There were moments in Auckland Choral's Elijah when one could imagine the full Victorian splendour of Mendelssohn conducting his oratorio in 1846, with 396 musicians under his command.

With less than half that number, conductor Uwe Grodd still ignited an impressive conflagration of sound from his choristers, supported by Pipers Sinfonia and organist Michael Stoddart.

Four-square choral marches, just a few chords away from revivalist hymns, were sturdily effective, free from the blemishes of brass smudging and occasional loose ensemble elsewhere.

Martin Snell caught the humanity of his Old Testament hero, from the bass' stentorian launch of the evening to a particularly moving It is enough, with well-turned cello obbligato from Charles Brooks. Alison Jepson's oboe, weaving through Jennifer Barrington's first aria caught my ear too, as did Melody Lin's flute, shading in the lyrical composure of Helen Medlyn's O rest in the Lord.

Treble Jacob Siohane-Royle asserted an individual voice, advising Elijah and his people of imminent and welcome rain.

Tenor Martin Thomas Buckingham was unerring in his well-placed and paced recitatives, investing his first aria with a confidently heroic swing.

Elijah is a perplexing work, famously and wittily loathed by George Bernard Shaw; perhaps this performance, free of the Draconian cuts that marred its last town-hall appearance 10 years ago, suggests it is time for a reassessment.

What: Auckland ChoralWhere: Auckland Art GalleryWhen: SaturdayReviewer: William Dart

- NZ Herald

Go here to see the original:
Classical review: Auckland Choral - New Zealand Herald

By Jim Lowe | on August 31, 2017

Provided photoEric Tucker

MIDDLETOWN SPRINGS The Paramount Theatre will host the third residency of the acclaimed New York City theater company BedlamSept. 4-10.The residency will feature two workshop presentations of works-in-progress: George Bernard Shaws Saint Joan (a re-mount of Artistic Director Eric Tuckers signature production prior to a national tour) and a new play, Kind Man, Man Kind by Kimberly Pau.

In a new Paramount structure, these two presentations will take placeoff-siteat the Burnham Hollow Orchard Barn, 30 Orchard Road: Saint Joan at 7:30 p.m.Friday Sept. 8, and Kind Man, Man Kind at 4 p.m.Sunday Sept. 10.

In Kind Man, Man Kind, eight weekend warriors hike through an isolated Texas forest and are forced to confront the darkness within: a meditation on masculinity, privilege and surrendering dominance. Kimberly Pau wrote the play as a rallying cry to the many men who find toxic masculinity abhorrent but often find themselves in the role of the innocent bystander.

Eric Tucker and Andrus Nichols co-founded Bedlam in 2012, presenting Saint Joanon a shoestring budget with only four actors playing over 25 characters. The show received instant recognition and was extended four times. Terry Teachout ofThe Wall Street Journalwas an early admirer, describing it asThrilling! An unforgettable show! The most exciting George Bernard Shaw revival Ive ever seen, bar none.

Paramount Executive Director Bruce Bouchard, commented: It is both an honor and a rare treat that The Paramount is able to host this talented and enterprising theater company for the third time in Vermont.Since their first appearance four years ago in the summer of 2013 they have established themselves as one of the premiere companies in the country.They have mounted nine full productions in the past four years (with three coming in their next New York City season) and have played in numerous American venues, to universal acclaim.

As these presentations are no-frills works-in-process, admission will be pay what you will ($10 suggested donation). Seating is limited to 80. There is no Paramount Box Office available for these presentations.

More:
Bedlam theater returns | Rutland Herald - Rutland Herald

As Buffalo's summer theater season winds down, the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. is moving ahead at full steam. Its 11-show season, in which comedy and tragedy live in close quarters and music suffuses almost everything, runs through October.

A look at four shows that opened in July:

Shawn Wright plays a Roman centurion with the cast of the Shaw Festival's production of "Androcles and the Lion." (Photo by David Cooper.)

"Androcles and the Lion," through Oct. 7 in the Court House Theatre

Audience participation is tricky business.

Usually, it is a gimmick designed to make up for a production's lack of vision with a cheap laugh or two at the expense of an unwitting -- or worse, overenthusiastic -- audience member.

Tim Carroll's "Androcles and the Lion," mercifully, is much more thoughtful in its use of audience engagement even if the results are unpredictable and occasionally awkward. As life often is.

George Bernard Shaw's play, at one time a popular piece that would now seem impossibly fusty if played straight, was the perfect choice for this kind of treatment. It tells the story of a meek early Christian tailor (Patrick Galligan) and his treatment at the hands of Roman persecutors and their leonine pets.

Under Carroll's cheeky direction, the show unfolds with the house lights on. An audience member always plays the titular lion, earning the requisite laughs. And others in the crowd are given color-coded balls, which they toss onstage at unpredictable moments to interrupt the action and force a cast member to perform an improvised task. These include personal stories, excerpts from Shaw's lengthy epilogue and harmonized Christian hymns.

