June 2010 Archives

Were you at the Philharmonic Hall last night? Wasn't it great?
I know I sound like a sad middle aged bore, but I'm currently rediscovering the music of my youth and realising that it was actually damn good - particularly compared to some of today's output (yes, I am turning into my mum but there you go).
Then again, Elvis Costello would stand out in any generation.

I dropped in to the Unity theatre's 30th birthday party on Saturday night.
With the Hope Place gem opening in 1980, the party had an 80s theme and there was a riot of bad taste clothing on display.
It was like stepping back to my teenage years!

LIiverpool Cathedral is looking for new "Noble Women"
It wants nominations for women who have shattered today's glass ceilings....although they won't get a glass window as the ladies of 1910 did I'm afraid.

Here's my review from the press night of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists last night..

WHEN Robert Tressell died of wasted lungs in Liverpool in 1911, his magnum opus The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists - all 1,600 pages of it - was languishing in a box under his daughter's bed after being turned down by no fewer than three publishers.

I went to the opening of Liverpool Hope University's Angel Field last night.
After spending a week in wet and windy (and cold!) France last week while Liverpool basked in the sunshine...typical...it was lovely to spend Midsummer's Evening outside in a beautiful garden.

So I see Sir Paul "Macca" McCartney has been asked to write the music for a new ballet.
No news that I could see on who had commissioned him, what the story was, whether it's going to be classical or contemporary - if anyone can enlighten me I'd be delighted.
Maybe he'll let slip a little more about it when he comes to the annual Lipa graduation ceremony next month?
What I would say is that if it is produced, I hope at sometime we may see the finished ballet in Liverpool....

So who is your money on in the race to become the first UK City of Culture in 2013?
Birmingham, Sheffield, Derry and Norwich were all in Liverpool yesterday to make their final pitches to Phil Redmond and the judges.

Pamela Anderson has been announced as the big name in this year's panto Aladdin at the Liverpool Empire.
Obviously the lovely Henry "Fonzie" Winkler must have put in a good word for the delights of a festive Liverpool and so Pammie, who appeared in the same show at Wimbledon last year, is heading north west for Christmas.

They seek him here, they seek him there, but next weekend Anthony Andrews - Scarlet Pimpernel, Nero, and of course Lord Sebastian Flyte - will be at Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall.
The actor is set to appear as Professor Henry Higgins - the role Liverpool's Sir Rex Harrison famously played on stage and screen - in a concert version of My Fair Lady with the RLPO.

I've been to a couple of shows over the last week which may have worked better in a different setting - and I'd be interested in people's feedback on the issue.
The first was Mamma Mia! which is currently playing at the ECHO arena, while the second is The Hobbit at the Empire.