Beyonce, Murrayfield, Edinburgh, tonight
The hottest ticket of the week surely. Ms Knowles-Carter is in Edinburgh tonight for the latest leg of her current Renaissance world tour, which promises showy spectacle and the world’s biggest star (who’s her competition? Taylor maybe?) reminding us why she is on that pedestal in the first place. It’s OK to be excited at the prospect.
CLASSICAL
RSNO All Star Gala, Usher Hall, Edinburgh, Friday; Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, May 27
But if Beyonce is not your cup of Darjeeling … Nicola Benedetti and Sheku Kanneh-Mason are both making appearances in these gala performances by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra which will also see appearances by pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, the RSNO Youth Orchestra and conductor Thomas Sondergard. Beethoven and Brahms are on the menu.
Anna Karenina, Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, today and Tuesday to Friday. Continues until June 3
In the mood for a proper full-on, grown-up, gritty love story? Good news. There is still time to catch Lesley Hart’s bold new theatrical adaptation of Tolstoy’s classic novel which runs until June 3. Co-produced with the Bristol Old Vic and directed by Polina Kalinina, this production sees Lindsey Campbell take the title role, while Robert Akodoto plays Vronsky and Stephen McCole plays Karenin.
COMEDY
Fred MacAulay, Highland Cinema, Fort William, Thursday, Strathearn Arts, Crieff, Friday
This week veteran comedian Fred MacAulay kicks off a new run of Scottish dates for his show What (Ever) Next: Again??!! It will take him north, south, east and west over the coming weeks as he keeps match-fit for this summer’s Fringe, with gigs in Port Ellen, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Stirling, Laggan, Stonehaven, Dumfries and Melrose all on the cards. Why wait until August to see him?
MEMOIR
Wish I Was Here, M John Harrison, £16.99, Serpent’s Tail, published Thursday
Actually, the subtitle explains it’s an “anti-memoir”. Now in his mid-70s, Goldsmith Prizewinner Harrison is one of the UK’s most ambitious and haunting writers and his latest book - part memoir, part guidebook to writing, part we don’t really know what - offers a fascinating insight into the man and his literary concerns. “What’s the point of an alien artefact that you can recognise? What’s the point of an alien being you can understand?” he writes, summing up the problem with most science fiction in the space of two lines.
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