Live Review: Jane McDonald, AO Arena, Manchester
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Very few people could have anticipated quite how much acclaim Jane McDonald would experience in the wake of 1998’s BBC series The Cruise. Yet, more than a quarter of a century later, the show’s standout star remains as popular as ever.
Albums: Airbourne- Airbourne
Airbourne has never been a band particularly interested in subtlety. Seven years after Boneshaker, the Australian hard-rockers return with their self-titled sixth album – and they have absolutely no intention of reinventing the wheel.
Team Dresch: “Our Queerness Is A Dreamland Full Of Feral, Playful Joy”
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In 2026, good news feels increasingly precious, so Team Dresch’s return is worth celebrating. Thirty years after their last full-length, the legendary queercore punks are back with Furthermore, out via Jealous Butcher Records on 18 September.
Opera North Announces Two Key Leadership Appointments
Opera North has announced two significant appointments as it continues to ensure opera remains a vital part of the cultural offering in Leeds and further afield. Garry Walker will step down as Music Director at the end of his current term in August 2028 to be succeeded by Patrick Lange.
Classical Music: Notes From The Living Room
There are worse places to sit with a new recording than a terrace above Cascais, the Atlantic gleaming below, a lighthouse standing sentinel over the fishing boats and the marina traffic beneath it. I had gone there for the view. It was the music, in the end, that did the travelling — from Kingston to Port of Spain, Tokyo to Skopje, Paris to small-town America, all before the lighthouse had finished its next sweep.
Classical Music: Beethoven For Three Series Symphony No. 3 ‘Eroica'
There is real rhythmic pulse and energy here, and a textural detail in Ax's piano playing that is a constant pleasure — every inner line audible, every line singing, with a beauty in the phrasing that never tips into preciousness. The Leonore Overture in particular sounds astonishingly orchestral in this reduced scoring; the changes of tempo are superbly judged, the observation feels authentic rather than merely careful, and the playing throughout is slick and fabulous in its precision.
Enescu: String Octet, Piano Quintet Reference
There are recordings that arrive with the changing season and feel exactly right for it, and Chandos's new account of Enescu's Octet for Strings, released this week and played by the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective, is one of them. I went in expecting a curiosity. I came out delighted.
Classical Music: Heartstrings
There is a particular pleasure in hearing pieces you already know intimately played as though for the first time, and that is exactly what violinist Sonia Lee and Grammy-nominated pianist Benjamin Loeb achieve on Heartstrings, a programme of favourites and encores that most collectors will already own in one guise or another, scattered across a dozen different discs, but rarely gathered together as satisfyingly as this.
Classical Albums: Quartetto Gelato Flight
Quartetto Gelato Flight Rodeo and Juliet Suite - A. Copland, P. Tchaikovsky, S. Prokofiev, N. Rota, arr Charles Cozens; Summer (Four Seasons) - A. Vivaldi. arr. M. Pulkki; Brahms' Polka - J. Brahms, arr. C. Maier; Intermezzo in A - J. Brahms, arr. Eun-Chul Oh Passacaglia - Handel 'Halvorsen; Song Of the Birds - P. Casals, arr. M.
Clark Datchler: Soul, Second Chances And Shattered Dreams
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There are some interviews where you spend the first few minutes establishing a connection. Then there are the ones where, despite the years that have passed, you simply pick up where you left off. My history with Clark Datchler goes back to the Johnny Hates Jazz comeback campaign.
Ian Mcmillan Reinvents Mozart's The Marriage of FigaroFor Modern Britain
What happens when Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro meets 1970s Britain, Yorkshire poetry and Indian classical music? Mashallah! It's Mozart – but not as you've heard it before. Bradford Opera Festival is bringing the vibe of a ‘70s Bollywood comedy to Mozart's madcap farce, with a very Yorkshire twist.
Albums: Smithfield Country With Heart
The long-awaited debut album from the Nashville duo finally brings together the eight tracks from 2024’s Country With Heart (Part One) with its newly completed Part Two, creating a fuller picture of Trey Smith and Jennifer Fielder’s musical partnership. Having recently returned from a UK tour that included appearances at Long Road and the British Country Music Festival, alongside a sold-out London headline show at St Pancras Old Church, it is increasingly obvious just how much affection there is for this pair.
Albums: Mastodon Marrow Deep
Mastodon has always had a knack for turning pain into something thunderous, but Marrow Deep feels different. This is an album born from grief, upheaval and profound change, yet rather than collapsing under that weight, the Atlanta metal giants use it as fuel
Albums: Alex Warren WILDCHILD
There is something about Alex Warren’s music that feels deeply personal while somehow remaining universally relatable. His songs have an unusual ability to sit beside you in the messier corners of life, offering neither easy answers nor polished clichés, but the comforting sense that somebody else understands. On WILDCHILD, that quality develops into something particularly affecting: an endearing, emotionally charged and remarkably honest pop record about surviving the past, finding connection in the present and learning to embrace the life that remains.
EPs: Appleton Side By Side
Appleton Side By Side Tracks: Ready To Begin, Falling Into You, Strange Kinda Paradise, Monster Label: Appleton Recordings Back in 2002, after the dissolution of All Saints, sisters Nicole and Natalie Appleton decided not to take the solo route. Instead, they paired up and released the driven anthem Fantasy.
