Edinburgh International Festival 2017 - Reviews

Edinburgh International Festival  - EIF 2017 - Reviews 

My musical introduction

• Mitsuke Uchida In Recital  - 21 August 2017

I have no great knowledge of the minutiae of classical music, and learned most of what I know about it from my grandad's 12 album Reader's Digest collection of "light classical music". So with an open mind I have tended to just give things a go, without any pre-conceived notions about it. I have found that I particularly enjoy opera and twentieth century classical music. My oldest son however has been learning to play the piano for several years now, and has given me great insights into the music that he likes, of Mozart and Chopin. About 8 years ago when he had not long started playing piano, we took him to see Mitsuke Uchida play in Glasgow City Halls. So I was delighted to take the chance to see her again in the Edinburgh Festival this year. 

The Japanese pianist is a world renowned interpreter of the works of Mozart and Schubert, but the main reason that I rushed to get tickets for this recital in Edinburgh was because of the mention that she got in a book that I read recently. Absolutely On Music is written by Haruki Murakami, recounting his discussions about music, from several afternoons spent with Japanese conductor Seiji Ozawa. As they listen to a recording of Uchida playing Beethoven, Murakami says

"Her touch is so clear. You can hear everything so clearly - every strong note, every quiet note. She plays with total mastery: there is nothing vague in her performance" 

 Ozawa adds...

"Listen to that, those perfect moments of silence....What an ear she has for music!"

Murakami describes the next section of the music with a flourish 

"(a) beautiful piano solo unfolds, like an ink painting in space. A string of notes, perfectly formed and brimming with courage, each note thinking for itself." 

It is a great book, with specific details about the music they are listening to whilst they speak, and timings about which sections they are discussing - the master and the enthusiast. In the era of music streaming you can find most of the recordings online and listen along as you read, part of the conversation. 

The stage is set at the Usher Hall, Edinburgh, for Mitsuku Uchida

Anyway, I loved that book and Murakami's description of Uchida's playing drew me to the Usher Hall tonight. The programme started with Mozart's piano sonata facile in C major K545. I didn't recognise it from the title, but the first 5 bars of this piece is the ONLY bit of music that my dad can still play, 50 years after he stopped learning the piano. My childhood was punctuated by his enthusiastic playing of 20 seconds of this before it faded into plinkity-plonkety, every time we passed piano somewhere. Though I had my own reasons, I am sure that I wasn't the only one with a grin on their face listening to this rendition of Mozart's playful, frisky tune. The reason for starting with this was evident in the second half of the performance which began with a modern Sonatina facile from German composer Jorg Widmann, a homage to Mozart's well known piece. When recognisable neo-classical phrases bubbled up they were scattered sideways by wild distortions. This was my favourite piece of the evening. 

The main meat of the evening was in two longer, and more dramatic, pieces by Robert Schumann. His tribute to Hoffman, Kreisleriana, crashed about one minute, before, quietly fading away and Fantasy in C major was a grandiose way to finish the night. 

Uchida is a star performer who held the attention of the whole hall. With her total mastery, there was indeed nothing vague about her performance. 

Edinburgh Castle

• Mariinsky and RSNO - 23 August 2017

So back again to the Usher Hall two days later to see another classical music celebrity, conductor Valery Gergiev, tonight conducting his own Mariinsky Orchestra from St Petersburg and our very own RNSO. The reason for the combined forces was to do the final piece of the night justice. Shostakovich's Symphony No 4 calls for an orchestra of 100+ musicians and is a masterclass in grandiose music, conjuring up the "gigantomania" of the USSR in the 1930s. 

To begin we had the Mariinsky perform a piece from another major Russian composer of the 20th century, Sergei Prokofiev.  His "Classical"symphony rolled along sweetly, with crisp playing throughout, particularly from the lead violin. It is a piece of music written in 1917 at the time of the Russian Revolution, that straddles the music of two centuries, the 20th century and the 18th. It was a controlled and professional performance, without any great drama. 

As the Mariinsky Orchestra shuffled off stage, the string section of the Royal National Scottish Orchestra came on, to be led by Gergiev in a rendition of Benjamin Britten's 1937 piece Variations on a theme of Frank Bridge. The theme of the piece sweeps across the orchestra in the opening and swirls around again at the end with more force. In between the musicians are put through every possible method to play their instruments, at one moment pizzicato, the next strumming their violins like ukuleles. A slight lack of variation between the "variations" started to make the piece sag a bit in the middle, and Gergiev seemed to perform with greater languor than when he was guiding the music of Prokofiev. Overall the piece feels a bit cinematic, but the RSNO played as a tight unit, with humour and levity in their manner under the inscrutable gaze of Gergiev. 

The combined orchestras assemble on stage at the Usher Hall

In the second half the concert caught fire, with Shostakovich's Symphony No 4. The massed ranks of both orchestras filled the stage and Gergiev conducted with energy, holding the two orchestras together as one unified instrument. There is a lot of clashing drama in the symphony, but also moments of quiet, with lovely solos from various musicians showing how calm and quiet 100+ musicians on stage can be (I didn't count, that's a quick guesstimate). There was impressive musicianship throughout, playing a fantastic piece of music and when the final hush fell, the full Usher Hall paused in sat in silence, waiting for Gergiev's permission to applaud. Special mention must go to Lynda Cochrane of the RSNO who had the nerve-wracking role of striking out the final notes of the symphony alone on the celesta, and mopped her brow in relief at the end after. Поздравляем всех вас.  

Edinburgh. One Day at the Festivals.

Edinburgh Festival Reviews

Every year I try to have a quick run around as much as I can in a day at the Edinburgh festivals. Every year I underestimate how long it will take me to get from venue to venue when the pavements are all choc-a-bloc with people dragging wheelie suitcases or trying to hand out flyers. So as usual I tried to squeeze in too much.

Here are some quick reviews of the shows that I managed to catch, in case you are planning to take in a couple.

Thoughtful

Issues of refugees are being discussed in several shows at the Fringe this year. The Sleeper (by Henry C. Krempels in a pokey space in the top floor of the Jury's Inn Hotel) starts with the testimony of real Syrian refugees. An Englishwoman on an overnight train across Europe returns from the bathroom to find "a pair of eyes" in her couchette. Reporting it to a world-weary staff member on the train he asks her to decide if she wants him to deal with it. They replay the confrontation, to see what choices we can all make in such a situation. The person who seems powerless to determine her fate is Amena, whose voice we struggle to listen to in all this (well played by Aya Daghem with a startled air of confusion). A quick wake up call to your brain in its 10.30am slot in the fringe programme. (Their shows have a later 11.40am time for the remainder of the run).

