Mcr11

MCR

11

Manchester City Region Magazine

#RugbyLeague Summer & Autumn 2013

FIRST WORDS Welcome to the eleventh issue of MCR – the destination magazine for Manchester.

For lovers of sport – we have The Ashes at Lancashire County Cricket Club, the NBA Series at the Manchester Arena and, in October and November, fixtures as part of England and Wales’ hosting of the Rugby League World Cup.

No two years in Manchester are ever the same.

Annual events there may be; the same event, not really.

And as if that wasn’t enough, in September, the hit musical Wicked - The Untold Story of The Witches of Oz - takes up a two-month residence at The Palace Theatre.

One of the city’s greatest qualities, I believe, is its willingness - and speed - to adapt and change with the times. Don’t get me wrong, ‘If it ain’t broke, (we) don’t fix it’. But what the city does do is evolve its events to make sure they still ‘ain’t broke’ next year.

This approach is more important than ever this year, as we build on the success of tourism events in 2012. And to those who predicted something of a tourism lull in 2013, think again.

There are loads of things taking place this year across Greater Manchester - many of which are featured in this issue of MCR. We’ve already welcomed Simon Rogan to The French, one of Manchester’s most exquisite dining rooms; seen the launch of direct flights to Moscow courtesy of easyJet; and are preparing for the opening of SEA LIFE at intu Trafford Centre.

This summer, Muse, Bon Jovi and Robbie Williams will play the Etihad Stadium; and the fourth outing of the Manchester International Festival (MIF) brings with it such acclaimed artists as Kenneth Branagh, The xx and Massive Attack.

Not a bad year, I think you’ll agree.

2013 is also the year that The University of Manchester began construction of the UK’s National Graphene Institute. We’ve talked about graphene in previous issues of MCR - and I for one never tire of hearing about its remarkable qualities – but if it’s news to you, check out homeofgraphene.com to see what all the fuss is about.

A quick word of thanks to Sir Kenneth Branagh and Ashley Gibson for appearing on the cover of this issue. MIF and Salford City Reds are both great assets to Greater Manchester and we look forward to sharing that talent with the world.

Hopefully, we’ll see you in Manchester at some point during 2013. Until then, I hope MCR11 gives you an idea of what we’re about.

Enjoy the read.

Andrew Stokes Chief Executive, Marketing Manchester May 2013 marketingmanchester.com @marketing_mcr

On the cover Sir Kenneth Branagh Kenneth Branagh has long been lauded as one of the great Shakespearean interpreters. His skills as a writer, director and actor have garnered international acclaim across the disciplines of stage, film and television, and he is the only man to be nominated in five different categories for an Academy Award. He will be performing in Macbeth as part of the Manchester International Festival from 5-20 July. #MIFMacbeth

Ashley Gibson Ashley Gibson plays for Salford City Reds in the Engage Rugby Super League. He joined the Reds prior to the 2010 season from Leeds Rhinos. He was part of the England team that won the Federation Shield in 2006, playing in all four matches, including the final against Tonga. In October and November, Manchester plays host to fixtures as part of England and Wales’ hosting of the 2013 Rugby League World Cup. #SCR

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Contents Features 04 - 10

Manchester International Festival 2013 We’ve been waiting for this since 17 July 2011, when the last MIF drew to a close. Feast your eyes on eighteen extraordinary days of world premiers coming to Manchester this summer.

18 - 21

40 - 43

44 - 45

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58 - 60

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HOMEward bound by Kevin Bourke Ahead of HOME’s opening at First Street in 2015, we take a look at the theatre scene across Greater Manchester and find out how excellence is very much the benchmark.

66 - 69

Festivals Books, food, science and jazz.

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76 - 79

Exhibitions

England’s great outdoors Home to the Peak District National Park and the world-famous Chatsworth, our colleagues at Visit Peak District & Derbyshire have almost as lucky a job as us.

96

The last word Nick Johnson wraps things up.

Sport Triathlons, cricket, basketball and rugby.

61

Music & Theatre Scoundrels, Peter Pan, merry men and witches.

70

LGBT Debates, parades, sports and vigils.

80 - 81

Greater Manchester Halloween, butterflies, bands and the ‘Diggers’ movement.

Snapshots 14 - 15

David Carden, Manchester Art Gallery

28 - 29

Kim Gillson, The John Rylands Library

38 - 39

Cameron Hall, Old Trafford

50 - 51

Kamila Plonska, The French

62 - 63

Anis Khan, The Opera House

74 - 75

Sarah Witts, Dunham Massey

On the town by Phil Griffin Six miles south east of Manchester city centre, the town of Stockport is a headstrong mix of fierce localism and determination. Phil Griffin explains.

86 - 89

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A different kind of drama

by Adam Lowe You’ve been to the Big Weekend at Pride. You’ve got the Queer as Folk box set. Think you know everything there is to know about gay Manchester? Think again.

Meet the ancestors Ever wondered if there’s anyone famous (or, eek, infamous) lurking in your family tree? Meet the descendents of some of Manchester’s ‘great and the good’.

Reaching for the star

by Simon Binns Manchester has been ‘sans Michelin star’ for far too long. Will 2013 be the year we correct this injustice? Simon Binns gives us his opinion.

Green spaces Cities are made by their hustle and bustle – and Manchester is no different. But where do you go when you need five minutes of peace and quiet?

Find out here.

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Brains, nature, Iraq and the Netherlands.

52 - 55

A league of our own

by Ewan Phillips If you don’t like the rules of the game – make up your own. Ewan Phillips talks us through the birth of Rugby League and the upcoming World Cup in Manchester.

More for your money The intu Trafford Centre is one of the best places to indulge in a spot of retail therapy. And with 20% VAT back for non-EU residents - what’s not to love.

Five star finds Every city break is different – but of them all we demand a few staple things: somewhere nice for a cup of tea, a bite to eat, a spot of retail therapy and a night out.

30 - 33

46 - 48

Toilets, taxis and temperance: tours of MCR Who says that walking tours are purview of town halls and public monuments! Manchester’s Green Badge Guides have got some rather different things to show you.

24 - 27

What’s on

Contributors

p 82

Simon Binns Simon is a journalist and food writer who has worked for the BBC, Manchester Confidential and the Manchester Evening News. He currently runs a food blog, eatdrinkmanchester.com, which covers food news and reviews in Manchester.

Kevin Bourke Kevin’s adventures in arts journalism have ranged from getting philosophically-refreshed with Leonard Cohen to being publicly kissed by Ronnie Spector and Sir Ian McKellen. He spent many lifetimes writing about film and theatre for the Manchester Evening News.

p 61

Percy Dean Percy Dean is an editorial and commercial photographer and cinematographer. His work has been published and exhibited internationally for over 18 years.

In 2010, he recieved an MA in Documentary Photography. percydean.com

p 86

Manchester Voices 12 - 13

Useful stuff

Annie Lennox

93

No introduction necessary. Ms Lennox paid visual homage to Manchester and Salford with her iPhone - and we loved it.

36 - 37

Accessibility could be our (rather boring) middle name. It’s true though – we have all the rail, bus, coach and tram services we could ask for. Well, until High Speed 2 comes along.

Daniel Gidney The new boss of Lancashire County Cricket Club tells us about the £45m transformation of the ‘other’ Old Trafford.

56 - 57

Transport information

Craig Gill

94 - 95

Manchester Airport Did you know our airport’s route network is bigger than Heathrow’s? We have direct flights from over 200 destinations around the world.

Save time, fly direct!

He’s a drummer, a DJ and a tour guide. Yeah, it’s fair to say that Craig knows a thing or two about Manchester’s music scene.

64 - 65

Dianne Bourne Manchester’s A-list has her on speed dial and she’s been to more showbiz parties than she cares to admit. The MEN diary editor dishes the dirt on celeb life in the city.

72 - 73

Phil Griffin was born in Ancoats and has lived in Manchester all his life. He has written about the architecture and changes to Manchester and the region in various magazines and journals.

He curates Pop Up Gallery Manchester. popupgallerymanchester.com

Adam Lowe Adam Lowe is the publisher of Vada Magazine, features editor at Bent Magazine and food & drink editor at So So Gay. He was assistant editor at The Sunday Telegraph's LGBT History Month Magazine. His 2012 pamphlet Precocious was a Guardian First Book Award reader nomination.

Ian Carmichael What has Indonesian Idol got to do with a music school in Ardwick? Allow Ian to explain…

82 - 83

Phil Griffin

Natasha Martono Natasha Martono is a freelance illustrator. She studied fashion and clothing at Leeds College of Art and Design and contributed to the Streetview and Lantern exhibitions at NQ2220 and Soup Kitchen respectively.

Elaine Constadine Bury-born photographer Elaine loves the, somewhat overlooked, Northern Soul music scene so much - she decided to make a film about it.

Marketing Manchester Carver’s Warehouse, 77 Dale St, Manchester, M1 2HG T. +44 (0)161 237 1010 marketingmanchester.com visitmanchester.com Designed & Published: Marketing Manchester, May 2013 Photography: Percy Dean, Paul Jones, David Lake, Jonty Wilde, Jan Chlebik, Ben Page, Craig Easton and VisitEngland

Whilst every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy in this publication, Marketing Manchester cannot accept liability for any loss or damage arising from its use. As changes often occur after publication date, it is advisable to confirm the information given.

The information contained within this guide is copyright and no part of the guide may be reproduced in part or wholly by any means, be it electronic or mechanical, without the prior written permission of the publishers.

Marketing Manchester is the agency

charged with promoting the city-region on a national and international stage. Visit Manchester is the Tourist Board for Greater Manchester and is a division of Marketing Manchester. They are funded by 360 commercial members and the organisations below.

Ewan Phillips Ewan Phillips is a TV comedy producer with credits on a long list of established shows in Britain and America. He is a lover of all sports, particularly rugby league, which he continues to follow closely despite the indignity of being exiled in the south of England.

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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#MIF13 World premières and special events. Made for Manchester. Shared with the world.

The Manchester International Festival returns for its fourth outing this summer – presenting a programme packed with premieres of new commissions and reenvisioned classic works, as well as a series of unique concerts and one-off events.

Previous MIFs have brought us the work of Damon Albarn, Zaha Hadid, Björk, Marina Abramović and Willem Dafoe – to name just a few from a very distinguished list. What does #MIF13 have in store for us? Take a look...

Goldfrapp © Annemarieke van Drimmelen

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Goldfrapp Performing live with the RNCM String Orchestra Albert Hall, Peter Street, M2 5QJ 17 – 18 July Goldfrapp release their long-awaited sixth studio album this summer and these exclusive shows offer a rare opportunity for fans to hear the new album live for the very first time. These never to be repeated performances will be accompanied by the Royal Northern College of Music’s string orchestra over two nights at Manchester’s Albert Hall, giving fans their first glimpse at what's to come next for one of Britain's most innovative artists. #MIFGoldfrapp

Massive Attack v Adam Curtis Created by Robert Del Naja and Adam Curtis Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 4 – 13 July Connecting the dark, intense music and visual work of Robert Del Naja of Massive Attack with the thought-provoking vision of filmmaker Adam Curtis in an atmospheric space never before opened to the public, this haunted, captivating production promises to completely redefine the very idea of "the gig". #MIFMAVAC

The Machine Written by Matt Charman.

Directed by Josie Rourke Campfield Market Hall, Campfield Avenue Arcade, M3 4FH 10 – 21 July In 1997, Garry Kasparov, the world’s greatest chess player, arrived in New York City for the biggest match of his life. His opponent wasn’t a fellow Grandmaster but a faceless super-computer: Deep Blue, built by tech giant IBM. Kasparov came to America for freedom and glory. What he didn’t expect to confront was the lifelong dedication of another man, Deep Blue’s wunderkind inventor Dr Feng- Hsiung Hsu. Both geniuses, they staked their reputations on the tournament. What followed was one of the most compelling stories of our time. #MIFMachine

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do it 20 13 A group art show Manchester Art Gallery, Mosley St, M2 3JL 5 – 21 July do it 20 13 consists of a growing series of written artists’ instructions, each of which is interpreted anew every time it is enacted.

Conceived and curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist in conversation with Christian Boltanski and Bertrand Lavier, do it began life in 1993. This 20th-anniversary show brings together artists from the first do it experiments with subsequent generations of artists who have been commissioned to reinterpret earlier instructions. #MIFdoit

Mogwai.

Performing live to Zidane, A 21st Century Portrait Directed by Douglas Gordon & Philippe Parreno. Produced by Sigurjon Sighvatsson, Anna Lena Vaney & Victorien Vaney Albert Hall, Peter Street, M2 5QJ 19 – 20 July

Maxine Peake © Jonty Wilde

Abida Parveen Appearing with her musicians The Bridgewater Hall, Lower Mosley St, M2 3WS 6 July Ask anyone in South Asia to name the greatest spiritual singer alive today, and it won’t be long before the name of Abida Parveen enters the conversation. Parveen specialises in ghazals and khafis, two distinct forms of Sufi poetry that date back centuries and is known for sending listeners into raptures in a way matched only by the late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, who Parveen has described as her ‘spiritual brother’.

This concert offers a rare opportunity to see one of the greats of modern devotional music. #MIFAbida

© Annie Leibovitz

© Mark Abrahams

© Hsu Ping

The Old Woman

Masque of Anarchy

Starring Robert Wilson, Mikhail Baryshnikov & Willem Dafoe Palace Theatre, Oxford Street, M1 6FT 4 – 7 July

Starring Maxine Peake.

Directed by Sarah Frankcom Albert Hall, Peter Street, M2 5QJ 12 – 14 July

Pioneering theatre director Robert Wilson presents The Old Woman. Developed with and starring legendary dancer and actor Mikhail Baryshnikov, and co-starring worldrenowned actor Willem Dafoe, The Old Woman is an adaptation of the work of the same name by Russian author Daniil Kharms. Carrying echoes of Beckett and Ionesco in its deadpan narrative, which follows the story of a struggling writer who cannot find peace with himself; it is perhaps the finest work by one of the great avantgarde Russian authors. #MIFOldWoman

Inspired by the Peterloo Massacre, poet Percy Bysshe Shelley penned The Masque of Anarchy, an indelibly powerful 91-verse epic widely regarded as the greatest political poem in British history. For MIF13, actress Maxine Peake and director Sarah Frankcom will deliver a haunting, provocative new interpretation of this landmark work, as relevant to post-riot, mid-recession Britain as it was when it was first written. The performance will be staged in the atmospheric Albert Hall, mere steps from the site of the massacre itself. #MIFMasque

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One of the most beguiling portrayals of an individual in recent cinematic history, Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait is a football film like no other. Using 17 cameras, the film tracks the legendary French midfielder Zinédine Zidane throughout a 2005 Spanish league match at Madrid’s imposing Bernabéu Stadiu. The result is a dramatic, hypnotic and deeply beautiful depiction of one of the world’s finest footballers performing on one of the sport’s grandest stages. The film’s soundtrack was composed by Mogwai — and for the first time, the band will be performing it live alongside the movie. #MIFMogwai

Peter Sellars Michelangelo Sonnets With Eric Owens & Cameron Carpenter Albert Hall, Peter Street, M2 5QJ 4, 5 & 7 July Shostakovich’s haunting Suite on Verses of Michelangelo Buonarroti is based on Michelangelo’s sonnets and accompanying drawings of bodies in the throes of overwhelming spiritual struggle. Sellars will be working with two American originals: bass-baritone Eric Owens, who gives towering performances of physical and metaphysical stature, profound musicality and sheer humanity; and organist Cameron Carpenter, who has quickly garnered a worldwide reputation for his daring imagination, bold programming, fearless technical brilliance and ferocious, exhilarating recitals. #MIFSonnets

MACBETH (MACBETH: Big Screen Relay) Starring Kenneth Branagh. Directed by Rob Ashford & Kenneth Branagh Manchester City Centre 5 – 20 July (20 July) Kenneth Branagh returns to the stage as Macbeth, for his first Shakespeare performance after more than a decade.

Directed by Rob Ashford and Kenneth Branagh, this tragic tale of ambition and treachery unfolds within the walls of an intimate deconsecrated Manchester church.

