Arts

Much is routine – and a fair amount is worse: Glyndebourne’s Madama Butterfly reviewed

26 May 2018 9:00 am

There is no such thing as a moderately good performance of Madama Butterfly, or, to be more precise, it’s not…

I desperately wanted to love Edie but I couldn’t

26 May 2018 9:00 am

Edie tells the story of an 84-year-old woman who wants to fulfil a girlhood ambition by climbing a Scottish mountain.…

Emma Pearson

26 May 2018 9:00 am

A remarkable achievement; since its inception in 2002, Pinchgut Opera has staged 20 rarely performed operas, many for the first…

Garden of earthly delights: horticultural apprentice Emma Love in the newly reopened Temperate House at Kew

The real stars of Kew’s newly restored Temperate House

19 May 2018 9:00 am

The glasshouses at Kew Gardens are so popular that they can be quite unbearably busy at weekends. And why shouldn’t…

Wonder woman: Saoirse Ronan is miraculous as Florence in On Chesil Beach

Whoever signed off on the ending deserves a good thrashing: On Chesil Beach reviewed

19 May 2018 9:00 am

On Chesil Beach is an adaptation of the Ian McEwen novella set in 1962 when ‘conversation about sexual difficulties was…

Wood and ivory figure group depicting a tooth extraction, 17th century

The troubling history behind the healthy, happy smile

19 May 2018 9:00 am

In his Physiognomische Fragmente, published between 1775 and 1778, the Swiss physiognomist Johann Kaspar Lavater insisted that ‘clean, white and…

How does David Matthews get away with writing symphonies with tunes in them?

19 May 2018 9:00 am

‘All fish in flood and fowl of flight/ Be mirthful now and make melody’ writes the poet William Dunbar in…

Panel from the bedroom of Louis Henri I, Prince de Condé, by Christophe Huet

The greatest French museum you’ve never heard of

19 May 2018 9:00 am

Imagine a French museum that’s second only to the Louvre when it comes to paintings, with an eye-watering collection of…

The glums: Marisol Montiel and Ana Luisa Montiel in Taryn Simon’s ‘An Occupation of Loss’

Grief-conjurors, space-mincers and earth-shovellers: performance roundup

19 May 2018 9:00 am

They enter two by two. Grannies, mainly. Headscarved, mainly. Some locking arms. A bit glum. Like rejects from Noah’s ark.…

What a relief: ‘Descent of the Ganges’ or ‘Arjuna’s Penance’, 7th century

India’s Sistine ceiling

19 May 2018 9:00 am

In Tamil Nadu we found that we were exotic. Although there were some other western tourists around, in most of…

Rarely have I sat through such a chaotic and whimsical script: Describe the Night reviewed

19 May 2018 9:00 am

Describe the Night opens in Poland in 1920 where two Russian soldiers, Isaac and Nikolai, discuss truth and falsehood. Next…

Living the high life: Benedict Cumberbatch as Patrick Melrose

Sky Atlantic’s Patrick Melrose adaptation is triumphant

19 May 2018 9:00 am

Warning: if you haven’t seen it yet, the first episode of the much-anticipated Patrick Melrose (Sky Atlantic, Sunday) contains scenes…

How hospices make you think differently about life

19 May 2018 9:00 am

The timing of the Today programme’s series about hospices could not have been more apt, coming as it did so…

A Bowie tribute album: Arctic Monkey’s Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino reviewed

19 May 2018 9:00 am

Grade: B+ Oh, terrific — a concept album about a 1970s hotel somewhere in space, plus an attack on our…

Tafelmusik – Bach and His World

19 May 2018 9:00 am

One of the most admired music ensembles in the world is touring for Musica Viva Australia until 4 June (Perth,…

Dancing feat: Fred Astaire and Bing Crosby rehearsing choreography for Blue Skies

From buck dancing to Happy Feet: a short history of tap

12 May 2018 9:00 am

Fire up YouTube on the iPad, tap in ‘tap’, then wave goodbye to the rest of your day: clip after…

Belly, the band responsible for one of my favourite 90s songs, is back

12 May 2018 9:00 am

Grade: B+ One of my favourite songs from the 1990s was about a Chinese adulteress forced to walk around town…

Why can’t podcasts be more like Radio 4?

12 May 2018 9:00 am

Now here’s a series that would make a brilliant podcast but is also classic Radio 4 — they don’t have…

‘Office at the Mühling prisoner-of-war camp’, 1916, by Egon Schiele

Animals, tourists and raptors: the hazards of being a plein-air artist

12 May 2018 9:00 am

A conservator at Kansas City’s Nelson-Atkins Museum was recently astonished to find a tiny grasshopper stuck in the paint of…

Which now unbearable TV show has been ruined for ever by political correctness?

12 May 2018 9:00 am

Twenty years after it first appeared, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? is back for a brief, week-long anniversary run…

Cecilia Noble as Aunt Maggie in Nine Night at the National Theatre

Flawed but often hilarious new play: Nine Night at the Dorfman Theatre reviewed

12 May 2018 9:00 am

Nine Night refers to a Jamaican custom that obliges bereaved families to party non-stop for more than a week following…

Dudamel’s Amériques made The Rite of Spring sound like Einaudi

12 May 2018 9:00 am

Apparently it’s called ‘expectation management’. Pollux, Esa-Pekka Salonen’s new work for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, takes its name from…

One angry mother: Nicole Kidman as Queen Boadicea in How to Talk to Girls at Parties

Convoluted, woeful mishmash with no central story: How to Talk to Girls at Parties reviewed

12 May 2018 9:00 am

How to Talk to Girls at Parties is set in the 1970s and has punk as the backdrop and an…

Girls at the Piano

12 May 2018 9:00 am

We need to remind ourselves that there was once a time when there were no Keynesian socialist bureaucracies determining ‘cultural…

Teetering chords and incestous sex: Francesca da Rimini at La Scala

How Riccardo Chailly brought joy – and Italian opera – back to La Scala

5 May 2018 9:00 am

As the curtain opens on the second act of Don Pasquale, I hear a rustle of discomfort. Donizetti’s opera has…