Angry 

It is difficult doing a stand-up show at noon, when your more sobre audience requires a bit more work to loosen them up, but Eleanor Morton at The Stand gives it a good go. In a show titled Angry Young Woman, she is angry about most things. Particular ire is aimed at the everyday sexism in our world which, funnily enough, female comedians (or comediennes if you prefer) are exposed to on and off stage. It would be good to see more of her, but as TV panel shows already meet their one woman per show quota, you probably won't.

Also apparently very angry is Lucy Porter, with her show Choose Your Battles at the Pleasance Courtyard. However it is the middle-class rage of losing the keys for the Volvo that is the subject of her show. Where Eleanor Morton was earlier talking about faking it by going about on public transport with a yoga mat prominently displayed under her arm, Lucy Porter was talking about her yoga classes. All a bit cosy.

Classy

The one name that jumped out at me when I saw the programme for this year's Edinburgh International Book Festival, was James Kelman's. With a new collection of short stories released this month (That Was A Shiver available now - go buy it at your local bookshops). He was on top form, and I was delighted that instead of reading from his new book he decided to talk to us about his thoughts on literature in general and the position of artists in Scotland today. TV's Brian Taylor was a good host, reflecting on his university studies of Descartes as they talked. Kelman talked about his own learning, starting from the Realism of Zola and moving on to Camus, Kafka, Kierkegaard, Dostoyevsky, Pushkin, and so it goes on. A curious mind exploring his world, and finding his voice in trying to express the subjective experience of his characters. Nobody else in Scottish (or British) literature comes close to this existential ventriloquism. Good painters start by first observing people and the world around them, and Kelman is a master of his art because of his ability to observe, and to listen, to people.

I bought a ticket for The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk as it is based on paintings I like by Marc Chagall, who often pictures himself and his wife floating over the town. Thinking of Chagall's paintings gives me terrible flashbacks, as my then 2 year old daughter all but managed to crash straight through a 10 foot painting of his when we visited the Musée National Marc Chagall. Thankfully no damage was done to either her or the painting. The play, by Kneehigh theatre company, is a two-header with Marc Antolin as Chagall and Audrey Brisson as his wife Bella, accompanied by two musicians. The fantastic choreography and Marc Antolin's floppy-haired physical similarity to Chagall does make the paintings appear before your eyes. Clever stagecraft throughout manages to carry a love story and a turbulent historical period, without distracting from the storytelling. A lovely way to spend an hour and a half.

Over the Town 1918 by Marc Chagall

Topical

Written by Sabrina Mahfouz (whose essay was one of the stand out's in the excellent book The Good Immigrant) and Hollie McNish, the play Offside benefits from the poetry that both writers excel at, with a rhythm and beat to the script that matches the muscular physicality of the story. On stage Daphne Kouma, Tanya-Loretta Dee and Jessica Butcher tell the real stories of Emma Clarke, a black footballer who played for Scotland in the 1890s and of Lily Parr from the 1920s. Flicking back and forwards to the current day the play tackles issues of prejudice, sexism, mental health, intrusive journalism, body image matters and more, but manages to stay on track by having a story that you want to follow weaving through all of this. The melodrama that real football can generate sometimes translates badly to film or theatre, but my problem  was that Emma Clarke's life sounds so interesting that I wanted to hear more about her, playing in Glasgow in the 1890s, than the imagined England players of the modern phase of the play. If it's true drama that you area after, the Scottish Women's Premier League is about to kick off again after a short hiatus for the Euros there. Glasgow City FC's next home game is against Hamilton Accies on Sunday 3rd September.

Goalkeeper Emma Clarke, in the back row here of Mrs Graham's XI in 1895

Oddity

Described as an "experimental opera" and written by Roddy Bottum, keyboardist with Faith No More, I found Sasquatch: The Opera a lot of fun. As a rock-opera the live music from Bottum himself on keyboards, accompanied by electronic beats, timpani drums and brass was very impressive, and far more dramatic than the story playing out in front of the musicians. I did not ever expect to see an opera where a drug-addled hill-billy family con tourists with their fake Sasquatch, before the chained up daughter of the family flees into the woods and falls in love with the real beast, who it turns out is a real pussycat with a falsetto voice. The surprising chorus working the forest meth lab in the second half of the story help hunt down the beast and...well you can go and see it if you want to find out what happens. Bass-baritone singer Joe Chappel should have his own show on at the fringe whilst he is here, as he has a great voice. It's a strange hotchpotch of ideas and maybe needs stronger direction and better acting to knock the story into shape, but if you want entertained you should see it now in case it gets the rough edges knocked off of it.

Stuffy

Part of the official Edinburgh International Festival, Had We Never, Robert Burns: Chains and Slavery, was a late night concert performed in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. The museum currently has two fascinating exhibits that offer a dialogue between Robert Burns's idealised character as demonstrated by the white marble statue of him in the main hall here, and the truer, more flawed character, who was on the verge of heading to Jamaica to work on the plantations before his poetry took off. Douglas Gordon has copied the white marble statue, in black marble, and as a literal iconoclast, has thrown its broken parts onto the hall floor at the feet of Burns. Graham Fagen has a video installation of reggae singer Ghetto Priest singing a new version of Burns's The Slave's Lament  by composer Sally Beamish.

Reflecting on these works an evening of Burns's poems and songs was promised, with new works by Jackie Kay and a live performance by Ghetto Priest and musicians from the Scottish Ensemble. It was a terribly Edinburgh affair, stilted and old fashioned. Instead of trying to see Burns differently much of it was based around old fashioned, churchy performances of Burns's works from bass singer Brian Bannatyne-Scott and counter-tenor David James. Away from the Caribbean angle, the international works were a bit dry. I like Avro Part's version of My heart is in the Highland's but like much of his work it feels very religious and churchy. I know the Shostakovich Burns stuff in Russian as I heard many earnest renditions of them at the Scotland-USSR Friendship Society, but again that took me to the late 1970s/ early 1980s. Jackie Kay brought fresher moments with her playful poems on Douglas Gordon's sculpture and on Burns, such as Resume The Plough, where she spoke of Burns getting "Awa frae polite society/ And Edinburgh literary soirees". I bet she was thinking the same thing. I have never been to a Jackie Kay reading which wasn't filled with laughter and applause and I have never, ever heard such a fussy rendition of A Man's A Man, in which I seemed to be the only person wanting to join in. All in all it was a very strange programme.

