AIM Awards 2020, SBTV review - a game attempt to rewire awards ceremonies

★★★ AIM AWARDS 2020, SBTV Without tables full of increasingly tipsy industry folk, how do awards work?

Without tables full of increasingly tipsy industry folk, how do awards work?

Music awards shows are a strange beast: part window display, part industry conference and part party. Especially if you don’t have Brit Awards or Mercury Prize budget to create a whizz-bang spectacle, the ceremonies can be an interminable pileup of attempts to earnestly celebrate both musicians and behind-the-scenes figures, in front of a room full of increasingly drunk and impatient people.

The Real Eastenders, Channel 4 review - timewarp on the Thames

★★★★ THE REAL EASTENDERS, CHANNEL 4 Timewarp on the Thames

Idiosyncratic doc records the life and times of the Isle of Dogs

This quirky little film about the Isle of Dogs (Channel 4), a vanishing fragment of the old London docklands overshadowed by the Canary Wharf skyscrapers while its traditional homes are usurped by new and unloveable tower blocks, presented a flavoursome line-up of rogues, jokers and eccentrics.

Kanneh-Mason, Philharmonia, Wilson online review - light in darkness

★★★★★ KANNEH-MASON, PHILHARMONIA, WILSON Light in darkness

With starry soloist and sky-high production standards, this is a sure-fire winner

Presenting online concerts has been a Matterhorn-steep learning curve for the music sector. Now, after a few months in which imaginations have been tested to the limit, it’s becoming clear what works and what doesn’t. All the more power, then, to the Philharmonia’s many elbows: in yesterday’s webcast, the first of three for their Summer Sessions series, they showed exactly what is possible once one dives into the chilly water.

The Rise of the Murdoch Dynasty, BBC Two review - how the Aussie tycoon acquired huge political leverage

★★★ THE RISE OF THE MURDOCH DYNASTY, BBC TWO How the Aussie tycoon acquired huge political leverage

New documentary told us what Rupert did, but not what he's really like

As an opening line to BBC Two's new three-part series, “Rupert Murdoch is an enigma” failed to set pulses racing. It rather implied that after three hours of documentary TV, we may end up none the wiser about what makes the scary Australian media tycoon tick.

Love Sarah review - missing key ingredients

★★ LOVE SARAH Missing ingredients in cookery-themed comedy that needs spicing up

Cookery-themed comedy needs spicing up

The cakes look great, but it's back to the recipe books in almost every other way for Love Sarah, a subpar film from director Eliza Schroeder about the struggles of a west London patisserie in the age of Brexit. The emergence of Schroeder's feature filmmaking debut just now may benefit from a citizenry eager to get back out to their local baker.

A Midsummer Night's Dream, National Theatre At Home review – a mad delight

★★★★ A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM, NATIONAL THEATRE AT HOME A mad delight

Nicholas Hytner makes the familiar gloriously strange in this slippery, sumptuous show

Nicholas Hytner’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, filmed for NT Live at the Bridge Theatre last summer, is – as it gleefully acknowledges – completely bonkers. But it doesn’t start out that way. A troop of actors trudge through the audience, singing dirge-like psalms in dark suits and The Handmaid’s Tale-esque headwraps.

Small Island, National Theatre At Home review – big-hearted story hits every beat

★★★★★ SMALL ISLAND, NT AT HOME Big-hearted story hits every beat

Andrea Levy's Windrush epic bursts triumphantly onto the stage – and our screens

A British-Jamaican man is confused. It's the Second World War, and he signed up for the RAF on the understanding that he would serve as a pilot overseas. But instead he's ended up as ground crew in a grey Lincolnshire village. "You are overseas, aren't you?" sneers his sergeant.

Roderick Williams, Joseph Middleton, Wigmore Hall online/BBC Radio 3 review - gender roles in song examined

★★★★ RODERICK WILLIAMS /JOSEPH MIDDLETON, WIGMORE HALL /BBC RADIO 3 Gender roles in song examined

A strong case for egalitarianism in all art song

I'm not sure if it was the beauty of Roderick Williams’s velvety vocals, the poignant delight of seeing a live performance in a concert hall after all this time, or my generally unusual frame of mind during lockdown that caused me to immediately burst into tears at the opening bars of Schubert’s "Gretchen am spinnrade" ("Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel"), but the fact no other audience members were around to witness my impromptu blubbering was certainly one plus point to watching Williams and

Paul Lewis/Hyeyoon Park, Benjamin Grosvenor, Wigmore Hall online/BBC Radio 3 review - tranquil Schubert, fiery Franck

★★★★ PAUL LEWIS/ HYEYOON PARK, BENJAMIN GROSVENOR, WIGMORE HALL/ BBC RADIO 3 Locked-down stars take to an empty Wigmore Hall with fervour and equanimity

Locked-down stars take to an empty Wigmore Hall with fervour and equanimity

The Wigmore Hall’s triumphant series of lockdown lunchtime concerts by the finest of local recitalists is not without an audience; it’s just that the performers can’t see them. Conversely, online viewers can watch the artists closely enough to see what fingering pianists choose for the awkward passages, and the sound quality is remarkably fine - though may also depend on your computer or smartphone (I heard Steven Isserlis’s recital the other day on my phone from the middle of Richmond Park).

Laura Marling, Union Chapel, YouTube review - communication breakdown

★★ LAURA MARLING, UNION CHAPEL, YOUTUBE Solo performance in empty venue doesn't make involving viewing

Solo performance in empty venue doesn't make involving viewing

Music, as the sociologist Simon Frith long ago pointed out, is “an experience of placing: in responding to a song we are drawn, haphazardly, into affective emotional alliances with the performer and with the performer’s other fans”. Music makes you feel things, it’s about shared emotional experiences. And while, since the invention of the Walkman, those experiences are possible in the isolation of one’s own headphones, nothing can begin to touch the communal concert experience.