Tickets for MACBETH sold out in record time and therefore MIF is offering the chance to see the production via a one-off live relay on a big screen in central Manchester. Held in the open air, the relay will take place come rain or shine, so attendees are advised to dress appropriate to the weather. Picnics and drinks are welcome, as are blankets and cushions (there are no seats at the venue), and glass is strictly prohibited. #MIFMacbeth

Martha Argerich

The Rite of Spring

With Manchester Camerata & Gábor Takács-Nagy The Bridgewater Hall, Lower Mosley Street, M2 3WS 12 July

Romeo Castellucci, Teodor Currentzis, MusicAeterna Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 14 – 19 July

In a career spanning more than 50 years, world-renowned Argentinean pianist Martha Argerich has won legions of admirers for her uniquely expressive and spirited performances and her fresh, imaginative recordings. Argerich only rarely visits the UK and has never before performed in Manchester, which makes this collaboration with Manchester Camerata a truly unmissable concert. #MIFArgerich

Images facing page: Maxine Peake, Masque of Anarchy; Mikhail Baryshnikov, Willem Dafoe & Robert Wilson, The Old Woman.

Images this page: Michelangelo Sonnets; The Rite of Spring; John Tavener

One hundred years after The Rite of Spring’s cataclysmic debut, this radical work will receive a dramatic reworking for MIF13.

Teodor Currentzis and his virtuoso orchestra MusicAeterna, have teamed up with Romeo Castellucci to create a vital new Rite that will celebrate the work’s centenary. Castellucci’s staging remakes what is conventionally a dance piece into an extraordinary theatre and art installation, creating choreography from falling bone powder. In a show without actors or dancers, the 100-piece orchestra will become part of the staging, which will take place in the dramatic, soaring industrial spaces of Manchester’s Mayfield Depot. #MIFRite

© Simone Canetty-Clarke

© Archive Timothy McCarthy/Art Resource, NY

© Delaney Allen

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John Tavener With the BBC Philharmonic & special guest Abida Parveen The Bridgewater Hall, Lower Mosley Street, M2 3WS 7 July Inspired by the great religious traditions, John Tavener’s music has connected with audiences around the world on a profoundly emotional level, and has brought him commercial and critical acclaim rarely enjoyed by living composers. For MIF, he has three world premières: The Love Duet from The Play of Krishna - performed by John Mark Ainsley; The Death of Ivan Ilyich Tavener’s recent exploration into the work of Tolstoy; and If Ye Love Me - a new piece for the MIF Sacred Sounds Women’s Choir. #MIFTavener © Alexandra Waespi

The xx In Residence Manchester city centre 6 – 18 July The xx are one of the biggest alternative acts in the world. And whilst the enigmatic London trio is spending much of 2013 headlining major festivals and huge open-air venues, for MIF, they’ll be playing in a much more intimate environment. For the duration of the Festival they will be taking over a secret space in the city centre. Across 18 performances in a specially designed, 60capacity room, the group will be presenting their music in uniquely atmospheric surroundings, redefining their music and their relationship with their audience in the process. #MIFThexx © Fredrik Skogkvist

© Hugo Glendinning

Neneh Cherry With RocketNumberNine Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 5 – 7 July

Are We Powerless?

River of Fundament

Evan Davis Albert Hall, Peter Street, M2 5QJ 6 July

One of music’s great maverick talents, singersongwriter Neneh Cherry has spent her career out on a musical limb. Cherry’s latest project is a potentially electrifying collaboration with Londonbased brothers Ben Page (keyboards/electronics) and Tom Page (drums/ percussion), better known as RocketNumberNine. For the first time, the trio will play their new album in its entirety.

The evening will marry Cherry’s distinctive vocals and irrepressible stage presence to the duo’s shapeshifting grooves and atmospherics. As always with Cherry, expect the unexpected and you won’t be disappointed. #MIFCherry

Can protest have an impact on the world’s financial powers? Are we simply victims of the financial crisis? Or, given the benefits that the global economy has delivered for so many of us, are we too complicit in the system to equate ourselves with the valiant protestors of Peterloo? Five years on from the crash, what demands should today’s many be making? Do we have the power to bring about change? Economist and broadcaster Evan Davis chairs a panel of leading thinkers in their fields for a discussion of these issues, incorporating a question-and-answer session with the audience. #MIFPowerless

A discussion with Matthew Barney and Jonathan Bepler Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 13 – 14 July

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For River of Fundament, Barney and Bepler are collaborating to produce a seven-part film project that will continue to draw upon the thematic undercurrents of Mailer’s novel.

Set in pre-Christian Egypt, Ancient Evenings elaborately chronicles the seven stages of the soul’s departure from the deceased body as it passes from death to rebirth in accordance with Egyptian mythology. River of Fundament will combine the traditions of narrative cinema with elements of live performance, sculpture and opera. #MIFRiver

Dan Graham

Eszter Salamon

Past Future Split Attention Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 13 – 17 July

Dance for Nothing Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 18 – 19 July

Past Future Split Attention is a simple yet psychologically complex live work. Playing on the intersubjective relations between two people, the piece creates what Graham calls ‘a figure-eight feedback-feedahead loop of past/future’. Dan Graham is one of his generation’s most influential artists.

His work has encompassed writing, photography, architecture, choreography and video. #MIFDanGraham

John Cage’s influential, experimental Lecture on Nothing, forms the rhythmic template for Eszter Salamon’s choreography in Dance for Nothing. Salamon’s movements are juxtaposed against Cage’s words, but as a parallel action: according to Salamon, ‘The dance should be autonomous and never become an illustration or a commentary on the text.’ Eszter Salamon is a Berlin-based choreographer, dancer and performer whose work has been presented widely in Europe and Asia. #MIFEszter

Tino Sehgal This variation Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 12 – 19 July This radical and immersive work plunges visitors into a pulsating sensory landscape, by turns enigmatic and recognisable.

Taking advantage of the visitor’s own dilating pupils, This Variation constantly shifts perception, processing and transforming before eye and ear. Tino Sehgal is one of contemporary art’s true pioneers, expanding the exhibition format into sensual and personal realms. #MIFTinoSehgal

Mette Ingvartsen Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 15 – 16 July

© Robert Martin

Evaporated Landscapes is an artificial world in which landscapes are constructed from light, sound, bubbles and foam. In Mette Ingvartsen’s work, choreography is removed from its normal context and becomes the relationship between these ephemeral elements as they magically float and dissolve into space. Mette Ingvartsen is a Danish choreographer and dancer whose recent works focus on questions of perception and sensation. #MIFMette

Urban farm, laboratory, research centre Irwell House, East Philip Street, Salford, M3 7LE 5 – 21 July With rising food prices, climate change and growing urban populations, how can we continue to put food on our tables? This summer, MIF and The Biospheric Foundation will be investigating some possible answers. They are transforming a derelict mill on the banks of the River Irwell into a thriving agricultural space. Part farm, part laboratory and part research centre, this disused industrial site will be filled with innovative sustainable food systems, from agroforestry to aquaponics. #MIFBiospheric

Once Upon A Story

By Inne Goris. For children, young people and families Manchester Town Hall, Albert Square, M60 2LA 12 – 21 July

Epic Mayfield Depot, Fairfield Street, M1 2QF 18 – 20 July

MIF13’s events for young people and families comes courtesy of charismatic Belgian theatre director Inne Goris, whose work crosses the boundaries of theatre, dance, performance and visual art. The programme’s arresting music is by Dominique Pauwels. For Once Upon a Story, Inne will create within Manchester Town Hall a treasure trove of stories of and about childhood, where anything is possible and audiences find themselves at the heart of the action. #MIFOnceUpon

A bold choreographic mise-en-scène for nine dancers, Epic explores the nature and artifice of format, materiality and attention.

On this abstract landscape are superimposed alien existences and objects that in turn reveal transient phenomena. Based in Stockholm, Mårten Spångberg is an artist, choreographer and theoretician who has also worked in the fields of education, publishing and writing. #MIFMarten

Images facing page: The xx; River of Fundament; Neneh Cherry.

Images this page: Evaporated Landscapes; The Biospheric Project; Once Upon a Story.

Mårten Spångberg

© Koen Broos

The Biospheric Project

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Nikhil Chopra

In Conversation Dave Haslam

Coal on Cotton Whitworth Art Gallery, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, M15 6ER 4:48am, 5 July - 9.37pm, 7 July

With Neneh Cherry, Jamal Edwards and others Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 7 & 10 July

Coal on Cotton sees Indian artist Chopra focus on the two materials that made Manchester supremely wealthy in the 19th century. Held over 65 continuous hours in the shell of the yet-to-be-completed Landscape Gallery at the Whitworth Art Gallery, Coal on Cotton will span centuries and continents. The performance will ask its audience to witness and reflect on connections between the lives of our forebears and ourselves, and on the actions that drive power and possession. #MIFChopra

DJ and author Dave Haslam returns to the Festival to present a series of interviews with a selection of the artists performing at MIF13 in an intimate lunchtime In Conversation series. Renowned for his revealing Close Up events that have featured Alastair Campbell, Jonathan Franzen, Jeremy Deller, Bernard Sumner, Jarvis Cocker and Nile Rodgers, for MIF13 Dave will interview Neneh Cherry, Jamal Edwards and others.

Rob da Bank

Jamal Edwards and SB.TV presents

A musical history in sound and pictures Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 6, 13, 18, 19 July

Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 8 – 17 July SB.TV is one of the biggest success stories in British youth culture. For MIF13, Edwards is taking three shows to the stage, showcasing the best urban talents in the UK. Smokey Barbers has already been a big hit on YouTube. Now the show moves from screen to stage. History of Grime: Rebels with a Cause undresses one of the most exciting musical cultures in Britain. Hosted by Kojo from Choice FM, Jokes from the Hood will bring the best in British urban comedy to Albert Square. #MIFJamaledwards

Delphic Our Wordly Collections Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 18 – 20 July High-flying Manchester trio Delphic will be taking Collections around the world and back without ever leaving Festival Square. At this ambitious event, the trio will be completely reworking Collections with the help of musicians from across the globe, radically rearranging the entire album with everything from bhangra beats to hip hop rhythms, Japanese soul to the distinctive chimes of the Javanese gamelan. #MIFDelphic

Image: Jamal Edwards

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© Dominic Marley

MONEY Perform their debut album Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 12 & 13 July A Mancunian secret until now, M O N E Y look set to break far beyond the city’s borders in 2013, but MIF will present them on home territory this summer. The group has recently signed to influential label Bella Union and will soon be releasing their muchanticipated debut album, which you can hear in full at MIF’s exclusive gig. M O N E Y will be playing much bigger venues before the year’s out — catch them at the intimate Pavilion Theatre before the world catches on. #MIFMoney

DJs at Festival Square DJs Every Night at Festival Pavilion Festival Square and Pavilion Theatre, Albert Square, M2 5DB 4 – 21 July Every night throughout MIF13, some of the best UK DJs will be playing in the Pavilion Theatre, including Will Tramp, Justine Alderman, Disco Mums, Gregling, Dialog, Dave Haslam, and Andrea Trout - all for free.

The Festival will start with Drunk at Vogue who present The House of Popular Disco.

Expect a selection of vintage and future club classics, plus the Drunk at Vogue Community Gospel Choir. The Pavilion celebrates the end of the Festival with Yellow, Dave Haslam’s legendary DJ night, featuring special guests Il Bosco and MC Kwasi.

If anyone can define a decade in 26 songs, it’s Rob da Bank, whose mischievous eclecticism has made him one of Britain’s best-loved DJs. For MIF, Rob will showcase the A-Z of Manchester - starting with the 80s, through different decades, covering the whole alphabet. Featuring visuals mixed live from the curated collection of legendary local photographer Kevin Cummins, this intimate party would go down a treat everywhere from Alphabet Street to Xanadu. #MIFRobdaBank

Despacio James Murphy, David Dewaele and Stephen Dewaele New Century Hall, Corporation St, M60 4ES 18 – 20 July A custom disco sound system commissioned

by MIF and designed by James Murphy and team. David, Stephen & James to DJ together in a unique venue, playing vinyl for four consecutive nights. A meeting of minds, music and perfect sound. #MIFDespacio

For more information or to buy tickets for any of the #MIF13 line-up:

mif.co.uk | +44 (0)844 375 2013

DISC SHA OVER H OW W PES LIVE AR S

The multi-award winning IWM North (part of Imperial War Museums), is a great FREE day out for all ages.

Designed by world-renowned architect Daniel Libeskind to represent a globe shattered by FRQĆ LFW LW UHYHDOV KRZ ZDU DQG FRQĆ LFW KDYH VKDSHG SHRSOHĹĄV OLYHV from 1900 to now.

Take the Metrolink to MediaCityUK or Harbour City or the X50 bus Open daily 10am – 5pm FREE ENTRY (Closed 24, 25, 26 December) 0161 836 4000 iwm.org.uk The Quays, Manchester M17 1TZ

Open daily 10 am - 5 pm Find us on the site of the world’s oldest surviving passenger railway station.

Liverpool Road Castlefield Manchester, M3 4FP

Celebrate the North West’s most incredible industrial inventions and scientific achievements.

Be inspired by our many galleries, daily demonstrations, events and exhibitions that’ll blow your mind and startle your senses.

mosi.org.uk @voiceofmosi

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Š Simon Taylor

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Manchester Voices

Annie Lennox Inspired by her experience at The Lowry, where she had exhibited The House of Annie Lennox in 2012, Annie Lennox embarked on a photographic project, paying visual homage to Manchester and Salford. Here, the global music star tells us about the exhibition and the top five things she loves to do when she visits Manchester.

Tell us about the exhibition.

Glorious Manford Salchester is a kaleidoscope of images that includes everything from relics of past Victorian grandeur to the edgy profusion of overgrown nature. These are contrasted by the urban wilderness of spray paint graffiti, accompanied by the persistent beauty and gloom of what might be described as the ever changing British sky.

Glorious Manford Salchester is quite an unusual name. What was the thinking behind that?

The reason I mixed up the names of the two different areas is because it seems to be a bit difficult for people to know ‘Is it Manchester? Is it Salford?’ People get very upset if you say something is in Manchester when you’re actually in Salford.

How did you go about taking the images?

I took them on my iPhone (as discreetly as I could). I recorded impressions of things I found fascinating and drawn towards in everyday life.

How did the exhibition actually come about?

I fell in love with this whole area when I came up here for The House of Annie Lennox exhibition at The Lowry. I spent a lot of time looking around at the fantastic industrial landscape – which is mixed up with all the modernity. It really fascinated me. I sort of developed this love affair with the whole area. I went out taking pictures – and the result was my exhibition. Maybe you’ll recognise some places that you’re familiar with.

They were on display in The Lowry Hotel and are now available online thanks to Comme Ca Art. (commecaart.com) From the time you have spent in the two cities, what are your top recommendations for places to go or visit in Manchester and Salford?

The first place on my list would be The Lowry – the performance and arts centre at Salford Quays. It’s opposite the new BBC centre and I have to recommend their LS Lowry exhibition. It’s a place where you can see all manner of diversity - from theatre performance to original Lowry artwork – which is truly exceptional. If I was coming to Greater Manchester for the first time – that’s the place I would go.

I would really urge people to go and explore the Northern Quarter. It’s fairly central, in the heart of Manchester, and is a really vibrant place. It’s full of diverse artists, craftsmen and women and lovely little funky cafés. It’s just the sort of place that I would go to. It’s a place I enjoy – and spend lots of money!

I love going down to Canal Street. I love it because it is irreverent, it’s gay – it’s hugely gay. It’s fabulous. It sort of shows to me the spirit of Manchester. It’s inclusive, it’s celebratory. And that’s what I love. I love the canal – sitting outside and watching the world go by. For that, you can’t get better than Canal Street.

If you’re looking for something really exotic, tasty, visual and exciting – get on the bus and go to the Curry Mile in Rusholme.

That’s where, if you're hungry, you'll enjoy the assortment of great food. And if you feel like spending some money on a bit of bling it's the best place to go.

And last, but by no means least, when I come up to Glorious Man-ford Sal-chester I am very privileged to be able to stay at The Lowry Hotel. It has the most beautiful bar and fabulous restaurant with brilliant food that I can honestly, highly recommend.

I could live at The Lowry Hotel.