I was maybe getting a bit tired by midnight when it finished, but I was now ready to go back to Glasgow, where audiences are a bit more bawdy.

Greek by Mark-Anthony Turnage. Scottish Opera at Edinburgh International Festival 2017

Review - Greek by Mark-Anthony Turnage.
Scottish Opera and Opera Ventures at Edinburgh International Festival 2017

Hibernian vs Partick Thistle. Incest patricide and plague

Two years ago I combined an afternoon at a Partick Thistle away game in the capital, with an evening at the Edinburgh Festival. Unfortunately that day a 3-0 defeat by Hearts was what preceded an evening of Greek tragedy, with Juliette Binoche as Antigone. Much as the heroes of Greek plays often fail to learn the lessons of their ancestors, I optimistically tried to combine a trip to Easter Road to see Partick Thistle open their season with a match against Hibs, with another Greek tragedy in the evening. The day started much as it did two years ago, with a 3-1 Partick Thistle defeat setting a dark mood for the evening's entertainment. 

Hibernian 3-1 Partick Thistle

The Greek stories persist because they are good stories. They also give us a prism with which to examine our current world. This year at the Edinburgh Festival alongside Mark-Anthony Turnage's Opera, Zinnie Harris's re-telling of The Oresteia, which I saw (and loved) last year, in on show (Oresteia: This Restless House review). 

In Greek mythology Antigone is the daughter of Oedipus, her tragic fate set in motion by the history of her father's actions. Tonight we were going to hear about the deeds of the father. Mark-Anthony Turnage's Greek is an opera of Steven Berkoff's play of that name, which re-staged the Oedipus myth in the east end of London in the 1980s. 

Oedipus in Greek mythology, was left on a hillside to die by his father, King Laius, to prevent a prophecy that he would grow up to kill his father and marry his mother. Found and raised as their own by King Polybus and Queen Merope he hears the prophecy of what he is fated to do, from the Delphic oracle, and not knowing his real parentage flees Thebes to avoid his fate. In the classic example of  the Scot's phrase "whit's fir ye'll no go by ye" he ends up unknowingly killing his father, marrying Queen Jocasta his mother, and bringing a plague upon the lands by his actions. Discovering the truth he rips out his eyes and lives on forever in the strange mind of Sigmund Freud who believed we all want to emulate Oedipus' complex family dynamics.

The cast of Greek

Scottish Opera have recently become very competent at modern, smaller scale productions, such as their excellent The Devil Inside. Greek has a cast of four artists playing several roles and an orchestra of 18 or 19 musicians, yet it still packs a mighty punch. The co-production with Opera Ventures uses a bare, revolving stage set onto which imaginative projections give a stark, and when necessary, humourous atmosphere to the whole performance. The costumes, often requiring a quick turnover, also give it a distinctive, consistent and crisp feel. Taken from Berkoff's play, it is a story set not among Greek kings and queens, but working class families in Thatcher's dystopian Britain. Coming here straight from Easter Road, the opening scene greeted me with the rhythmic chanting onstage of Arsenal fans in an London pub. Alarmed by the racist chants of his father and his parents' belief in a fairground fortune-teller's alarming prophecy, shell-suited Eddy leaves home. 

Alex Otterburn as Eddy

The cast of Susan Bullock, Andrew Shore, Allison Cook and "Scottish Opera Emerging Artist" Alex Otterburn as Eddy were excellent throughout, both in singing and in the extravagant acting required of their parts. The words are sharp and witty throughout, with much dark humour at times. As London descends into riots and plague (the play was written whilst AIDS was running out of control) Eddy kills a cafe owner in a fight and marries his wife, before inevitably finding out at the end when his parents arrive years later that his true origins mean he has unknowingly fulfilled the prophecy. Oedipus pleaded to be excused his actions because he was unaware of what he was doing. Now Eddy knows what he has done, should the shame destroy everything he has? 

The orchestra keep the story moving along, with brassy jazz sounds at times, and a cacophony of percussion, with truncheons and riot shields at other moments. The 1980s setting feels unfortunately contemporary in a Tory led Britain fermenting division along racist lines and between those that have and have not. Are people responsible for their actions when they know not what they are doing? 

It was nice to see Steven Berkoff on stage at the end to take the plaudits from the audience, alongside Mark-Anthony Turnage and the cast and crew.

A thoroughly enjoyable night out, and I find it bizarre that the audience for this type of thing remains elusive. Opera has got to tear down its elitist image to make people aware of the imaginative and entertaining material it can provide. After a second night at the Edinburgh Festival, Greek will be coming to Glasgow in February 2018. I am planning to go see it again. 

Edinburgh skyline as we head home to Glasgow

Edinburgh Festival 2016 - Edinburgh International Festival

Edinburgh International Festival 2016

I only realised a couple of years ago that the Edinburgh Festival is a whole pile of festivals all happening at the same time. The fringe, the art festival, the book festival, the gardening festival (I made one of those up). The main Edinburgh International Festival has a much more focused and normally highbrow atmosphere. This year the world of alternative popular music has elbowed its way into the International Festival with Mogwai, Young Fathers, Sigur Ros, God Speed You! Black Emperor and Karine Polwart in the programme alongside the likes of the Russian National Orchestra and Scottish Ballet. Several of these concerts it was impossible for me to get to from Glasgow and others were sold out very quickly. I made do with a couple of Edinburgh jaunts to wonder around the galleries, catch some fringe theatre and book readings. There is only so long I can join the Edinburgh festival-going crowd before I want to scream though. There is a particular demographic that fills the city in August, and it feels like a good proportion of them will all trudge to the Henley Regatta and Glyndbourne at other times of the year.

I did make it to two International Festival events at the Usher Hall. A concert by a Swedish Orchestra and one by a Senegalese superstar. 

Hello Edinburgh

Usher Hall, Edinburgh

Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra - Usher Hall

Beethoven Piano concerto No. 1 in C major Op 15
Mahler Symphony No. 9

English conductor Daniel Harding, led the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra at the Usher Hall on Friday night. First up was Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 1, which was actually the third piano concerto he had written, but the first to be published. Written by the 26 year old Beethoven he performed the piano himself on the first performances of the piece. As you would, he has written the best parts for himself and Russian pianist Daniil Trifonov took this role. His performance was mesmeric, without being overly showy and flamboyant. At times hunched over the keyboard with his face inches from his fingers I fear he has an old age filled with back pain ahead of him if he keeps that up, but his playing was fantastic.