It all adds up to a quirky afternoon or evening at the theater and, much to its credit, lends this piece of creaky Shaviana a refreshing infusion of humor and spice.

Cherissa Richards as Lucy Westerman and Allan Louis as Dracula in the Shaw Festival's production of "Dracula." (Photo by David Cooper.)

"Dracula," through Oct. in the Festival Theatre

How many more permutations on Bram Stoker's classic tale are possible before its dramatic fuel is exhausted?

We seem to be getting close to an empty tank, at least going by Eda Holmes' beautifully designed but ultimately anticlimactic production of Liz Lochhead's sex-saturated adaptation of the novel.

Far and away the star of this production is set and costume designer Michael Gianfrancesco, who with projection designer Cameron Davis has conjured a world where terror comes alive in Victorian settings that somehow feel contemporary.

There are plenty of neat stage tricks -- splatters of blood, great washes of fluttering light, sweeps of shadow -- to occupy theatergoers' attentions. But too much of the dialogue seems superfluous to the action, especially toward the wearying end of the first act.

There is much to like about the production, which is shot through with erotic energy. Allan Louis' performance as Count Dracula is both funny and genuinely menacing. It doesn't achieve as much contrast as audiences might expect against Marla McLean's Mina, who brings an unusual degree of self-awareness to this normally one-dimensional character.

The rest of the cast performs ably in beautiful surroundings, but little about the production sticks. At the final curtain, it vanishes from stage and mind like a puff of Transylvanian smoke.

The Shaw Festival's production of "An Octoroon" runs through Oct. 14 in the Royal George Theatre. (Photo by David Cooper.)

"An Octoroon," through Oct. 14 in the Royal George Theatre

If you needed proof that the Shaw Festival has moved into the 21st century, look no further than Peter Hinton's production of "An Octoroon."

Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' play, a smart and searing critique of black representation based on a racist 1859 play by Dion Boucicault, is by far the most radical piece the festival has ever produced on its main season.

It is radical from the very start, when a nearly naked Andr Sills walks out onstage and straight through the fourth wall to give us the setup. He's soon joined by a similarly unclothed Patrick McManus as "the playwright," which we understand to mean Boucicault. And soon enough, after Sills' character downs an entire bottle of liquor to Lil John's "Throw It Up," the show begins in earnest.

Set in the antebellum South, Boucicault's melodrama tells the story of a plantation owner, his evil rival and the woman he falls in love with, who happens to be 1/8th black and thus an unvalued "octoroon." It casts its central character as the white hero in a high-stakes moral drama, which unfolds against a highly stylized backdrop designed by Gillian Gallow featuring silhouetted figures in the style of the visual artist Kara Walker.

Even though it is presented with tongue firmly in cheek as a metatheatrical device, the melodramatic style can become grating. However, the interruptions from Sills' omniscient narrator and other contemporary punctuation marks help to remind audiences of the critical lens through which they are viewing the action.

The action, the era and the approach are all absurd. The lens provides painful clarity. And the lesson, which comes in one of the most devastating closing scenes of any American drama, hits hard.

Gray Powell and Moya OConnell are featured in the Shaw Festival's production of "Middletown." (Photo by David Cooper.)

"Middletown," through Sept. 10 in the Jackie Maxwell Studio Theatre

There are moments in the theater, and they can only happen in the theater, when the full weight of the cosmos seems to bear down on you in your seat until you lose all sense of where you are.

Several of those moments occur in Will Eno's charming, devastating play "Middletown," consummate production of which is now running in the newly renamed Jackie Maxwell Studio Theatre. Meg Roe directs an immensely talented cast, whose members wring torrents of emotion and meaning out of scant material.

The play is set in a nowhere place, in a nowhere time. Like its most obvious antecedent, Thornton Wilder's "Our Town," its main themes are the main themes: life and death. It centers on two unhappy characters, a recent transplant to Middletown (Moya O'Connell) whose husband has abandoned her to have a child on her own; and a man (Gray Powell) who has spent his entire life searching in vain for a place of comfort.

The show begins with the cast using erasable markers to draw the streets of Middletown onto the stage, an attempt to give some shape to the shapelessness of their lives. We meet an eager librarian (Tara Rosling, excellent as always), a druggie down on his luck (Jeff Meadows, ever-affecting), a cop struggling to balance power and compassion (Benedict Campbell, who always looks like he belongs).

We also meet a strangely philosophical obstetrician (Karl Ang), who doubles as a strangely philosophical astronaut, floating out in the space above Middletown in one of the show's most magical and affecting scenes.

The interaction between Powell and O'Connell is the most affecting part of the production, but in every aspect it brims with sadness and vitality. This ranges from Camellia Koo's perfectly simple set design to Powell's almost unbearable performance of his character's final struggles.

The members of the Shaw Festival, still reeling from the death of the vital young cast member Jonah McIntosh, in July, have been through a lot this season. It is difficult to imagine any one of them watching this play without thinking of their friend.