Classical Music: Mahler's Symphony No. 3 in D minor
Mahler's Symphony No. 3 in D minor is a work that dares almost too much. Six movements, the best part of a hundred minutes, and a programme that runs from the awakening of Pan to a final movement of wordless, all-embracing love: it asks a conductor to hold together a vast orchestra, a mezzo-soprano soloist, a boys' choir and a women's chorus without the whole edifice splintering into episodes. I went into this recording expecting admiration. I came out with something closer to reappraisal as Petrenko unlocked Mahler's cosmic Third and the RPO, and Harmonia Mundi's engineers are on inspired form
Classical Music: Janáček The Excursions Of Mr Brouček
It would be easy to file Brouček away as a Janáček footnote, the one even his admirers tend to skip. Rattle and his forces make a compelling case that it shouldn't be. A comic opera, treated with real seriousness, and all the better for it.
Classical Music: Beethoven String Quartets Vol 3
It is, as they say, the gift that keeps on giving. The Doric String Quartet continue their sublime traversal of Beethoven's quartets with a third volume that ranges across the composer's early, middle and late periods – from the youthful high spirits of Op. 18 No. 3 to the visionary strangeness of the final works.
Classical Music: Elena Ruehr: Violin Concerto No. 1
Released by St7dio as a digital single rather than packaged within a fuller album, it stands entirely on its own merits.
From the opening bars, this concerto sings. Ruehr's writing is accessible without ever feeling slight, its lyrical lines unfolding with real confidence in what the violin can do. She understands the instrument intimately, and the orchestral accompaniment is judged with equal skill: nothing overwhelms the soloist, nothing sits idle. The woodwind, in particular, is excellent throughout.
Levina on Invincible Summer: finding her way back to connection, joy and herself
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For London-based alt-soul artist Levina, Invincible Summer is more than just a new album. Written over the course of two years, the record charts a deeply personal and musical journey through disconnection, self-discovery and, ultimately, a return to connection.
Lennie Gallant: Songs, Stories and a Little Bit of Laughter
With 16 albums, a Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame induction and a career that has taken him from intimate venues to the International Space Station, Lennie Gallant has certainly accumulated a few stories along the way. The celebrated Canadian singer-songwriter is bringing those stories to the UK, with an appearance at the British Country Music Festival followed by a mini UK tour.
Albums: Natalie Imbruglia Algorithm
Having started to tease the release back in April with the impressive shimmer of Upside Down, it was immediately apparent that Natalie has not lost sight of the slight alternative pop leanings that produced her biggest hits to date, but that she is not afraid either of playing the pure pop game. Subsequent singles, Algorithm and Just Drive, both built on this. Natalie Imbruglia has not lost sight of who she is as an artist, it is clear from these singles that she is simply ready to fully embrace the pop label with all her heart.
Bon Jovi - Hanging On By A Wing And A Prayer
When Adele chose to hold a residency in Munich two years ago, the idea kickstarted the trend for holding huge multiple outdoor concerts where fans would travel from across the globe to see their favourite act: instead of the artist coming to your city, you had to go the distance to see them.
Fatboy Slim to headline Lytham Festival 2027
Superstar DJ and award-winning producer Fatboy Slim will head to the Lancashire coast next summer to headline the North West’s largest live music festival. It has been announced that The Rockafeller Skank and Right Here Right Now star will bring his big beats and incredible live show to Lytham Festival on Friday July 2.
Albums: Westside Cowboy It Goes On
Westside Cowboy’s It Goes On is the kind of album that makes you want to turn the volume up simply to hear where it might take you next. Across its nine tracks, the Manchester band have refined their scrappy, guitar-heavy sound into something that feels both unmistakably British and remarkably fresh.
There is a looseness to the record, but never a lack of purpose. Guitars jangle, grind and collide; melodies appear from the noise; and the songs find poetry in everyday observations without ever making them feel ordinary.
Albums: Mystery Jets A Hole To See The Sky Through
Mystery Jets has returned with A Hole To See The Sky Through, an album that feels like a genuine rediscovery of what makes them such an enduring proposition. Where their recent work sometimes felt weighed down by its own seriousness, this record finds a far more natural balance between reflection and exuberance, bringing back the melodic sparkle, wit and sense of adventure that first made the band so compelling.
Albums: Sam Smith Hazel Eyes
There is plenty to admire here. Hazel Eyes is richly produced and, at its best, allows Smith’s extraordinary voice to breathe rather than simply serve as another component in a maximalist pop production. Everlasting Love opens with a gently fingerpicked guitar and sultry minor chords before Smith’s nimble head voice glides over restrained strings and horns. It is sleek and sophisticated, recalling the understated elegance of Sade without feeling like mere pastiche.
Albums: Jorja Smith- What Are The Odds
Smith's voice remains the star attraction. There is a smoky warmth to it, but also a remarkable precision. She knows when to hold back and when to let a phrase hang in the air, giving even the sparsest moments real weight. Crucially, she never sounds as though she is trying to prove anything.
Albums: Sara Bareilles Good Grief
Written and recording during COVID-19, Bareilles is in a very reflective mood as she tries to understand the world that surrounds her. As she explores the notion of loss, grief, heartbreak and personal breakdowns, she delivers what many may see as an introspective record but in reality is based on the stories of those she knows and those she has read. And the real beauty of this record is that she showcases such deep empathy that they feel so true to her that it is impossible not to connect with the depth of emotion showcased.
Albums: Stella Lefty Long Way Home
Stella Lefty has had a massive 2026. The breakout success of her Noah Kahan-interpolating single, Boston, has seen her achieve the longest-running ever #1 single on the UK country radio charts, but it has also seen her included on the prestigious Country Mount Rushmore for 20