After the interval the orchestra had to pause for a while until someone silenced an electronic alarm (getting a round of applause when they managed). Mahler's 9th Symphony is often described as a contemplation on death and the first movement was indeed very dramatic. I found the rest of the evening rather colourless after that and a bit disjointed. Beautiful crisp playing throughout, particularly the strings, but the music didn't sing out to me.

Summer in Scotland

Youssou N'Dour - Usher Hall

One of the greatest figures in African music, "Senegalese superstar" Youssou N'Dour was in the incongruous setting of the stuffy Usher Hall on Wednesday night. His appearance was like a slash of light and warmth in a cold, wet Scottish summer. His audience were a refreshing change from the majority of Edinburgh crowds that I've been sat amongst this week, with many black and younger people dressed up to the nines mixed up with the usial Edinburgh Festival white, middle class, elderly audience.

I have seen him play once before, but that was 26 years ago now, a brief set in a Wembley concert for Nelson Mandela, so I was greatly looking forward to seeing him here tonight with his band in full flow. The band were impressive, 10 musicians and an acrobatic dancer and two singers backing him. With four of them on percussion rhythm was to the fore.

Youssou N'Dour at the Usher Hall 

Youssou N'Dour himself is a slight figure, out front in his shiny white suit, with a voice that's uniquely his. A few songs in we were given a piece of impromptu Scottish cabaret as ushers tried (ineffectually) to usher an obstreperous man away from the front row, where he had planted himself. They needn't have bothered as Youssou soon had sections of the crowd on their feet and dancing at the front of the stage and in the aisles. He slowed things down for a bit with "7 Seconds" before whipping the crowd up again as the tumbling dancer started jumping over the head of the djembe player, who was now draped in a Senegal flag from the crowd.

A captivating performance. Would love to have seen him in a more relaxed venue. Maybe next time.

Look. Youssou even brightened up the Edinburgh weather 

Edinburgh Festival 2016 - Edinburgh Festival Fringe Theatre

Edinburgh Fringe 2016  - Theatre

I've come all the way to Edinburgh and the first two things that I saw were set in a Glasgow school and a Glasgow night club toilet. Quick reviews of a few of the theatre performances I saw at this years Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Glasgow Girls - Assembly Hall ****

Produced by National Theatre of Scotland Glasgow Girls, by David Greig and Cora Bissett, is based on the story of seven Glasgow school friends from Drumchapel who stood together in 2005 when their classmate and her family, seeking asylum in Scotland, were taken from their home to be forcefully deported. Based upon true events the song-filled play has been touring since 2012 but I have only now caught up with it. It is being shown in the Assembly Hall on the Mound at present, and the hall doesn't do it any great favours - a room filled with multiple restricted views and echoey acoustics, which made some of the speaking a bit difficult to discern.

Assembly Hall on The Mound, Edinburgh

The story is probably very familiar to most people now and is told with energy and enthusiasm. I am not a great fan of musicals I must admit, so would generally rather be shown things than told them through song. However when Terry Neason takes centre stage as Noreen, one of the women who organised look-outs for Home Office vans doing dawn raids, the whole story suddenly feels more real and visceral, largely due to her acting abilities and phenomenal voice.

First General Assembly, Edinburgh
 "Did he just say that the cheesemakers shall inherit the Earth?"

 An uplifting piece of theatre, which passes the Bechdel Test with flying colours, still reaching a wide audience as it tours again. Later this month it will be returning to Glasgow at the Citizens Theatre.

Expensive Shit - Traverse Theatre *****

Written and directed by Glasgow based Adura Onashile, Expensive Shit at the Traverse Theatre takes place in the women's toilet of a nightclub. If it hadn't already happened recently in the real world, you would think that the idea of having men getting kicks from staring through two-way mirrors into this private place was an over the top theatrical device. The Shimmy Club in Glasgow was shut down in 2013 after men were found to be paying to leer from behind the glass at women using their toilets. In the play we, the audience, sit in their place, voyeurs to a place people feel they can relax and be themselves.

If you have ever felt uncomfortable with unpaid, often African, toilet attendants in night clubs handing you paper towels, a skoosh of deoderant or a lollipop for tips, then you will recognise Tolu as that character. Nigerian toilet attendant Tolu, (Sabina Cameron) works in the toilet of a Glasgow nightclub, talking to the women and gets paid extra to encourage them to linger at the mirrors or leave the cubicle doors open. The story flits back and forwards between the present and the past where she lived at Fela Kuti's Kalkuta commune, hoping for a better life dancing at his  Afrika Shrine club.

Fela Kuti was an inspirational and controversial figure, married to umpteen of his dancers and singers.  The title of the play, an elegant word play for their stories, takes its name from a Fela Kuti album, an Afrobeat classic. The ideals of the commune, the freedom the women hoped to gain by coming to it, is questioned when the women have to face the reality of what they are being asked to do. The four Nigerian women rehearse, talk and argue in the sanctuary of the women's toilets there.

It is an arresting play, with excellent performances from Sabina Coleman in the lead role, Teri Ann Bobb Baxter, Jamie Marie Leary and Diana Yekinni. Their dance moves are slick and their arguments swing back and forth like the cubicle doors. The audience here in Edinburgh was very white and middle aged, complicit maybe in looking at the African woman in the corner of the room, but perhaps not noticing her.

Diary of a Madman - Traverse Theatre **

Gogol's novella, Dairy of a Madman, is transferred to modern Scotland by writer Al Smith and Gate Theatre. In the original a lowly civil servant driven mad by his unrequited love, eventually believes himself to be able to understand the language of dogs and that he is the next King of Spain. He gives a proper, early description of delusions and symptoms we would now recognise as schizophrenia. (Everyone knows that Gerry Britton, former Partick Thistle player and manager, now in charge of youth development, ins thee true King of Spain). I am a big fan of Russian literature and have been to visit Gogol's house in St Petersburg. So I was looking forward to this re-imagining of the story.

Visiting Gogol in St Petersburg

Instead of Arksenty Poprishchin we have actor Liam Brennan playing Pop Sheerin, a painter maintaining the family tradition, painting and repainting the Forth Rail Bridge. The first half hour is witty and quips pass back and forth between father, daughter Sophie and her mouthy pal. The arrival of English chemical engineer Matt White (boom, boom) as Pop's apprentice lays the foundation for Pop's future redundancy, at work and at home. Matt's burgeoning romance with Sophie upsets Pop's ideas of manliness. As he descends into madness the plot takes a strange turn, with wrong-headed ideas about Scottish nationalism and history shoehorned in. Pop Sheerin becomes increasingly unhinged in a cartoonish fashion, dressing as Mel Gibson's Braveheart to stand against the foreign, globalisation pressures of new-fangled American paint, Qatari share ownership and English nobility.