The best literature attempts the impossible task of placing such incomprehensible events in some kind of perspective. "Middletown" is such a play. For anyone who has ever contemplated where they fit in the larger scheme of things, it begs to be seen.

email: cdabkowski@buffnews.com

Continued here:
At Shaw Festival, four shows to entice theater lovers - Buffalo News

Bushy Park provides a sanctuary for nature-lovers.

Bushy Park provides a sanctuary for nature-lovers.

A NEW Terenure Walking Trail Map & Guide is to be launched on Saturday, September 2.

Starting at St Joseph's Church and ending at Bushy Park Market, this free tour lasts approximately 90 minutes.

Now this is one for the diary, the I Love Terenure group announced on Facebook.

We are soooo excited! After nearly a years work we are absolutely delighted to announce that the Terenure Walking Trail Map & Guide has just gone to print and we will be launching it at 12 noon.

Well done to all involved in compiling the content, especially our very own Ciara Quinn, Pat Liddy and of course Dublin City Council.

The new tour takes in one of the gems of the Southsides many beautiful parks - Bushy Park.

Part of an extensive open space network along the Dodder, Bushy Park extends to 20.5 hectares.

The park originated in 1700 when Arthur Bushe of Dangan, Co Kilkenny, Secretary to the Revenue Commissioners, built the house known as Bushes House on a site of four hectares.

A John Hobson became owner in 1772 and changed the name to Bushy Park, possibly after the park in London of that name.

Purchased by Abraham Wilkinson in 1791 who added almost 40 hectares to the estate, he gave it as a dowry to his daughter Maria when she married Robert Shaw in 1796.

George Bernard Shaw was a distant relative, his grandfather being a nephew of Sir Robert Shaw (1st Bart).

The Shaws were connected with Bushy Park for the next 155 years until 1951 when they sold the estate to Dublin Corporation.

In 1953, the Corporation sold eight hectares to the Sisters of Religious of Christian Education but later re-acquired two acres of woodland in 1993.

The park is noted for its woodland walks, ornamental ponds and beautiful Dodder Walk as well as catering for football, tennis boules, and children's play.

Dublin Citys first public skatepark was opened in 2006 in Bushy Park.

It consists of a concrete bowl surrounded with typical street elements. The park is open to skateboarders, in-line skaters and BMX bikes.

It also boasts a kiosk, a nature trail, boules (pentaque) pitches and 11 tennis courts that are managed in association with Dublin Parks Tennis League.

There are also band performances in the park, historical leisure walks, a pavilion, a playground, a river nd pool, a sea shelter, sports fields and wildlife.

The Terenure Village Market opens every Saturday in Bushy Park from 11am to 4pm.

The market has a mix of stalls selling artisan food products, organic vegetables, pastries, breads, confectionary, arts and crafts and much more.

There are also occasional music performances and family fun events associated with the market.

Bushy Park Native Tree Trail will help to introduce you to a selection of Ireland's native trees.

There are 15 native tree signposts in Bushy Park. To find them you can navigate your way around the park using The Native Tree Trail booklet.

They can be downloaded from http://www.dublincity.ie/main-menu-services-recreation-culture-dublin-city-parks-visit-park/bushy-park

Dublin City Council Parks Department commissioned MosArt to prepare a Landscape Masterplan and Management & Development Plan to identify management, maintenance, development and landscape design objectives for Bushy Park.

The brief required a set of consolidated guidance documents to provide the direction for future design and management decisions relating to the park.

The project was divided into two stages with the first one being a combination of professional evaluation and public consultation.

The second stage was the development of design and management objectives based on the findings of stage one.

MosArt presented their Landscape Masterplan to the South-Central Area Committee and it can be downloaded from the same address.

Read more:
New Terenure map takes in a Dublin gem - Dublin People

THE BASICS: Bernard Shaws wild and woolly take on this ancient, well known tale has been adapted by the Shaws new Artistic Director, Tim Carroll (and to some extent, the whole ensemble of fourteen), and plays in repertory at the Court House Theatre in Niagara-on-the-Lake through October 7th.

THUMBNAIL SKETCH: Androcles the tale concerns a meek, pious Christian tailor in thedays of the Roman Empire, when Christians were routinely on the bill of fare for hungry lions at the Colosseum. Our hero, Androcles, on the run, befriends a wild lion in distress. Years later, when hes been captured and is being served up as lion food, hes befriended by the very same beast, who returns his former good deed in spades. Shaw seems to have very little interest in the tales inspiring message, however. He uses ANDROCLES as a launching pad for a fierce and funny examination of religion, Christianity in particular.

