8 Monday May 2 2022 | the timesfirst night
OK! A Celebration of
Oliver Knussen
Royal Festival Hall
{{{{(classical
T
he late, great Oliver
Knussen’s favourite TV
comedy series may have
been Curb Your Enthusiasm,
but I see no reason to curb
my own for his brilliantly coloured
compositions, penetrating conducting,
passionate advocacies and kindling
presence on our musical scene. If this
celebratory concert’s layout — three
concise Knussen pieces in the first
half, better-known composers and
a repertory stalwart in the second —
implied that his works haven’t the
ballast of standard concert fare, every
second of them still offered serious
aural enchantment.
We began with Flourish with
Fireworks, a four-minute kaleidoscope
set alight by the conductor Edward
Gardner and the London
Philharmonic Orchestra with a
precision and vim that never left them
all evening. The astonishing jewellery
of Knussen’s orchestrations shone
particularly in the quick-changing
tapestries of Whitman Settings, offering
attractions that Sophie Bevan’s nimble
but medium-strength soprano couldn’t
match. To navigate Walt Whitman’s
exact words we needed a larger voice,
or surtitles; something to make her
agile vocal line stand out from the
orchestral maze.
No balance problems affected the
Horn Concerto’s mysteries and magic:
partly because Knussen’s textures here
were thinner; partly, too, because
Annemarie Federle, replacing the
Covid-hit Ben Goldscheider at a day’s
notice, proved so forthright, confident
and lyrical. This was a most impressive
performance from the brass finalist in
the 2020 BBC Young Musician
competition. She is all of 19.
After Knussen’s box of delights,
Gardner gave us two works that
Knussen loved to conduct. First was
a dip into the neglected riches of
Britten’s ballet The Prince of the
Pagodas, distilled by Gardner into
a valuable 25-minute selection of
highlights.
What could climax this pleasure
ride? It could only be the sensuous
frenzy of Ravel’s second suite from
Daphnis et Chloé, delivered with
a subtle caress and an urgent glow
that sent us all out beaming. Knussen
should be celebrated like this every
week of the year.
Geoff BrownAnd, in a production by Lucy Bailey
that elegantly feminises some of the
power structures, Katy Stephens is a
standout as the amusing, authoritative,
Latin-tempered governor Leonata. She
forms a fine double act with another
older stateswoman, Antonia (Joanne
Haworth). And everyone excels in the
all-out slapstick rendition of the scene
in which they engineer first Benedick
(Ralph Davis), then Beatrice (Lucy
Phelps), into overhearing fibs about
how much the other one loves them.
There are all sorts of incidental
pleasures, from George Fouracres’s
larky Dogberry to the dance routines
(by Georgina Lamb) to the gorgeous
arch of flowers in which Claudio
(Patrick Osborne) messes it up royally
as he spurns the couldn’t-be-sweeter
Hero (Nadi Kemp-Sayfi) at the altar.Much Ado is only as good as its
sparring leads, though. This young
pair are tremendous. Phelps is a
poised, sardonic Beatrice who means it
when she says: “I was born to speak all
mirth and no matter.” Or she thinks
she does; Phelps makes her palpably
wounded and wary as well as sharp.
Davis is at ease with the unease of a
manchild Benedick whose boisterous
putdowns suggest immaturity more
than self-assurance. And when the
sour subplot asks them to grow up and
take action, the lovers get beyond their
banter. The sense of fun, finally, is all
the more infectious for having been
tested so severely in a production that
embraces this play’s contradictions
with a forgiving smile on its face.
Dominic Maxwell
To Oct 23, shakespearesglobe.comF
uel bills are high, food prices
are up, but a fiver to stand in
the yard at this outdoor
theatre by the Thames
remains one of the capital’s
great deals. And when the show is as
bewitching as this year’s stylishly
summery season opener, one that
takes Shakespeare’s bantering lovers to
1945 Italy, why, budget willing, you’d
be happy to have paid exponentially
more than that for a seated ticket too.
Something about Much Ado’s
sprawling mix of the cheering
(flirtation, farce, love, redemption) and
the sobering (misogyny, betrayal)
seems to suit the Globe. Here, Joanna
Parker’s set beguiles from the off with
an ivy-draped country house backdrop
to a grassy stage. Five women play
Orlando Gough’s music on accordions.Joanne Haworth as Antonia and
Katy Stephens as LeonataMuch Ado
About Nothing
Shakespeare’s Globe, SE1
{{{{(theatre
GETTY IMAGEST
he atmosphere was more pop
gig than dance show. A late
start, the front of the stalls
converted into a mosh pit,
T-shirts on sale in the foyer
and a full house pumped to roar every
time our compere Jonzi D exhorted us
to “make some noise”. Yes, this was
Breakin’ Convention, the international
festival of hip-hop dance theatre, now
in its 19th year.
