Coffee-Table Notes

In the corridor of Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, Hanna Tuulikki is spinning what looks like a wooden carving of a bird-feather on the end of a rope above her head. Standing outside her studio, with the aid of what she calls a thunder-speller, the Anglo-Finnish artist, singer and performer is making a noise that sounds like a low whoosh of industrial thunder. The last time she used the ancient instrument more commonly known as a bull roarer in such a fashion was in 2015 on Skye, when the thunder speller heralded in the open-air performance of Tuulikki's three-act ritualistic song-cycle, Women of the Hill. More than two years on, Tuulikki and her thunder-speller revisit Women of the Hill by moving indoors for a one-off performance at the Centre of Contemporary Arts in Glasgow. Re-imagined for a theatrical context, this showing of a work devised for three female performers is a long way from the outdoor hollow close to the hidden entrance of High Pasture Cave, the iron-age sacred

Edinburgh's Hogmanay Four stars “We're coming to get you!” says the message beamed onto the walls of Calton Road in what looks like animated blood in New Year Resurrection, crime writer Val McDermid's seasonal short story that forms the heart of Edinburgh's Hogmanay's turn of the year multi-media promenade. Told over twelve chapters shown in monumental fashion across a dozen iconic buildings, the story brings back to life one Susan Edmonstone Ferrier, the neglected nineteenth century novelist who rises up to reclaim a piece of history buried by cultural gate-keepers who prefer to highlight the tough guys of wordsmithery. Beginning at Parliament Square, the two hour walking tour that follows gives voice to Ferrier, who, as we move through the places where she lived, wrote and died in, becomes a kind of animated vigilante for a host of similarly sidelined women writers. Ferrier's extreme actions are eventually derailed by an intervention from the late Mu

Edinburgh's Hogmanay Four stars When Rag n Bone Man sings Auld Lang Syne following the eight minutes of fireworks choreographed to a mash-up of tunes by Skye-based band Niteworks that heralded the new year, he looks so little-boy pleased with himself that he might just burst. As well he might, given the year the artist formerly known as Rory Graham has had. Following collaborations with the likes of Kate Tempest, the Brighton-based rapper turned crooner's debut album, Human, was the fastest selling record by a male artist this decade, and saw him named as British Breakthrough Act at the 2017 Brit Awards. For Edinburgh, Graham brought with him a seven-piece band, including a two-piece horn section, to accompany his set of nouveau soul epics. Prior to that, semi-local heroines and Scottish Album of the Year winning duo, Sacred Paws, opened the Waverley Stage programme. Expanded to a quartet, their fleshed-out dispatches from a post-punk global village made for an infectiou

It was a photograph that became the inspiration for Miss Saigon, the Vietnam War set musical that ran for a decade on the West End after its original production opened in 1989. At the time, French composer Claude-Michel Schonberg and lyricist Alan Boublil were in the full throes of their success with Les Miserables, their musical version of Victor Hugo's epic nineteenth century novel, which had already been running on the West End for four years. That show would go on to be seen throughout the world, while in 2015 its London production celebrated its thirtieth anniversary. With such a huge hit already on his and Boublil's hands, Schonberg was wanting to do some kind of adaptation of Madame Butterfly, Puccini's opera about a US Navy officer's love affair with a Japanese geisha. Exactly how he would do it, however, had yet to be worked out. The fact that Puccini had tried and failed to write an opera based on Les Miserables, but wrote Madame Butterfly instead after deci

When Val McDermid was approached to write a new short story for Edinburgh's Hogmanay by the event's incoming producers, Underbelly, the result looks set to be illuminating on every level. Commissioned by Edinburgh's Hogmanay and Edinburgh International Book Festival, New Year's Resurrection sees McDermid move away from her crime-based novels to bring neglected nineteenth century writer Susan Ferrier back to life. Rather than being confined to the page, New Year's Resurrection will be told by way of Message from the Skies. This literary walking tour and dramatic promenade will the story's twelve chapters revealed across a dozen buildings using projections, music and recorded voices heard by way of an app. Beginning at dusk, Message from the Skies will run every day from New Year's Day to Burns Night on January 25 th , transforming the capital's city centre landscape after dark. The projections will be created by Double Take Projections, the Edinburgh

Dan Jones reckons his heart will be pounding at one minute to midnight on Hogmanay. This probably won't be an unusual experience for the several hundred thousand revellers who are likely to be on Princes Street in Edinburgh as they await the midnight fireworks at the climax of this year's Edinburgh's Hogmanay street party. For Bristol-based composer and sound designer Jones, however, the stress may be heightened. This is likely to be the case for both Jones and his collaborators who've created the first ever original soundwork to accompany the annual pyrotechnical spectacular will be sixty seconds away from seeing if their vision literally goes off with a bang. This will be the culmination of a project commissioned by incoming Edinburgh's Hogmanay producers Underbelly, in which the turn of the year fireworks display will be choreographed to a single nine-minute sound-scape. Working with Skye-based band, Niteworks, and regular firework display designers, Titanium

For the first time in six years, Karen Fishwick is not in panto. This time last year, the Clarkston raised actress was playing the female title role in the Citizens Theatre's seasonal production of Hansel and Gretel. This year, she's hanging out in Edinburgh, putting her feet up while her fiancée does all the work onstage over at the King's Theatre. For many performers at this time of year trying to fill their Christmas stocking, such enforced leisure time would be a disaster. After her Christmas present came early, however, Fishwick is making the most of her time out while she can. As was announced last week, come the new year, she will begin rehearsals playing another title role as half of an altogether less cheery onstage duo when she takes the lead in the Royal Shakespeare's new production of Romeo and Juliet. The company's latest take on Shakespeare's doomed romance will be directed by Erica Whyman, the RSC's deputy artistic director, who in 2016