years of the company. Being good Yorkshire folk they opted to get value for money by highlighting two brilliant announcements at once. Although the company was set up in 1981, the 40th Anniversary Tour began in November 2021 and so…
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Last year’s concert held to mark Holocaust Memorial Day was focussed on the works of three composers who perished in one of the most reviled concentration camps during the Second World War, this year the spotlight shifted to the lives of ‘ordinary’ people – the clue is in the title. Although the object was to…
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This was a very fitting title for the last show I will be covering before Christmas. Next Friday, strikes permitting, I am going into hospital for a knee replacement, so one week on I will be Stick Man, probably Two Stick Man, Crutch Man, but we won’t go there, or even Dylan, the real name…
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Tyke It To The Limit 