The portrayal of mental illness in the style of One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, the women's roles ("kingmakers" through sex with men or as passive wife, who inexplicably doesn't phone a CPN) and the ideas of manliness all felt clichéd, old fashioned and the political jibes were ill-informed. Matt's put down, that the Forth Rail Bridge is "no more Scottish than I am" because it's constituent parts come from elsewhere is so upside down and flawed as to be offensive. I'm quite embarrassed that this play is going on to be performed in England and give people the daft impression that people in Scotland think like the characters here. Surely it's widely accepted that once you're here, you're here and you are part of the country, whether you are a bridge or a dinner lady? Anyway, now I'm nit-picking. It started well, then went off in several strange directions.

Last Dream (On Earth) - Assembly Hall ****

Taking my kids to see Yuri Gagarin

Yuri Gagarin and rocket designer Sergei Korolev are two heroes of mine, which has led me to drag my kids to see the Monument to the Conquerors of Space in Moscow to pose under Yuri Gagarin, and drive to London to see an exhibition on the Cosmonauts. In this theatrical piece in Edinburgh Yuri sits on the launch pad, expecting death, but hoping to orbit the Earth. Our attention shifts to an African who has traveled with smugglers across the Sahara and stands on a beach in Morocco about to launch towards Europe.

These are the starting points for this performance/ sound installation designed by Kai Fischer and the National Theatre of Scotland. The five performers and musicians on stage are lined up in a row facing the audience, and we all don headphones to hear their amplified utterances, mixed with radio static and sound effects. Silences are exaggerated in this environment, as we fall below the waves of the Mediterranean or enter radio silence on the dark side of the Earth. The performers hold our gaze at the front, with excellent performances from Edward Nkom, Kimisha Lewis, Michelle Cornelius, and musicians Tyler Collins and Gameli Tordzro. The parallels are clear as we flit back and forth between those about to embark in a toy dinghy and our Cosmonaut about to launch into the darkness of space. The crackled back and forth between Vostok-1 and mission control contrast with the refugees' attempts to make re-assuring mobile phone calls home. The real transcripts used of Yuri Gagarin's communications with mission control are phenomenal. He is the epitome of calmness, reporting "mood buoyant" and "Let's go!" as the launch arrives. Both of our travellers are brave/ foolish pioneers. We only know that one of the trips will definitely end in glory.

Call Mr Robeson - Spotlites ***

Actor, singer, lawyer, campaigner Paul Robeson is the inspiration for Tayo Aluko's one man performance (with piano accompaniment), telling the story of the great man's life. Paul Robeson's booming bass voice was a familiar sound in my childhood home from an old album that my mother often played, a mixture of his singing, reading poetry or Othello's speeches from Shakespeare. He famously attended the Glasgow May Day parade in 1960, and in the play his dealings with striking Welsh miners featured prominently in the play.  

I knew a bit about the life of Paul Robeson, but learned a lot more, particularly about the extent of the hostility he faced from the American state. The tireless efforts made to deprive him of his passport, of his ability to work, even of his health, was remarkable. Tayo Aluko doesn't have the bone rattling quality to his voice that Robeson did (who does?) but his singing earned applause throughout and evoked the music that Robeson used to such powerful effect protesting against the injustice that he saw. Back home to dig out my mum's old Paul Robeson album that I've got in a box somewhere.


Milk - Traverse Theatre *****

Orla O'Loughlin of the Traverse Theatre Company directs Ross Dunsmore's first full length play, Milk. A trio of couples riff on a theme of nourishment and sustinence. Steph and Ash aged 14 (Helen Mallon and Cristian Ortega), their teacher Danny Doig and his wife Nicole (Ryan Fletcher and Melody Grove) and elderly couple May and Cyril (played by Tam Dean Burn and Ann Louise Ross). Steph's body image fixation and self-confidence issues lead her to chase after her teacher. His pregnant wife feels crushed by her inability to breastfeed when the baby comes. The old couple play the most touching scenes, with their electricity cut off, ex-soldier Cyril is too fearful of the outside world to go out and buy food. Although all the ideas don't always gel, I found the later scenes incredibly moving. It made me think back to people I know who struggled to breastfeed and were given increasingly unhelpful advice from people who should have known better. I'll admit that I was a wee bit weepy in the final scene. It brought back a moment I'd completely forgotten, the most supportive thing I ever heard for a stressed parent. Dashing around a supermarket with a screaming baby when an old man leans over and instead of moaning, says "that's the most beautiful sound in the world, the cry of a baby". Try it next time you see someone looking stressed.

Anyway, really enjoyed the play. Nicely paced direction kept things flowing along. I finished up at the Traverse and ran across to Nandos for some grub. (It only got about 10 mentions).

48 Hours at Edinburgh Festivals 2015

Edinburgh Festival Reviews 2015

Like most Glaswegians I am vaguely aware of Edinburgh as a thing, and spend most of the year oblivious to what it is up to. However, in August each year this becomes impossible as the Edinburgh Festivals draw the London media, the combined population of every Oxbridge Drama Soc and 1000s of visitors to the city on a daily basis. This year I had the chance to spend a day off work in Auld Reekie, and take in some of the festival attractions. On Friday I managed to see two concerts from the Edinburgh International Festival, two plays from the Fringe and several exhibitions from the Edinburgh Art Festival. To help me remember what I actually did, I'll knock up a quick review of what I saw. Not only was this a good chance for me to overdose on some culture and entertainment, but as I was using some friends' unused complimentary tickets and gallery passes, I saved myself over £100. Much as that was pleasing for me, it does flag up one of the problems here at the festival, that not everyone gets to join in.

One highlight of this year's Edinburgh International Festival is the new stage adaptation of Alasdair Gray's classic book, Lanark. I caught one of the preview performances in Glasgow (review here) before it transferred to Edinburgh's Royal Lyceum Theatre. After its run in Edinburgh it will return to Glasgow's Citizens Theatre in September, where the tickets are about half the price of the Edinburgh ones. There will also be discounts for those living in the Gorbals and concessions for the unemployed reducing the price of the best seats in the house to £2. I mention this only to highlight the point that ticket prices do not need to be as prohibitively expensive as many appear to be in Edinburgh, where even a student doing an hour's monologue about cheese can expect to charge £12 a go.