THE PLAY, THE PLAYERS AND THE PRODUCTION: I had not seen ANDROCLES in a very long time, though I retain vague happy memories of a 1967 TV adaptation starring Norman Wisdom. When I heard that director Carroll and company were transforming it into an audience participation piece, Ill admit that I was filled with trepidation. Would this happy hodgepodgeof a play be cut to ribbons? Happily, this is not the case, although big liberties have been taken, in an effort to achieve spontaneity andactor-audience bonding. One audience member is chosen to play the Lion in Scene One. Another helps pick the cast Emcee for the show, drawing out a numbered slip from a fishbowl. Still others throw balls of different colors onstage at odd intervals; retrieving ensemble members oblige them with personal anecdotes, stories gleaned from the audience before and during the show, andcondensed bits from Shaws own voluminous (37,000 word!) Preface and Afterward. These additions insure that the various performances will be like snowflakesno two exactly alike. Reading this, some people will no doubt be thinking How clever. How refreshing. How enchanting!

Director Carroll is obviously hoping that you people will be attending in droves.

Director Carroll is obviously hoping that you people will be attending in droves. Others of us, mainly traditionalists and authors, I suspect, are bound to have a very different reaction. I would say this is nothing but a big boatload of gimmickry, and is permissible only because poor old GBS is not around to say No!. Shaw did not like people taking liberties with his works; ask all the ghosts of the many Hollywood people who tried to bring his plays to the screen over the years! Further, as guardians of his legacy, the Shaw Festival has a responsibility to stage the pieces as they were written. Many theatergoers are coming to these wonderful plays for the first time; do they not deserve high quality, straightforward, right-from-the-pen productions? My goodness, there are so many ways to be creative without compromising the playwrights actual words! Please start giving that approach a try, wont you, Mr. Carroll?

Now, despite these serious reservations, and some problematic casting (see below), ANDROCLES ends up being an entertaining show. There are reasons for this. A lot of the Shaw dialogue is retained, and it provides of us with plenty of laughs, as well as plenty to chew on (Shaw himself declared that ANDROCLES was not a comedy (although it is), to make sure that we pay enough attention to all the critical, thought provoking stuff about the Church and its doctrines.) This is also because, ensemble wise, we are in very capable hands. You know this the minute the cast begins singing, in disciplined four-part harmony. There are moments, especially when improvisation reigns, that you feel like you are watching bad childrens theater. Happily, none of these last too long. Playwright Shaw keeps riding back to the rescue!

While neither Patrick Galligan or Jenny L. Wright are quite the ticket physically for Androcles and his carping wife, and they are not the sort of James Thurber-ish couple that Shaw clearly intendedhere (listen for the dialogue tells), this isnt a calamity, as they are both so adept in their roles. Jeff Irving is spot on as the tormented warrior turned Christian, Ferrovius, and comes close to stealing the show. Kudos also to Julia Course for her fetching, unwavering Lavinia, and to Neil Barclay for his wavering, witty, world-wise Emperor (shades of Peter Ustinov). Shawn Wright is consistently amusing as the Centurion, channeling (or so it seemed to me) Kenneth Mars in Young Frankenstein.

This productions creative approach to The Lion is a major failure, in my view. The audience is being asked to meld three hugely different representationsone a tiny shadow puppet, another basically a giant floating bronze maskinto a single satisfying and functional entity. This is just too much to ask. And to make matters worse, the big Androcles/Lion reunion, laid out quite specifically by GBS in a long stage direction, has gotten the axe at the Court House. So much for good storytelling

There are some pleasing costume pieces by Dana Osborne on display, and music director Paul Sportelli has composed a darling little overture that is played enthusiastically by the entire ensemble, on a motley band of instruments.

IN SUM: In spite of all my objections (see above), this ANDROCLES AND THE LION is an enjoyableouting, at once funny and thought provoking. The original text takes a beating in spots, but Shaws literary brilliance ultimately prevails. Its not exactly a family show, but its certainly suitable for older kids, who will probably want to discuss it with you on your way home from Niagara-on-the-Lake!

*HERD OF BUFFALO (Notes on the Rating System)

ONE BUFFALO: This means trouble. A dreadful play, a highly flawed production, or both. Unless there is some really compelling reason for you to attend (i.e. you are the parent of someone who is in it), give this show a wide berth.

TWO BUFFALOS: Passable, but no great shakes. Either the production is pretty far off base, or the play itself is problematic. Unless you are the sort of person whos happy just going to the theater, you might look around for something else.

THREE BUFFALOS: I still have my issues, but this is a pretty darn good night at the theater. If you dont go in with huge expectations, you will probably be pleased.

FOUR BUFFALOS: Both the production and the play are of high caliber. If the genre/content are up your alley, I would make a real effort to attend.

FIVE BUFFALOS: Truly superba rare rating. Comedies that leave you weak with laughter, dramas that really touch the heart. Provided that this is the kind of show you like, youd be a fool to miss it!

Read the original post:
Androcles and The Lion @ The Shaw - Buffalo Rising

George Bernard Shaws Comedy You Never Can Tell came to the stage at the Mineral County Fairgrounds on Wednesday evening. Jim Goss with the Mineral County Performing Arts said they were worried about holding the event outside because of the smoke from area wildfires. However, when show time came at 6 p.m., the afternoon breeze had cleared the air and people brought lawn chairs, blankets and sat on bleachers to enjoy the show.

