London has done it again. This week, the Resonance Europe’s Best Cities Report named the capital Best European City for the second year running. She’s like Adele at any given awards ceremony: grateful, but she knew it was coming.
Because there is, essentially, no contest. And a large part of the reason that London topped the list is its unmatched culture scene — indeed, it came first in the culture category too, as if there had been any question about it.
Let me elaborate (indulge me, please, this is my favourite subject).
London is home to more than 230 museums and galleries, the vast majority of which are free to visit. Free. Before you even think about the superb temporary exhibitions that punctuate every glittering year, you can just waltz into the National Gallery on any day of the week and plonk yourself in front of the Arnolfini Portrait (Jan van Eyck, 1434) or Artemisia Gentileschi’s Self-Portrait as Saint Catherine of Alexandria (c1615-17). You can immerse yourself in the elegance of ancient Korean pottery at the British Museum, or swoon over delicious wallpapers at the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow, for nothing. Not even the price of a coffee. And you can use the loo.
Every time I visit Europe I’m reminded how brilliant Britain is at museum craft. Sure, sometimes our institutions get a bit hand-wringy with their wall texts, but compare the new, superbly curated and interpreted National Portrait Gallery with, say, the almost perversely eccentric Museo Capodimonte art gallery in Naples (a bit random, but that’s where I was last week) and it’s instantly clear just how many streets ahead we are.
What else? London has four ‘self-governing’ symphony orchestras (in addition to the BBC SO) — The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, the London Philharmonic and the Philharmonia. These latter two are resident at the Royal Festival Hall, along with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the London Sinfonietta, Chineke!, and Aurora Orchestra (they’re the ones who do everything from memory. Incredible).
Meanwhile, the Wigmore Hall is a world-renowned jewel for classical music, beloved by musicians from pianist Igor Levit to cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason. It’s about to announce its new season, so keep your ears open.
In fact there’s live music of all stripes — London has between 90 and 100 grassroots music venues, plus all the stadia, the arenas, your Academys, your Apollos, your Ally Pallys and the like. You could go to a gig every night of the week, music or, indeed, comedy, if you had a stronger constitution than mine.
Our theatre offering, too, is second to none, and I say that as someone who is about to spend an entire week in New York seeing Broadway shows.
From tiny spaces above pubs (shoutout to Theatre503 in Battersea) to West End venues hosting major names (Matt Smith in An Enemy of the People at the Duke of Yorks, or Sarah Snook doing all the voices in The Picture of Dorian Gray at the Theatre Royal Haymarket); from local places punching way above their weight (the Bush; the Kiln; the New Diorama) to unique theatrical environments like Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre, there is truly a space and a show for nearly every budget, and the sheer diversity of stories now beginning to be told on London’s stages (go and see Red Pitch at @sohoplace and For Black Boys... at the Garrick) is just so exciting.
Then there’s dance, and obviously we have the Royal Ballet, which is one of the best in the world, but then also the contemporary company Rambert, which is also, er, one of the best in the world, just as an example, and the peerless Sadler’s Wells is an unmissable stop on any touring dance company’s schedule.
Oh and despite the concerted efforts of the Arts Council, we still have two great opera companies (as well as a number of little ones, doing very interesting work), though how long ENO can hold out I’m really not sure.
It’s hard to put a finger on what the alchemical formula is that makes London so exciting for culture. I think our uniquely integrated, multicultural populace has a lot to do with it. Living in this higgledy-piggledy city, cheek by jowl, it’s near-impossible not to be influenced and intrigued by what’s going on next door.
Add to this a rich historical fabric that visibly exists, layer upon layer, alongside the new and evolving in this ever-changing city (and that word, evolution, is key; London never stays still) and I think you come close to understanding why culture flowers here in the way it does. There are just so many stories, and every new arrival comes with his or her own. Like I said. No contest.
What the Culture Editor Did This Week
Soufiane Ababri, Barbican
The Moroccan artist’s new installation in the Barbican’s Curve is a stylised homage to the spaces of gay clubland. Populated by his vivid paintings (lots of nude men), it explores the many layers of queer pride and shame experienced in a society that wants to erase you. There is much here I failed to grasp, but I rather liked it, and for many it will speak volumes.
Nye, National Theatre
This weird Welsh fever dream stars a pyjama-clad Michael Sheen as Aneurin ‘Nye’ Bevan, socialist firebrand and architect of the NHS, reliving his past as he lies dying in hospital. Tim Price’s slightly too-long play gets a bit explicatory and tub-thumpy, but it’s interesting and the musical number in the middle was fun, if odd.
