The Fairy Queen closely follows the plot of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream – which is the age old story of girl loves boy, boy loves another girl, who in turn loves another boy, all go to the forest where they encounter fairies, love potions, and a man called Bottom who has been turned into a donkey. All this is set to an early Baroque score which, although not iconic, is solidly performed by The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment conducted by William Christie.

The production sets out its deconstructionist approach from the second scene, where actors in period dress are joined on stage by cleaners in boilersuits with a vacuum cleaner, immediately blurring the lines between performace and created reality. Add to this the fact that a large percentage of the opera is set-up as entertainment primarily for those on stage – including the Pyramus and Thisbe “play within a play” – and, like Lysander et al. in the forest, you are left wondering whether you are dreaming or awake. The consistency slowly breaks down, tearing layers off the traditional Stuart era mask, and when members of the cast dressed as bunnies simulate sex acts on stage singing “A thousand, thousand ways we’ll find to entertain the hours”, the boundaries and rule dissolve entirely.

The first half’s variety is backed up by some fantastic set pieces including a beautiful dance piece where a female fairy leads a sleeping man (with pillow) through a mesmerising combination of lifts and footwork, the male “Echo” semi-chorus, and Sally Dexter’s alluringly dangerous Titania falling for the ass-headed Bottom.

The final two acts continue to showcase the inventiveness of the director, with Adam and Eve becoming Aussie beach bums within the space of a few minutes, and the wedding scene being stalled by a vicar appearing in the audience. However without the benefit of a full lavish set (described excellently here by Kate Kellaway), the continued liberal disconnect between the on-stage audience those of us in the stalls falls short through a lack of signposting and the constant feeling that there’s some kind of inside joke going on here.

The laughs (after all, this is a comedy) are genuine, and the vocal highlight of the evening comes in the form of Carolyn Sampson’s stunning soprano lament, but throughout a second half which is essentially a Nutcracker-esque variety showcase, the transition from it’s much lauded East Sussex home – which maintains the dreamlike direction without the mesmerising production budget – has left The Fairy Queen wanting. There are five more performances of the Glyndebourne show – if you get a chance to see it, I’d certainly be interested to hear your thoughts.

So anyway. Valentine’s Day – that’s a bummer for single people – maybe you could use Twitter to find your next date? Since you’re probably on Twitter all day, you won’t meet people in the real world so you might as well stalk people you fancy engage in conversation with “people who inspire you in the gender you’re looking to go in to” as it were.

How I might do it and how you might too

Speaking as someone who’s experience in this field spans absolutely nada, here are my top 10 tips.

1. Sign up to twitter.com – no brainer really, but have a good name… for girls, use something suggestive but not slutty. If your full name is naturally close to a porn name, like say.. Jaz Cummins for instance, use that. For boys, include your last name – according to my sources “girls want surnames so they can imagine marrying you.”

2. Write a bio – but make sure you lie a bit, and don’t give too much away. What’s more important is have a sexy avatar. Fortunately twitter pics are about 70×70 pix so you can be pretty ming an get away with looking half-way decent.

3. Right, who do you fancy? – Start following them. This is normal, they won’t get freaked out until you start sending DMs (more on this later). Seriously, there is some decent talent on twitter – you can check out TwitorFit as a starting point.

4. You don’t have to blog – but a link to a facebook page would be nice… that way you can make the transition from the geeky social platform to one more acceptable. Saying you met via mutual facebook friends will make you feel much less of a loser.

5. Be yourself. Be true. Be genuine. But for goodness sake don’t be over emotional, or talk about ex-partners, or how many people you’ve slept with, or your period… no need to be that transparent.

6. Bring something to the table – preferably a hot avatar, or some stylish background. I’ve gone for a damask look which I think works pretty well.

7. Help people out. Or… mock them in a matey banter way. Everyone’s trying to be nice on twitter, so stand out by being a bit acerbic sometimes. Keeps your potential victims love interests on their toes as well.

8. If someone you fancy follows you, send them a DM – you can flirt easily over DM… this is very hard to do using @ replies, since you have to walk the line between flirting with one person and putting off other potentials.

9. Get dating alerts. There aren’t many, and they’re pretty rubbish, but follow @londonsingles and @thinkmarriage. They might be useful, but on current form, don’t hold your breath.

10. Finally, put appropriate pegs in appropriate holes. This is most easily done at “tweetups” like @twestival or @shoreditchtwit where you can meet people in real life. Having said that, I think I’m on camera (courtesy of @hermioneway) quoted as saying I started Shoreditch Twit to meet hot girls… oops.

So, let me know how you get on. Thanks to @kalbonner @brideyrae and @catherinegee for some tip suggestions.

So I’ve been meaning to put a post up about this for a while. Mario Cacciottolo is a photographer, and a blogger. He runs a website called Someone Once Told Me. The concept is a simple one – a new photo, every day, of someone displaying something that someone told them… once. We all remember being told different things, from the serious to the inane, there are things that stick in our minds, and the site documents these short sentiments in pictures. 

My SOTM comes with a rather embarassing audio file where I sound a lot posher than I think I sound. Funny, how my perception is that I do look like my photo, and I don’t sound like my audio recording. Just goes to show that when it comes to perceiving ourselves, we might not be the best judges.

My little daydreams aside, now’s the time to mention that Brideshead Revisited is released to cinemas this weekend. Brideshead Revisited is based on the 1945 novel by Evelyn Waugh, set in the years leading up to the Second World War. It was first translated to the screen in the 1981 BBC adaptation starring Jeremy Irons and Anthony Andrews. So it’ll be interesting to see what the lastest version has in store – my prediction is that the costumes – at least – will be a visual feast for the eyes (start listening to this awesome podcast to get the reference).

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0Xql3fDM44]

1. It’s better than shuffle – As the “radio stations” have individual profiles which are based on the style of music in the seed band or track you don’t get odd juxtapositions (e.g. Tiesto followed by Bill Withers)
2. It’s better than playlists – there’s no need to create a list from scratch, plus it gives you music that you don’t yet own and even stuff you’ve never heard of.
3. It’s better than Moron Genius – let’s face it, Apple has a lot to do with that puppy.

Oh, here’s an old video of a Coldcut track I like:

[youtube=http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=HxNrr0pBk2g]