The 1987 four-act play, directed by William Brown, is set in a seaside town and tells the story of Mrs. Clandon and her three children, Dolly, Phillip and Gloria, who have just returned to England after an 18-year stay in Madeira.

The children have no idea who their father is and, through a comedy of errors, end up inviting him to a family lunch. At the same time a dentist named Valentine has fallen in love with the eldest daughter, Gloria. However, Gloria considers herself a modern woman and claims to have no interest in love or marriage.

The play continues with a comedy of errors and confused identities, with the friendly and wise waiter, Walter (most commonly referred to by the characters as William, because Dolly thinks he resembles Shakespeare), dispensing his wisdom with the titular phrase You Never Can Tell.

For more than five years Montana Shakespeare in the Parks has entertained August audiences in Superior through the Mineral County Performing Arts Council. They are the only professional touring theatre program in Montana producing Shakespeares plays and the only Shakespeare company in the country to reach as extensively into rural areas.

View original post here:
GB Shaw comedy hits the stage in Superior - Clark Fork Valley Press

NIAGARA-ON-THE-LAKE, Ont. The Shaw Festival's 2018 season will feature several productions honouring the 100th anniversary of the end of the First World War.

The Ontario theatre festival's slate of newly announced shows includes Bernard Shaw's satirical comedy "O'Flaherty V.C," directed by Kimberley Rampersad.

The production centres on a young man awarded the Victoria Cross who is paraded around Ireland to recruit others.

The festival will also stage "Oh What a Lovely War" directed by Peter Hinton, which is billed as a Canadian take on a classic anti-war musical.

Festival artistic director Tim Carroll will team with Kevin Bennett to co-direct Shakespeare's "Henry V," which will be set in the trenches of France in 1918.

Tickets for the 2018 season will be available to Friend of the Shaw members on Nov. 4, and to the general public on Dec. 9.

The festival will also feature "The Orchard (After Chekhov)" directed by Ravi Jain, which will explore the Canadian immigrant experience through a century-old Russian play.

Eda Holmes will direct the 1920s-set musical "Grand Hotel," and Anita Rochon will helm romantic comedy "Stage Kiss."

Shaw will also showcase "Of Marriage and Men: A Comedy Double-Bill," with "How He Lied To Her Husband" and "The Man Of Destiny" directed by Phillip Akin.

The festival playbill also includes the Sherlock Holmes murder mystery "The Hound of the Baskervilles" directed by Craig Hall; "The Baroness and the Pig," helmed by Selma Dimitrijevic; and "A Christmas Carol" directed by Carroll.

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Shaw Festival's 2018 season has First World War theme - TheRecord.com

Protesters shout anti-Nazi chants after chasing alt-right blogger Jason Kessler from a news conference on Aug. 13 in Charlottesville. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images hide caption

Protesters shout anti-Nazi chants after chasing alt-right blogger Jason Kessler from a news conference on Aug. 13 in Charlottesville.

Nazis don't always look like bad guys in funny helmets. The Nazis and other bigots in khaki slacks and bright polo shirts who marched in Charlottesville chanted racist and anti-Semitic slogans I'd rather not repeat on a Saturday or at all. But it's discouraging to feel that you have to explain, more than 70 years after Nazi Germany was defeated, why Nazis are still the menace that embody evil.

The 20th century saw a lot of state-sanctioned mass murder: Stalin, Mao, Mengistu and Pol Pot, Armenia, Bosnia, Cambodia, Rwanda, Ethiopia's Red Terror, the Great Purge, the Cultural Revolution, and more. In America there were lynchings and the cruelty of official segregation, which followed the end of slavery, and the massacre of so many Native Americans.

To cite one or another doesn't excuse any. But Nazism was something extraordinary. The laws on race and citizenship they began to impose on taking power in 1933, which were encoded in the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, invoked blood, soil and the twisted science of eugenics to make anti-Semitism and Aryan supremacy the law. They used those wicked decrees to begin to engineer the murder of millions.

Much of the west was slow to believe they should worry about Nazism. Distinguished people, including George Bernard Shaw and Charles Lindbergh, said Germany's repression and race laws may be repellent, but were Germany's business; or that the U.S. and Britain committed equivalent crimes with segregation and colonialism. It was Winston Churchill, in June of 1940, who called the advance of Nazism, "a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science."

The fight to defeat that "perverted science" was bloody, costly and came close to failing several times. But when the war was won, the U.S., Britain and Canada were forced to face their own most painful contradictions, and began to turn themselves into better, freer and more diverse societies.

I've interviewed young Nazis and Ku Klux Klan members. They seem to be loveless, clueless clods, who see only skin color and ethnicity or "blood and soil" as the Nazis of the 1930s and 2017 call it.