Exhibitions

A frequently used device in some of Alasdair Gray's art is the drawing hand of the artist appearing in the work. I was thinking of this whilst seeing the same idea used to such great effect at the wonderful MC Escher exhibition at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, "The Amazing World of MC Escher". They have pulled together a fantastic quantity of his works, from the very familiar, to his early etchings and sketches of Islamic tiles, flat Dutch fields and the Alhambra Palace that you can recognise in his later material. Seeing them in the flesh, instead of in reproduction, you can appreciate the effort and attention to detail that went into producing his work. Also his skill as a craftsman shines through. 

A cancelled etching plate created by MC Escher

I also had the chance to swing past Jupiter Artland, a slowly growing sculpture park of modern art on the outskirts of Edinburgh where I was mesmerised by Tara Donovan's exhibition. Her large sculptures made from Slinkies, plastic cups and the material used to make helium balloons (Mylar) are beautiful. 

Untitled (Mylar) by Tara Donovan

St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh

On a more personal level I found the exhibition about the men who served on the boats of the Arctic Convoys during the second world war interesting. The men shown here received the Ushkanov Medal in 2014 for their efforts to try to supply the Russian people. The exhibition itself, in the beautiful St Mary's Cathedral, of photographs and small tapestries inspired by their stories is a bit sparse, but fascinating information about their lives is explored in more detail in the accompanying booklet.

My own interest in hearing about this was because my gran's brother died at sea during the war, off of the coast of Norway (I've written about him here). I now have the Arctic Star which my great uncle was awarded after his death, and I could recognise this medal, amongst others, on the chests of the men in the photographs here.

Arctic Star medal of Donald Bailey

The works from the official Edinburgh Art Festival are scattered throughout Edinburgh and most can be reached by a quick walk around the city centre. Charles Avery's work Tree no. 5 (from the Jadindagadendar) greets you in Waverley Station as you get off of the train from Glasgow. A wee bit harder to find, but worth seeking out is Holoturian by Ariel Guzik. This is in Trinity Apse, a disused church off of the Royal Mile which I can remember coming to when we came through to the Edinburgh Miners' Gala, in the days when it was the brass rubbing centre. Now the space is filled with Ariel Guzik's nautical drawings, collected material, whale sounds and his submersible. The mirror below it reflects the depth of the church tower. 

Ariel Guzak's Holoturian

At Gladstone's Land on the Royal Mile Hanna Tuulikki performs a vocal duet, SING SIGN:a close duet with Daniel Padden on film, and at other times live further down the hill. I am a fan of her work and loved the recent piece she created, "Away With The Birds" (a version of which is now online as an interactive website). The commissions from the Art Festival have taken Italo Calvino's book "Invisible Cities" as inspiration under the theme The Improbable City. This is captured nicely here by the performers, on a two-screen film installation singing a composition based on the strange topography of the medieval closes leading off of the Royal Mile. I was never sure if the seagulls and car engines I could hear in the background were outside this ancient room, in the street, or were part of the film, which all added to a sense of place.

Other exhibitions under the umbrella of the Art Festival include Phyllida Barlow's set at the Fruitmarket Gallery, a work on a disorientating scale. I was a bit disappointed by Here Comes Everybody, an exhibition by kennardphillips at the Stills Gallery which is less finely honed than some of their other work (google kennardphillips, if you don't know the name, you'll recognise their work).

More biting photographic work was on show in the foyer of the Scottish Parliament with the World Press Photo exhibition. This could really have come with some warnings about the graphic nature of some of the content, particularly photos from the Ukrainian conflict and the downed MH17 Malaysian aircraft. A sharp reminder of the powerful storytelling ability of good photojournalism.

A small part of Phyllida Barlow's set

Within the Scottish National Gallery I found the works of 18th century Swiss artist Jean-Etienne Liotard a bit underwhelming. He is not an artist I had ever heard of but his hyper-realism style drew my attention from his wacky self-portrait used on the publicity for the exhibition. The exhibition, largely of court portraiture, doesn't seem to merit the £9 you are charged to view it.

More photography is on show at the Scottish National Gallery, £11 for "Bailey's Stardust" seemed a bit steep and if we had come as a family to these two exhibitions instead of me coming alone using someone else's free pass, this would have been a ludicrously expensive visit. This is a David Bailey retrospective with over 250 photos from over 50 years of work. His early work from 1960's East End London is the most engaging material, where the characters pictured do seem to sparkle. His later court portraiture of the great, the good and the fashionable of the swinging sixties I felt no connection to. Maybe you had to be there.

Royal Mile during the Edinburgh Festival

Music

Musically my day started with Scottish percussionist Colin Currie and friends at the Queen's Hall.

I have seen Colin Currie play several times before, usually his interpretations of Steve Reich's work, and Reich's "Quartet for Two Vibraphones and Two Pianos" was one of the pieces performed here. Before that we had John Adams's Hallelujah Junction, played on two pianos and nicely echoing Reich's style it reveals the piano as the percussion instrument it is in this crisp performance. Both pieces fizzed with jazz-tinged energy. The second half opened with a warm, solo piece for marimba by Norwegian composer Rolf Wallin and ended with Bartok's Sonata for Two Percussion and Piano feeling strangely muted in comparison. It was a great way to spend two hours, even if the highlight of my day was accosting Nobel prize-winning physicist Professor Peter Higgs at the interval. If anybody knows what "star struck" literally means, it is this unassuming man whose achievements I would rather see proclaimed in exhibitions on Princes Street than the images currently there. After texting my science-mad son that I had spotted him, he was dead keen that I get an autograph of one of his heroes. I am grateful to Professor Higgs for tolerating my interruption to his day in the charming manner he did. As my son continues to harbour ambitions to study physics himself this wee memento will mean a lot to him. 

