Unrelated – Film

This was a really interesting first film from writer and director Joanna Hogg.     Anna, played superbly here by Kathryn Worth in her first film role, arrives to join her old school friend Verena (Mary Roscoe) who is on holiday in a villa in Tuscany with her family and another family in what is clearly an [...]

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Jeff Beck at Ronnie Scott’s – BBC Four

I caught Jeff Beck’s set from Ronnie Scott’s on BBC Four recently, and have not enjoyed music on TV as much as this for ages – and that includes Later with Jools Holland, good though that show is.
Here was Beck, relaxed and really enjoying himself in an intimate club atmosphere.    His guitar playing was sensational, [...]

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Oleanna – Perth Theatre

This is a play that I have been wanting to see for a while, but never quite managed to get to, so it was fortunate that Guy Masterton’s Theatre Tours International brought this to Perth – one of only two venues in Scotland on this tour.
This production has been around for a while, first appearing [...]

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Scottish Opera

I have been to two operas in Glasgow fairly recently, and was very disappointed with audience numbers.    In other European cities, both performances would have been packed out, and difficult to get tickets for.
So, what is going wrong?    Scottish Opera does all the right things, and ticks the right boxes.    They go into schools, they [...]

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The Lesson – Benchtours – Dundee Rep

Benchtours Theatre Company have had their funding taken away from them, so this might be their final show, which is a pity.   The company has produced challenging and engaging work for the past 15 years, so I hope that something happens to allow them to continue.
The Lesson is a typically quirky short play from Eugene Ionesco, [...]

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Sunset Song – Perth Theatre

It seems much more recently than 2001 when Prime Productions performed Alastair Cording’s adaptation of Sunset Song, directed by Benjamin Twist in a touring production.    It was haunting and deservedly award-winning.
The current staging by Kenny Ireland working with a team from HMT in Aberdeen was not quite as successful, despite an excellent central performance from [...]

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Scottish Ensemble – Red.

The Scottish Ensemble chose Perth to perform their first concert of the season.   This year, each concert has a name, and this was ‘Red’.    The programme was a well balanced mixture of Baroque and Shostakovich, and joining the Ensemble were two top class soloists.    We had spied Alison Balsom and Jonathan Morton in the chamber orchestra for [...]

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Some R and R – Go Ape – Aberfoyle

A friend is getting married soon, so for a stag activity day, we all went to Go Ape at Aberfoyle.    Go Ape is a high wire ropes course, and the Aberfoyle site has the second-longest and the longest zip-wires in the UK.
We were fitted into safety harnesses and had a fairly lenghty training session, where [...]

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A Delicate Question

I think that most people now have access to soap and running water these days.    We have come a long way from standpipes and outside lavatories.     And the ‘weekly bath’ – or there again, perhaps not? 
There a consistent and recurring problem with an older audience at Perth Concert Hall.     Several times over the past year we have [...]

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Fire Exit Doors, or the Horsecross Challenge

Often, the quickest way to leave a theatre is to go out by the fire doors.    It is a quick way to clear the building, and avoids everyone having to crush out of the front doors.     In Theatre Royal in Glasgow, many people in the 2nd circle and the Gods leave by the fire staircases [...]

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