The world barely escaped from the death grip of Nazis 70 years ago. The men and women who won that battle gave us freedom, as much as those who served Washington, Lincoln and Harriet Tubman. It dishonors those who struggled against Nazis to forget the evil they were brave enough to confront and defeat.

Go here to see the original:
Explaining, Again, The Nazis' True Evil - NPR

Noel Baker follows in the footsteps of Pippa Middleton and pays a visit to Glengarriff and the Eccles Hotel.

One delightful aspect of Pippa Middletons recent visit to Glengarriff was how, at the end of an evening, she tucked into a Tayto sandwich. Surely its only a matter of time before Irelands premier crisps are being served at Buckingham Palace.

The younger sister of the future Queen of England was in this glorious part of West Cork for a wedding and stayed in a bridal suite at the Eccles Hotel.

It certainly made for some fabulous advertising for the village and its surrounds, even if, as one local told me on a recent visit, for a few days afterwards it was a case of Pippa this, Pippa fecking that...

Pippa and co may have been over a wedding but Glengarriff has had its fair share of famous visitors and residents over the years, not least the late Maureen OHara, whose five-bedroom house went on the market earlier this year.

My gang arrived in Glengarriff at lunchtime on a Saturday and we headed straight for Jims Coffee house, located just at the point the road begins to slope down into the village. The sun was beaming, dogs were frolicking in the back garden and the place was packed.

We devoured some delicious sandwiches the korma pitta bread is a real hit and then made our way to the Eccles Hotel, with its unmissable cast-iron verandah catching the eye every bit as much as the view opposite it.

Luckily, our family room opened out onto the waterfront and its the kind of vista you just want to drink in. You can see why high profile figures have decamped here over the years, among them George Bernard Shaw and WB Yeats.

And given there has been accommodation available at this site since 1745, there have been many years. Pictures of Yeats et al feature at various points in a building that reeks of history and heritage.

Its not your identikit nouveau hotel with feng shui sofas and ergonomically-enhanced bar stools.

Its a treasure trove of windy stairways and open fires, where the heritage seems to bounce off the walls back at you.

Recently brought under new ownership, it will be interesting to see how those in charge maintain and even develop this rich and vital sense of classy antiquity, no matter what other tweaks are made to this beautiful old building.

Its understood the new management want to push Eccles as a choice wedding venue. Clocking the spacious dining area and the views out the windows, its easy to see the appeal.

Whatever changes, that view will not, and for that we can all be truly grateful. Across to the right is Garnish Island, a planned subtropical haven of exotic plants and architectural delights.

The ferry trip across takes just a few minutes but the journey is enlivened by the expanding panorama of the bay and the chance to witness seals slouching on the rocks or bobbing along by the boat.

Once across, follow the maps to make your way around the Italian Garden, Happy Valley, and down the Dell.

There are some spectacular vantage points, not least the Martello Tower, which dates from 1805, well before businessman Annan Bryce and architect Harold Peto transformed Ilnacullin into the wonder it is today.

Back on dry land, we headed off to the Ewe Experience a few kilometres out the Kenmare Road.

This is obviously a labour of love, using the side of the mountain as a canvas for a marriage of ideas and nature.

Kurt Lyndorff, formerly an overseas reporter with Danish media, chiefly Jyllands Posten, and his partner Sheena Wood, an artist and ecologist, had previously lived on Mizen Head before they moved here and built a home and garden unlike any other.

Youre greeted at the entrance by artworks including a sheep poking its head out of a Morris Minor. Inside the theme continues, with eye-popping sculptures and artworks that range from a pig in a bath to a dinosaur peaking over the undergrowth to a dragonfly made out of tin and metal.

The trail takes you through the trees, climbing up alongside a waterfall, with the artworks and associated poems developing themes such as the evolution of the planet and mans role within it.

From an adult perspective there is much here to ponder, from a childs perspective it is simply a wonderful place to move from one surprise to the next. My three struggled to observe the no running rule, but in any event, we all had a workout.

Just down the road from the Ewe Experience is the local nature trail, and you cant turn left or right around these parts without a sign pointing you in the direction of a lake or a walkway.

The proximity of sea and mountain is really something, as is the sight of the sun setting in the distance over Garnish Island. We were all wrecked by the time we made it back to the Eccles Hotel.

One perfectly-cooked steak later, I was ready for the scratcher, although I did treat myself to a drop of Jameson and water as I sat outside on the veranda and watched the world go by - not that much did. And I bought my wife a bag of Tayto.

The following morning we took a stroll up through the village, which was already gearing up for a busy Sunday and busloads of tourists, breaking things up with a visit to the playground and another stroll along the walkway that brings you across the waters edge.

After that it was time to leave, but even then this part of the world had another surprise in store. Until this particular morning I must have been the only man from West Cork to have never travelled the route from Glengarriff to Kenmare.

Having now done so, I can only marvel at the scene, the mountains and valleys and the sea disappearing in the rear view.

Its only when you take in the sheer breadth of the geography here that you remind yourself that this country is still a knockout.

