this month's
Ink Pellet contains
HARMONY IN DIVERSITY
International soprano and Artistic Director of Pegasus Opera Company, Alison Buchanan, speaks to Nilgün Yusuf. Fans of Bridgerton may have seen Alison Buchanan sing in the spinoff series, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story (2023) easily located on YouTube if you missed it. “That was a high point” the singer reflects. “I loved the show and the whole process. They treated me like artist.” Bejewelled […]
TAYLA KENYON
Tayla Kenyon is a producer, playwright, actor, teacher and workshop facilitator whose award-winning debut play FLUFF is a play text at the National Theatre. Her new play, Tell Me Where it Hurts, explores Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder andis currently on tour. “There weren’t masses of theatres in Hemel Hempstead where I was brought up, although we […]
Let’s fill this country with artists
Mountview is multiplying and now has seven CertHEs across the country. By Nilgün Yusuf. It’s been a long-held view that to make a career in the performing arts, you must move to London. But with sky high rents and the prohibitive cost of capital living, this is not an option for many young people. Mountview, […]
Poetry for Life
Having curated the Poetry Arena at Latitude for ten years from 2006, poet Luke Wright revisited the festival this summer to present excerpts from his latest book, Later Life Letter, and IP caught up with him later for a chat. Inspired by the likes of Blur’s Country House and the tapes of Monty Python, Luke […]
Into Film Supporting Literacy
This year’s Into Film Festival will take place between 6-27 November 2026, and will once again help educators bring learning to life for 5-19-year-olds across the UK by inspiring young people to watch, understand and make films in new and creative ways. Welcoming almost half a million pupils and their educators each year, education charity, […]
Beyond Laughter
Actor, comedian, broadcaster Rufus Hound, 47, has starred in the West End and presented primetime TV. Susan Elkin spoke to him. When I catch up with Rufus Hound he is eating a bowl of noodles between the matinee and the evening show where he is appearing as William in Jack and Sarah at the Mill […]
Matilda the Musical – Writing challenge
“Change My Story” is the Royal Shakespeare Company’s (RSC) flagship education programme accompanying the UK and Ireland tour of Matilda the Musical. Inspired by the musical’s themes of empowerment and literacy, the initiative aims to reach thousands of young people in cities hosting the touring production Roald Dahl’s delightful, subversive novel Matilda champions reading and […]
OHMI Trust
The OHMI Trust’s objective is to enable children and adults with physical impairments to play the instruments they want to play, when they want to play them and where they want to play them (whether at school, in the home or in a professional ensemble). OHMI Trust Music-Makers is a Birmingham-based charity, founded in 2011. Its primary […]
Learn with Mischief
Learn With Mischief is a new, free to use education resource designed for secondary students, and aims to inspire the next generation of theatre-makers and comedians, from the team behind The Play That Goes Wrong. Classrooms usually work better if there’s laughter. We teachers are inclined to get so earnestly involved in “delivering” the curriculum […]
Italia Conti
Italia Conti was an actor and teacher. In 1911 she founded the training school which bears her name. It has trained Naomi Campbell, Pixie Lott. Russell Brand, Noel Coward, Peter Duncan, Jack Hawkins, Lesley Manville and Layton Williams among thousands of others across twelve decades. One of the fifteen members of the Federation of Drama […]
News
Meet John Hopley, the editor of Ink Pellet. He is a bit of a traditionalist (Jane Austen, the Brontes, Shakespeare, Dickens…) who is developing a love of modern teen fiction.
These are just some of our occasional musings on life in the arts world in Stage Whispers, the every day tale of everyday magazine folk…
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Dancin’ Oxford 2012 is a celebration of dance talent in the city of dreaming spires and Moving With The Times is a showcase for six local artists who have been commissioned by the Oxford Dance Forum and Pegasus to create new work especially for this annual festival. Highlights include: Sole Rebel Tap which premieres their […]
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Don’t miss the chance to see the British Library’s major exhibition, Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination, as it enters its last month. This milestone exhibition, opened by Her Majesty the Queen in November, is the first to display richly illuminated manuscripts from its Royal collection in such large numbers. You have until March 13th […]
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Preview There is much to see and admire this season in the world of the visual arts. The biggie is the Leonardo da Vinci at the National Gallery in London. The dryly-titled Painter at the Court of Milan runs until February 5 and features the most complete collection of his rare surviving paintings ever held. […]
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Here’s one for everyone to share! As the newspaper industry suffers the multiple threats from the internet, falling advertising and sales, a new resource from the British Library demonstrates why we need to ensure they survive. The British Newspaper Archive website, brought to all by the British Library and online publisher brightsolid will offer access […]
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To Ink Pellet’s own Ode To Autumn, the season of mellow fruitfulness and…err..,poetry. October has been designated National Poetry Month, an honour it shares with Black History Month – both specials being imports from our friends across the pond, did you know? Still, our ambassadors of this increasingly popular and accepted art form have been […]
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It is always interesting to see how writers modify their work and I offer you a brace of Bertolt Brecht to compare, contrast and discuss. Methuen Drama offers two versions of the German’s masterpiece Der gute Mensch von Sezuan, to which the dramatist made significant changes. The original, translated by John Willett, and titled The […]
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The National Children’s Orchestra of Great Britain (NCO) is currently touring the UK auditioning aspiring children who want to make the most of its wonderful training and performance opportunities. Once selected, they attend intensive residential courses where they receive first-class training from tutors drawn from major national orchestras and the best specialist music schools around […]
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This is the year of Sir Terrence Rattigan and to celebrate, the Barnfield Theatre in Exeter hosts the Camp Theatre Company with their production of The Browning Version. For those not in the know, the play tells the story of Arthur Crocker-Harris, a failed public school teacher. As ill health forces him into early retirement, […]
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Young actors are hard at work on the Talawa Young Persons Theatre project in London. Here's how to follow the fun - and hard work!