Writer: Kieran Knowles Music and Lyrics: Megson Director: Jess Millward It’s hard to describe The Herald, and indeed Megson themselves aren’t quite sure what to call their current creative output. The folk duo have created a collaboration that definitely isn’t a folk musical, it also isn’t a play with music. It could possibly be described as ‘songs with a storyline’, but this really doesn’t do it justice. Megson, named after a dead dog (their words, not mine), is comprised of Debs and Stu Hanna, who have been singing together since they were bright young things, releasing numerous acclaimed folk albums…
Author: The Reviews Hub - Yorkshire & North East
The Reviews Hub - Yorkshire & North East
The Yorkshire & North East team is under the editorship of Jacob Bush. The Reviews Hub was set up in 2007. Our mission is to provide the most in-depth, nationwide arts coverage online.
Writer: Rich Hardisty Philosophical and deeply emotive, Rich Hardisty’s Silly Boy is more than just a stand up comedy show. As a storyteller and true master of his craft, he brings a sublime yet deeply moving debut show to the Godber Studio at Hull Truck Theatre – and what a show it was – a real tonic; endearing and utterly flawless. Set to an 80s power ballad soundtrack this beautifully shocking and well rehearsed routine was a pure joy from start to finish with Hardisty not pausing for breath; full throttle, high-octane and passionately compelling. Baring his soul with themes often…
Writers: Elizabeth Godber and Nick Lane Director: Paul Robinson According to the programme this was “originally by William Shakespeare, messed around with by Elizabeth Godber and Nick Lane”, but this is messing around on a grand scale. Shakespeare’s shortest play becomes a near-three hour affair, stuffed with 1980s songs, sometimes shoehorned in, but always performed with zest and animation – choreography by Wayne Parsons. It’s difficult to describe what Godber and Lane (and director Paul Robinson who had the original idea) do to The Comedy of Errors. Originally set in Ephesus, in Shakespeare’s version a series of remarkable events means that Egeon…
Conductor: Jordan de Souza For the final concert of the 2022-23 season, the Orchestra of Opera North engaged two international stars, Norwegian trumpeter Tine Thing Helseth and in-demand Canadian conductor Jordan de Souza. If Helseth’s artistry and technique came as no surprise, de Souza’s fiercely energetic approach to Brahms (and, earlier, to Richard Strauss’s Don Juan) produced some electrifying edge-of-the-seat moments. In Hummel’s Trumpet Concerto Tine Thing Helseth displayed all the fluency, combined with purity of tone and range, that Anton Weidinger’s new improved trumpet could muster in 1803. The longish first movement contained delightful interplay with the orchestra; the…
Writer: Keith Alessi Director: Erika Conway This show is described on Keith Alessi’s website as “A joke tellin’, banjo playin’, heart healin’ experience”, which gives potential audience members a very good idea of what to expect. A one-man show, performed by Alessi, it charts his story from accountant and successful businessman, through life-threatening illness and harrowing treatment to banjo-playing survivor. Alessi comes on in a check shirt and jeans, smiling a little shyly at the audience. Like Alessi, this is a dressed-down production, being chiefly staged in informal performance spaces, without any lights and with little fuss. Alessi is not…
Book: Cheri Steinkellner and Bill Steinkellner Music: Alan Menken Lyrics: Glenn Slater Director: Bill Buckhurst Sister Act, the hugely popular film starring Whoopi Goldberg, was first put on a UK stage at the London Palladium in 2009. Since then it has enjoyed West End runs, UK tours and many amateur productions up and down the country. With some slight updates since previous productions, this Olivier Award nominated revival tells the story of club singer Deloris Van Cartier as she gets up in a sticky situation with her partner. She has to go into hiding in a place she would never…
Writer: Daniel Swift Writer and Director: Belle Streeton Music and Lyrics: Tess Fletcher and Guy Hughes Concrete Youth is a charitable organisation that exists to increase the social and moral needs of disabled people and their carers. So far the company have reached over 4,500 young people and adults with profound and multiple learning difficulties (PMLD). This isn’t just a tick box exercise, this is work of real merit. As an experienced and knowledgeable theatre company with a really big heart, the key ethos to their work is testimony to the multi-faceted and audience-centred shows they produce. As pioneers of…
Writer: William Golding Adapter: Nigel Williams Director: Amy Leach Amy Leach, Deputy Artistic Director at Leeds Playhouse and Director of Lord of the Flies, invites the audience of Lord of the Flies to draw parallels between the themes of this famous story and the world we live in today. A nameless island represented by a set comprising of a single brutalist structure and tall palm trees becomes home for a group of young plane crash survivors, fleeing war in Britain. No sooner are we introduced to the school children do we see hierarchies and tribes form onstage. Allegiances are pledged…