Anyone trudging back to work on this cold January day may have been forgiven for not feeling the glow of optimism as a new year stretches out ahead. And indeed, there is so much to despair about in 2024.
As Londoners, however, we can always rely on our city’s world-beating array of cultural delicacies to cheer us up throughout the year from music and theatre to comedy, dance, opera and so much more.
Last summer, The Social Hub, a hospitality company, pulled together a table of the top cities for culture in Europe. It looked at the 50 highest-rated hotspots in Europe, ranking them using various categories from the number of museums to theatre shows and cultural and historic activities on offer and so on. London came out top of the lot outstripping Berlin, Paris, Barcelona and Rome.
London doesn’t look like losing its crown any time soon. Our city has more than 850 art galleries, 300 music venues, almost 200 museums – and a similar amount of festivals each year – and 240-odd theatres putting on thousands of performances a year.
That world-beating theatre has much to keep audiences salivating in 2024. In the first few weeks of the year alone, Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick will be in the West End in Plaza Suite, while Catherine Tate will be terrifying the punters in chiller The Enfield Haunting.
Other treats include a new play from Jerusalem writer Jez Butterworth, Sarah Snook (AKA Shiv from Succession) playing all the characters in a one-woman take on The Picture of Dorian Gray, Live Aid musical Just for One Day, Ralf Fiennes as Macbeth, Matt Smith, Michael Sheen and Keeley Hawes all back on stage (in separate shows) and that’s before March!
Then there’s new musical Opening Night with Sheridan Smith and the welcome return of such brilliant shows such as Red Pitch and For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When the Hue Gets Too Heavy.
This spring will also see the extraordinary, indefatigable Ian McKellen, one of the greatest actors this country has produced, return to the West End to delight audiences with his take on Falstaff.
Is dance more your thing? Well the start of the year offers Matthew Bourne as well as Alina Cojocaru, while later on the Mark Bruce Company will put on Frankenstein and much feted choreographer Crystal Pite brings new work to the capital.
Opera fans have a chance to see stellar work from a new staging of Richard Strauss’ Elektra to the classic La Bohème with Angela Gheorghiu in Covent Garden. English National Opera is bringing back The Handmaid’s Tale and Regent’s Opera is putting the Ring Cycle on at Freemason’s Hall.
But of course it’s not just live performance on offer to culture vultures, we’re looking forward to a stellar year for exhibitions too.
Just a few of many of those to look forward to are Legion at the British Museum (a look at life in the Roman army), a solo show for Yinka Shonibare at Serpentine South, and an exhibition dedicated to one of THE supermodels, Naomi Campbell, that will bring that catwalk glamour to the V&A and is likely to sell out in 10 minutes.
I also can’t wait for Expressionists at Tate Modern, while on the more ‘out there’ end, Somerset House is putting on an exhibition exploring the irresistible force of cuteness in contemporary culture. Awww.
Tate Britain’s Women Artists in Britain 1520 to 1920, heralds what is looking to be an incredible year for women artists with major solo shows for figures from Yoko One (Tate Modern) and Angelica Kauffman (Royal Academy) to Judy Chicago (Serpentine) and Korean superstar Haegue Yang (Hayward) as well as the joint exhibition Francesca Woodman and Julia Margaret Cameron (National Portrait Gallery).
In the music world, some real heavy hitters are heading this way. Liam Gallagher is performing Definitely Maybe in London and there’s the small matter of Taylor Swift arriving in the capital too. Other notable performers include the Foo Fighters, Girls Aloud, Doja Cat, Olivia Rodrigo and Bruce Springsteen.
For those in the know, the major afrobeats star Davido is coming to the O2 and there is a chance to catch hyper buzzy band The Last Dinner Party at the Roundhouse.
As Justine Simons, deputy mayor for culture and the creative industries, told me this week, 2024 looks incredibly exciting even beyond the gigs shows and exhibitions, for other reasons too including the opening of Sadler’s Wells East in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park.
This 550-seat theatre is a landmark moment in creating yet another cultural centre for the capital, the £1.1bn East Bank project (London College of Fashion and UCL East have already opened there).
It will be followed in 2025 by V&A East, a new museum to display more of the V&A’s collection and its new storehouse, which will be open to the public, plus the new BBC Music Studios facilities for performance, broadcast and recording.
If that’s not enough for you, this year also brings a new commission for one of the most visible pieces of public art in London: the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square, and we will also learn the winners of the 2025 and 2027 London Borough of Culture. As Simons said, she and Mayor Sadiq Khan “are looking forward to seeing art and culture thrive and uniting the capital”.
I haven’t even mentioned the brilliant films and TV shows arriving on big and small screens, much of which is filmed in the capital’s state of the art facilities, as well as a host of other art forms and artists.
So whether your favourite stars are coming to town, or you’re up for exploring the wealth of extraordinary talent yet to cross your radar – whatever the future may hold elsewhere, 2024 in London promises to be a very rich cultural year, so come on dive right in.
