Online survey for bands/musicians/DJs
“This is a survey to support the conceptualisation of a local music platform. It is a student project of mine within the Music Industries course at BCU”
News: Birmingham Opera Company
“You’re invited to join us and find out more about the company and how to get involved in our next production Life is a Dream which will premiere in Birmingham in 2012.”
15 July 2011 was the first anniversary of Birmingham not winning the title of City of Culture 2013. An odd thing to celebrate maybe, but Radar Magazine used it as an opportunity to get a load of people to talk about the creative or cultural experience that had most impressed them over the past year.
I could’ve mentioned any number of things, but in the end I gave a nod to Birmingham Opera Company‘s really-very-excellent-indeed Othello.
I can’t find a copy online – if there’s one floating about then please add a link in the comments.
Actually, speaking of CoC 2013, have the plans for the “six-week Autumn Festival which will have the significance of the Edinburgh festival and Paris Autumn Festival” been officially binned? I remember statements to the effect that it was going to happen regardless of whether Birmingham got the title or not, so strong were the arguments in favour of going ahead.
Still, as has been pointed out, there are quite a few festivals happening in October already.
Job listing for Birmingham Contemporary Art Forum: Call for Proposals (The Event)
Good to hear this is happening again, I liked the last one. “Birmingham Contemporary Art Forum is pleased to announce it is currently seeking projects from artists and curators in the UK for inclusion in The Event 2011, to take place 21 – 30 October”
Experiencing Burningham’s Live Graffiti Battle: Tagged@EXYZT
“We hope Tagged@EXYZT opened new minds to street art and showed the soul and joy a community the city would rather not exist can create. For all of us involved it was an evening where Birmingham sparkled”
Presenting the world’s biggest art prize: the £175,000 Gulbenkian
“Graham Vick and his Birmingham Opera want to turn Brecht and Weill’s political satire Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny into a multi-participant online production examining the survival of the soul in a virtual world”
Desert Island Life « More Canals than Venice
Jeans Retailer Promotion in Decent Line-up of Events Shock. Featuring Project Pigeon, Flatpack Festival, LOAF, Chicks Dig Jerks, Them Lot and Mr Hudson (NB – some, perhaps all, of this has happened already)
Pickled
Based in The Oasis: “Here at Pickled, we aim to provide a hireable exhibition space for anyone in the arts. From the amateur to the professional, we want anyone with an interesting art idea or project to come along and exhibit their work”
Just a quick one to say that BBC 2 are broadcasting a double bill of Birmingham Opera Company this Saturday, 19 Feb. You can catch Verdi: The Director’s Cut at 3.25pm and Othello at 4.25pm – 7pm.
Verdi: The Director’s Cut – Graham Vick prepares his production of Verdi’s Aida for Bregenz Festival on the banks (and sometimes in!) Lake Constance. The film maker, Andy King Dabbs then followed Graham Vick to Birmingham to document the creation of another new Verdi production, Othello, with Birmingham Opera Company in the Argyle Works, a former factory, in Digbeth.
Othello – a broadcast of the Birmingham Opera Company production in its entirety starring Ronald Samm as Othello – the first time in a professional production in the UK the role has been sung by a black tenor. He is joined by Stephanie Corley as Desdemona and Keel Watson as Iago and the Birmingham Opera Company Orchestra & Chorus is conducted by the distinguished UK conductor Stephen Barlow.
Christmas Day television treated us to Birmingham Royal Ballet, with a prime Christmas dinner slot on BBC1, while Birmingham Opera Company also made it onto BBC4 for post dinner relaxation.
Merry Christmas from one and all at Created in Birmingham!
To be honest, I’d be surprised if anyone is reading this (and to be even more honest, I wrote this a few days back anyway) but, in case it’s timely, here are a few things on TV that you might be interested in today:
Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Cinderella, BBC2 at 3pm
Best of European Opera 2010 (ft Birmingham Opera Company’s Othello), BBC4 at 7pm
Fullrange – This Is Birmingham
“The film was being commissioned by commercial property giant Land Securities. Although buried under layers of non-disclosure at the time, they were planning to use the film as part of a sales pitch to sell a sizeable stake in Britain’s busiest shopping centre, Bullring”
Hell’s Kitchen star Marco Pierre White to open Birmingham restaurant
“Marco Pierre White – who was the youngest ever chef to receive three Michelin stars – is set to launch a Steakhouse Bar and Grill on the 25th floor of the recently completed Cube development in the heart of Birmingham”
Birmingham City Council reveals plans to axe 10,000 jobs
“Coun Randal Brew (Con Northfield), cabinet member for finance, said: “We are giving people the opportunity to help themselves.” Right, yes, aren’t they the lucky ones.
