Flotsam and jetsam

A few bits and bobs:

The MIF fringe fest is coming back for more in Summer '09, and has started scouting around for acts and artists. Somewhat confusingly, its name has changed again. After being called Not Manchester International Festival and Not Part of Manchester International Festival it's now being called, simply, Not Part Of. Anyway, if you'd like to be involved, all the info is here: Not Part Of festival.

Maybe this is old news at this point, but I just heard about the rebranding of Wythenshawe. This was attempted with Ancoats/"New Islington" a year or so ago, and I think it's interesting that the folks involved in this project are openly stating that they're rebranding it. Is it just me who gets all squirmy when people talk about rebranding neighbourhoods, like they're deodorants or trainers rather than communities where people have been living quite happily for hundreds of years? Hmmm.

Krispy Kreme is about to hit Manchester like a spare tire. An outpost of this American donut chain is opening at Piccadilly Gardens next week. Have you seen these things? I renewed my acquaintance with them at the Trafford Centre drive-thru recently. They are fearsome. But tasty, dammit. Even if one of the sugarcoated devils contains enough saturated fat to keep a family of four alive for two weeks. Ah well, at least I'll now be able to get a a decent cup of brewed coffee in the city centre.
And don't give me that song and dance about Americanos being the same. They're not.

And, yes, I'm feeling much better now. Thank you to the many kind souls who sent in messages of solidarity during my long period of sickness and self-pity. I'm taking my massive 8-month-old bump to Ireland next week, so all will be quiet here on the blog.

Manchester International Festival: Dead Wedding

I finally got myself down to another MIF event this weekend - I saw Dead Wedding at the Library Theatre. And like a good blogger here's my report:

Faulty Optic do just the kind of ramshackle, macabre adult puppetry and animation I love. Sort of Tim Burton-esque, but more arty. And the description of Dead Wedding really appealed to me - it's an adaptation of the Orpheus myth featuring a score composed by electronica maven Mira Calyx, with help from the musicians of Opera North (live strings and recorded experimental vocals).

We showed up on Saturday night, wedged ourselves into the theatre's tiny seats, and from the first minute I was pleasantly confused. The spectacle Faulty Optic put on was incredibly entertaining and inventive - they used every part of the stage and employed about 73 different kinds of puppetry and animation, from live manipulation of the puppets by black-clad puppeters (works better than it sounds), to shadow play, to puppets seamlessly interacting with film projected on a scrim. You had to wonder at it.

The problem was a bit too much wondering about the action unfolding on stage. As a former classics student who's really into mythology, I'm probably more familiar than most people with the story of Orpheus and Euridice, but I kept getting confused about where we were in the story and what was happening. The way it was staged was too abstract, and frankly lost me at times. And this aspect of the show completely ruined it for my companion (who wasn't keen on the music either.) The music was quite modern and interesting, at times even beautiful, with the strings playing off against Calyx's multilayered and sampled soundscapes. But the whole thing was more of a bewildering curiosity than a great night of entertainment.

Blogmeet Monday at MIF

Richard and Robin over at BBC Manchester blog have organised a blogmeet Monday evening in the Manchester International Festival Pavilion (AKA GMEX, Manchester Central or whatever they're calling it today.) They'll be there from 6 pm, and will have a table reserved for blog folk. The food and beer ain't free, but the wifi is. More details here. I'm going to try my darndest to make it, but Monday's busy for me.

Not Manchester International Festival

The green disembodied Alex Poots head is back (and I know at least one person who will be delighted to see it). So that means I have some news about the MIF. Or actually, in this case, the NMIF. What's this? Yes, a new festival has taken shape, and it's Not Manchester International Festival (so what is it then? Ahem.) NMIF is the Manchester International Festival's opposite number, The maverick Master to its oversubscribed Doctor Who. Okay, sorry. It's a fringe festival. Read on...

Not Part of Manchester International Festival will run alongside the International Festival showcasing art from every media all around the city and its environs. We will run from the 29th June (to give MIF one night in the spotlight) till the 15th July 2007. We believe everyone who can be should be able to be involved in a cultural event with such great potential, regardless of whether they were commissioned to be or not.

To be officially not part of MIF is very simple. All we ask is you put ‘www.notmanchesterinternationalfestival.co.uk’ on all your promotional material to promote yourself, and everybody else. If every flyer, poster, postcard etc, for everything that happens between the 29th June and 15th July 2007 in mcr has "www.notmanchesterinternationalfestival.co.uk" on it then everyone will know where to look for the listings to find everything that’s on.


"Like heaven, there are steps to being not part of the MIF. But unlike heaven, we're not exclusive." If you want in, email non-organiser Gareth McCann on gareth AT notmanchesterinternationalfestival.co.uk

MIFfed on Portland Street

I thought I was safe from news of the Mancunian arts scene way over here, but today it came looking for me. I opened up the New Yorker this morning and read this Talk of the Town piece about the upcoming Manchester International Festival (that takes way too long to say, doesn't it? How about we come up with something shorter, like Muffy or the MIFfest?)

MIFfed is surely how some people in our city felt after reading the piece, which made Marketing Manchester's Nick Johnson, Sir Richard Leese and Alex Poots (listed in descending order of how silly they came out sounding) look a bit, well, idiotic. Like powerpoint hucksters trying to condense the city's appeal into "brand signifiers" and not letting little things like historical accuracy or not actually knowing much about Manchester get in the way. Apparently, Poots (pictured above looking green) still lives in London half the week. I know it's not the same as trying to commute from Australia, but still.

Anyway, I thought the article was good, slightly patronizing about Manc at times, but those New Yorker writers probably don't get up North much. And it's downright refreshing to see someone write about the city without the automatic unquestioning deference for Mancunian sacred cows (The Hacienda, Alan Turing, Peter Saville, etc.) that the local press always includes free of charge.