Arts
Ska struck
When Trojan Records attempted to break into the United States music market in the early 1970s, it hit an insurmountable…
Star trek
Now that all of the billionaires are going into space, the night sky holds a special new kind of allure.…
Drawing breath
Amid the greatly exaggerated reports of the death of painting issued and reissued over the course of the past century,…
The play’s the thing
Let me start with a spot of admin: if you’re wondering what The Speccie makes of GB News, it’ll be…
Dylan
Bob Dylan turned 80 the other week. Does that seem to consign not just the vanished twentieth century but the…
Festival music in Townsville
For those music lovers who can travel, the prospect of a festival in Townsville in mid-winter is an alluring one.…
Kitsch tomfoolery
The latest movie to turn into a musical is Amélie, from 2001, about a Parisian do-gooder or ‘godmother of the…
Black Midi: Cavalcade
Grade: A– Imagine a really disgusting and immoral scientific experiment in which the members of Weather Report, the Mahavishnu Orchestra,…
Where is my mind?
The Father is an immensely powerful film about dementia starring Sir Anthony Hopkins, who was asleep in his bed in…
The only way is Israel
Tragically it wasn’t my turn to review when Channel 5’s groundbreaking Anne Boleyn came out so you’ll never find out…
Coming up roses
At the turning point of Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s Der Rosenkavalier, all the clocks stop. Octavian has arrived…
In search of an ending
There are many Symphonies No. 10 by Gustav Mahler, or none. The situation is rare, if not unique, in the…
Great expectations
The OED defines ‘gala’ as ‘a festive occasion’. In the ballet world this usually translates as a handful of stars,…
Two sides of the Storey
Jasper Rees remembers David Storey, giant of postwar English culture and wry teller of tales, whose newly published memoir is perhaps his most remarkable work
Chekhov
The trouble with the performing arts in Melbourne is that you blink and they’re gone. The other week we were…
European Masterpieces from The MMA, New York at Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art
This is a very active period for the visual arts. The Archibald Prize finalists have been announced, Vivid is returning,…
Ladies first
On the way home from This Is The Kit’s show at a socially distanced Barbican, I listened to Avalon by…
Lockdown unlocked
The choreographers called on to get the nation’s dancers back on to the stage have as much to say about…
The caged bird sings
At the first night of Glyndebourne Festival 2021 there was relief and joyful expectation as Gus Christie made his speech…
History repeats itself
Fifty-one years ago, in the BBC’s much-acclaimed The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn was portrayed as a brave…
Title deeds
The best thing on the radio last week was, without question, Kind Hearts and Coronets. You may have missed it…
Still Can do
Krautrock pioneer Irmin Schmidt talks to Graeme Thomson about taking risks, playing badly and ignoring the Brits
Colour and confusion
Back to the Globe after more than a year. The theatre has zealously maintained its pre–Covid staffing levels. On press…
When two become one
‘When pictures painted as companions are separated,’ John Constable wisely observed, ‘the purchaser of one, without being aware of it,…
Macbeth
It’s an extraordinary thing that a director of Bruce Beresford’s reputation should be directing for Melbourne Opera until you remember…
