music and words
Events
Thursday May 18th, 2023
Piano improvisation at the Playground Theatre
The Playground Theatre, 8 Latimer Road, London W10 - 7:30 pm
10 October 2022
Kardamyli Literary Festival
6:00 pm
Life writing: turning your family or personal history into a book
04 September 2021
A conversation with Rachel Cusk
Black barn contemporary, Swaffham Norfolk - 6:00 pm
Rachel Cusk – Alba Arikha – Jonathan P. Watts
The panel will discuss the works in the exhibition and the themes of the works (Siemon Scamell-Katz). Particular emphasis will be on the theory of the Sublime, its historical origins and its contemporary meanings and uses.
The Siemon Scamell-Katz exhibition will be curated by Hugh Pilkington.
27th- 31st October
Blue Electric the opera: live at the Playground Theatre
The Playground Theatre - 7:30 pm
Music: Tom Smail
Libretto: Alba Arikha
Directed by Orpha Phelan
02 October 2019
The Happy Few – Laylow Club
Laylow Club - 12:00 pm
Writing fiction and why it matters
14 November 2019
Gibraltar Literary Festival – Nov 14th-17th
The Convent - 2:00 pm
Where to find me: in conversation with Suzi Feay
04 April 2019
Oxford Literary Festival
Oxford - 2:00 pm
interviewed by Suzi Feay
17 March 2019
Et tout ça: an evening of French songs
Brasserie Zedel, London - 7:00 pm
With Peter Michaels – guitar, Tom Smail – drums, Marcus Tilt – accordion, Loz Garratt – double bass.
10 March 2019
Jewish book week
King's Place, London - 12:30 pm
with Alex Clark
08 March 2019
Lichfield literary festival
Lichfield, Staffordshire - 3:00 pm
19 February 2019
Shakespeare & co
Shakespeare & co - Paris - 11:20 am
With author Rupert Thomson
10 October 2018
Waterstone’s Crouch End
Waterstone's Crouch End - 7:00 pm
Reading from ‘Where to find me’ and Q&A
07 October 2018
Literary live
Hampstead and Highgate Festival - 8:00 pm
Reading
07 August 2018
Blue Electric: the opera
RADA Studios, 16 Chenies St, London - 7:00 pm
Produced by Tom Smail and Alba Arikha
Paris, 1980’s. A rebellious adolescent. Holocaust and exile. Cafés and nightclubs, shifty boyfriends and broken friendships, BLUE ELECTRIC charts a young woman’s search for identity in the shadow of her artist father’s hidden history. Based on the acclaimed memoir Major/Minor and directed by Academy Award winner Hugh Hudson, this opera explores the effects of trauma on family life. With a powerful contemporary score, this is a universal story of loss, love and what it means to be alive.
01 March 2018
Tulane University: lecture
Tulane University - 6:30 pm
In conversation with Thomas Beller
20 March 2018
In conversation with Nadja Spiegelman and Lucy Sholes
Waterstone's Gower Street - 6:30 pm
Trauma, womanhood and memoir
11 March 2018
Major/Minor at Jewish Book Week
3:30 pm
In conversation with Janet Wolff
12 October 2017
Daunt’s Books: reading
Daunt's Books Hampstead - 6:30 pm
Reading and discussing Major/Minor
06 July 2017
Words and music: French songs and a reading of Major/Minor
Book and Kitchen
with Tom Smail and Peter Michaels
19 March 2015
Notting Hill Unplugged
Book and Kitchen - 7:00 pm
An evening of French songs, with Sagat Guirey and Tom Smail
29 May 2014
A different side of Sam: Beckett, Arikha and a Parisian adolescence
Tel-Aviv University, Kikone Building - 6:00 pm
29 October 2013
Reading from Soon
Queen's Park bookshop - 7:30 pm
joint reading with Harry Eyres
13 November 2013
An evening of words and music
Book and Kitchen - 7:00 pm
16 September 2013
Cabaret Futura
Paradise by way of Kensal Green - 8:00 pm
Poetry reading at the Cabaret Futura
01 August 2013
Opera premiere: SOON
Riverside Studios - 7:50 pm
tête a tête festival
words: Alba Arikha, music: Tom Smail
19 June 2013
Te lo dirò un altra volta
Feltrinelli Bookshop, Florence - 6:00 pm
Presentation of ‘Te lo dirò un altra volta’ (Major/Minor) with Benedetta Cibrario
29 September 2012
Henley-on-Thames Literary Festival
Henley-on-Thames - 1:00 pm
26 August 2012
Happy Days: Enniskillen international Beckett festival
Enniskillen, county Fermanagh - 6:00 pm
With writer Claire Kilroy and actor Adrian Dunbar
22 June 2012
Major/Minor shortlisted for 2012 Spear’s Book Award
14 May 2012
Upper Wimpole Street Literary Salon: “Writing Family Memoir”
28 Camden Hill Gate, London W8 7QH - 7:00 pm
Speakers: Nancy K. Miller, Andrea Stuart, Alba Arikha
Jewish ancestors escaping pogroms in turn-of-the century Russia, white plantation slave owners and black slaves in 17th century Barbados, coming of age in the literary-artistic milieu of 1980s Paris. Three authors discuss the challenges involved in their recently completed family memoirs.
19 May 2012
Queen’s Park Book Festival
Queen's Park, London. NW6 - 6:00 pm
Paris in the Spring
With Rosa Rankin-Gee
23 February 2012
Major/Minor at Jewish Book Week: a conversation with journalist Janine di Giovanni
King's Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9AG - 1:00 pm
21 February 2012
Jazz after dark: an evening of French songs, sponsored by Jazz FM
Bar Roux@Parliament Square, 11 Great George st, London SW1
Sagat Guirey (guitar) Steve Watts (double bass) and Tom Smail (drums)
12 January 2012
Reading at the Village Voice Bookshop
6 rue Princesse, 75006 Paris - 7:00 pm
24 September 2011
Concert at le Theatre de la Vieille Grille (Paris)
Paris - 9:00 pm
Gabriel, performed at the Theatre de la Vieille Grille. Musicians: Alba piano, Sagat Guirey: Guitar, Marcus Tilt: Accordion, Tom Smail: Drums, Loz Garratt: Double bass