Say hello chamber music, farewell arms

Based on Ernest Hemingway’s real-life experience of World War One in Italy, it tells the story of Frederic Henry, an American ambulance driver for the Italian army, and his relationship with English nurse Catherine Barkley.

The couple discover love and the loss of innocence in a time of conflict.

In this unique stage adaptation, The Dukes has joined forces again with imitating the dog, one of the UK’s most original and innovative performance theatre companies, who use video projection, stage design and music to recreate a story of love and the brutality of modern warfare.

The play’s director, Andrew Quick, a founder member of imitating the dog, and who lives in Lancaster, said: “The company fell in love with the novel many years ago and knew the creative possibilities of creating something special.”

The play is a co-production with Lancaster’s Live at LICA and Cast, Doncaster. Following its Dukes premiere, the play will tour nationally and also to Italy.

The production is suitable for anyone aged 14 plus as it features scenes of an adult nature.

Box office: 01524 598500 or www.dukes-lancaster.org

Live at LICA at Lancaster University launch their autumn concert season tonight.

The Great Hall boasts one of the north of England’s best acoustics for classical and live music and has a long and impressive list of past performers.

Tonight the university welcomes back a former music graduate, soprano Jane Irwin, to open the concert series for the campus’s 50th anniversary.

Thornton Cleveleys-born Jane’s voice has been heard on opera stages and in concert halls far and wide, working with the world’s greatest musicians such as Sir Simon Rattle.

She recalls: “I used to be an usher for the concert series in order to get in for free.

“I couldn’t have imagined in my wildest dreams that I would be performing a recital for the university’s 50th Anniversary!”

Her programme includes works by Purcell, Schumann and Richard Strauss, accompanied by pianist Julia Lynch.

Other highlights this autumn include the Northern Chamber Orchestra, above, (Oct 23), cellist Giovanni Sollima with pianist Kathryn Stott (Nov 20), and a celebrity recital by Russian pianist Yevgeny Sudbin (Nov 27).

Box office: 01524 594151 or www.liveatlica.org

For the fourth year, the highlights of Birmingham’s European festival are touring the UK and Madrid, introducing three of Europe’s most exciting new theatre companies.

The festival places emphasis on collaboration, participation and exchange, and each of the pieces has been selected to cross cultural and linguistic boundaries.

All performances conclude with post-show discussions, and an extended dinner interval with the performers

From Hungary, Radioballet’s From the Waltz to the Mambo finds a 1960s Hungarian ballroom dance manual becomes a tool to explore beauty and education. From Austria, Julia Schwarzbach’s Loops and Breaks puts the audience in the spotlight.

Finally, Waiting By from Belgium/Iraq is a meditation through film, movement, art and sound on the human experience of waiting.

Catch it at the temporary base of HOME in Manchester – 1 First Street, next Friday and Saturday.

Box office: 0161 200 1500 or www.homemcr.org