For information about Annie Lennox, including news, tour dates and release information: annielennox.com To view the Glorious Manford Salchester prints – or to buy signed, limited edition Annie Lennox artwork, visit: commecaart.com

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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SnapShot Manchester Art Gallery David Carden is a member of the Manchester Art Gallery visitor services team. He regularly performs musical tours of the gallery’s 18th and 19th century collections complete with banjo and ukulele. The painting is The Sirens and Ulysses by William Etty. manchestergalleries.org

What’s on: Festivals

Manchester Literature Festival 7 – 20 October

© Pablo Khaled

24:7 Theatre Festival

Dig the City

19 – 26 July Various locations

3 – 11 August

24:7 is a unique theatre festival that brings innovative drama to the people of Manchester and nurtures the writing, directing, performing and producing talent of tomorrow. This year sees the event in its tenth year – and will continue to prove that theatrical excellence can be achieved with little money but big ideas.

247theatrefestival.co.uk @247theatre

mjf (Manchester Jazz Festival) 26 July – 3 August Various locations Submerse yourself in surprising, moving and invigorating contemporary music, performed live across Manchester this summer at mjf: UK debuts, new collaborations and many free events. manchesterjazz.com @ManJazzFest

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Free and taking place across Manchester’s city centre Dig the City – the UK’s only urban gardening festival – returns again for 2013.

The festival will bring the city alive with colourful displays, special events and flower markets. Visitors will see the city centre transform into a sea of green and enjoy music in the streets, spectacular exhibitions, family workshops, talks and entertainment and the region’s tastiest gourmet street food. @digthecitymcr

Manchester Food and Drink Festival September The UK’s largest and highest profile urban food and drink festival. The Festival ‘Hub’ of the outdoor element takes place on Albert Square. A ‘Festival Pavilion’ is specially built, and chef demonstrations, restaurant dining arenas, live entertainment, bars, sampling and more take place throughout. Its a fabulous food adventure right in the heart of the city… and its all free! foodanddrinkfestival.com @MFDF13

Manchester Literature Festival returns for 2013 and will once again feature an amazing line-up of internationally renowned authors, exclusive performances of specially commissioned work, bespoke literary tours and industry debates. manchesterliteraturefestival.co.uk @McrLitFest

Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair 10 – 13 October Spinningfields The Great Northern Contemporary Craft Fair returns to Manchester in October showcasing the latest work by some of the UK’s most exciting designer-makers. Voted Small Tourism Event of the Year at the 2011 Manchester Tourism Awards, this is a unique opportunity to buy direct from selected makers in textiles, wood & furniture, lighting, mixed media, metal, jewellery, glass, ceramics, basketry and paper. greatnorthernevents.co.uk @GNCCF

Manchester Science Festival 26 October – 3 November Be curious and surprised at Manchester’s action-packed Festival. Come out and play, create and experiment at hundreds of events, exhibitions and experiences across Manchester proudly produced by MOSI. manchestersciencefestival.com @McrSciFest

The leading 5 star hotel in the north west The Lowry Hotel offers 165 bedrooms, six suites and the Charles Forte Presidential Suite. The hotel is contemporary, luxurious and comfortable.

Eat Drink & Dine... for less Pick up your FREE Yellow Card now.

The River Restaurant offers a Modern British menu whilst the River Bar and Library offer a modern, light menu throughout the day.

The luxurious Lowry Spa, offers a range of treatments from Carita and Elemis, a gym, sauna and relaxation lounges.

Room rates from ÂŁ169 including breakfast.

Special menus from ÂŁ19.50 per person for 3 courses from our daily menu.

To make a booking, call us on 0161 827 4000

Visit Spinningfields and pick up your FREE Yellow Card. The Yellow Card is your key to a host of fantastic discounts so you can enjoy everything that Spinningfields has to offer...for less!

You can also enjoy VIP access to exclusive gigs and events at Spinningfields and competitions with a number of our affiliates.

Make sure you keep your Yellow Card with you at all times as you will need to show your card to qualify for discounts at participating restaurants and to gain entry to exclusive gigs and events at Spinningfields.

Yellow Card participants and offers are subject to change.

Please check the website for the latest offers.

The Lowry Hotel

50 Dearmans Place, Chapel Wharf, Salford, Manchester, M3 5LH Telephone +44 (0) 161 827 4000 Fax +44 (0) 161 827 4001 enquiries.lowry@roccofortehotels.com www.roccofortehotels.com

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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Toilets, taxis and temperance: tours of MCR Joining an official walking tour is undoubtably one of the best ways to discover a new city, helping visitors find their bearings, discover hidden gems and get up-to-date suggestions and recommendations from a local in the know. Manchester has over 30 professional tour guides, trained to take you around and show you the sights. However, there’s no reason to stick to a tour that focuses on the major sites as each guide has their their own specialist subjects and passions to share. Here we look at a selection niche walks and tours on offer.

Mark Coleman – East Lancashire Rail Ale Tour

Pauline Lloyd (with John Ryan) – Saints and Sinners

“It is said that brewing beer was second only to cotton manufacture during the Industrial Revolution. So if cotton was Manchester’s fabric, beer was, and definitely still is, its fuel. On this tour, I take you on a journey of discovery along one of the UK’s longest preserved heritage railways. By steam train, we visit traditional Victorian villages – the sort of places whose mill owners paid workers in beer tokens, and inspired the works of a certain Charles Dickens. The 12mile route is blessed with more than 25 pubs, served by a region that boasts just as many independent breweries; two of which sit next to the railway. If beer drinking isn’t your…cup of tea, the trail also includes Britain’s oldest original temperance bar Fitzpatrick’s - which has been serving customers in the Lancashire town of Rawtenstall for more than 120 years. It’s a sobering thought.” eastlancsrailway.org.uk/rail-ale-trail @rail_ale

“This walk began as a joke during guide training. I became known as an expert on things religious because of my faith tourism experience and John could always counter with a story of criminals and the like. So someone laughingly suggested we create a tour together called ‘Saints and Sinners’.

Villains and criminals abound in a city with Manchester’s colourful past and you’ll hear about murderers, quack doctors, prostitutes and terrorists. But saints? I’ll tell you about the radical nun who could become the first Catholic saint of the Industrial Revolution and the story behind a blue plaque uniting two very different men who died for their faith. And have you ever stopped to wonder why a Good Samaritan painting is prominently displayed in Manchester Art Gallery? Tales of good and evil, but no sermons!” manchesterguidedtours.com @GuideManchester

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The Good Samaritan, G.F. Watts © Manchester City Galleries

Suzanne Hindle – Pub/Non-Pub Tour: Debauchery to Temperance “This tour was borne from research I did for an exhibition about temperence which ran at the People's History Museum until earlier this year. The research led me to uncover that Manchester had been at the foreground of the latter years of the temperance movement, influenced by the 1850s United States Maine Law which introduced the prohibition of drink. So influential were the temperence societies in Manchester that they named a street after it – Maine Road, where Manchester City Football Club’s historical ground was built. 19th Century Manchester was full of vice, drinking and crime; pubs were open from 4am to 1am.

That's twenty one hours of drinking! So the temperence hotels and coffee taverns had a fight on their hands pursuading folk away from the evils of drink. This tour takes in both the temperate and the debauched with alcoholic and non-alcoholic stops along the way.” manchesterguidedtours.com @AmanchesterTour

© Sarah Franklin

Ed Glinert – Underground Manchester Tour “Thanks to word of mouth praise and excellent reviews in newspapers such as the Daily Telegraph, the Underground Manchester Tour, is one of Britain’s most popular walking tours. Hundreds of people join us most weekends – as long as they bring a torch and wear stout shoes! – on a descent into Manchester’s largest World War II airraid shelter, built into a disused, industrial canal that runs under Deansgate. But the tour involves much more than just a quick look around a secret space. We have a remarkable story to tell about Mancunians fleeing underground to take refuge from the Nazi bombs; about how the Midland Hotel and Town Hall were spared by the Luftwaffe; and how, after the war, Nato built a top secret nuclear bunker under the city to protect the Manchester elite from the atom bomb. We also trace the canal’s route overground and underground from the Bridgewater Hall to the Great Northern Leisure Centre and the edge of the former Coronation Street studios.” newmanchesterwalks.com @NewMcrWalks

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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Anne Beswick – Toilets of Manchester

© Anthony McCarthy

Emma Fox – South Cemetery Tour “Paris has Père-Lachaise, London has Highgate and Manchester has Southern Cemetery, the largest municipal cemetery in the UK. Take a walk with me through this peaceful cemetery, enjoying the wildlife and calm, whilst hearing stories of the notables that helped to make Manchester the dynamic city it is today. Open since the time of ‘Cottonopolis’ in 1879, we’ll visit the earliest grave, through to the ultra minimal headstone of cultural catalyst Tony Wilson.

Southern Cemetery is the final resting place of the brave, the philanthropic, the sporting legend, the pioneer aviator, the artist, Manchester’s Sherlock Holmes, and many more. You can learn the whole story of Manchester through a morning spent at this beautiful place of rest.” manchesterguidedtours.com @Showmemcr

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“This most ‘convenient’ of walks really gets to the bottom of Manchester! On my back-tobasics tour I’ll show you some prime places to spend a penny - or more. We’ll visit the oldest ‘stones’ in the area and a superloo fit for a very fastidious prince. In between are some rudimentary and very decorative installations at the likes of John Ryland’s Library and The Temple. There’s also a serious side of course. Manchester has always been a practical city but it took us a long time to sort out basic sanitation - clean water and sewage disposal are fairly recent luxuries in the original, modern city - so as well as learning some excellent pub-quiz ammo, you’ll also leave with a new-found appreciation for the humble loo.” manchesterguidedtours.com @annebesw

Jonathan Schofield – The Tour of Uninteresting Objects

John Consterdine – Manchester Taxi Tours “There are two things people generally assume about taxi drivers: that we know the city better than anyone and that we can talk for Britain. I’m proud to say that both of these are true of me! As Manchester's only taxi driver / tour guide I’ll show you around the city where I live and work. Sit back and relax as I guide you through 2000 years of history; show you our stunning architecture; and take you down the backstreets to find some truly hidden gems.

There are no limits with a taxi tour so I can take you out to the suburbs; show you where the rich cotton merchants built their villas and where the sports stars now build their mansions. I can tailor tours to whatever you want to see, even if it’s a drink and a sing song in a traditional Manchester pub - but make mine an orange..... I'm driving!” manchestertaxitours.com | @MCRTaxiTours

“Ah yes, the unregarded things that make a city. This tour reveals odd sculptures, mad details and washed up remnants of things inside and outside buildings. Whether with the story of the missing finger, the veiled lady, the wicked Bible, the iron kerbs and much more; this tour gets deep under the skin of the city. The massive quantities of uninteresting objects revealed will help people learn, smile and wonder at the variety of Manchester life past and present.

Of course the tour doesn't ignore famous landmarks but it covers far more besides.” jonathanschofieldtours.com @jonathschofield

Verity Henry – Tours of the BBC at MediaCityUK “Guiding groups from all over the world and closer to home is a fascinating and rewarding job. Whether our tour group is from Hungary, Japan or Salford, aged six or 96, everyone has an interest in something here.

We say our hello’s, give a potted history of the BBC and then head out to have a look around the site, giving the technical and personal stories of our radio and TV studios, including Match Of The Day, Blue Peter, BBC Breakfast and BBC Radio 5 Live. After all of that, there’s a chance for visitors to host their own TV show in our interactive studio, which always goes down well! I love the tricky questions we get asked, although I’m still not sure exactly how many miles of cable run into the studio block!” bbc.co.uk/showsandtours | @BBCNorth

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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What’s on: Exhibitions

Wiiliam Cuffay and the London Chartists 1842 © Red Saunders courtesy of Impressions Gallery Bradford and The Culture Company

Nature’s Library Manchester Museum Throughout 2013 Manchester Museum has undergone some dramatic changes in recent years, developing new galleries of natural history, archaeology and Egyptology. Nature’s Library is the final piece in the redevelopment jigsaw and sees the restoration of a Grade II* listed gallery revealing many of its original Gothic features.

Spectacular new displays showcase objects from the Museum’s collection of four million preserved animals, plants and fossils and visitors can discover where the specimens come from and what they mean to people today. museum.manchester.ac.uk | @mcrmuseum

Home, Land and Sea: Art in the Netherlands 1600-1800 Manchester Art Gallery From 24 May This new exhibition presents around 50 of the galleries’ most important 17th and 18th century Dutch and Flemish paintings, the majority of which have not been on display for many years. The display includes portraits, domestic interiors, still lifes, landscapes and seascapes by prominent artists such as Jacob van Ruisdael, Pieter de Hooch and Gerard ter Borch. Showcasing the unique artistic creativity of the Netherlands, the exhibition presents the latest historical research as well as intriguing provenance details relating to the works. manchestergalleries.org | @mcrartgallery

Iraq: Photographs by Sean Smith IWM North From 9 March The invasion of Iraq started on the evening of 19 March 2003. To mark the tenth anniversary, IWM North launches a new photographic display by award-winning Guardian photographer Sean Smith. As well as a powerful display in the WaterWay Gallery, six images will be shown in large 5m high frames outside IWM North. iwm.org.uk/north | @I_W_M

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Summer Season Whitworth Art Gallery 4 July to 1 September Whitworth Art Gallery hosts a season of exhibitions that reveal some of its most cherished works in a final presentation before closing for a dramatic redevelopment to be completed in summer 2014. The Summer Season will include highlights of the Whitworth collection with works by William Blake, Turner, Durer, Picasso and Degas on show. museum.manchester.ac.uk | @whitworthart

Brains: The Mind as Matter MOSI From 26 July Featuring a range of objects, audio-visual installations and beautiful artworks, this fascinating exhibition explores what humans have done to brains in the cause of medical intervention, scientific enquiry, cultural meaning and technological change. mosi.org.uk | @voiceofmosi

Hidden by Red Saunders People’s History Museum Until 29 September Hidden features re-imagined photographic tableaux by Red Saunders, recreating great moments in the long struggle for rights and representation in Britain. With the past often dominated by Kings, Queens and military battles, the aim of the Hidden project is to recreate historic scenes involving the dissenters, revolutionaries, radicals and non-conformists who have often been hidden from history. Each scene is carefully planned and lit, using costumed models in the style of tableaux vivants. phm.org.uk | @PHMMcr

Soak up the views in Manchester’s most atmospheric cocktail and champagne bar

Cloud 23 is unique and opulent and the destination for the discerning reveller looking for an extraordinary experience.

The highlife awaits you.

To make a reservation: call: + 44 (0) 161 870 1670 email: cloud23.manchester@hilton.com or visit online at www.cloud23bar.com Twitter.com/@cloud23bar

Facebook.com/cloud23bar

Manchester Visitor Information Centre Piccadilly Plaza, Portland Street, Manchester, M1 4AJ

Monday - Saturday: 9.30am - 5.30pm Sunday: 10.30am - 4.30pm Tel: +44 (0)871 222 8223 Email: touristinformation@visitmanchester.com

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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FIVE STAR FINDS No matter where you are in the world, there’s always time for a brew, a bite to eat, a little retail therapy and a bit of live music. Manchester does all of the aforementioned – and it does them well.

Here’s our round-up of the top five places for tea and coffee, food, shopping and live music.

TEA & COFFEE North Tea Power

Richmond Tea Rooms

Often referred to as serving “the best coffee in Manchester”, North Tea Power is another laid-back, Northern Quarter haunt to wile the day away with a warm cup in your grasp. With a stripped back interior and ‘no nonsense’ approach – North Tea Power is all about the beverage, particularly for coffee fanatics. northteapower.co.uk @northteapower

For a wonderful taste of the whimsical, this Alice in Wonderland inspired tea room is a must-see.

