Ireland
The Weir, Harold Pinter Theatre review - evasive fantasy, bleak truth and possible communityMonday, 22 September 2025
Why are the Irish such good storytellers? The historical perspective is that the oral tradition goes way, way back, allied to the gift of the gab. On the psychological level, is it partly an evasion, an escape from telling the truth about oneself?... Read more... |
Reunion, Kiln Theatre review - a stormy night in every senseFriday, 19 September 2025
If you ever wanted to know what a mash up of Martin McDonagh and Conor McPherson, stirred (and there’s a lot of stirring in this play) with a soupçon of Chekhov, Ibsen and Williams looks like, The Kiln has your answer.Mark O’Rowe’s feuding family... Read more... |
How to be a Dancer in 72,000 Easy Lessons, Teaċ Daṁsa review - a riveting account of a life in danceFriday, 19 September 2025
Anyone who has followed the trajectory of choreographer-director Michael Keegan-Dolan and his West Kerry-based company Teaċ Daṁsa (House of Dance) will know by now to expect the unexpected. Such as a Swan Lake whose storyline, in part a searing... Read more... |
Album: NewDad - AltarThursday, 18 September 2025
With their second album Altar, the Irish combo NewDad has moved from the love-embittered shoegaze of their 2023 debut Madra toward a worldlier perspective married to a comparatively sophisticated but confrontational style. Some reviewers have... Read more... |
BBC Proms: Alexander’s Feast, Irish Baroque Orchestra, Whelan review - rapturous Handel fills the spaceMonday, 01 September 2025
Many Londoners would already have experienced the musicality incarnate of Peter Whelan and his Irish Baroque Orchestra. A smaller ensemble rocked two of Irish National Opera’s Vivaldi specials in the Linbury Theatre – one a major award winner – and... Read more... |
Album: CMAT - EURO-COUNTRYFriday, 29 August 2025
Queen of the earworm Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson has had quite the summer, capturing imaginations and sparking indignation. The brazen hussy has the audacity to wear what the hell she likes while belting out her stream of catchy country-pop, life-... Read more... |
MARS, Irish National Opera review - silly space oddity with fun stretchesMonday, 11 August 2025
The craft heads to Mars, the music remains below on earth. Which is partly intentional: composer Jennifer Walshe tells us she listened to “synth heavy music” uploaded by astronauts (“a lot of Mike Oldfield and Vangelis”), so we veer from pop to... Read more... |
Album: Cian Ducrot - Little DreamingThursday, 31 July 2025
Cian Ducrot cut his teeth on a blend of intimate singer-songwriter balladry and lowkey alt-pop, most of his debut album Victory sounding like a less personable Lewis Capaldi. There’s a modernity to Ducrot’s sound, though. The palette is... Read more... |
Album: Olafur Arnalds and Talos - A DawningMonday, 07 July 2025
Silken ambience is the name of the game on this set from Icelandic composer-producer Olafur Arnalds and dreampop singer Talos, aka Eoin French, who tragically died in August last year, aged 36. Arnalds completed the album after his death.Talos' high... Read more... |
The Brightening Air, Old Vic review - Chekhov jostles Conor McPherson in writer-director's latestSaturday, 17 May 2025
It's one thing to be indebted to a playwright, as Tom Stoppard and Harold Pinter have been at different times to Beckett, or Sondheim's latest musical is to Sartre. But Conor McPherson's The Brightening Air – the title itself is derived from Yeats... Read more... |
Album: Maria Somerville - LusterSaturday, 19 April 2025
Luster’s fifth track “Halo” has the lyric “mystical creatures… of Éirne,” referencing the Irish river and lough of the same name – both of which are associated with a mother goddess. Earlier, the album’s opener is a short, ambient-styled, scene-... Read more... |
Blue Road: The Edna O'Brien Story - compelling portrait of the ground-breaking Irish writerFriday, 18 April 2025
“I was born with the ability and the demon to write. I have been punished for it constantly.” Written and directed by Sinéad O’Shea, this fascinating documentary is a testimony to Edna O’Brien’s rebellious talent, her prolific output – a novel... Read more... |
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