The UK National Theatre's Performances Now Playing Live in High-Definition

The UK National Theatre’Äôs Performances Now Playing

Live in High-Definition Exclusively in Canada at Cineplex Entertainment Theatres

Four-part series begins June 25^th with Phˆ®dre, starring Helen Mirren,

Dominic Cooper and Margaret Tyzack

TORONTO, ON, May 20, 2009 (CGX.UN) ’Äì Cineplex Entertainment, the National Theatre, London and BY Experience, Inc. are pleased to announce a new series of theatrical performances will be presented live from the stage of the National Theatre exclusively in Canada at select Cineplex Entertainment theatres. The first performance in the four-part series, Phˆ®dre, starring Helen Mirren, will be shown on Thursday, June 25^th at 7 pm EST & PST/8 pm MST/6 pm CST in High-Definition (HD) and digital surround sound.

’ÄúThe NT Live events are designed to bring what we do on the stages of the National to a far greater number of people than we would ever be able to reach otherwise,’Äù says Nicholas Hytner. ’ÄúThrough high definition broadcasts, we have the technology at our disposal to present our productions beyond the four walls of the National, to reach passionate theatre-goers all over the world, and to do it really well.’Äù

Of her performance in Phˆ®dre to be sent via satellite to Cineplex Entertainment theatres, Helen Mirren says, ’ÄúI am very happy to have the opportunity to play Phˆ®dre - a rich, complex and demanding role ’Äì and to be part of NT Live, this grand new adventure for the National Theatre.’Äù

’ÄúWe are delighted to offer our guests a new series of theatrical performances live from the UK National Theatre,’Äù said Pat Marshall, Vice President, Communications and Investor Relations, Cineplex Entertainment. ’ÄúThis series further extends the entertainment options available at our theatres from the MET opera performances, to the Stratford Shakespeare Festival and live concerts. In the first of four performances, Helen Mirren takes on another regal role in Phˆ®dre that is sure to ’Äòwow’Äô our guests when they experience it exclusively on our big screens across the country.’Äù

Lloyd Dorfman, Chairman of Travelex, says: ’ÄúNT Live is a major innovation in theatre. We’Äôre enormously proud to be part of it ’Äì the result of a seven year partnership with the National Theatre, one of the world’Äôs most respected theatres. Day-to-day, Travelex is committed to helping connect people and businesses across the globe. We really hope that this initiative makes world class theatre accessible for those connected by a love of the stage on a truly worldwide scale.’Äù

Advance tickets are now available online at www.cineplex.com/events as well as at participating theatre box offices. Admission for children ages 3 ’Äì 12 is $16.95 + tax, seniors is $17.95 + tax and general admission is $19.95 + tax. A special group rate is also available for groups of 20 or more at $16.95 per person. For more information on group rates, call 1-800-313-4461.

Mirren will play the title role in Racine's Phˆ®dre. In the play, based on earlier treatments of the Greek myth by Euripides and Seneca, Phˆ®dre is the wife of Theseus, king of Athens, who develops a fatal and unrequited passion for her stepson, Hippolyte. Dominic Cooper will play Hippolytus and Margaret Tyzack will co-star as Oenone, Phˆ®dre's nurse. Nicholas Hytner, artistic director of the National, will direct.

Following Phˆ®dre, the remaining plays in the series include Shakespeare’Äôs All’Äôs Well That Ends Well with Clare Higgins on October 1, 2009; and in early 2010, Nation, based on the a novel by Terry Pratchett and adapted by Mark Ravenhill as well as Alan Bennett’Äôs new play, The Habit of Art, with Michael Gambon, Alex Jennings and Frances de la Tour.

NT Live events are distributed outside the U.K. through New York-based BY Experience, Inc.

NT Live is supported by Travelex, in partnership with Arts Council England and NESTA.

About Travelex

Travelex is the world's foreign exchange and business payments specialist. With operations spanning 35 countries, the business operates three divisions focusing on retail foreign exchange, cross border business payments and outsourcing partnerships.The company serves a customer every other second and, through an expansive network covering 115 airports, has a global annual audience of 1.8bn people.

About Cineplex Entertainment

As the largest motion picture exhibitor in Canada, Cineplex Entertainment LP owns, leases or has a joint-venture interest in 130 theatres with 1,333 screens serving more than 63.5 million guests annually. Headquartered in Toronto, Canada, Cineplex Entertainment operates theatres from British Columbia to Quebec and is the largest exhibitor of digital, 3D and IMAX projection technologies in the country. Proudly Canadian and with a workforce of approximately 10,000 employees, the company operates the following top tier brands: Cineplex Odeon, Galaxy, Famous Players, Colossus, Coliseum, SilverCity, Cinema City and Scotiabank Theatres. The units of Cineplex Galaxy Income Fund, which owns approximately 99.5% of Cineplex Entertainment LP, are traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange (symbol CGX.UN). For more information, visit www.cineplex.com.