Richmond Tea Rooms’ extensive and impressive drinks menu offers the likes of China Yunnan, Imperial Gunpower, Ceylon and Kwazulu (Ntingwe) tea – on their own or as a part of a selection of four Afternoon Tea options. richmondtearooms.com @richmondtearooms

Zouk Teabar and Grill Koffee Pot Cool, casual and as offbeat as its bohemian Northern Quarter surroundings, Koffee Pot is a laidback space to enjoy a moment of calm either independently or with friends. With prices that won’t break the bank, your beverage might not come with smoked salmon and cream cheese, but that’s probably exactly why its regulars are its regulars. thekoffeepot.co.uk

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Spice up the traditional past-time of Afternoon Tea and ‘builder’s coffee’ at Zouk. The award-winning restaurant’s inspiring hot drinks menu invites visitors to try something new such as ‘Jamaican’, ‘Calypso’ or the more familiar ‘Irish’ coffee, and a tea selection including dhesi chai, sabaz chai and masala (and ‘English’ for the less adventurous). zoukteabar.co.uk | @ZoukTeaBar

The Midland Traditional Afternoon Tea at its finest doesn’t come much better than at The Midland’s Octagon Lounge. The historic and renowned hotel not only offers a spectacular ambience, but also wonderful views out into the city. The Octagon Lounge is a great choice for visitors who are more than a little parched and want to truly indulge and unwind. qhotels.co.uk | @QHotels

FOOD Australasia

Yang Sing Established in 1977 by the Yeung family, the award-winning restaurant Yang Sing has a reputation for being one of the best Cantonese eateries in Europe.

From delicious dim sum to an impressive a la carte menu, Yang Sing uses market-fresh food and offers individually tailored banquets for groups coming to the restaurant. yang-sing.com | @yangsingmcr

Pacific-rim and modern Australian eatery Australasia is one of Manchester’s most glamorous restaurants – situated down the steps of its grand glass pyramid structure in trendy Spinningfields.

A celebrity favourite, the restaurant serves slick and refreshing foods and has an extensive and impressive drinks menu. australasia.uk.com @AustralasiaMcr

Rosso Rio Ferdinand’s restaurant Rosso is another of Manchester’s most popular eating spots and a favourite for Manchester’s elite, often including footballers in the city. Serving high-end Italian food in a Grade II building, its decadent interior of stained glass windows and marble domes is the perfect accent to the top quality food on offer. rossorestaurants.com @RossoRestaurant

Mr. Thomas’ Chop House Livebait Manchester’s premier seafood restaurant Livebait serves sustainably sourced British fish and shellfish seven days a week, and is situated in a prime spot just outside of Albert Square. An extensive champagne and wine list accompanies the food, in addition to a private dining facility which holds up to 40 people. livebaitmanchester.com @livebait_M2

Mr. Thomas’ Chop House is set within a stunning Grade II listed building, rich in heritage and history dating back to the 1870, where the site was first a public house and then restaurant. With a stellar menu including its trademark roast dinners, Mr Thomas’ offers guests an unforgettable and quintessentially British dining experience. tomsmanchester.thevictorianchop house.com | @chophouseToms

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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FASHION Afflecks

Exchange Square

A palace of the peculiar and a mixed mecca of independent retailers, Afflecks is a favourite amongst locals and visitors alike. As well as its endless vintage-filled spaces, mazelike and never-ending corridors, you’ll find everything from handmade jewellery to nostalgic pick n’ mix sweet stores and tattoo parlours all in one iconic building. afflecks.com | @AFFLECKS

If shopping districts were Hollywood, Manchester’s Exchange Square would be amongst the A-Listers. Department store giants Selfridges and Harvey Nichols sit side by side – stocking high end brands such as McQueen, Chanel, Tom Ford and Louis Vuitton – alongside designer brands such as Ted Baker, Lacoste and UGG’s own stores. selfridges.com | @Selfridges harveynichols.com @HN_Manchester

Craft and Design Centre A hand-made heaven in the Northern Quarter, the Craft and Design Centre houses an array of bespoke pieces from independent artists in exhibition and boutique spaces. In the gorgeous setting of its ex-Victorian warehouse building, the Craft and Design Centre can bring a breath of fresh air to a hustling and bustling day of retail. craftanddesign.com @ManchesterCraft

Arndale Centre For staple wardrobe pieces and many of the UK’s best-known fashion brands, Manchester Arndale is a high street haven, bringing visitors the complete shopping experience (all under one roof ).

Topshop, River Island, Levis, American Apparel and All Saints are just a few of the brands on the menu for fashion-hungry visitors to Manchester. manchesterarndale.com @manarndale

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The Avenue Retail utopia Spinningfields is a must-stop shop-spot for anyone who knows their KG from their LV. The Avenue certainly starts as it means to go on, facing out onto Deansgate with its iconic Emporio Armani building. For high fashion hijinx and for a style-shaped cocktail of chic – any shopper who means business will choose The Avenue in Spinningfields. theavenuemanchester.com @AvenueThe

MUSIC & PERFORMANCE Gorillla

Manchester Arena As a city with such an acclaimed musical heritage, Manchester frequently hosts world-class performers from across the globe.

Manchester Arena is a fantastic space to accommodate this, and welcomes stars through its doors all year round, including Rihanna, Take That, Morrisey and Lady Gaga. mcr-arena.com / @manchesterarena

Opened in 2012, Gorilla has already solidified itself as a key bar, restaurant and music venue in Manchester. As well as their mouthwateringly good (and awardwinning) burgers and sumptuous shakes, Gorilla hosts some of the city’s best club nights, and regularly welcomes cutting-edge and up-andcoming acts to play gigs. thisisgorilla.com | @thisisgorilla

Chethams School of Music The UK’s largest specialist music school, Chetham’s, is over 600 years old and is an extremely special and exciting part of Manchester and its musicality. The school’s lunch time concerts series invite the public free of charge to come and watch their most talented students play, which is certainly an experience not to be missed. chethams.com | @chethams

Bridgewater Hall

Band on the Wall Not-for-profit venue Band on the Wall presents top-class musical talent from around the world.

The space plays host to an array of spectacular performances throughout the year, and is a great spot for hearing artists and bands you may not have been familiar with in a relaxed and friendly environment. bandonthewall.org @bandonthewall

For something a little more classic, Manchester’s acclaimed Bridgewater Hall hosts over 250 performances per year, including world music, jazz and classical, and is home to three orchestras in residency: the BBC Philharmonic, Manchester Camerata and the Hallé. The Bridgewater Hall is perfect for a sophisticated end (or start) to an evening in Manchester. bridgewater-hall.co.uk @BridgewaterHall

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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SnapShot The John Rylands Library Kim Gillson is a facilities and gallery attendant at The John Rylands Library – one the best examples of neo-Gothic architecture in Europe. It houses over 250,000 printed volumes and more than one million manuscripts and archival items. library.manchester.ac.uk/deansgate

A league of our own...

By Ewan Phillips

2013 is the year of the Rugby League World Cup: 14 teams, 28 games, 21 different venues and the final’s right here in Manchester.

Ewan Phillips, lifelong Rugby League fan and author of the Wigan Warriors Miscellany, previews the tournament.

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Here’s a question: you’re a sports mad country three years into your muchtrumpeted ‘Golden Decade’; you’ve done your Olympics and your Commonwealth Games is almost ready to go, so how do you fill the global occasion-sized gap between the two? Well, here in the UK, we’ve opted for a high-octane international tournament in arguably the world’s toughest collision sport: this autumn sees the Rugby League World Cup (RLWC2013) coming home and-whisper it quietly–hopes are cautiously building of a watershed ‘1966 moment’ for the thirteen a side code and its England team.

with a further 40 million people expected to tune in to TV coverage worldwide. Although the winning nation is unlikely to come from outside the afore-mentioned top three, there is a real spread of talent throughout the other contenders, with mouth-watering match ups everywhere you look in the group fixture lists. The five-week jamboree promises to tap into much of last year’s leftover feel-good factor and nowhere more so than right here in the game’s Greater Manchester heartland where five gamesincluding a quarter final and the final itselfwill be played.

However, before we book the open top buses and start unfurling the flags, it is probably worth pointing out that nine time winners Australia and current champions New Zealand will both be sending squads blending all their usual supernatural levels of power and skill. England may not start as the favourites with the bookies but coach Steve McNamara will be banking on home advantage to raise the chances of his exciting and experienced group of players. The host nation boasts stand out names from the domestic Super League competition such as mercurial full back Sam Tomkins and wily skipper Kevin Sinfield as well as blockbusting forwards like Sam Burgess and James Graham who ply their trade in Australia’s ultra-competitive NRL. With luck, hard work and a following wind, we might just be treated to a first English World Cup win on home soil since the sepia- tinted days of Bobby, Nobby, Sir Geoff et al.

Think of Manchester and sport and the association is normally football, but the city and its surrounding towns possess genuine Rugby League pedigree. Old Trafford hosts the sport’s showpiece Grand Final every year with numerous other big games-finals, semi finals and test matches being staged in Greater Manchester or the city itself throughout the sport’s 118 year life span.

There are countless thriving amateur teams across the area, professional clubs in Oldham, Rochdale, Swinton and Leigh, each one of whom has been a major force at one time or another in years gone by. Salford City Reds and Wigan Warriors play week in week out in the elite Super League competition.

The latter outfit are arguably the Manchester United of rugby league; internationally famed for its star- studded, trophy laden past and nationally envied for the inexhaustible conveyor belt of local talent that continues to provide a successful present. Other major league playing towns (and RLWC2013 venues) such as Warrington, St Helens and Leeds are less than an hour away from central Manchester, making it the perfect base to take in what promises to be a landmark sporting event.

However England fare, Rugby League’s fourteenth World Cup will still be a seriously big deal: a total of 500,000 people are likely to attend matches at a number of venues across England, Wales, Ireland and France

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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(for some reason) Papua New Guinea as well as attracting sizeable followings in New Zealand and France.

Nowadays, it vies with cricket and rugby union for recognition as the country’s second most popular spectator sport and is played in every English county, involving almost 250,000 people as players, coaches, officials or volunteers nationwide. Yet, despite this spread and the missionary zeal of those who love rugby league, it is in the old counties of Lancashire, Yorkshire and Cumbria where it remains most firmly rooted and, just like the people from thereabouts, it enjoys a reputation for honesty, hardness and a dislike of pretension. However, the old stereotype of large, broken nosed men grappling in winter mud is no longer applicable... they play in the summer now.

For the uninitiated, it should be explained that rugby league was born towards the end of the nineteenth century when the rampaging northern rugby clubs, made up of miners, mill workers and factory employees, sought compensation for taking Saturdays off from their lowly paid toil in order to go and beat their largely southern based opponents.

This issue of ‘broken time payments’ was in anathema to the professional class university types who turned out for non-northern teams and, when a compromise couldn’t be reached, an emergency meeting was called at The George Hotel, Huddersfield in 1895.

The upshot was a breakaway of 22 clubs (including seven from the Greater Manchester area) and a new sport was formed. It quickly modified itself from 15 to 13 a side, did away with most of rugby union’s enduring set piece complexity, changed the points system and a faster, slicker, very distinct game gradually emerged. The upstart quickly spread to a number of other countries becoming particularly big in Australia and

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The sport’s appeal is its unique marriage of an innovative, ever- evolving on-field product with the old-fashioned, working class traditions of the industrial towns of Victorian England that created it. The term ‘family game’ is often attached to rugby league and indeed, whilst the matches themselves with their banter, singing and “pie n’ pint culture”, are ideal days out for young and old, male or female, the true “family” feel springs from the sport’s enduring place at the heart of close knit communities like Wigan, Salford and Oldham, inextricably linked in a way that football probably last was some time in the 1950s. The state-of-the-art hard men who play this game are local heroes in every sense: they went to the same schools, live in the same streets and still shop in the same supermarkets as the adoring fans who watch them every week, seemingly as approachable and humble off the pitch as they are aggressive, committed and awesome on it.

Rugby League’s strong regional identity means it may not enjoy the media profile of some other sports but whenever its fans, players and administrators congregate in large numbers (at Wembley for the Challenge Cup Final or Old Trafford for the Grand Final for instance) there is always a sense of a meeting of kindred spirits and an immense collective pride. Be in no doubt the World Cup will be an unmissable event: the sight of the sport’s finest players competing for its biggest prize in some of Europe’s top venues will be both a treat for the connoisseur and hopefully, a recruiting agent for armies of new fans. Providing a high quality match experience has never been an issue for rugby league; the challenge has always been persuading non-believers through the turnstiles to see the one match it usually takes to get hooked. Will you be there?

Believe me, you won’t regret it.

Images facing page: Akuila Uate; Wigan Warriors fan Images this page: Sonny Bill Williams

Get tickets for...

28.10.13 Fiji v Ireland, Spotland Stadium, Rochdale 5.11.13 Tonga v Cook Islands, Leigh Sports Village 7.11.13 Scotland v USA, Salford City Stadium 16.11.13 Quarter Final DW Stadium, Wigan 30.11.13 Final Old Trafford

Watch out for...

Sam Tomkins (England) The sporting hero of none other than Sir Bradley Wiggins, Tomkins’ wiry frame and bewitching feet make him the Lionel Messi of English rugby league. Predictably unpredictable and never dull, at his magical best he could just conjure up a World Cup win. Fingers crossed.

Jonathan Thurston (Australia) The superstar of the Australian game, ‘JT’ would be most people’s choice as the sport’s outstanding player and, in concert with his delightfully named half back partner, Cooper Cronk, could well seal a tournament win and a place amongst the all time greats.

Sonny Bill Williams (New Zealand) Multiskilled Kiwi giant who in his spare time also happens to be WBA International heavyweight boxing champion will fancy his chances of adding a League World Cup winner’s medal to the Rugby Union version he won with the All Blacks in 2011.

Akuila Uate (Fiji) His thrilling combination of sprinter’s pace and blockbusting strength inspired Fiji to a shock semi final place in 2008. If Australia don’t decide to pinch him for their squad, he could well power the ‘Bati’ to the last four again.

Hilton Park, Leigh A proper rugby league pub in a proper rugby league town. Packed with memorabilia from Leigh’s glory days and popular with former and current players, enjoy the match with a knowledgeable crowd.

Andrew Fifita (Tonga) At 6ft 4ins and over 18 stone, Andrew and his similarly sized twin brother David typify a tough, experienced, ultra-physical Tongan side that will be no-one’s pushovers. Expect the 24 year old forward to waste little time in introducing himself to the opponents of the Group C dark horses.

Junction Inn, Oldham Lively rugby-loving pub in one of the sport’s traditional towns.

Watch the game and stick around for live music and good, northern fun.

Watch on telly in...

Tib Street Tavern, Manchester Friendly venue in the city’s trendy Northern Quarter for the more discerning League fan: take in the game on an HD screen and treat yourself to an array of quality food and beverage options.

Berkeley Square, Wigan Big screen pub located slap bang in the centre of the region’s capital of rugby league. Handily located for the railway stations, pie shops and the town’s celebrated King Street nightspots.

Village Inn, Trafford Park Can’t get into the final? This busy bar will be near enough to feel like you’re there. See the action on the box and hear the roar from the ground as England lift the cup... (possibly)

You might end up sitting next to...

Serious celebrity fans who could well be attending include Hollywood actors Russell Crowe and Hugh Jackman, Premiership footballers Rio Ferdinand, Ryan Giggs, Roy Keane and Wayne Rooney, cricketers Graeme Swann and Tim Bresnan, cyclist Sir Bradley Wiggins, racing driver Mark Webber, Coronation Street star Michelle Keegan, singer Ian Brown and comedian Johnny Vegas.

Rugby League World Cup 2013: 26 October - 30 November 2013 Ticket hotline: +44 (0)844 847 2013 rlwc2013.com facebook.com/rugbyleagueworldcup @rlwc2013 #bethere

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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What’s on: Sport

© 2013 NBA Entertainment

Salford Triathlon

The Ashes

Rugby League World Cup 2013

MediaCityUK (Various) 18 August

Lancashire County Cricket Club 1 – 5 August

Venues across Greater Manchester October – November

The Salford Triathlon is back and this summer will be hosted on the iconic MediaCityUK – the home of BBC Sport.