My day finished off with a concert by celebrated Chinese pianist Lang Lang at the Usher Hall. Like many of his performances at the festival this year this concert was sold out. His traditionalist piano repertoire, playing Bach, Tchaikovsky and Chopin this evening, isn't the type of thing I'd normally come to see (as I said above, some of these tickets ended up with me when others weren't able to attend) however it was an entertaining evening, if not exactly the most dramatic performance I have ever seen. For two hours alone at the piano he had the audience eating out of his hand. He began with Tchaikovsky's The Seasons, twelve short pieces Tchaikovsky wrote for the amateur pianist evoking each of the twelve months. I got a bit lost through the year and struggled to get a feel of which seasons were passing. Bach's lively Italian Concertos received "whoops" and applause from the audience for an energetic performance. A Chinese journalist was asking me at the interval if I thought he brought an "Eastern" rather than "Western" interpretation to the music, but I could only offer that he brought a "Lang Lang" interpretation to it, not wanting to say that it was Harpo Marx I was thinking of at times as he pointed, gurned and emoted. The second half, consisting of Chopin Scherzos, was performed with skill and bravura, but didn't give me the warmth and enjoyment I'd felt from the performances earlier in the day. Also particular audience members whom I was sat near were insufferable.

Theatre

In the afternoon my random Fringe choices brought me to Assembly Roxy to see an hour of Dylan Thomas: The Man, The Myth. Narrated by Thomas's grand-daughter Hannah Ellis and performed with Guy Masterton's mellifluous tones, we learned about Hannah trying to find out about the grandfather she never met, and whom I never really knew beyond the image of the drinker poet. What came out most strongly from this was the strength and character of his powerful wife, Caitlin Macnamara, and as I left I passed by Blackwell's bookshop and picked up a copy of some of Thomas's poems. Bizarrely, although I've read all of his prose fiction I've never really given his poetry a go. I also didn't realise how autobiographical many of his writings were until hearing this performance.

Echoes, a play by one-time Spitting Image writer, Henry Naylor, is performed at the Gilded Balloon by Felicty Houlebrooke and Filipa Braganca. They play two 17 year-old women from Ipswich who, separated by over 100 years, go to Afghanistan and Syria to marry and to do their perceived Christian/Muslim duty. The parallels become apparent once we learn that British women were needed to go and marry British soldiers, out in the east fighting for the Empire and trade. As their overlapping monologues unfold we see history repeating itself and gain some insight into the hopes, expectations and disillusionment of both women. It was a fascinating idea, well acted and well told.

Hearts 3-0 Partick Thistle. Tynecastle, 22nd August 2015

On Saturday I was back in Edinburgh with the hottest ticket in town. A sell out crowd filled Tynecastle to see Hearts play Partick Thistle in the SPFL match of the day. Sadly Thistle didn't turn up and Hearts had a straight-forwards 3-0 victory. After this I was in the mood for some uplifting theatre, but as we had tickets for Antigone, we settled for Greek tragedy instead.

I do like the ancient Greek plays, and always try to catch them whenever a version comes around. I have seen some really memorable adaptions of Sophocles and Euripides works, particularly I'm thinking of Theatre Babel's productions of Medea and Elektra. More recently I enjoyed a very traditional performance of Antigone by Strathclyde Theatre Group. My earliest exposure to Antigone was as assistant stage manager at the Knightswood Secondary School Drama Club when our teacher had us perform it for the school. A trifle ambitious I feel in retrospect.

The production at the Edinburgh Festival had already played at the Barbican Theatre in London and featured Juliette Binoche in the lead role. A new translation by Canadian writer Anne Carson and directed by Ivo van Hove, this was a mouthwatering prospect. The thing about Antigone is its ongoing relevance and the fact that it can be so open to interpretation. After the two brothers of Antigone on opposing sides of a civil war die in battle, King Creon decrees that one will be buried with honour, the body of the other left on the battlefield for the birds and wild dogs to eat. Antigone cannot countenance this and defies her uncle, the king, to bury her brother with the dignity she feels everyone deserves. From here we can decide whether obedience to our rulers must come first, trumping family, tradition, personal beliefs, or not. "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists" as George W. Bush put it. The programme notes suggest that the Ukranian conflict was an inspiration behind this production, the bodies from the shot down MH17 flight lying ungathered between the opposing forces. We could alternatively think about refugees with this play, or even the Greek economic crisis. Do we obey EU rules above all as Creon may, or act as responsible, feeling human beings as Antigone does? If any of these ideas were floating about, it was the case that they decided against exploring them in this production. Antigone does not seem to have a moral or solid reason for her actions as Juliette Binoche plays her like a rather stroppy teenager. The stripped down setting and modern dress drains a lot of the melodrama of the play, the ending feels underplayed, losing so much impact. The amplified voices of the cast sometimes make it hard to identify who has spoken. The phenomenal story at the heart of it all survives, despite some clunky modern phrases that don't fit well, but it all feels like a missed opportunity. It was good, but it didn't seem to say anything or speak to us.

This was all that I managed to squeeze in with my 2 days at the other end of the M8 motorway. There is another week to run and a thousand other things out there to see and do that I didn't get the chance to. Many of the exhibitions will run on for longer or tour to other places.  Book festivals, comedy, political theatre...aargh, too much choice.

Typical Edinburgh scene during festival.
A man plays a didgeridoo in Princes Street Gardens,
ignored by everybody including the seagulls

The James Plays, Edinburgh International Festival

Review of  "The James Plays" - National Theatre of Scotland, National Theatre of Great Britain. Edinburgh Festival Theatre, August 2014

• James I : The Key Will Keep The Lock

• James II : Day of the Innocents

• James III : The True Mirror

As I never had much time this year to drag myself along the M8 from Glasgow to visit the Edinburgh Festival or Fringe, I decided to splurge and in one day try to take in all three of "The James Plays". A co-production between the National Theatres of Scotland and of Great Britain the plays have been written by Rona Munro, as stand-alone plays telling the story of three generations of Scotland's Stewart dynasty. At this time, a month ahead of our independence referendum in Scotland, I think it is important we take the time to look back to see how we got to where we are today, before deciding where we go next. This isn't just a principle of Karl Marx's historical materialism, but a fairly universal aphorism. 

"Life is divided into three terms - that which was, which is, and which will be. Let us learn from the past to profit by the present, and from the present, to live better in the future"  - William Wordsmith

 Like most people, I imagine, I know next to nothing about these three kings. Monarchy-wise I know that there was a Duncan and a Macbeth in the 11th century thanks to William Shakspeare, then I'm a bit vague on details for a couple of hundred years. Later you've Robert the Bruce and Bannockburn in 1314. Shortly afterwards you had the Stewart kings. Often I pass a sign proclaiming Renfrew as the ancient home of the Stewarts, the one-time "stewards of Scotland".



Plaque on a wall in Renfrew

Again I'm a bit vague here on the details, but presume that we had five kings called James before we got to Mary, Queen of Scots. Next of course was "James the VI of Scotland and First of England" and the joining of the monarchy on these isles in 1603. Amidst all of that we have Catholic and Protestant conflict, and various ebbing and flowing of allegiances between Denmark, France, England and others, all jockeying for control.