Kings Place - This is Tues events

KINGS PLACE: THIS IS TUESDAY- Break Your Sound Barrier -

"’Ķa fantastic addition to the city's cultural life." (Musical Opinion)

VENUE: Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9AG;

TIME: 8.00pm

PRICE: Tickets from £9.50 online (These prices are available online only. Please add an extra £2 to all ticket prices if booking in person or by phone.)

BOX OFFICE: 0207 520 1490

FURTHER DETAILS: www.kingsplace.co.uk

www.myspace.com/kpthisistuesday

Tues 12 May

THE SOUND SOURCE: Turned Off, Tuned Out

Featuring Andrew Lampert - Curated by no.w.here and Sound and Music

Visual artist Andy Lampert collaborates with three maverick musicians: US cellist/ improviser and Tzadik label artist Okkyung Lee, multi instrumentalist Steve Beresford and trumpeter Peter Evans, for a playful evening of music and film. www.myspace.com/okkyunglee

Tues 19 May

MULTIPLIER 6 - Curated by Graham Fitkin

The final Multiplier event with 3 stages, featuring the World premiere of Jeremy Peyton Jones' ensemble of a dozen guitarists on one, singers Melanie Pappenheim and Rebecca Askew performing vocal gymnastics on another, whilst the well known violinist Darragh Morgan will bring some rigor to the affair. Music from Michael Gordon, Orlando Gough, Jeremy Peyton Jones and Wayne Siegel. www.myspace.com/jeremypeytonjones

Tues 2 June
THIS ISN'T FOR YOU/ Music and Machines - Curated by Matt Fretton with Sarah Nicolls
Using as a start point the idea of the piano as a machine, this event will explore mechanical devices which produce sound in theatrical ways. Including performances by co-curator Sarah Nicolls; the evening will include intriguing installations and impressive feats of engineering entertainment. The last TI4U of the season.

www.myspace.com/sarahnicolls www.sarahnicolls.com

Ffin Records releases John Hardy composition

Orchestra piece is a step outside reality

With a salary of £30 and a mission to oversee every school in an area the size of England, Anne Ritchie set out on foot and by dugout canoe across vast terrains and wild country. Her letters home paint pictures of a truly foreign world, with schools so poorly equipped they have "children doing arithmetic on their bare arms," and where they found a "python over at St Mary's, but the girls killed it quite happily!"

Forty years after her return, her son John Hardy was commissioned by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales to compose an accessible, energetic piece for a series of concerts. His inspiration for the music came from the stories his mother had told of her adventures in Africa. Her letters sent back home gave the piece its name: Blue Letters from Tanganyika. "What I did was to take some of them and use them as the basis for a sort of tone poem," explains John, "describing in music some of the colour and drama of her time there."

The 18-minute piece is split into four movements, each based on a different part of Anne's travels. "The first movement is her arrival there, a dangerous and rough journey, at one point she inadvertently walked through an area patrolled by lions; the second movement is a scherzo which describes travelling on a lake, sometimes calm and tranquil and other times stormy; the third describes the calm and peace of the very long and dark African nights near the Equator and then the last movement is an on-safari finale."

Full of exuberant African colours and textures, the piece is rich with imagery and imagination. Anyone who likes classical, orchestral, classical crossover and big film scores will feel instantly at home with this visual and visceral sound-world. Fresh and bold, Blue Letters from Tanganyika conjures an exotic world where lions are banished by bicycle bells, snakes are frightened away with hymns and the only person who can cure an aching tooth is a German nun.

Following the success of the piece in audience votes, radio broadcasts and five live performances, Ffin Records are releasing the music on Friday 1st May.

The tiny Cardiff-based record label has kept hold of the music in the face of serious attention from major companies who have described the piece as "great" (Universal Classics & Jazz) and "cinemagraphic" (Hyperion Records), praising the "great feel for atmosphere, beautifully scored" (EMI Classics).

Naxos even put in a bid to release the music themselves, noting "the music would appeal to a Classic FM audience." However, Ffin Records is committed to an independent release. "This music needs the attention it can only get from a personal, specialist label," manager Ed Scolding notes, "we know the music best ’Äì so we can help everyone experience this extraordinary music in the fullest possible way". Recorded by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales conducted by Grant Llewellyn, Blue Letters from, Tanganyika will be released digitally on Friday 1st May at www.ffinrecords.co.uk. Part of the sale proceeds will be donated to charities supporting work around the area of Tanzania described in the letters.