The first half of Saturday’s main
line-up showcased how street dance as
theatre has evolved around the world
and how seriously it now takes itself.
After a lively introduction from
EASTablishment, a crew of young
dancers from east London, where
Sadler’s Wells is opening its new
hip-hop dance academy, we headed to
the Netherlands with the women of
Oxygen, who offered a sophisticated
movement language and emotional
commentary. From Peru came the
D1 Dance Company, who used their
defiant moves in a social context,
highlighting the experiences of young
people in Lima who have to struggle
with overwhelming hardship while
hoping to realise their dreams.
Mr Kriss, from the Czech Republic,
is a rubber-limbed B-Boy soloist who
tied himself in knots while journeying
through a desolate landscape. The
American poet Jessica Care Moore,
the Canadian dancer Axelle Munezero
and the British saxophonist Soweto
Kinch gave a live performance of the
film Our Bodies Back, a vehement cry
on behalf of black women who
experience violence and injustice.
The second half gave two French
crews a chance to shine. Compagnie
Niya combined live music (violin and
hang pad drum) with male
breakdancing that was playful and
thoughtful. Compagnie Antoinette
Gomis presented excerpts from Les
Ombres, a full-length work about the
plight of African refugees heading for
Europe, but taken out of context it
failed to resonate.
The audience favourite was Far from
the Norm, the Olivier award-winning
east London crew whose 60 Sec asks:
“Within 60 seconds how much energy
can move through our sphere?” Set to
music by Ezio Bosso and Torben Lars
Sylvest that literally shook the
auditorium with its epic reverberation,
this was a stylish display of brilliant
street dancing with a soul.
Debra CraineBreakin’ Convention
Sadler’s Wells
{{{((dance
Arcade Fire
Koko, NW1
{{{{(pop
Frontman Win Butler led Arcade Fire through an appropriately celebratory display at Koko in CamdenBurning down the house
The art-rockers
were the ideal
band to reopen
a historic
venue ravaged
by flames, says
Ed Potton
S
ome major shit has been going
down here,” said Win Butler,
the frontman of Arcade Fire, at
the jubilant reopening of this
characterful venue. “The only
thing that survived is this,” Butler
added, pointing to the mirrorball, one
of the biggest in Europe, that hangs
from Koko’s roof. That wasn’t quite
true — much of this grand old theatre
emerged from the fire of 2020
relatively intact. The £70 million
refurbishment that followed has
certainly been “major”, though,
and seriously impressive.
The focus is still the auditorium,
built in 1900, whose stage has been
trodden by Charlie Chaplin and the
Rolling Stones, Prince and Madonna.
To that list add Arcade Fire, and
the art-rockers from Montreal
rechristened it with an appropriately
celebratory display. Swapping their
instruments like batons in a relay
race, the nine-piece outfit were led
by Butler and Régine Chassagne,
a wonderfully complementary
husband-and-wife team.
Chassagne was a livewire, singing,
playing keyboards, accordion and a
rainbow keytar, and leaping about in a
range of laser-emitting outfits. For the
swooning rush of Age of Anxiety, one
of several songs from their excellentnew album WE, she wore gloves firing
out green rays. For the pulsing Age of
Anxiety II (Rabbit Hole) she switched
to a belt sprouting pink ones.
Butler cut a sterner figure. Huge
and statuesque, he asked the crowd to
“shut the f*** up” during the delicate
introduction to My Body Is a Cage. You
sympathised with him — some people
were here for the party, not to see one
of the best bands in the world playing
in a more intimate venue than they
normally would. “I’m not trying to be
an asshole,” Butler said as silence
finally fell. “I just think it’ll be really
beautiful.” It was: a ballad built around
a plangent organ and gun-like drums,
and he sang it even more desolately
for being slightly annoyed.
That moment failed to kill the
joyous mood, which reached a peak
when a horde of inflatable stickmen
were released on to the stage. Arcade
Fire tread a deft line between arty and
fun and the set was stuffed with
thrilling but thoughtful anthems, from
Ready to Start to The Suburbs. Yes, the
choruses on Everything Now and Wake
Up are wordless but they are somehow
never brainless. The crowd sang the
refrain from Wake Up for several
minutes after Butler and co had
stopped playing. We were forgiven
and he was clearly moved.