Disappear through the tunnel hoven out of ancient rock and appear out the other side, looking over into Bonane and south Kerry and marvel at the surrounds. Even Pippa and co might agree: it puts Bucks House in the hapenny place.

Where to stay:

Glengarriff has plenty of options. Rooms at the Eccles Hotel start at 135 per night, see wwweccleshotel.com

Where to eat:

Again, loads of options. Jims Coffee House is great for lunch but be warned, they dont take cards so have some cash handy. See their Facebook page for food details. McCarthys Bar in the village also comes recommended.

What to do:

The Ewe Experience (www.theewe.com) is well worth a visit, while another option is the Bamboo Park (www.bamboo-park.com).

There is also the local nature trail and various walks, plus the boat to Garnish Island is a must - enquire at the pier and see http://www.garnishisland.com. After that, theres always just lounging around looking at the scenery.

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Follow Pippa Middleton and head to Glengarriff in West Cork - Irish Examiner

Transcript

I'm here with Brad Simpson. He's the Chief Wealth Strategist at TD Wealth. They've just come out with their quarterly investment strategy publication-- a great publication, really interesting. And you start things off with a quote that I think kind of sets the theme for the entire thing. And you say, "the only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor. He takes my measurements new each time he sees me. The rest go on with their old measurements and expect me to fit them." That's from George Bernard Shaw. Why did you start with that?

Thank the universe for Shaw. At the end of the day, we think that we are in a time -- I think our name of our publication says it all, "Grand Distortions." We are of the belief that we are in a generation of change in the financial marketplace, and this change requires a whole new way of doing things. And one of the things that we tend to do in portfolio management is kind of stick with our knitting, what we've always done.

So it's kind of going back to the tailor and saying, I've changed. The world's changed. And I need to have a new attire to prepare myself for the environment that I'm in. And that's really it.

And it really comes down to, I guess, making sure that it's tailored -- you talk this tailored for you. And there's what's happening in the world, but it's got to make sense for your life, in terms of the risks that you're managing at the same time. So you go through this. Again, you talk about the market. Then we talk about the tailoring side of things.

But let's talk a bit about the world we're living in right now in terms of the market today. And you talk about where are we now? So where are we now?

Well, I think a starting point to that is that at the asset allocation committee, which I'm a member of, we set a group of themes that are always going on about 18 months. So we literally have five themes right now that, I think, in a really good way, frame our thoughts and thinking today.

So our starting point on that is yearning for yield. And yearning for yield is really this idea that investors, if you had a GIC in 1980 or 1981, it yielded 13 and 1/2%. Got $100,000 in that, your income was $13,500. That same investment in terms of deposit today, you might be getting 1.25% for it, where you're getting an income of $1,000, $1,250. That's rate shock. And so yearning for yield is this notion of really getting that tail end of folks doing whatever it is to find something that will produce an income for them.

Second thing is rarefied air. Rarefied air is looking at equity markets globally. And again, with on the backs of monetary policy pushing up most of the industrialized nations' stock markets, really, to their all-time highs and as we know, we've discussed in the past, most other financial assets too, from real estate to art too. So really, that's the rarefied air piece of this.

The third notion, the third of our themes is the Trump

Not to interject, but what I really loved about the chart that you have on this thing is you have Trump fear and Trump hope. And it looks as though we're kind of stuck in between right now.

Yeah. Yeah, back in November when he was elected, how the market turned into this hope phase, where we would have a new cycle of growth and a new pro-business government, if you will. And if anybody's been watching the television or following the news the last few months, thus far, their accomplishments really can kind of get down to nothing. And interestingly is that there's really such kind almost low hope or thought towards the change they could accomplish, that TD Economics actually isn't even taking the impact of what they're going to possibly put in place and giving that consideration in the forecastings right now.

So on the one hand with Trump, you have this notion that there's this world of possibility, and then the market is really traded off of that. And now we're kind of at this place, well, maybe nothing's going to happen. And this middle point is like a neutral, right? It just is want not really of not knowing what to do from here.

You've mentioned the five -- so yearning for yield, rarefied air, Trump effect. Stuck in neutral was another one that you talk about.

Yeah, and stuck in neutral is really this notion that on the one side here is, if you look at the halfway through 2017, things are pretty good. The industrialized nations, their economies are all kind of growing around 2%. Their markets are particularly strong. And then in some of even in those industrialized nations that were a little bit of laggards in the past are really starting to perform really well. And in particular when you look at Europe, you see Germany performing well.

You see France really starting to surprise and perform well. And so on the one hand, manufacturing is strong, if you're looking at the purchasing managers index and the surveys that are coming in from there. Credit conditions are still very favorable. And yet growth still is only 2%. And so kind of stuck in neutral is the reality is while you we're doing all these things, the fact is we still have this issue of demographics in these industrialized world.

We still have these mountains of debt that we've created. Today on balance sheets of federal reserve boards, our central banks around the world, it's over $25 trillion now. So then you kind of throw that into the mix, where any time there's any thought of inflation, and it just kind of peters away, right? And growth is hard to come by.

