Hannah is the rail thing

When rail fares are rising and stations are busier than ever, Hannah Butterfield has made a show for commuters that unpacks the rules of talking on trains, and tests the possibilities of chance encounters with strangers.
21,000 Miles Of Rail21,000 Miles Of Rail
21,000 Miles Of Rail

21,000 Miles Of Rail is a journey with live music, true train stories and a bit of love and laughter. It’s at the Lowry Studio in Salford tonight.

The show was developed through her time last year as a BBC Performing Arts Fund Fellow when she spent one year with theatre company Third Angel.

Box office: 0843 208 6000 or www.thelowry.com

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Pianist and bandleader Jools Holland pops up in two different TV programmes this weekend, and lucky ticket-holders will catch him live in concert with his Rhythm and Blues Orchestra at Preston Guild Hall tomorrow night.

Jools recorded his concert in Blackpool last month – which featured singers Marc Almond and Rumer – and this will be featured in two programmes on BBC2 Saturday night and BBC4 Sunday night.

A Lancashire-born artist whose passion for painting began in the 60s is staging a summer exhibition at The Dukes gallery in Lancaster.

John Baldwin learned his craft at Leeds Arts School whose alumni include Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and Damien Hirst.

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He was drawn into the music scene there and ran a psychedelic nightclub where the likes of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band appeared and he also booked Van Morrison.

John later moved to London where his studio was in a building shared with Oz and the fledgling Time Out magazines. He returned North to work in the family business until, in his early 40s, he decided to dedicate himself fully to art following spells of teaching at colleges in Accrington and Blackpool.

John moved to Crook in the Lake District while also spending time in London where he has been a member of Chelsea Art Club for 30 years and will exhibit there in November.

He has lived in Silverdale since 1998 and recently took part in the Arnside and Silverdale Art Trail.

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More recently, he has started painting in oils and his current exhibition – Oil And Water – combines the two.

The colourful results, some on massive canvasses, also reflect the psychedelic era when his love of art began.

Oil and Water can be viewed until August 2 during normal Dukes opening hours. If making a special trip to see it, call the Box Office as sometimes the gallery is used for other activities. Box Office: 01524 598500 or www.dukes-lancaster.org

A comedy of manners by Noël Coward in the Main House and a psychological thriller about the nature of identity, performed in the Studio, complete Theatre by the Lake’s summer season line-up in Keswick.

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Opening on Saturday Coward’s champagne comedy Fallen Angels follows two married women whose former lover threatens to pay them an impromptu visit. It’s a stylish classic from the master of theatrical wit.

Opening in the Studio the following Saturday is a very different play – Shelagh Stephenson’s Enlightenment.

When Adam goes missing whilst backpacking overseas, his parents grapple with the little information they have to go on to try and locate their son. Then out the blue a stranger appears, uncannily like their son, covered in scars and clutching Adam’s passport.

This regional première is a mesmerising play exploring grief, identity and absence.

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The two productions join the four shows already playing in the Main House and Studio; and from August 3 they rotate performance days, with all six playing every week until November 7.

Box Office: 017687 74411 or www.theatrebythelake.com

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