Hilary Finch at the Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool
A triple triumph for Liverpool: a home win, a uniquely enterprising act of homage to Shostakovich and inspiring new blood at the helm of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. And all in one night.
As the 30-year-old Vasily Petrenko takes up the baton at the start of his first season as principal conductor of the RLPO, Shostakovich’s centenary was celebrated in the first collaboration between the European Opera Centre (now based at Liverpool Hope University) and the RLPO. They presented a double bill of the single extant act of Shostakovich’s projected Gogol opera, The Gamblers, and the composer’s completion and orchestration of Veniamin Fleishman’s tiny Chekhov opera, Rothschild’s Violin.
Rothschild’s Violin is the only surviving composition of the student of Shostakovich who was killed in 1941 at the age of 28 when Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. Shostakovich thought highly enough of it to complete it, and to provide a postlude of orchestral variations that form a crescendo of an apotheosis to a work of extraordinary humanity.
The eponymous violin symbolises the redemptive power of music in the life of the terminally morose coffin-maker and klezmer fiddler Yakov Matreievich Ivanov. And both Fleishman’s beautifully characterised and structured score and Elena Tzavara’s simple concert dramatisation made of the work a Chagall animation in sound. The young cast, led by the nicely laconic Polish bass Jacek Janiszewski and the Russian mezzo Elena Gabouri as his dying wife, fleshed out the music’s yearning, its hopes and its fears.
The RLPO rose to the challenge, clearly inspired by the palpable enthusiasm of Petrenko. And a motley crew of obese gamblers, tarts and balalaika players even made a creditable silk purse out of the sow’s ear that was the fragment of The Gamblers. Shostakovich’s determination to set every word of Gogol backfires horribly in a text as tedious as a Soviet-period phrasebook (“the smoked fish is not special, but the caviar is passable”). And the score — only a preamble, after all — is no more than serviceable. Everyone tried more than hard, though — and the RLPO is playing like an orchestra reborn.
LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL 2006 - INTERNATIONAL 06 AT FACT
Matthew Buckingham, Obscure Moorings. Courtesy the artist
24 Hour Museum's Kay Carson is impressed as she visits FACT to see a fascinating line up of work
If you have time to visit only one venue during Liverpool Biennial, make it FACT. The cutting-edge arts centre has pulled it off again, offering an impressive line-up of exciting new commissions for International 06, which runs until November 26, 2006.
And it's not just a visual feast: greeting you when entering the foyer are piped noises - and smells - of Liverpool. If that sounds gimmicky, it isn't in reality. This attempt to capture the essence of the metropolis is OUTSIDEIN, the work of Norwegian Sissel Tolaas, but it's only an appetizer for what's to come.
There are also works by artists from Finland, Canada, Thailand, India and the USA – a veritable smorgasbord.
Anu Pennanen, A Day in the Office. Courtesy the artist
A Day In The Office celebrates the transition Liverpool is currently undergoing. The video chronicles the daily routines of seven office workers. Filmmaker Anu Pennanen uses the workers' voices to narrate the piece, some nostalgically and some with humour.
In true FACT fashion, every nook and cranny of the building is being used for the festival – part two of Pennanen's film is projected on the outside of the building.
The Godfather of Thai cinema – otherwise known as experimental artist Apichatpong Weerasethakul – has produced an eerily silent, two-screen spectacle entitled Faith (2006), charting the loneliness and heartbreak of humans, using space as a metaphor for that all-consuming feeling of isolation.
Apichatpong Weerasethakul, FAITH, 2006. Photo: Adisorn Saovadee © Kick the Machine Films
Each screen focuses on one solitary space traveller. They each lead parallel existences where, at times, their experiences intersect, and at others are polar opposites. It's slow moving – balletic, even – but absolutely compulsive viewing as we witness the gradual and symbolic disintegration of relationships.
Lightening the mood, Shilpa Gupta's untitled work invites visitors to become part of her video installation. Rather like being inside a giant game of Tetris, participants' images are cast on to a screen, where houses come flying down and land on them.
Again, it echoes the regeneration of the host city and reminds us that, no matter how permanent bricks and mortar may appear, they can be torn down in an instant. This particular urban landscape's evolution is rapidly gaining momentum.
Shilpa Gupta, Untitled C-Prints, 2006. Courtesy the artist
The most captivating piece of the festival is short film Obscure Moorings, by Matthew Buckingham. It’s a mini-masterpiece. At just 22 minutes long, not a second is wasted as we observe the fate of an old sailor returning to dry land after a lifetime at sea.
American Buckingham's work is a modern-day slant on an old, old tale – Herman Melville's Daniel Orme of 1891 – and is filmed entirely in Liverpool.
The lead character's touching portrayal of a man in quiet, cowed turmoil, surrendering himself to change, combined with such familiar surroundings – anyone who has arrived by train into Lime Street will immediately relive those steep, sandstone walls – that the ultimate effect is simply haunting.
The reason these pieces work so well is because they manage to fuse together the two faces of Liverpool: the one looking humbly inward to its natives and the one looking out towards the rest of the world – something which the Culture Capital-elect will have to develop even further as it continues to shine on the international arts stage.