So one hand, we have these things that we're doing to get things going. But ultimately, stuck in neutral is that there is some embedded things that are causing things to not go like they used to.

The fifth one you talk about here, as well -- again, stuck in neutral, yearning for yield, rarefied air, Trump effect, and global a-go-go, just in terms of looking outside North American borders.

Yeah, and then the last piece is -- that still your equity allocation is a major part of your portfolio. And there's no secret that most Canadians have an incredibly domestic-oriented portfolio. And for the last six months, we had been speaking an awful lot about trying to move out from that and try to add positions in the United States. We still think that is a good place to be.

We have reduced our allocations across our platform in the United States, though. And we've really taken some of those proceeds, and we've taken some of the proceeds that we've reduced in allocations in Canada, and moved into international markets, particularly focused on Europe. And that's, again, really about in an earlier stage of return around compared to the United States.

They really didn't start this monetary cycle till about two to three years afterwards. And so now they're starting to see the early stages of that benefit. And valuations there on a comparable basis are much better.

When you put all that together, you talk about, again, from the wealth asset allocation committee, to having a cautious stance at this point, just given how well everything's pointing right now.

Yeah. No, so ultimately, I think the starting point, and it really leads our document, is that when we meet is ultimately we're trying to come down to, are we in an environment should you be really defensive? Should you be cautious? Is this the time to become a little bit more assertive, or is this a time to be aggressive? And we're cautious right now. And cautious doesn't need to be worrisome or calling market tops or anything of that nature.

It's just looking at the inputs of what's gotten us to where we are today. We think it's just time that you have a little bit of sober second thought and think about perhaps taking this time to readjust your portfolio.

Now, we've talked about this before as well. But when you take a look at the ingredients of what's happening in the world, that you need to bring it back and go, what does this all mean for me? And you talk about -- we've talked talk about the risk priority plus portfolios, the idea of risk. I think the one thing that's really interesting is that people may not realize that the traditional allocations -- fixed income, equity, those types of things -- you may be incurring a whole lot more risk than you are aware of because that risk bleeds between those allocations.

Exactly. Right. Yeah. And so what we've been really focused on in the last decade, particularly in the pension universe, has been this movement between building investment portfolios that have a broad category of asset allocations. And that can be equity, and that can be fixed income, but also use of absolute return strategies, use of private capital.

But that's still not enough. And you still have to get to this notion -- so think about a great diversifier along the lines of typically in an asset allocated portfolio was real estate. In fact, my team was just doing a portfolio review for a family that almost 50% of their investment portfolio was ultimately in real estate.

In our view of things, they were looking at this, well, this is good diversification. And our view is that real estate equals equity. There's nothing more, nothing less. And that's what a risk factor approach to investing means.

And why does real estate equal equity?

Ultimately, it is an investment that is a structure like an equity investment, right? It has its ups and downs, its revenues, its dividends that it pays out, which is ultimately very much an equity structure. And if you look at a portfolio, say, of real estate during a crisis like 2007 and 2009, yeah, it performed like that. And that was a big surprise for many.

So what we're seeing is that if you think about that, you go that that real estate has equity risk. Equities obviously have equity risk. And the fact is that if we had a big correction in an equity portfolio, many of those listed companies, where you have investment grade bonds, and your fixed income would also have an impact on them as well. And that's really what risk priority management is about and allocating like that. And it's not something that, really, universally we're seeing more and more of. And there's a fascinating section at the Canadian Pension Plan that actually discusses all this and says that this how they're allocating.

So we know it's a movement that we think that we're one of the leaders of. And we think it makes an awful lot of sense.

I've only got about 30 seconds left, but for the risk priority portfolios, and there's a number of them, what do they do, just in layman's terms, that address this risk issue, so that you don't have that real estate/equity problem or something like that.

Yeah, well, the bottom line is we still have the allocations there. But the first thing is, is knowing how to build a diversified portfolio is to understand the risks that you're taking, right? And so I think for us, the starting point is that if we can acknowledge that if I own a stock and an investment grade bond from the same company and one side of that gets hit, the other one will get hit.

They move together.

They'll move together. So really, for us is that saying that we are looking at building an investment portfolio, that just saying how much I have in fixed income and equity isn't enough. Ultimately, we have 10 different models that we're running, that all can be customized and changed because we also think that in 2017, having something that is finished and done that's kind of down from and set upon in front of a client is long over. We live in a world where we very easily can sit down and meet with somebody with one of our professionals and custom make something for the person sitting in front of them.

So for us, it's a starting point, back to our tailor analogy, right? We send out the cloth, right? But ultimately, you're going to take those tapestries, and you're going to take that tapestry and get it to fit the client. And that's really what our whole process is all about.

Brad, thanks very much.

No, thank you.

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Chief Wealth Strategist: A Time Of Grand Distortions - Seeking Alpha