steveharding’s posterous
Steve Harding works “in a policy role in Birmingham City University on EU projects about the creative economy”. Interesting to see comparisons between Birmingham and the other cities he visits
I attended this last night, the performance was absolutely incredible. I am a huge fan of Birmingham Opera Company, they blow me away every year. We are so lucky to have such an exciting organisation in Bham.
And I have to say I absolutely agree. It was great, and had more ideas, cheekiness and more serious things to say packed into its 30 minute running time than just about anything else I’ve seen this year.
A proper review of the show won’t be worth me writing – if I’m honest I’m still not quite sure what happened. I hardly remember the music and had no idea what was going on most of the time. Everything was going on most of the time. It was more an installation than anything with the cast (hundreds of brides and grooms) running riot throughout AE Harris.
Things started as soon as we started drifting into the building, with the cast getting into character and assuming odd positions all over the place. I know I’m not the only person to have taken this picture:
And to think this was ‘just’ a quick little thing to fill the gap before a bigger production in the spring of next year. Can’t wait for that.
Now I think of it, there’s been quite a bit of Stravinsky around recently. BRB included The Firebird in Russian Steps in 2008 and the 3D audiovisual spectacular version of The Rite of Spring will be at the Symphony Hall next year. Anyone for Petroushka?
This weekend Birmingham Opera Company will be presenting Stravinsky’s The Wedding at A E Harris. The experimental performance will last half an hour, as audiences are drawn around the space, with no formal seating and performance area.
The Wedding is a screaming, shrieking, flat out masterpiece with its rhythmic drive and unique sound world – 4 virtuoso pianists on grand pianos, a dazzling array of percussion, 4 soloists and a chorus. Written as a ballet in 1923 for Diaghilev’s Ballet Russes, Stravinsky drew on Russian traditions to conjure up a vivid and intense depiction of the old ways, and the not so old!
Performances take place on Friday 19th November 8.30pm / Saturday 20th November 7.30pm & 9pm / Sunday 21st November 4pm & 5.30pm.
Tickets are £7.50 (£5 concessions) and can be booked through The Ticket Sellers on 0844 870 0000
Birmingham Opera Company’s Verdi’s Othello and a documentary on the work of Graham Vick are to be broadcast in June 2010 on BBC 2
Which is good. I remember hearing that the BBC came in to film Othello during it’s hugely fantastic run at the end of last year but I also heard it didn’t go quite as planned. Looks like everything turned out alright after all.
I’m disappointed I missed a talk by Birmingham Opera Company‘s Graham Vick at the Barber Institute yesterday lunchtime. I need to keep a closer eye on what happens over there (and maybe, y’know, get round to visiting at some point).
The arts in the UK are blighted with fearfulness, conservatism, reactionary ordinariness. Our job is to build a more exciting, bolder future than the past has been. There is no such thing as tradition. The earth never stops moving. Stasis is a delusion. Be open to changeability.
Birmingham Hippodrome Brochure April 2010
The forthcoming summer/autumn/winter programme from Big Theatre. A whole heap of dance (esp IDFB and BRB) and musicals with a dash of opera
Creative Survival in Hard Times « D’log
“Creative Survival in Hard Times is a new report from New Deal of the Mind, commissioned by the Arts Council. It explores policy options for supporting young creatives in the UK, and the key useful suggestions are…” Click the link to read on
And plenty more besides, although nine months away from CiB (and a fair amount of time out of the country) meant that I was slightly more out of touch with some of the smaller-ticket stuff.
Birmingham Opera Company were featured (at 11mins). Othello is currently racking up rave reviews in a manner approaching unseemly – 5 stars in the Guardian and Times and the Birmingham Post described it (somewhat inaccurately, seeing as how it’s sold out) as ‘unmissable’.
Dice Productions also made it onto the show in a feature on online comedy (at 51mins):