Scotland was a feudal society, which Marx described as the stage after a slave society. An aristocracy ruled the people, inheriting their position and marrying or conquering to gain or retain power. There was religious rule, inherited classes and inherited social standing. Nation states were forming from the remains of fallen empires.

The Great Hall at Linlithgow Palace,
built during the reign of James I

So I think that for most of us we come to hear about James I, II and III without many pre-conceptions about these men. The point of these "James plays" is not to re-tell the history of ancient kings though. I've recently been reading some poems by Greek poet C.P. Cavafy and of the Egyptian, Caesarion, he writes 

"History reserves/ but a few lines for you,/ and so I fashioned you more freely in my mind."

 The next line says "I made you fair and sensitive". So playwright Rona Munro gets to chose the characters for her kings. As Shakespeare did with his monarchs, you have a few bare facts to hang a story and a character upon, what you do with it is in the hands of the playwright.

James I : The Key Will Keep The Lock 

James I

James I lived from 1394 to 1437 and was King of Scotland from 1406. With both of his older brothers dead by the time he was eight years old, he was being taken to France for his safety. En route he was captured and spent 18 years a prisoner of the English kings, Henry IV and V, becoming King of Scotland on his father's death when aged 13 years old. When he was returned to Scotland, under ransom, with his English Queen, it is apparent that he was not universally welcomed. James McArdle plays James I and Blythe Duff is Isabella Stewart. She and Gordon Kennedy are two amongst several of the actors who have roles across all three plays.

The Scottish prisoners who are on stage at the opening of the play chant like football supporters. I liked the fact that football gets a mention in every play. The mocking cheers of the Scottish nobles in the throne room as the crown comes down on the head of this king, newly arrived from England, echo the "whooooooooOOOOOAAAH" we give an opposition goalkeeper gets when he kicks out a goal kick. The king is greeted with suspicion by the conniving lords of Scotland, but wins them over with his ideals of the country he envisages. But he and his ideals become crushed by bloody realpolitik.

James tells them he "had an education in England. I learned history." In a speech that recalls the words of  Robert Burns in "Such a Parcel of Rogues In a Nation" he warns us to beware English gold. "Then they'll flick us a coin of our own stolen gold and call it charity".

It's a fast paced story, with the hesitant young king evolving into the man he became.

James II : Day of the Innocents

James II

When his father James I was killed, his son James was 6 years old. James II lived from 1430-1460 and the only fact which I knew about him for some reason was the method of his rather ignominious death. Glasgow University was founded during his reign in 1451 and his interest in the latest artillery brought Mons Meg to Scotland. Andrew Rothney plays James II and Mark Rowley is William Douglas. The young king is literally a puppet on stage as the Earls of Scotland vie for control through him. This time a football game is used to extract the king away from his competing nobles by his friend William Douglas , but the two sides on the pitch will end up opposing each other later.

The play gets weighed down a bit on unpicking the threads of conspiracy and retribution here and when the king's childhood friend becomes the latest Earl of Douglas, his character hasn't been given enough space to breathe and mature, to explain his later opposition to James. I liked the wee nod to the ensemble cast when Blythe Duff's imprisoned Isabella Stewart sees King James. She says to him "You remind me of my son Walter" who the same actor had played in the earlier play.

James III : The True Mirror

James III

James III lived from 1451 to 1488 and reigned as king from age nine. James Sives plays the King and Danish actress Sofie Gråbøl, known for her role in The Killing, plays Queen Margaret of Denmark. This marriage led to the Orkney and Shetland islands becoming part of Scotland. The play opens with the actors arriving on stage and dancing to a "heedrum hodrum" version of Lady Gaga amongst other songs as the audience drift in. The stage set has gradually changed across the three plays. The huge sword stuck into the stage has now been buffed and polished, like the royal court, but the worn saltire that criss-crosses the stage floor is still visible. Part of the audience has sat on tiered seats behind the stage throughout, as jury or parliament observing the actions. As the rule of King James III becomes more unpopular and chaotic the focus of the story is upon his wife. She shows what contribution outsiders, newly arrived from abroad and having first to learn the language, can bring to a country. In her rousing speech to parliament to rally the country she also has parts of the audience cheering and clapping along. In the most clear reference to the referendum she pleads with the country to stop moaning and act.

 "You know the problem with you lot? You've got fuck-all except attitude. You scream and shout about how you want things done and how things ought to be done and when the chance comes look at you! What are you frightened of? Making things worse? According to you things couldn't get worse for Scotland!"

Queen Margaret is one of several strong female characters running through the plays and seeing the three plays together you see these threads, the recurring metaphors and plot lines. Gordon Kennedy is born to play medieval lords, Blythe Duff was excellent throughout and Sofie Gråbøl was the stand out performer in the last play, which had the Taggart and The Killings leading ladies playing off against each other.

Some reviews have bemoaned the fact that the actors speak in a modern way, with much cursing and swearing. I love the idea that, like sex, swearing is something that people only started doing recently. The playwright anticipates this criticism and answers it by the words of French-born Queen Joan in the first play.

"Well, how am I supposed to understand something if you put it in a poem! Why can't anyone here ever say anything in plain words!?"

It was a really fantastic day of theatre. The cast, the music (some Boards of Canada in there?), the stage set, direction and the plays. Historical plays resonating with the present day. Theatre seems to be a place where ideas and issues can be aired at present, particularly important as politicians seem to have abandoned this role (Glasgow Girls by Cora Bisset and Benjamin Zephaniah's Refugee Boy both dealt with the issue of asylum seekers on stage more lucidly than any politician has). For looking at our history at this important time the National Theatre of Scotland is to be praised.

With medieval football running through the three plays, I quite liked the complaint midweek from National Theatre of Scotland that Real Madrid fans had hijacked their #JamesPlays hashtag when James Rodriguez made his debut.

A final thought. Apart from James I, II and III being medieval Kings of Scotland they also, whilst heir to the throne, held the titles of Duke of Rothesay and Baron of Renfrew. If you think that hereditary entitlement seems weird, anachronistic and incongruous in the 21st century, I would remind you that the person currently holding the titles of Duke of Rothesay and Baron of Renfrew is the possible future King of Scotland; Prince Charles.

600 years later we STILL have a Duke of Rothesay
and Baron of Renfrew. Weird, huh?