Welcome to the university of Liverpool's China campus
MADE in China - with more than a little help from their friends in Liverpool.
The University of Liverpool celebrated a major milestone yesterday, when it opened a university in China - the first ever such UK/China venture.
In 2004, the University of Nottingham opened a branch campus in the city of Ningbo, Zhejiang province, but this new university is the first of its kind, as it is independent and offers its own degrees.
As the first students arrived at the Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, its executive vice president, who has been seconded from Liverpool, said he was delighted that it had become part of the family.Professor Michael Fang, a pro-vice-chancellor at the University of Liverpool, explained: "As one of the parents, the University of Liverpool is proud to welcome its new offspring and will continuously provide support for XJTLU.
"At Liverpool we have every confidence that this is the very beginning of a great institution which will devote itself to the advancement of knowledge and produce graduates of a high calibre."
The university is in Suzhou, around 90km from Liverpool's twin city of Shanghai and part of the Jiangsu Province - one of the wealthiest regions in China.
Liverpool’s Casbah Club becomes listed building
Culture minister David Lammy has announced that The Casbah Club in Liverpool, where The Beatles played their first live performance, has become a Grade II listed building.
The club still has murals and paintings by John and Cynthia Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and The Beatles’ original drummer, Pete Best.
The club was also the site where the group signed their first contract with manager Brian Epstein.
English Heritage advised that the club should be listed, due to its special historic interest as representing “tangible evidence of the Beatles’ formation”. The Casbah closed in 1962 with a Beatles gig on the final night and has remained unaltered ever since.
Lammy said: “The Beatles were truly giants of popular culture in the 20th century. It is absolutely right that the club where the group first learnt their craft should be badged as an important part of our heritage and receive the extra protection from harmful redevelopment that listed building status affords.” Details: www.casbahcoffeeclub.com
Britain protects Liverpool basement where Beatles played
LIVERPOOL, England — A suburban basement where The Beatles played some of their earliest gigs was given protected heritage status by the British government Friday.
The Casbah Coffee Club, created in the home of original Beatles drummer Pete Best, was given Grade II Listed status on the recommendation of conservation body English Heritage. The designation means the venue, which still contains original artwork and musical equipment, is of "special architectural or historic interest" and cannot be demolished.
Best's mother, Mona, created the club in the basement and coal cellar of her Victorian house on the edge of Liverpool after reading about the "beat" clubs popular with teenagers in London.
John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison — then billed as The Quarrymen — played at the club's opening in April 1959 as a last-minute replacement for scheduled headliners, the Les Stewart Quartet.
Best later joined the band, renamed The Silver Beatles and then The Beatles. The band played the Casbah many times until the club closed in 1962. The same year, Best was replaced as drummer by Ringo Starr and The Beatles released their first single, Love Me Do.
The building, still owned by the Best family, features murals and paintings by members of the band and by Lennon's first wife, Cynthia.
Bob Hawkins of English Heritage said the club was "in a remarkably well-preserved condition ... with wall and ceiling paintings of spiders, dragons, rainbows and stars by original band members along with 1960s musical equipment, amplifiers and original chairs."
"We know of no other survival like it in Liverpool or indeed anywhere else," he said.
Definitive history of Liverpool's 800 years
A professor and 'honorary Scouser' has written a book to mark Liverpool's 800-year-old past - and its historical significance. Mike Chapple reports
Daily Post
OUT of the past 800 years, five might seem a very short period indeed. But they have been very important years for the city - because, finally, after five years, the definitive history of Liverpool has been completed in time for its 800th anniversary celebrations in 2007.
However, John Belchem - the man behind the creation of the book Liverpool 800 Culture Character and History - is philosophical about finally seeing his long-awaited, whopper-sized, paper baby delivered in the flesh.
"When I first picked it up, it was an absolutely fabulous moment, because it was the first time I'd had a chance to look at the thing as a whole," said the Professor of History at the University of Liverpool.
"I showed it to my wife Mary and she thought it was fantastic and other people thought it was terrific.
Review: The Liverpool Football Miscellany
There is something for every fan in "The Liverpool Miscellany". Liverpool FC has a widely diverse and amazingly successful history, but this book is not exclusively a history, or a fan's guide, or a collection of biographies, or even an encyclopedia. It is a little bit of all of these things. Within these pages, the reader will learn thousands of quirky and obscure facts about The Reds on a wide range of topics, from the history of Anfield, to the European glory nights, famous managers, and match-day facts and stats.
More than a book of lists or compilation of trivia, this expertly researched volume will bring hours of reading pleasure to any ardent follower of The Pool.
Pool fans everywhere will enjoy a new book about the club written by the author of more than a dozen football books, John White. His Liverpool Football Miscellany gives a wonderful cornucopia of history, biographies, fan's guide and general and obscure information about Liverpool Football Club from its formation up to the present day.
Like an encyclopaedia of the club, Johns' book aims to bring hours of reading pleasure to any Reds fan. The Liverpool Football Miscellany has a foreword by Phil Thompson. Published earlier this month and retailing at £9.99 each, the book can actually be found cheaper on internet book sites such as www.amazon.co.uk