It will be the first time in six years that a triathlon has been hosted in Salford and almost 1,000 athletes are expected to tackle the spectacular course. salfordtriathlon.com | @salfordtri

The Ashes returns to Emirates Old Trafford this August as England take on Australia, just in time for the location’s new look, fit for international fixtures. This includes a redeveloped Pavilion and a state-of-the-art Players and Media Centre flanked by two double-tier grandstands. As the first Test at Emirates Old Trafford since 2010, this will no doubt be a fantastic sporting event to remember. lccc.co.uk | @lancscricket

The Rugby League World Cup comes to Manchester as part of England and Wales’ hosting of the tournament. Teams including defending champions New Zealand, Australia (who will be based in Manchester), Cook Islands, the USA and Italy will compete for the famous trophy. Matches will be among the highlights of Manchester’s sporting calendar, especially the final at Old Trafford. rlwc2013.com | @RLWC2013

Ironman UK Triathlon Bolton 4 August Returning to Bolton for the fifth year, IRONMAN UK continues to offer a world class event, in the heart of the North West countryside. Watch 1,800 athletes swim 2.4 miles, cycle 112 miles and run a marathon, finishing with a spectacular finish in front of Bolton Town Hall. This year’s event also includes IronKids on 3 August, a run-only event in Bolton town centre for children aged 3 to 15 years old. ironmanuk.com | @Ironman_UK

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NBA Basketball live in Manchester!

PSA Men’s World Squash Championship

Manchester Arena 8 October

National Squash Centre and Manchester Central 26 October – 3 November

Manchester plays host to world-class basketball as the NBA’s global tour comes to town. The Oklahoma City Thunder and the Philadelphia 76ers will go head to head at the Manchester Arena in the first ever NBA preseason game in the city. Don’t miss out! eventim.co.uk

The PSA Men’s World Squash Championship will be a highlight of 2013. Set to be the biggest squash event in UK yet featuring four World Champions, including England’s two-time champion Nick Matthew on our doorstep too so it’s set to be a phenomenal show! mensworldsquashchampionship2013.com

Manchester Voices

Daniel Gidney After an extensive refurbishment to the tune of £45m, Emirates Old Trafford will host a summer of international cricket in 2013, welcoming the 3rd Investec Ashes Test Match and the 2nd NatWest OneDay International. We caught up with Daniel Gidney, chief executive of Lancashire County Cricket Club (LCCC), to find out his thoughts in advance of the tournament.

You took over at LCCC in September 2012 – what made you choose to relocate to Greater Manchester and how have you found it?

I was born in Birmingham and have lived mostly in south Warwickshire, but also in Essex, Glasgow and Northamptonshire.

However, I seem to have spent most of my career in or around Manchester. The city has been calling to me for a long time and as well as working up here, I am delighted to finally relocate. The area is vibrant and growing rapidly and has much to offer. Although I was born in Birmingham, I do believe Manchester now has a greater claim to being the UK’s real second city.

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LCCC has undergone a huge transformation over the last couple of years, can you tell us what’s new?

Pavilion - a development par excellence providing an unrivalled hospitality experience for our members and VIP guests.

We were a much loved ageing cricket ground, home to a Club with a proud history and heritage. Now we have a Club that still, of course, has that enviable history and the iconic location, but boasts a world class £45m venue. The great and the good of the North West are already aware of our stunning development ‘The Point’ - a truly amazing addition with remarkable technology, vaulted ceilings, pitch views and the rare ability to host 1,000 guests in an entirely column-free space! We now also have a brand new, state of the art players and media centre and the new £7.5m

You come from the Ricoh Arena, home to Coventry City FC and several high-profile sporting, music and business events – what’s your vision for LCCC? In just six years I moved non-match day revenues at the Ricoh Arena from just 20% of our revenues to over 80%, and in the process created a conference and events business of over £10m from scratch. Here at LCCC International cricket is our crowning summit and Emirates Old Trafford must always be at the forefront of the England and Wales Cricket Board’s mind when selecting future

Test Match hosts; however, my vision is to create a sustainable business outside of cricket to ensure we can continue to invest in the team and ensure LCCC can compete in and win competitions in the future. My vision for the Club is to have cricket at our heart but business on our mind.

What does it mean to have The Ashes return to LCCC this summer?

This is our Olympics. With the North West being such a hotbed for cricket and top level sport in general it was our duty to ensure that The Ashes returned to Emirates Old Trafford after eight long years. You can begin to taste the excitement and anticipation of what will arguably be the biggest sporting event to happen outside of London during 2013. Let me make this promise to those who have been lucky enough to buy tickets: we understand the bar has been raised after the Olympics and we accept the responsibility to deliver an outstanding experience for our customers. We just can’t wait!

What would you say to cricket fans from around the world that plan to descend on Greater Manchester this summer?

The experience of The Ashes at Emirates Old Trafford in 2013 will be memorable and live in the mind for years to come - a genuine “I

was there” moment to tell the grandchildren about. Two evenly-matched teams at the top of their game competing relentlessly session by session, coupled with the beautiful unpredictability of sport against the backdrop of a world-class stadium makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck. And if that isn’t enough to whet your appetite, remember this: Old Trafford is an iconic Test venue with some unbelievable cricket history to live up to - Laker’s unrivalled 19 test wickets in a match, Botham’s century in his ‘81 Ashes, Tendulkar’s maiden Test ton as a 17 year old and, of course, Warne’s ball of the century. Aside, though, from the event itself the region has so much to offer that fans must expand the time for their trip to sample the delights of Greater Manchester and the wider North West.

What would you recommend visitors to see and do whilst here?

My wife Becky would urge you to check out The Trafford Centre and Manchester city centre for great shopping. My daughter Renee would say horse-riding in Mobberley, ice skating in Altrincham and then seeing a show at the Palace Theatre. My in-laws would probably want to visit the Manchester Museum and the National Trust properties at Lyme Park and Dunham Massey with my parents choosing to watch a Premier League

match at either United or City. Although I know both Salford City Reds and Sale Sharks play in their excellent new stadium, I must admit to being a fan of Rugby Union so personally a perfect day for me, apart from the cricket, would be to watch the Sharks in the Premiership. Then, I would hit the Curry Mile in Rusholme or go to Chinatown for an early dinner, then head over to the Manchester Arena for a live concert.

Finally, what’s your Ashes prediction?

3-2 to England with a glorious win at Emirates Old Trafford for Andy Flower’s men. I also want to see our very own Lancashire Legend Freddie Flintoff recalling the 2005 victory over the old enemy and having some great banter with LCCC’s 2013 overseas Aussie star Simon Katich (another 2005 Old Trafford Test veteran) in The Point during the match.

For more information about Lancashire County Cricket Club and to buy tickets or hospitality see lccc.co.uk | @LancsCCC

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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SnapShot Old Trafford Cameron Hall is a trainee groundsman at Old Trafford – the home of Manchester United since 1910. He is one of the team responsible for maintaining the hallowed turf at the 75,000 capacity venue. manutd.com

Green spaces There's another side to Manchester just waiting to be discovered.

Fortunately for you, Caroline Johnson and Simone Ridyard - two of the city’s Urban Sketchers - have drawn five of their favourite green spaces within the city centre as part of their campaign to raise the artistic, storytelling and educational value of location drawing. Words by Phil Griffin.

Cotton Field The Ancoats cotton mills made Manchester a global brand. The sheer cliff face of mills on Redhill Street, looking south across the Rochdale canal is one backdrop to the city’s newest park. Another is the colourful Chips apartment building by architect Will Alsop, sitting on the bank of the Ashton canal. The area is New Islington, and the brand new water and wildlife park, named by popular vote, is Cotton Field.

Orchard, beach, reed-beds, nesting boxes, turning bridges and mooring pontoons. Building in New Islington might have been cruelly stalled by the recession, but life, and nature drives on. Even the outdoors furniture here, whether concrete or timber, has flare and quality. All the moorings are taken and there’s a fragrant year-round community of wood-burning stoves aboard colourful narrow boats. There is no other city centre community, neighbourhood or park quite like it.

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Piccadilly Basin Today we’d call it a ‘Transport Hub’. Piccadilly Basin was a buzzing interchange of horse drawn barges and drays, cotton bales, coal and all the timber, brick and iron an industrial cauldron could consume. The Rochdale Canal Company offices were on Dale Street, in front of Carver’s Warehouse, built in 1806, the oldest in the city. The basin was a maze of wharves, docks, pools and moorings, where the Rochdale and Ashton canals meet.

Filled in for a car park, the area was a neglected backwater, without much water. There’s still car parking here, but also plantings, footbridges, towpaths and a properly reconstituted waterside. New and refurbished offices, apartments and hotels make this a modern hub of a very different order. Piccadilly Basin is an exciting and historic contribution to Manchester’s open spaces. It anchors the southern margin of the Northern Quarter and links through to Ancoats. Piccadilly Basin is the counter balance to Castlefield. Get there along the Rochdale canal, past the only canal lock in the country that sits beneath a building!

Cutting Room Square If you want an example of visionary regeneration, this is it. Cutting Room Square, Ancoats, is watched over by five giant monoliths. Each frames an enlarged photograph by Ancoats artist-in-residence Dan Dubowitz. They are photographs of the derelict, over-grown spaces where women used to cut the paper patterns for the thousands of fabrics and garments that were made here and exported to the world.

Royal Mill, where these photographs were taken, is now converted into apartments and people cook, take showers and watch TV were thousands of mill workers turned in for their shift.

Cutting Room Square opens on to St Peter’s church. Completed in 1859 this pretty Italianate building was the first Anglican Church in this predominantly Catholic area.

A century and a half later it was abandoned, looted and burnt out. In early spring 2013, it is beautifully restored as rehearsal and small performance space for the Hallé orchestra, itself founded in the city just two years prior to the church being built. Look around you.

Nowhere in Manchester will give you a stronger sense of the city’s industrial past, and nowhere bears the city’s cultural identity so positively represented.

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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Parsonage Gardens If it wasn’t called Parsonage, it could fittingly be called Harry Gardens. The Parsonage was of St Mary’s Church, built in 1753, closed in 1890 when the congregation had abandoned the polluted industrial city centre, demolished in 1928, as the great white five-storey cruise ship of Arkwright House, by architect Harry S Fairhurst took up the entire south side. Harry also designed National House, its neighbour to the west, headquarters building for the National Union of Boilermakers. It was (rather well) converted into flats, along with its 1960’s neighbour, also by Fairhurst’s, in 2000. The great Harry Fairhurst, Manchester’s most significant architect after Alfred Waterhouse, also designed Blackfriars House, another bright white Portland stone liner of a building, just a step down the street.

Parsonage Gardens is no great work of landscape design; cruciform paths run corner to corner and dissect a small central circle. The plantings aren’t great. Grab a sandwich and an early lunch and head across Deansgate, past Kendal’s, down St Mary’s Street on the next fine day, and discover that even the plainest, least adorned space can be a haven in the city.

Cathedral Gardens Cathedral Gardens was created in 2002 as part of Manchester’s Millennium Quarter.

When Ian Simpson Architects won the competition to design Urbis, their scheme was the only one that didn’t plonk a building in the middle of the site. By folding Urbis (currently housing the National Football Museum) around the Corporation Street edge, architect Ian Simpson created a unique glass backdrop to a brand new green space in the city.

Cathedral Gardens was designed by Building Design Partnership, that also designed the M&S / Selfridges building, Harvey Nichols and New Cathedral Street, to a masterplan

by Ian Simpson, following the 1996 IRA Bomb. Ironically, it was enemy bombs that first created the site in the 1940 Blitz.

For more information: visitmanchester.com/greenspaces

Manchester's Green Corridor Within Greater Manchester, there is more than 500 square miles of inspiring countryside, crisscrossed by historical waterways and dotted with picturesque towns and fascinating attractions that make for great days out of the city. Manchester's Green Corridor is a walking circuit made up of 14 routes which connect many of the beautiful green spaces and tree-lined streets around the city. For more information: getwalking.org/walking-routes/manchester-green-corridor

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Manchester Cathedral, Corn Exchange, Chetham’s School of Music, Victoria Station and Urbis bound Cathedral Gardens. With Manchester Arena just around the corner, future consolidation of the Medieval Quarter and NOMA, this is not about to be an especially quiet space anytime soon.

From its opening to the present, Cathedral Gardens has been adopted by moshers, goths and emos from all over the city. Dress code, Marilyn Manson, Slipknot, a lot of black.

Meet the ancestors Researching one’s family history is more popular than ever. A family tree can uncover all sorts of surprises. Of course, some people grow-up knowing exactly who their ancestors are – with proud parents passing on the story of famous relatives no longer with us. Here, we hear from the living descendents of three of Greater Manchester’s most notable figures on how proud they are of their ancestors.

© MOSI

Joan Hadwen Descendent of John Kay, inventor of the Flying Shuttle “The invention of the ‘Flying Shuttle’ was crucial to the birth of the Industrial Revolution. It could do the work of three men (before then, one weaver would stand in the middle of the loom with a man at each end throwing the shuttle back and forth).

John’s shuttle was mechanically thrown across the width – and thus workers foresaw jobs being laid off. They rebelled and John took fright and went to France. At first he was welcomed, employed and put on a salary – but when his attempt to negotiate a pension was denied, he fell on hard times and was eventually found dead on the Quay in Calais. We’ll never know if he was trying to return home – but I am proud of his achievements because the Industrial Revolution, fuelled by inventions like John’s, put Manchester on the map and changed the world forever.”

You can learn more about John Kay in the Local & Family History Section of Bury Library and Archives. For information about the Flying Shuttle and its contribution to the Industrial Revolution, visit MOSI, the Museum of Science & Industry: mosi.org.uk

Neville Alcock Nephew of Captain Sir John Alcock, pilot of the first non-stop transatlantic flight “In June 1919, my uncle John made history when, along with his co-pilot, Arthur Brown, flew the first ever non-stop transatlantic flight from St Johns in Newfoundland to Clifden in Ireland. The flight took 15 hours 57 minutes in a modified Vickers Vimy aircraft and earned the pair a knighthood from King George V. It’s a shame Sir John didn’t live long enough to see the developments in transatlantic air travel that came in the years that followed his historic flight. (He died in December 1919) He was so passionate about aviation. If he could see the aircraft in flight today he would be so excited about how far the industry has come.”

For more information about aviation in Greater Manchester, visit the Air & Space Gallery at MOSI, the Museum of Science & Industry: mosi.org.uk

© MOSI

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© Charlotte Newson

Dr Helen Pankhurst Great-granddaughter of Emmeline Pankhurst, campaigner for women’s rights “A centenary ago, Emmeline Pankhurst lead the ‘Votes for women’ campaign and for millions of people around the world she has since become a feminist icon. Manchester is where it all started - where Emmeline was born, grew up and married Richard Pankhurst, himself an influential Mancunian involved in campaigning for social justice.

In 1903, she formed the WSUP, the Women’s Social and Political Union, and the Suffragettes were born. I am proud to be the great grand-daughter of Emmeline, and

Sylvia’s granddaughter. Sylvia was Emmeline’s second daughter, who went on to champion many other social causes internationally. The house in Manchester in which the WSPU was formed is now a Women’s Centre with an Edwardian parlour room as a museum – the link between Manchester, the Pankhurst name and women’s rights lives on.”

Dr Helen Pankhurst works on international development and women’s rights issues with CARE International, UK Feminista, Farm Africa and WaterAid. For more information about the Pankhurst family visit: thepankhurstcentre.org.uk

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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ADVERTORIAL

More for your money at intu Trafford Centre Who doesn’t like to indulge in a spot of retail therapy when they’re on holiday? Visitors to Manchester certainly do.

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and Victoria’s Secret (opening Summer 2013) – which you won’t find anywhere else in the North West. British designs at the Centre include Karen Millen, Vivienne Westwood and Stella McCartney.

No outfit is complete without a touch of jewellery – so look out for shops including Goldsmiths and Beaverbrooks where you can also pick up luxury watch brands like Rolex and Omega.

The Great Hall & The Orient Your intu Trafford Centre experience would not be complete without a visit to one of the 60 restaurants, cafes or bars in The Orient or The Great Hall. The Orient is Europe’s largest food court; the steam ship architecture takes its inspiration from the nearby Manchester Ship Canal and will make you feel like you’re on a cruise somewhere in the Atlantic. With a sweeping marble staircase and towering chandelier, The Great Hall is a stunning dining experience like no other.

Opening times Intu Trafford Centre - one of the largest shopping centres in Europe – is one of Greater Manchester’s most popular attractions and is just a short bus, taxi or bike ride from the city centre.

And don’t forget - if you live outside the EU you can claim the VAT on many of your purchases back from the UK Government.

