Your Weekend Dose of Culture Starts Here!

Hi everyone,

Well, it's another lovely weekend to be experiencing some free culture via the wonders of the internet, and what a great way to feed our spirit, eh?

First up, there's Carrie Underwood (and Stephen Moyer) starring in "The Sound of Music", streaming from 1900 BST (less than an hour away from when I'm writing this) on "The Shows Must Go On" channel on youtube. That's only going to be available for a couple of days so if you want to catch it, don't hang about.

If you're a fan of comedy (one of the great weapons to bring to bear to keep our mental health strong, I always think), it would be worth a look around the Shows Must Go On website (rather than their youtube channel) because they have a lot of comedy streaming there. I don't know if it's free, but at first glance it looks like it.

If you enjoy a spot of Shakespeare, we have two versions of the play "A Midsummer Night's Dream" available to stream at the moment. There's the Bridge Theatre version being shown by the National Theatre At Home (via youtube), starring Gwendoline Christ (looking very different from her role as Brienne of Tarth in "Game of Thrones") and there's also Shakespeare's Globe theatre production with their own Artistic Director Michelle Terry playing Titania and Hippolyta. Either of those could be fun, if you can get over the language differences between around 1600 and 2020!

We still have the delights of Mozart's "The Magic Flute" streaming on the Royal Opera House's channel on youtube, so that might be fun. There's also a chance to see "Die Zauberflote" from the New York Met Opera House, whose weekend programme is here:

Friday, June 26

Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore

Starring Kathleen Battle, Luciano Pavarotti, Juan Pons, and Enzo Dara, conducted by James Levine. From November 16, 1991.

Saturday, June 27

Massenet’s Cendrillon

Starring Kathleen Kim, Joyce DiDonato, Alice Coote, Stephanie Blythe, and Laurent Naouri, conducted by Bertrand de Billy. From April 28, 2018.

Sunday, June 28

Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte

Starring Golda Schultz, Kathryn Lewek, Charles Castronovo, Markus Werba, Christian Van Horn, and René Pape, conducted by James Levine. From October 14, 2017.

Don't forget that if you're in the UK the Met streams their next opera from 1930 EDT (available until 1830 EDT the following day) so for us that means we get to enjoy the show the next day, effectively, up until 2330 at night. It works out quite well, I think. But look at that, Pavarotti in his prime, God rest his soul, and then the best of current stars in Joyce DiDonato the next day. This is world-beating stuff, and we'll never have free access to it again, so watch as much as you can!

And finally...

People who subscribe to Disney+ channel may be pleased to know that the smash hit musical "Hamilton" is streaming from 3 July (not exactly this weekend, or even free, but I know people have been wanting to see this one, so I thought I'd mention it).

I hope so much that you find something glorious in here that makes your weekend a bit special. We're not out of lockdown yet, although things are starting to reopen. My thinking is that it's better to go out with caution until we're sure we're not heading for a second wave. Which of course means more time available to enjoy these lovely treats! <3