Notes: John Hardy is a highly-acclaimed composer whose concert music has been described as 'utterly engrossing' and 'unique' by the Guardian, 'witty' by the Independent, 'gripping and intensely theatrical' by Opera Now and 'energetic, instinctive' by the Times.

He is regularly commissioned to write substantial choral and instrumental works for organisations such as Welsh National Opera, DV8, BBC National Orchestra & Chorus of Wales, BBC Concert Orchestra, Test Dept. and Westminster Abbey.

Rainer Hersch with the WSO

Rainer Hersch presents new orchestra show:

Last Night of the Proms...Ever!

Rainer Hersch, musician, comedian and conductor

Lindsay Sutherland Boal, soprano soloist

Friday, March 27 at 8pm

Saturday, March 28 at 8pm

Sunday, March 29 at 2pm

’ÄúYou really have to see (Hersch) live to appreciate how skillfully he can weave together music and mirth. And the beauty of it is that you don't have to know your Bach from your Elgar to appreciate the punch lines."

- Evening Standard Comedy Choice

A perennial favourite of Winnipeg Symphony and Fringe Festival audiences, Rainer Hersch (click for bio) returns to the river city, following a year hiatus, to perform a brand new show with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. The Last Night of the Proms’ĶEver! pokes fun at all things British and musical and parodies the jewel of the British concert season, the BBC Proms**.

Though Britain has no official national anthem, several songs have made their way in to the heart of British patriotic repertoire ’Äì Land of Hope and Glory, Rule Britannia, God Save the Queen, Danny Boy and Scotland the Brave ’Äì and Rainer (respectfully) takes aim at them all.

With the help of the top-notch WSO musicians and soprano Lindsay Sutherland Boal (click for bio), Rainer will navigate the world of ’Äòpomp and circumstance’Äô that is British classical music. Whether you know anything about classical music or not makes no difference ’Äì maestro Rainer Hersch presents a program of truly classic comedy.

Caring for the Caregivers

This concert, an uplifting mix of music and comedy, is also an opportunity for the WSO to honour Winnipeg healthcare workers for their outstanding contributions to our community. Thanks to generous support from Manitoba Lotteries Corporation Great-West Life and Manitoba Artists in Healthcare, the WSO has invited these caregivers to the Friday night performance.

Ticket Info

Tickets for Rainer Hersch’Äôs Last Night of the Proms range from $28.50 to $65.00 and are available through the WSO box office at 949-3999, online at www.wso.mb.ca or at any Ticketmaster outlet.

As a thank-you for their hard work and dedication to our community, Winnipeg firefighters, police and paramedics may purchase tickets for any of the three performances for $25 (best available seats, excluding loge).

**The BBC Proms is an eight-week concert series featuring daily classical music events throughout London that has been a tradition for over one hundred years. The Last Night of the Proms concert features light classics and the most well-loved and patriotic of British music, including Elgar’Äôs Pomp and Circumstance Marches.

Jonathan Plowright London recital 15 November

Jonathan Plowright

"one of the finest living pianists" GRAMOPHONE

"a colossal musical mind" INTERNATIONAL RECORD REVIEW

Rare London Recital by British Pianist Jonathan Plowright

British concert pianist Jonathan Plowright is to give his first solo recital in London for 20 years at the Wigmore Hall on Saturday 15 November 2008 at 7.30pm

Despite many years of successful recording and concert activity around the world, and the enthusiastic public response to his interpretations of neglected Polish Romantic composers*, Jonathan Plowright has not been heard in his own capital city since the late 1980's.

Plowright is now recognised globally as one of the UK's truly exceptional pianists, and this recital is presented in response to the overwhelming demand to hear him playing Romantic repertoire in a live London performance.

Plowright will play three pieces with which he feels a particular empathy: Brahms's Sonata no.3 in F minor, Mussorgsky's 'Pictures at an Exhibition' and the "beautiful 12 minutes of heart-rending devotion" (Musicweb-International) that is Rummel's transcription of Bach's aria "Die Seele ruht in Jesu Hˆ§nden" from Cantata 127**. This will be a rare treat for piano enthusiasts ’Äì and one not to be missed.

Booking opens from 1^st September, on line at www.wigmore-hall.org.uk, or by calling the Wigmore booking office at +44 20 7935 2141.