The majority of its stores offer tax free shopping, so take a look at what’s on offer and have your credit card at the ready.

First things first…

The old-modern and aristocratic architecture of intu Trafford Centre makes its visitors feel like they are inside a palace, taking the shopping experience to another level. It’s

like no other shopping centre in Europe, with glazed domes, gold edged columns, statues, murals, fountains and elaborate staircases. Above all, intu Trafford Centre is a destination in itself – somewhere you can spend the whole day - either with friends or family.

Shopping hours are Monday to Friday from 10am to 10pm, Saturday from 10am to 8pm and Sunday from 12noon to 6pm. For dining and most other leisure facilities the opening hours are Monday to Friday 10am to midnight, Saturday from 10am to midnight and beyond and Sunday early to midnight and beyond.

Shopping Intu Trafford Centre is home to some of the world's finest brands. It boasts lots of stores offering desirable labels to suit all tastes.

This includes a stunning Selfridges store that offers brands such as Miu Miu, Jimmy Choo, Michael Kors and Mulberry, plus DKNY, Armani Exchange and Calvin Klein.

Entertainment Intu Trafford Centre is not just a shopping experience – there’s also a LEGOLAND Discovery Centre, ODEON cinema, Namco Funscape, Paradise Island Adventure Golf, Laser Quest and The Rock and Aerial Extreme high ropes adventure course.

And new for 2013 (in June) is SEALIFE.

For those that love the latest trends, look out for stores like Forever 21, Banana Republic

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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Can I shop tax-free?

In the UK, there is a sales tax (VAT) of 20% on most goods you buy. Therefore, if you are a non-EU resident you can claim back the VAT on most of your purchases.

If you are travelling for leisure purposes or visiting friends and family, you may be eligible for a VAT refund. You need to have spent fewer than 365 days out of the two years prior to making the purchase living in the UK, and you must be leaving the EU (for at least 12 months) within three months of making the purchase.

1. Get it While doing your shopping at intu Trafford Centre, ask the staff in the shop for a Tax Refund Form.

2. Stamp it When you’re leaving the country, take your purchases, receipts and passport to the customs desk to get your Tax Refund Form(s) stamped.

3. Cash it Send the validated form in the prepaid envelope and you will receive your refund directly onto your payment card.

How to shop tax free The majority of stores at intu Trafford Centre offer tax free shopping so speak to the staff as you shop for more information. Just follow these simple steps:

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For more information about intu Trafford Centre, visit: intutraffordcentre.co.uk For details of how to shop tax-free, visit: global-blue.com

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SnapShot The French Kamila Plonska is the restaurant manager at The French – one of Manchester’s most famous restaurants. Over the years, its patrons have included royalty, presidents, sports stars and showbiz legends. It re-opened in March 2013 under the leadership of chef and restaurateur, Simon Rogan. qhotels.co.uk

Images this page: top Aiden Byrne; below Simon Rogan

If 2012 was a good vintage for new openings – highlights included Kaleido at the National Football Museum, Albert’s Chop House near the town hall and The Beagle in trendy South Manchester suburb Chorlton - the next 12 months are set to raise the bar even higher, as big-name chefs move in.

Simon Rogan’s recent takeover of The French at The Midland has the city’s foodies salivating, but there are also high hopes for Aiden Byrne’s fine dining project with Living Ventures, The Restaurant at Manchester House on Spinningfields, which opens in May.

Reaching for the star

By Simon Binns

While some cities feel the pinch, Manchester’s food and drink scene appears to be in rude health. In fact, where some operators are tightening belts, Manchester’s diners are more likely to be slipping theirs down a notch, such is the rapid growth of the sector.

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Byrne has set his stall out for a Michelin star (he’s the youngest chef to have ever won one, so he should know what he’s doing), which has so far eluded Manchester city centre. Some argue a star is just an added luxury though – the real win for the city is the capture of Rogan, Byrne et al and the extra interest they’ll generate in Manchester just by being here.

Living Ventures had a stellar 2012, as its Alchemist, Australasia, Oast House and Grill brands packed in punters. Do everything well and one thing brilliantly is a mantra that’s really worked for Tim Bacon’s brigade.

The firm is also set to launch its Artisan pizza brand and the Grand Pacific Bar and Garden this year, both in Spinningfields.

But the key to Manchester’s food and drink scene is its diversity. Over in the Northern Quarter – the antithesis of Spinningfields and its corporate environment – restaurants like Almost Famous and Solita have cashed in on the recent trend for low-down and dirty burgers packed with, well, anything you can readily grill or fry and cram into a brioche bun.

Their ‘no reservations’ and social media hype marketing is a nod to Soho operators like Polpo and Meat Liqour, but it seems to be working on Manchester’s hipster brigade.

The team behind Almost Famous has recently opened a Mexican-inspired add-on beneath its burger mecca, called Luck, Lust, Liquor and Burn, which is already getting rave reviews.

Excess seems to be the trend at the moment.

How long will it last? Well, everyone needs a salad eventually.

Spanish restaurant Evuna, which has been a fixture on Deansgate for many years, will venture into the Northern Quarter later this year too. Personally, I’d like to see a real Basque pintxos bar come to Manchester – inventive table top snacks and beer is a winning combination.

Cool new bars such as Terrace, Kosmonaut and The Blue Pig have joined established NQ favourites such as Common, Trof, The Castle, Port Street Beer House and Black Dog Ballroom.

The real ale scene has really filtered through the Northern Quarter too, finding a younger audience. Older types know that pubs like The Marble Arch, The Angel, The Mark Addy and the Briton’s Protection have been doing it for much longer though.

But the boho NQ neighbourhood is almost at capacity for bars now, which has led to a mini-revival in other parts of the city as operators clamour for space.

A cluster of fine new bars has emerged around Oxford Road Station – Gorilla, Black Dog Ballroom and Whim Wham Café have all added to the mix – and Peter Street has gone from a parade of boarded up units to an impressive array of drinking options opposite The Midland and the five-star Radisson Blu Edwardian, as Brewdog, Revolution Di Cuba and Trof breathe new life into a street that had looked bereft on one side for a number of years.

You won’t struggle to find a cocktail in the city either, as the tiki scene continues to flourish and flare. Hula, The Liar’s Club and Corridor are all great for late night concoctions and morning-after hangovers.

Why is the bar scene so active? Well, we all like a drink when times are tough, but the city’s 80,000 students probably help on that front too.

Canal Street continues to evolve as a vibrant evening destination, with the pick of the bunch being The Molly House. A real ale pub in the Gay Village? Trust me, it works.

And if you want to see it all from high up, the recently refurbished Cloud 23 in the Deansgate Hilton is your best bet.

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phenomenon since opening two years ago.

An all you can eat buffet spanning more than half a dozen nationalities might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but the restaurant’s fixed-price menus are packing them in. And that’s Manchester really – we’re a city of foodies, but we’re also tied to the idea of value.

You don’t have to stick to the city centre though. Some of Manchester’s best restaurants are out in the suburbs. Aumbry in Prestwich; Nutter’s in Bamford; Ramson’s in Ramsbottom and Damson in Heaton Moor are all exceptional and inventive, and regularly dominate the award nominations at the annual Manchester Food and Drink Festival.

Damson recently opened a new restaurant on MediaCity at Salford Quays and plans for a city centre operation are on the cards for later this year.

Manchester’s hotels do well for restaurants too – The Lowry’s River Restaurant, Steak and Lobster at the Radisson Blu Edwardian and Michael Caines at Abode are all worth a visit. But a tour of Manchester food and drink scene wouldn’t be complete without a mention of the two powerhouses of the city.

They’re at opposite ends of the scale, but in terms of weekly turnover, they stand head and shoulder above all others.

San Carlo is a city institution and once held the claim of being the second highest earning restaurant in the UK, after The Wolseley in London.

No matter what time or day, the place is invariably packed. Business deals are done, birthdays are celebrated and grand plans are

Images facing page: Andrew Nutter, Nuttters Restaurant.

Images this page: top The River Restaurant, the Lowry Hotel; below The Oast House, Spinningfields

drawn up over a few bottles of good Chianti in San Carlo. Sadly, Mario Balotelli won’t be nipping in to pick up his pizzas anymore now he’s traded Manchester for Milan, but you’re more than likely to see a footballer or two in there. Even the managers like it. Its smaller sibling, Cicchetti, is nestled just opposite and its Italian tapas menu is worth checking out.

Not too far away though, Red Hot World Buffet has become something of a

In 2010, AA Gill wrote in The Times that ‘Manchester is a city that drinks first and eats with its mouth open...and thinks tables are for dancing on.’ Some local food critics got quite upset about that, perhaps overreacting to Gill’s deliberate mischief making.

Gill didn’t really look too far into the city’s food and drink options before disappearing back to the capital, but we’re certainly a city that likes to enjoy itself.

The arrival of big hitters like Rogan and Byrne, however, are testament to the fact that the city is more discerning and eager to try new things than it ever has been.

All tastes are catered for and the varied nature of the city’s dining scene mean you can have a great fried breakfast at a cafe like Koffee Pot in the morning; a burrito for lunch at Pancho’s in the Arndale food market and a fine-dining dinner across five courses and matched champagnes at The Midland, Aumbry or Nutter’s in the evening.

Be careful though. You might end up abandoning that belt altogether.

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Manchester Voices

Craig Gill Inspiral Carpets drummer and former Hacienda DJ Craig Gill has spent 30 years living and breathing Manchester’s music scene. Since 2005, he’s been drawing on his first-hand experiences running ‘Manchester Music Tours’.

We caught up with Craig to find out more about the tour, the scene and his new venture, ‘Britain Rocks!’

‘The Carpets’ were formed in 1983 and came to prominence during the ‘Madchester’ period. Can you tell us about your memories of that period?

I joined the band in ‘85 aged 14 and a week later we played our first gig at The Boardwalk. It was already clear that there was a great scene emerging - we got to hang out with bands like The Bodines, The Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses who were breaking through in 1988 when The Hacienda unleashed acid house. Manchester became ’Madchester’, the centre of the universe. I was young and loved every minute of it. By 1990 the scene had become so big that like punk before it, it couldn't last and the founders went off to tour the world.

Whilst ‘The Carpets’ never formally split, after the initial burst you went on to DJ at legendary club the Hacienda. How did that come about and what was it like?

I got my first DJ job at a pub in Oldham when I was 16 and had to lie about my age. A few years later I was asked to do a guest slot at a club called Home – and the promoters, surprised at how good I was, asked me back a few times. In 1995, just as the band had initially decided to go their separate ways, The Hacienda asked me to spearhead a new student night called Stone Love. We capitalised on Britpop culture and it was an instant success, regularly pulling in huge crowds and we took it to other clubs like Cream in Liverpool. For me the buzz from DJ’ing replaced the void from the band being inactive, but The Hacienda closed suddenly in ’97 so I went to over to work at The Boardwalk where my DJ partner was Jeff Hordley who now plays Cain Dingle in the TV soap Emmerdale.

Looking back now, what’s your overall take on Manchester’s musical heritage?

When you weigh it all up Manchester’s musical heritage is second to none. We have given the world folk: Ewan Maccoll wrote ‘Dirty Old Town’ about Salford and The Hollies rehearsed at Salford Lads Club.

Pioneering clubs such as The Twisted Wheel became the birthplace of northern soul. The city also had a vibrant punk scene - Tony Wilson caused national outrage by giving The Sex Pistols their TV debut on Granada and that in turn kick-started a new wave of bands such as The Fall, Joy Division and The Smiths. The Hacienda gave rise to the ‘Madchester’ era of The Happy Mondays, and The Stone Roses heavily influenced our former roadie, Noel Gallagher to join Oasis.

Let’s not forget that Simply Red and Take That have also sold millions of records worldwide, and we’re still making history with Elbow being asked to write the theme tune for The London 2012 Olympics.

What can visitors expect when they book a Manchester Music Tour with you?

If you come on one my walking tours, in two hours you’ll get a clearer understanding of how all the major musical events and bands came together. There’s a thread that runs from one band to another, from scene to scene, covering venues from the 19th century to the present day. You’ll also gain a better understanding of Manchester’s natural history and how its industrial landscape influenced and created an environment for the music business to flourish. All peppered with personal tales and anecdotes taken from my experiences working in the industry.

And you run a number of specialist tours too...

As well as the general music walking tour, I also run specialist tours for The Smiths/Morrissey, which includes a tour inside the magnificent Salford Lads Club; Joy Division, which includes a round trip to Ian Curtis’s Macclesfield; Oasis, visiting Sifters record store in Burnage; and The Stone Roses, where you can enjoy a drink in the band's Chorlton local.

‘Britain Rocks!’ is a consortium that brings together the country’s leading music-based tourist attractions and ‘Manchester Music Tours’ are really pleased to be involved.

We’re aiming to promote Britain around the world with fully inclusive music package holidays. The North West is second only to London in terms of revenue brought in by music tourism - The Beatles in Liverpool and Manchester’s cult city status. Combine this with what The Midlands and London has to offer and you’re on to a winner.

Are there any particular bands or artists that we should be watching? Or any venues that are working particularly hard to promote new music?

I love the way the Northern Quarter has become a hub for music - all the old pubs down Oldham Street now have live music, which is what it was like in the mid 19th century. I like the way tourists can walk into Night & Day on any given evening and be treated to at least two good bands. The Deaf Institute is a great venue too. Local artists to watch out for are: Twisted Wheel, The Minx, The Tea Street Band, The Deadbeat Echoes and a singer-songwriter called Danny Mahon who is full of northern wit.

Finally, what would you recommend visitors to Greater Manchester see and do whilst here?

I was born in Salford, and brought up in Oldham so I always considered myself Mancunian. All my recreational time was spent in the city as Manchester seemed more appealing than Oldham. Now I’m older and currently residing in Saddleworth, I really appreciate its rural beauty and village life with all its quaint traditions. But I also love being able to jump on the train to Manchester with all its cultural delights within 30 minutes I can be sat in Shambles/Exchange square having a pint, record shopping in the Northern Quarter or visiting one of city’s great galleries. I feel blessed to have the best of both worlds.

manchestermusictours.com @McrMusicTours | @Britainrocks

With ‘Britain Rocks!’ you’ve partnered with music industry bods to deliver a packaged tour of London, Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham. Can you tell us a bit more about it?

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HOMEward Bound

By Kevin Bourke

Ever since Annie Horniman founded Britain’s first-ever repertory theatre company here in 1908, Manchester has been on the cutting edge of theatre.

In 2015, it will once again be the birthplace of a unique and dynamic new way to experience theatre and the arts, when HOME opens.

Meanwhile the Manchester Opera House has just celebrated its centenary and The Lowry, which changed the face of the Manchester arts scene when it opened just over a decade ago, continues to offer world-class performances on a weekly basis.

Many of the other local theatres are on the verge of change, including Oldham Coliseum, also building a brand-new theatre, and the city’s fringe scene goes from strength to strength.

A night at the Opera House At the opening night of its 2012 pantomime, the Manchester Opera House celebrated its centenary.

David Hasselhoff was giving his Hook that night but since Boxing Day 1912, its boards have been trod by everyone from Sybil Thorndike (The Trojan Women, 1924) and John Gielgud (Hamlet, 1935) to Zach Braff, Victoria Wood and Michael Ball in the last year or so, via Orson Welles, Rex Harrison, Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, Albert Finney and, quite literally, thousands more.

Manchester International Festival, the only festival in the world entirely devoted to original work, has just unveiled a lineup for 2013 that includes Kenneth Branagh’s Macbeth.

Zach Braff ’s All New People in February 2012, like the groundbreaking Ghost The Musical and Dolly Parton’s 9 to 5 – The Musical was part of a significant new development by its owner/operator ATG, called Manchester Gets It First!

Why is Manchester such a vibrant place for theatre? We talk to some of the major players to try to find out…

It’s both a clear and confident signpost to the future and an acknowledgement of Manchester’s glorious past, when the likes of

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Ivor Novello or Noel Coward would routinely try out shows here before taking them elsewhere. In 1958, for instance, West Side Story brought the house down with its European Premiere at the much-loved venue.

“Manchester is a great place to launch new productions because of its heritage,” enthuses ATG’s Howard Panter. “New musicals and plays need to have a place where the author and creative team can work with a knowledgeable, sophisticated audience. If you can make it work in Manchester, it will work anywhere.”

