The Great Train Dance performers; dancers and students from throughout the region, transformed the Severn Valley Railway into a magical experience with a puzzle to solve. In a Hitchcock thriller designed for families, this fascinating performance drew all ages on the train into the world of the absurd and seduce everyone into hunting for clues.
I missed this – I got stuck in traffic on the way there and just missed the train – so it’s good to see a film’s been produced (by Louis Price). It can’t have been easy to shoot though, there’s all sorts going on and was only performed once. It looks like it was a lot of fun.
Earlier today Alex Jones and I popped over to an aircraft hangar at Coventry Airport. Rosie Kay‘s in there at the moment with Aquila TV, filming a version of her most recent work – 5 SOLDIERS: The Body is the Frontline.
In the spirit of full disclosure I should mention that we’re involved in this project too via Meshed Media (that’s our day job, in case you didn’t know).
During my first stint on Created in Birmingham I had a nagging feeling that there was loads of good dance stuff going on but it was all happening under my radar. I’m pretty much on top of it these days, partly for the reasons given in the disclaimer at the bottom of this post but mainly because there’s so much dance stuff happening around the city this year.
Anyway, from tomorrow until Sunday, British Dance Edition – a biennial showcase of the British dance scene – is in Birmingham. It’s a big deal, with loads of venues hosting performances, events, presentations and debates. It’s a national showcase, not a local one, but there’s a fair bit of local interest:
Digbeth is Good – Sunday Xpress open mic and dangling
Quoting the organisers – “open mic session this Sunday at the Adam & Eve, Bradford Street, Digbeth. Free entry, free roast potatoes, free arts & crafts, free junk stall, free entertainment, we’ll even give you some free advice if you ask for it. We are great. Kicks off at 3pm, goes on however long we want but definitely til 7pm”. I’m not sure what the dangling involves, mind
mama feel good this October!
Ah, my musical bias is showing. I like me some funk/soul/northern soul/afrobeat and latin so on Sat 25 Oct the Bulls Head will be the place to be
Rosie Kay kicks off the DanceXchange autumn season
On 24 Sept “DanceXchange Associate Artist Rosie Kay presents the premiere of new piece Supernova, plus the welcome return of her International Dance Festival Birmingham hit Double Points: K”
Capsule Blog » Have your portrait taken for Home Of Metal archive
An “opportunity for fans of Judas Priest, Napalm Death, Godflesh, Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin to be photographed wearing their prized band t-shirts” At Scruffy Murphys in Birmingham on Friday 26 Sept 9pm – 11pm. Steve Gerrard will be doing the snapping
D’log – Mac call for artists
“There’s a call out for five new commissions for the new mac arts centre in Birmingham, which is currently being rebuilt”
Music Network meeting Thursday 31 July 4pm at The TIC
“The Birmingham branch of Musicians Union will be supplying luxury chocolate biscuits and good coffee for all. There’s food and drink afterwards supplied by the creative networks lot too. Come and talk about what you’re up to and meet some new people”
Rosie Kay Dance Company at the Edinburgh Fringe
Rosie has been invited to show Double Points: K at the festival but could do with some support to help make it happen. Here’s the justgiving page set up for that purpose
Birmingham fails to make cultural top 10
Paul Groves doesn’t know what to make of what purports to be a list of the UK’s ‘most cultured local authority areas’. Neither do I. Birmingham comes in 14th behind a slew of London authorities and Manchester
Baron Davenport’s Charity require someone to copy a (bronze?) bust
If you can help, or if you know someone who can, then contact Marlene Keenan at mkeenan@barondavenportscharity.org or on 0121 236 8004
Moseley Folk Festival 2008
“Moseley Folk Festival is again looking for smiley, happy people to help
out at the festival”. Details via the link and/or email nicola@moseleyfolk.co.uk
You can see the festival programme but it’s worth highlighting the local talent on show:
Dancer, director and chereographer, Rosie Kay, will perform her current project, The Wild Party, for the last time at the Garrick Theatre on Sat 5 July.
Thomas Trotter, Birmingham’s city organist, will play at Lichfield Cathedral on 7 and 9 July.
PolarBear, described as ‘one of Britain’s foremost performance poets‘, is doing a late night session at the Garrick Studio on 9 July. I’m listening to the tracks on his MySpace as I type this and he’s really (really) good.
The International Dance Festival Birmingham started today and continues until Sunday 25 May at venues all over the city. Pete mentioned this back in January and pointed out how truly international the line-up is, with performers from Taiwan, Australia, South Africa, Cuba and Russia, as well as “rising star” Rosie Kay from Birmingham.
The full line-up for this week (and indeed the other weeks) can be seen on their events page.
Pulling out highlights would be a fool’s errand but for those looking to sample the impressive wares without parting with their hard-earned, there are a few free events to catch:
Performances in shop windows around the city centre are taking place daily from midday all this week – head for Oasis, the Puma Store, Bathstore and Chamberlain Square. More details here.
In Victoria Square on Friday night, 9pm and on Saturday at 4pm and 9pm you can see Watch This Space which I have very high hopes for indeed.
Lastly, the festival has a blog, although I see this hasn’t been updated in the past week. I’m hoping they use it to collect together all the photos, videos and reviews that will be spun out by visitors to the events, similar to the Collective Memories that Pete did here (and that I’ll be continuing to do).
