Acclaimed European fashion designer Gianfranco Ferré staged this year’s catwalk show to launch the 2004 Life Ball in Vienna.
The event, now in its 11th year, has become one of the largest and glittering Aids charity fundraisers in Europe, attracting top models, celebrities and performers.
This year’s show in May, which raised €603,000 was staged on a massive ribbon-shaped catwalk outside Vienna City Hall.
Ferré’s fashion extravaganza was followed by an opulent party for 4,000 ticket holders in the hall’s many ballrooms and courtyards.
VIP guests included Elton John, with performances from Mis-teeq, Jimmy Sommerfield and Nina Hagen.
Part of the proceeds go to Aids-hit countries.
Irrepressible energy and rich uplifting harmonies are the hallmarks of the Soweto Gospel Choir, headlining at this summer’s Edinburgh festival.
Their Edinburgh appearance marks the start of a 30-city tour of the UK including London’s Festival Hall. Performances are characterised by dynamic and soulful vocals, compulsive, earthy rhythm and athletic dance that give full expression to South African culture and faith.
The 26-strong choir, which draws members from Soweto’s many township churches and surrounding communities, first attracted attention when they appeared alongside Bono, Queen and Anastacia at the Mandela 46664 Concert in November.
The UK tour will raise funds for the choir’s charity Vukani that provides vital support for Aids orphans in the townships.
The Soweto Gospel Choir is at the Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh, August 6-30 and the London’s Festival Hall, September 11-12. For other UK tour dates and booings visit www.sowetogospelchoir.com
THEY F***
YOU UP
Mark Ravenhill’s shocking and sexually explicit play Handbag, about modern parenting, gets a welcome airing at this year’s Edinburgh Festival fringe. The play will be staged by the Glottal Stop Theatre, a new outfit founded by actor and voice tutor George Richmond-Scott, who like the playwright, is openly living with HIV.
Written in 1998, two years after his massive hit Shopping and F******, Handbag was described as an “uncompromising portrayal of modern manners” by a playwright who “celebrates Sodom like there’s no Gomorrah”.
Handbag opens with an artificial insemination scene and swiftly moves to modern parenting obsessions, like baby stealing nannies and gay parenting. Behind the ferociously contemporary main plot runs a sub-plot set in Oscar Wilde’s London.
Despite its reputation for extreme language and explicit sex, Ravenhill insists the play represents his “sincere response to the whole question of parenthood by asking what exactly is ‘natural’.”
The Glottal Stop Theatre perform Handbag at the Komedia Roman Eagle Lodge Theatre, Edinburgh, August 6 to 29. Box office 0131 226 0000, tickets £6/£5.
Recently diagnosed writer and editor Vince Laws has produced a life-affirming debut collection of poems that span the highs and lows of love, life and childhood.
Tightly written and eminently accessible, his poetry exposes petty (and not so petty) prejudice; touching a chord here, playing a heart string there and often raising a wry smile.
Diagnosed, the only poem dealing directly with HIV, describes how the poet received his test result on his birthday: “I considered stepping under the proverbial bus; but sensed my soul already has a suitcase packed. In defiance, I buy a return ticket.”
The title poem lightly mocks the UK’s most famous celebrity couple: “She opens her mouth and sings, he shuts his and scores. You know Posh by her castrato And Beckham by the balls.”
But Vince, editor of the Brighton-based lesbian and gay community magazine Gscene, delivers his best and bitchiest lines in the style of AA Milne. Repeat after me: ‘They’re choosing a Pope in Vatican City, so much Pap and yet so little titty.”
Beckham by the Balls, a book of 30 poems price £5, is available from www.vincelaws.com