His company also operates the equallyhistoric Palace Theatre just down the road, which now tends to be the home of blockbuster musicals like The Lion King, which has just finished a record-breaking, award-winning run there.

In fact, Manchester and its surrounding areas, including Salford, Bolton and Oldham boast more theatres than anywhere outside London.

“That makes Manchester an incredibly exciting place because there really is a theatrical ecology here, a balance and a healthy competition between the many theatres,” points outs the Royal Exchange’s executive director, Fiona Gasper, formerly a prime mover in the rebirth of developmentoriented Contact Theatre, along the Oxford Road corridor.

“It’s great for theatre audiences that there’s not just one place they can go to, so they can have more exposure to different types of work. It’s a real ‘virtuous circle’ with the audience and arts organisations, who constantly have to up their game and prove themselves because the audiences can be choosy. As the critical mass gets bigger, the more that happens really.

“I remember when I went to the Contact, there was a huge change in the ecology about to take place because The Lowry was about to open, the Royal Exchange was about to open their Studio, Contact was reopening and there was a real shuffling before it all settled down. But the result was that the audience grew across the board.

“So what’s about to happen at HOME could be incredibly significant.”

Fresh air Following the retirement of founding artistic director, Braham Murray, the Royal Exchange is relishing its own period of “opening the doors and windows and letting the fresh air of new energies and new artistic voices blow through the building”, as artistic director, Sarah Frankcom, puts it.

“Braham’s was an extraordinary achievement and his legacy is massive. But theatre has changed and the landscape is totally different now. This, she believes, “is the time to be bold, to increase our commitment to creating new, original work.

For every classical play that we revive, we have to make an investment in a future project with a new artist or a new writer or a new commission.

Image facing page: The Royal Exchange Theatre Images this page: Top The Lion King; below David Hasselhoff in Peter Pan at the Opera House

This year’s tenth 24:7 Festival (from 19-26 July), for instance, will boast nearly 20 brand-new works in one enormously exciting week.

“In terms of reshaping what this theatre needs to be for the 21st century, for its audiences and for Manchester, there’s nothing more thrilling than seeing new energies and new artists respond to the unique proposition of a unique space like ours.

“We can never be like the (Manchester International) Festival because we’re running 48 weeks a year and we have to appeal to a broader range of audiences in order to keep people coming in all that time,” acknowledges Fiona. “But our audience, who may have been coming to the Royal Exchange for long time, constantly surprise me with how open they are to different and new work.

“What I love about what Sarah says is that, for a long time, what this theatre has been about - and has done very, very well at times - has been the creative imaginations of a few people. It’s now about working with a larger spectrum of artistic minds, and I feel really confident that we can take our place alongside all the other world-class, exciting, relevant and significant work that’s taking place in this city.” The development of the independent sector, the small-scale and the fringe has been hugely important in that growth, everyone agrees.

As executive producer, David Slack, says “it’s a unique opportunity for writers to selfproduce their work imaginatively and effectively in non-theatre spaces. Firmly established nationally as a key opportunity for new playwrights to be heard, the Festival has also become invaluable career development for many theatre artists in the region.”

A feeling of community “For all of us it’s about moving forward,” says Bolton Octagon’s Roddy Gauld, who points out that it’s not “simply about the production but about the whole experience for the audience. I’m proud of how proud Bolton is of its theatre, which people literally paid for brick by brick. Artistically, they’ll take a chance because they feel we’re a part of the community.”

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Images: Top The Bolton Octagon; below HOME

There’s equally fervent support in the community for Oldham Coliseum, which, like Bolton and the Royal Exchange, recently received some Arts Council England funding in recognition of its local significance. The local council there is flying in the face of a prevailing atmosphere of cuts in the arts to support an ambitious scheme to build a new theatre.

“They understand that the work we recently did on the theatre had to be done simply so that we could continue to operate in our old building for another ten years or so,” says David Martin. “But they also know that a new theatre for us, alongside a new Oldham Heritage Centre, not only makes it much easier for us to produce great art and entertainment but puts the arts right at the centre of an alternative night-time economy for this community.”

Changing the game at HOME But for the moment, most eyes are on the exciting plans for a game-changing new centre for contemporary art, theatre, film and books called HOME. Combining the legacy of Cornerhouse, itself a hugely significant development in the arts when it opened three decades ago, and the historic Library Theatre Company, to create something entirely new, it will open in spring 2014.

Artistic director, Walter Meierjohann, currently an associate artist at London’s Young Vic where he has established an outstanding international reputation, will lead development of the new theatre programme.

“New things can only happen if you create the infrastructure for it, which Manchester is willing to do. I’m really excited that everything is going to be new in this new building so everyone will be starting from scratch,” he says. “Yet at the same time, you have these two well-loved Manchester institutions to build from to create something that’s brand-new, a cross artfusion across three different art forms.

“We want to speak to Manchester audiences, and we especially want to get a younger audience into the theatre. Cinema does have a certain ‘cool’ factor and my work is very visual, so you have something there already.

But we also want to collaborate with international groups, as I’ve done somewhat with the Young Vic. We want HOME to be a home for people from abroad as well.”

Once HOME opens, Walter projects “Six or seven theatre productions a year and I’d hope to direct at least two, maybe three.

There are some site-specific projects I think could be fantastic too. But it shouldn’t just be my handwriting; the audience should be constantly surprised.”

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If Walter is the new kid on the block, HOME is a project that executive director, Dave Moutrey, has lovingly nursed for several years.

“This is something that simply doesn’t exist anywhere else,’ he points out. “Somewhere where there’s equality across the art forms, without one or the other being superior. It will provide opportunities to produce work, including micro-budget films, and it’s also a new place for engaging audiences. It’s going to be a challenge, of course, but it we get the work right it will be something that’s of Manchester but international.

“Every so often, the tectonic plates shift, internationally and regionally, and HOME feels that exciting.”

What’s on: Music & Theatre Too Clever By Half

Wicked

Ray Mears Tour 2013

Royal Exchange 10 July – 17 August

Palace Theatre 12 September – 16 November

Bridgewater Hall 10 October

Too Clever By Half is a biting satire about Gloumov, a young scoundrel who is out to climb to the top of bourgeois society, regardless of what it takes to rise through the ranks and who he steps on to get there.

Backstabbing, greed, blind ambition and some wonderfully odd characters combine with Told by an Idiot’s bold energy to create a truly theatrical, heartfelt and touching piece that is as provocative and pertinent as it was in 1868. royalexchange.co.uk | @rxtheatre

Global musical phenomenon Wicked flies into Manchester this September. Brilliantly re-imagining the stories and characters created by L. Frank Baum in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Wicked tells the remarkable untold story of an unlikely but profound friendship between two girls who first meet as sorcery students: the blonde and very popular Glinda and a misunderstood green girl, Elphaba. atgtickets.com | @PalaceAndOpera

Ray Mears is taking to the road again in Autumn 2013, celebrating his 50th year on this planet. This will be a fascinating, compelling and entertaining evening with Ray Mears who is recognised worldwide as an authority on bushcraft and survival.

Don’t miss this compelling theatre show in which he shares stories from over thirty years surviving the wilderness and its colourful wildlife. bridgewater-hall.co.uk | @BridgewaterHall

Peter Pan – The Never-ending Story Manchester Arena 16 – 18 August Featuring an international cast of acrobats, dancers, stuntmen and magicians, Peter Pan, The Never Ending Story is a magical experience that moves live entertainment into a new dimension. Theatre… with added fairy dust! The show features an original score and hit songs including Angels, Forever Young, Sailing and Nessun Dorma. mcr-arena.com | @ManchesterArena

Wanted! Robin Hood The Lowry Theatre 29 November – 11 January 2014 Wanted! Robin Hood brings the well-loved, legendary characters of Robin and his Merry Men to life in a magical, fun-filled adventure story with music. With brave heroes, daredevil kidnappings, a cruel Sherriff of Nottingham and a very feisty Marian, it promises to be a thrilling show for everyone aged six and above. thelowry.com | @TheLowry

Aladdin Opera House Manchester 7 December – 5 January 2014 Don’t miss Manchester Opera House’s spectacular journey to the mystical world of the Far East this December – as characters such as Princess Jasmine, Widow Twanky and The Genie join young hero Aladdin onstage. Manchester Opera House we will be making all your Christmas wishes come. atgtickets.com | @PalaceAndOpera

West Side Story Palace Theatre 10 December 2013 – 4 January 2014 As part of its national tour, West Side Story comes to the Palace Theatre, after its sell out world tour across the likes of Tokyo, Madrid, Sydney and Paris. Set on Manhattan’s Upper West Side and exploring racially aggravated gang rivalry, West Side Story changed musical theatre since first opening in 1957 and its film version (1961) has won ten Academy Awards. The score includes the unforgettable songs ‘Maria’, ‘Tonight’, ‘Somewhere’, ‘America’ and ‘I Feel Pretty’. atgtickets.com | @PalaceAndOpera

© Brinkhoff Mögenburg

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SnapShot The Opera House Anis Khan is the stage manager at the Opera House. The Quay Street theatre opened to the public on Boxing Day 1912 and played host to the 1958 European premier of West Side Story and the world premier of Ghost: The Musical in 2011. atgtickets.com/venues/ opera-house-manchester

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Manchester Voices

Dianne Bourne Dianne Bourne has been Diary Editor of the Manchester Evening News for the past seven years, covering all the showbiz events, celebrity interviews and general gossip on Manchester's hectic social scene. Dianne, 35, has lived in the North West all her life, but also loves to travel across the world on showbiz missions for the M.E.N. Running the showbiz page (The Diary) for the MEN newspaper must be fun, albeit tiring, work. With two of the world’s biggest football clubs, the BBC’s presence and its infamous music scene, it must be rather exhausting work…

There's certainly never a dull moment in this job! It's far from your usual 9 to 5, as Manchester has a habit of being a city that never sleeps.

Barely a week goes by without a new bar or restaurant launching in the city centre, the opening night or premiere of a new production at one of Manchester's wealth of theatres or a black tie charity event attended by the rich and famous of the region.

It's my job to try and cover them all and chat to as many of the fabulous glitterati as I can.

What is your most memorable experience in the city in the time you have spent as Manchester’s #1 showbiz reporter?

There have been so many fantastic events here, including four Manchester International Festivals, which have helped to focus the eyes of the world on our city.

Then last year we had the incredible comeback of indie band The Stone Roses – a reunion that many people felt would never happen.

at the Manchester Arena, and also to film at the many different film studios at the huge new Media City complex at Salford Quays.

The Mancunian band returned for a triumphant weekend of gigs at Heaton Park, with 70,000 fans each night creating an incredible festival atmosphere across the city.

The UK version of talent show The Voice has just filmed at MediaCityUK, where the judges included international music stars Will.I.Am, Jessie J, Sir Tom Jones and Danny O'Donoghue, frontman of The Script.

Whether it is for business or for pleasure, high profile visitors to Manchester are always keen to step out into the town.

When you are out and about, where do you find are the most common places to catch a famous face in the city?

Everyone knows about the two big Italian restaurant rivals in Manchester – to be found at opposite ends of the swanky King Street.

At the top of the street is Rosso – a restaurant co-owned by Manchester United footballer Rio Ferdinand and often frequented by his Reds teammates (well, Rosso is, of course, translated from the Italian for red!) as well as stars from Coronation Street.

Walk to the bottom of King Street, to King Street West and you'll find San Carlo, known as the biggest celeb-haunt restaurant in the city centre, where premier league footballers can be found tucking into pasta – Man City's former star Mario Balotelli famously used to even drive up for take-away meals from the venue!

David Beckham was spotted there on his last visit, while visiting Hollywood stars including Chloe Sevigny and Nicole Scherzinger have dined there.

The more alternative celebrities, like Manc rockers and musicians, can often be found in the city's boho Northern Quarter, with the Castle Hotel popular among Manc musicians like Elbow, Everything Everything and I Am Kloot.

But probably the most memorable occasions for me have been the big comeback concerts of two of Manchester's most famous music bands of recent times.

Many believe that Manchester’s celeb circuit is simply made up of footballers and soap stars. What other avenues do some of the city’s top names come from that our readers might not have realised?

First up in 2004 was the return of boyband Take That, who of course had been formed in Manchester back in the early 1990s.

Don't forget we get many of the biggest stars in the world heading to Manchester for gigs

They certainly made the most of their stay in the city. Will.I.Am told me he enjoyed a night out at the Tiki “dive” bar The Liars Club on Bridge Street, Jessie J went on a shopping spree at Harvey Nichols for her quirky designer clothes for the show, while Sir Tom Jones could be found giving an impromptu sing-song to delighted, and rather surprised guests at the Opus Restaurant in the Radisson Blu Edwardian!

For any visitors looking to experience the red carpet lifestyle, how could they live like a star for a day in Manchester?

Well, they'd need to choose between one of our two five-star hotels, The Lowry Hotel or the Radisson Blu Edwardian, to check-into for a start. Both are regular celeb hotspots for both our footballers and visiting A-listers who might be performing at the Arena, or filming at MediaCityUK. Take in afternoon tea at Manchester's loftiest bar – Cloud 23 at the Hilton on Deansgate – where you can see panoramic views across the city centre and beyond.

Then you'd probably want to do some designer shopping – Harvey Nichols and Selfridges are right next door to each other on Exchange Square, and celebs will regularly be spied snapping up expensive goodies on their swish floors.

If you want to party into the night, head to Panacea for cocktails on John Dalton Street, and if you still have the energy, you could try to gain entry to private members bar The Circle Club just off Deansgate.

If it's a very late night, party on like Will.I.Am at The Liars Club on Bridge Street, where a Zombie is the most famous choice of cocktail.

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Š Ian Brooke

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a different kind of drama: LGBt art in Manchester Manchester looks set to continue to build upon its reputation as one of the most exciting places to experience LGBT arts and culture. Adam Lowe investigates.

A Queer Hub Manchester boasts the UK's second largest lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans community after London. You might think LGBT Manchester is all rainbow flags and cobbled streets. Mostly people think of Queer as Folk and The Big Weekend party machine. But Manchester stands out as one of the best places for LGBT arts in the country.

Manchester has always been a hub of creativity, and with a clearly fabulous gay scene, it's natural that the city's LGBT denizens should contribute to that in vibrant and exciting ways. Local venues are very supportive of the city's LGBT population and you can find plays in pub back rooms, prog-rock in cafés and fiery scribes reciting verse in hotels.

In the Gay Village itself, Taurus has long been respected for supporting the arts, with a range of events taking place downstairs.

Taurus' owners also run the canal-st.co.uk website, which serves as a listings, news and opinions portal for the Gay Village. (Thrifty readers will also note its offers and occasional competitions too.)

Sackville Gardens, just on the edge of the village, makes for an occasional but picturesque setting for arts events—for instance, during LGBT History Month, when the writers of Young Enigma held a poetry picnic for families and the community.

Beyond these irregular events, however, it makes for a peaceful writing retreat any time of the year.

The 2012 Cultural Olympiad festival has perhaps kickstarted a whole new range of arts and cultural activities in the city. And there are always local artists and community groups itching to set up their own salons,

open mic events and pop-up arts activities.

It's perhaps no coincidence that the Arts Council's assessments centre (the place where applications for funding are processed) is based here. Manchester looks set, therefore, to continue to build upon its reputation as one of the most exciting places to experience LGBT creativity.

Pride and the Fringe Let's start with the big guns. Manchester Pride, though often associated primarily with its sprawling long weekend party, also supports a growing arts and culture festival in the city. Pride runs for ten days, with only the last three taking place inside the barriers of The Big Weekend.

In 2012, the Arts Council gave Pride Fringe a boost, by supporting them with funding for the first time. In total the Fringe included over forty events. Highlights included a smorgasbord of events celebrating the legacy of Alan Turing in biology and computing, and the politics of sexuality in science. Pride also partnered with the Arts Council for its annual series of Chamber Music Concerts, which featured the work of gay composer Britten, besides Tchaikovsky, Schubert and Somervell, as well as Composer-inAssociation, Marc Yeats.

Performance events included wordsmiths battling it out at Poet Brownie's Poetry Slam.

There was a stunning exhibition called Boys, Boys, Boys by Ian Brooke, and work by Jez Dolan and Rob Flood that took the funeral floral tribute and subverted it to explore the use of pejorative language used against the LGBT community. Margarita Pracatan's Stranger in the Night, thirty short plays (Two-Minute Queers), and Loitering with Intention were just some of the wonderful shows onstage in the run-up to the Big

Weekend in 2012. Check manchesterpride.com for up to date listings as they're announced.

Theatre and Performance Contact Theatre opens its doors for a full week every LGBT History Month for Queer Contact. Past productions have included the fantastic Unhappy Birthday with plus-sized queer heroine Amy Lamé; Dominic Berry's exploration of mental health in Wizard; and 2013's transatlantic voguing battle, House of Contact. Each year poets also take to the stage in the spoken word extravaganza Outspoken.

One of the regular LGBT events at Contact is Mother's Ruin. Supported by the Cake Tin Foundation, Mother's Ruin is a vivacious variety show and community event, offering programmes such as stand-up, performance, music, puppetry, sing-alongs, and lots and lots of dressing up.

Three Minute Theatre is an intimate and very gay-friendly theatre in Affleck's Palace, in the city's Northern Quarter. 3MT (as it is casually known) has hosted work by LGBT poet Dominic Berry, Vertigo Theatre Productions and VADA Theatre.

Never ones to be outdone, Manchester's indie theatre companies (Vertigo Theatre Productions, Dream Avenue Productions and Pink Triangle Theatre) collaborated for the first Queer as Fringe festival in March 2012 at Three Minute Theatre. Queer as Fringe returned in April 2013 with the ambitious aim of presenting eight short plays over four evenings. Past writers have included Lloyd Eyre Morgan, Craig Hepworth, Paul Burgees, Adele Stanhope, Joe Gosling and Stuart Crowther.

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Pout on Tour

Playwright, author of Gimme Gimme Gimme and scriptwriter for Coronation Street Jonathan Harvey has a long relationship with Manchester's Royal Exchange Theatre. His critically-acclaimed play Beautiful Thing (which became the film of the same name) has been staged there a number of times, as well as his more recent work.

Alternative Manchester is also known for its cutting-edge performance and live art scene. The loose, ever-glamorous collective known as the House of Tranarchy are guilty of many things. Being fabulous, subversive and fun are just three of the things that spring to mind first. You can often find their members at Mother's Ruin, or at club night Bollox. One of the highlights of Pride 2012 was when Tranarchy 'invaded' Canal Street on a boat— bypassing the barriers altogether and staging their own song and dance routine as they floated past the revellers.

The House of Tranarchy is also responsible for Zombie Pride: the Halloween, alt-queer spectacular, which last year featured a 'Darkroom of Horrors' and a chilling performance of The Cranberry's 'Zombie'.

Punters dress up in their most grotesque, unusual and flamboyant outfits, and make carnage with fake blood and mannequins on the dancefloor. More information can be found at tranarchy.co.uk.

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Film The Cornerhouse is known as a hub for independent film and visual arts in Manchester. Located on Oxford Road, it showcases new, indie and mainstream films; hosts a cool but smart bookshop, with a very local edge; and is known for supporting the LGBT community.

POUT, launched in 2008, is a touring sister festival to the BFI London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival. Peccadillo Pictures, a UK distributor, stepped in when the LLGFF had its funding cut. Cornerhouse hosts a selection of new LGBT-themed films each summer as part of this festival. Last year lauded films such as Romeos, Circumstance and North Sea Texas were just part of the exciting line-up.

Literature From Lemn Sissay to Gerry Potter, Manchester has a huge literature scene.

Carol Ann Duffy teaches at Manchester Metropolitan University and Jeanette Winterson is writing fellow at the University of Manchester. Duffy runs the popular Poets and Players series, pairing writers with musicians for an evening of high-brow entertainment that often sees LGBT poets taking the stage alongside the poet laureate.

Jackie Kay is also a resident of the city who has been involved in Manchester Literature Festival and Manchester Pride.

Manchester is a city where poetry finds you unexpectedly. Lemn Sissay's poetry can be discovered at Piccadilly Gardens and elsewhere in the city. Meanwhile, a quick trip to the toilets in New York New York will reveal a plaque above the urinals featuring Gerry Potter's poem 'Faith is a Toilet'.

Literature North West acts as a literary hub for Manchester and the North West. At their website you can find details of upcoming spoken word events, competitions, readings and performances. Manchester's most beloved LGBT poets include Gerry Potter, Dominic Berry, Jackie Hagan and Rosie Garland. Most of whom you'll find engaged in running or appearing at the plethora of literary events taking place almost daily in the city.

Flapjack Press, Comma Press, Dog Horn Publishing and Carcanet are just four of the publishers with offices in Manchester.

Between them they organise performances, book launches and competitions of occasional relevance to the LGBT community.

OpenMind is one such literary event, run by LGBT poet Ushiku Crisafulli, and working to support mental ill health as well as promoting poetry and spoken word.

organises public heritage tours of the city, which incorporate key places and people through time, such as the Village and Alan Turing. More information is available at outinthepast.org.uk.

Museums Heritage organisations in the city also have an excellent track record of supporting LGBT arts and culture. The Museum of Science and Industry sports its own LGBT exhibit and an exhibit on queer pioneer Alan Turing. The basement archive features recorded oral testimonies from key local faces on the gay scene, including poet and musician Rosie Garland (AKA Rosie Lugosi). Their map of LGBT stories is touching, revealing and heartening, showing, as it does, the everyday spaces that resonate with local LGBT people because of love, loss and community. Their website also features a radio play, produced

by Gaydio, exploring Alan Turing and life with HIV, penned by local writer Okey Nzelu.

For an alternative take on the city tour, LGBT History Month Writer in Residence Andrew McMillan has recorded a downloadable app that takes you on a poetic but subversive romp through Manchester's hidden gay world. Based on the work of Thom Gunn and named 'Progress', the app allows users to follow a map of Andrew's movements and listen to recordings of the poems that correspond to each location upon arrival.

Andrew is a member of local LGBT writing troupe Young Enigma. You can download the app from youngenigma.com/progress.

What's more, the exhibition is also familyfriendly, with a doll house featuring dolls from a range of ethnicities and various genders, to promote the contemporary family unit as diverse and all-encompassing.

Visit mosi.org.uk for more information.

More Information Manchester has some great listings magazines and websites. For a truly LGBT perspective, check out canal-st.co.uk or visitmanchester.com/lgbt. Also check out creativetourist.com for other cultural activities taking place in the city.

Cultural and Heritage Tours Funded by Manchester Pride and The National Lottery's Big Lottery Fund, Out in the Past is an online resource and timeline of LGBT Manchester. Out in the Past also

Pout on Tour

Pout on Tour

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What’s on: LGBT Manchester Pride Big Weekend

Pride Games

Gay village, city centre 23 – 26 August, 2013

Various Greater Manchester venues 1 – 2 June and 8-9 June 2013

The popular, flamboyant parade through the city centre and the HIV vigil, both free to attend, will continue as part of the Big Weekend with the majority of the festival’s entertainment taking place as part of a paidfor event in the Village. Once inside, wristband holders are promised new undercover areas and more space in the outdoor main stage arena with fundraising activities playing a much more prominent role throughout the weekend. The parade will take place on Saturday 24 August, and the HIV vigil will take place on Monday 26 August. manchesterpride.com | @ManchesterPride

Pride Games is an annual international multi sports festival for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their friends. Held at various sporting sites in Manchester, it’s the perfect opportunity to try a new sport, re-awaken old talents or brush up on current skills…have loads of fun and meet new people.

Sports will include: women's basketball, squash, rugby league, badminton, softball and athletics. pridesport.org.uk/pride-games-2013 @LouEngland

Sparkle Manchester Pride Fringe Various Throughout August 2013 The popular Manchester Pride Fringe, which has taken place in the week prior to the Big Weekend, will eventually move in 2014 to become a summer arts festival staged around the city centre in addition to showcasing the best in LGBT arts and theatre talent. In 2013, the Fringe will be extended to run for two weeks prior to the Big Weekend so that people have more chance to enjoy it.

Gay village 12 – 14 July 2013 Sparkle - The National Transgender Celebration – is back for 2013, for a weekend festival celebrating all forms of transgender, culminating in Sparkle in the Park with live music and stalls. Now attracting visitors worldwide, Sparkle is an important part of the LGBT calendar in Manchester and is open to all! sparkle.org.uk | @SparkleWeekend

World AIDS Day Also planned for 2013 is a new Manchester Pride Community Festival, a free to enter event in the Village which will take place in early Summer and bring together all of Manchester Pride’s charity partners to showcase their work and raise additional funds. manchesterpride.com | @ManchesterPride

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Worldwide December 2013 Taking place each year on 1 December, World AIDS Day gives people across the globe to come together to come together in supporting those living with HIV, help battle the prejudice against them and raise money for HIV/AIDS groups. Each year Manchester is a part of World AIDS Day in numerous ways. worldaidsday.org | @NAT_AIDS_Trust

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Manchester Voices

Ian Carmichael Ian Carmichael is vice principal of SSR Manchester, an audio school with outlets in London, Jakarta and Singapore. Here, we catch up with Ian about the school’s involvement with Indonesian Idol, his personal experiences of live music in Manchester and get a history lesson on some of the musical legends that have passed through its doors.

What is your personal affinity with Manchester?

Quarter, before moving here to Downing Street in 2006.

I first came to Manchester as part of a band, whilst touring and visiting the city a few times. It wasn’t until 1997, though, when I came here for Mardi Gras weekend, that I came to know the city better.

The school has fourteen studios, three computer suites, DJ booths and a live venue. Students range in age from 16-18 on our BTEC courses, to adults on our academic and industry courses, and our degree programmes. We occasionally also offer summer schools for a slightly younger age group.

Originally, I was meant to stay for two days, getting back to Glasgow on Monday, but I ended up here until Wednesday or Thursday. Within six months, I’d put my apartment there on the market and had moved to Manchester to live. I’ve now been here for 16 years.

Tell us a little bit about the school…

SSR started in 1984 as the UK’s first audio school, originally based in the Northern

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We hear there is an interesting musical history to the school…

Back on Tariff Street in the Northern Quarter, before SSR was a school, it was actually a private studio named Spirit Studios, where bands including The Smiths, Happy Mondays, Stone Roses and Simply Red came to record. We have a photo here

somewhere of the owner of the company with Bill Wyman from The Rolling Stones…

I’m not sure what it was he was doing here, but he was here!

Today, as a school, we do still get bands coming in to record. Recently we had Delphic and also American group, Whetus.

What is great now is that, as a school, the students can record with these groups and use it as a fantastic ‘real’ learning experience.

Manchester is known for its thriving music scene. Where are some of your favourite spots to watch live acts?

I really like the smaller venues for music in Manchester. Academy 3 is a great larger venue, but places like Soup Kitchen, Deaf Institute and Trof are some of my personal favourites.

Recently I went to see a band named Stubborn Hearts in Fallowfield and, when I turned around at one point, saw one of my students was doing the sound. This happens so often these days – being at a gig and recognising a sound engineer as an SSR student – and is one of my favourite things about the more grass-roots live music venues in Manchester.

SSR now has campuses globally, from London and Singapore to Jakarta. What is it about the schools that makes them so special?

A really important part of the SSR brand, and an ethos throughout the schools, is that our tutors are all industry active. Having the students being taught by individuals who are currently working in the industry ensures everything they learn is relevant and current, which is integral.

Although sometimes it can cause schedule conflict, it really does make teaching special.

A tutor from SSR Manchester is currently working on music for a film in LA and, although it means he’s been away, he’ll be back in two weeks time to teach the students directly about his experience, which is a great connection for them.

Tell us a little bit about the school’s involvement with Indonesian Idol and how that kind of exposure will help SSR…

A staff member at SSR Jakarta actually contacted Indonesian Idol to see if the two could work together and the show made use of the school and studio, hosting the audition process there.

Indonesian Idol’s ‘winner’s prize’ was to record a single with SSR Manchester.

The runner-up of the competition had said that, when she realised the winner would be coming to Manchester, it made her want to work even harder to win, which is a real testament to the city’s reputation and musical heritage. In the end, both her and the winner came to the city and loved it, making a dash for Manchester United the moment they arrived at the crack of dawn.

Having that global reputation is great for Manchester, and therefore it is fantastic for SSR to have its headquarters based here.

What else has SSR got lined up for the future?

At the moment, the brand is happy with the way it has and is expanding. Being able to grow and develop schools internationally encourages us that what we are doing with the school is right and has a strong reputation.

engineering we could look at the gaming industry, animation, and things like that. It’s important to know the ways in which the industry is moving and, whilst being a sound engineer was a compact job ten years ago, you need more strings to your bow today, and expanding course offers would respond to this.

How do your partnerships (including Yamaha, the Royal Exchange, BBC and MUTV) help benefit SSR students?

The partnerships really help SSR deliver the courses in the way we need to. With Key 103 for example, our affiliation with them means students can actually go into the building and learn in a hands-on, real environment. It means, too, that those from the industry will come to us and teach the students.

Our live venue was really built by MAMA acoustics and other partners, who gave us equipment, saying “this is what we’ll be using in five years – we need your students to be able to use this equipment”. It is fantastic for the school but, equally, is mutually very beneficial.

One thing we might look at is extending the course options at the school; as well as audio

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SnapShot Dunham Massey Sarah Witts is the assistant head gardener at Dunham Massey - a 300 acre estate managed by the National Trust in Altrincham, Traord. The house and a 17th century mill on the estate are open until November. The garden and surrounding park are open throughout the year. nationaltrust.org.uk/dunhammassey

On the town

By Phil Griffin

Old Father Time, red-coated soldier and jolly jack tar, chiming the quarters on Winter’s the jewellers clock, high above their shop on Little Underbank, Stockport. The long climb up the cobbled hill to the market full of noise. My Friday life as a five year old.

We came from out of town on the 92 bus, me and my mum.

First, from Levenshulme. Later in her life – the best part of a century later – I’d drive her to meet her friend Marjorie from Marple, and they’d amble through Mersey Way for meat and potato pie in the market, until they could no longer manage the hill. In my life, Stockport was exotic long before Manchester city centre revealed its charms. Exotic, because it was different.

In towns and cities, difference is a rare commodity these days. World War II, the booms and busts of the 20th century and globalisation made town centres more interchangeable, less distinctive. From the 1950’s telly made us all look alike. Which boy or girl bucks the trend and will not turn out in the latest fashion; Nike, Topshop, H&M or Primark? Amongst the boys and girls least likely to squander their money on high street brands are the ones who throw themselves into Stockport’s Teenage Market. This is a firebrand initiative by bothers Joe and Tom Barratt and friends, of whom there are swelling legions, fed by social media, frankly inspired by a strong sense of creative individuality. (Watch their Teenage Market TV Episode 1 here: www.theteenagemarket.co.uk/ ) Sixteen year old Lucy Shaw paints delicate fantastical portraits which she sells on her market stall. Jessie Rose from Heaton Moor has a muscular voice and plays guitar like Sister Rosetta Tharpe. In the Teenage Market video she steps confidently through that Stockport-made, thirty year old paean to teenage romance, Love Will Tear Us Apart.

Both these young women can clearly run up hills. This is Stockport now. Some of the most historic and attractive streetscapes anywhere in Britain, populated by some of the brightest young people.

Lower, Middle and Higher Hillgate – the continuation of Little Underbank – is one continuous street, the town’s main drag until Wellington Road (A6) skipped west of the

centre in 1820. Stockport Station hopped further west still in the early 1840’s, and anchors the sensational 27 arch railway viaduct, eleven million bricks worth of wonder, stepping nimbly over mills and a classic pub (The Crown). Urban myth has it that railway operators were granted permission to cross it on condition they all stopped at Stockport Station. Myth as may be, most of them do. And a great many linked-in business folk from south Manchester and Cheshire kick their heels early morning on Platform 2, awaiting the London train. Most are back by late evening, to pick up their cars and head home. That’s as much of Stockport as many of them see. This needs to change.

Head inland. Stockport’s headstrong mix of fierce localism and determination is colourfully presented on the margin of Mersey Square. The Plaza Cinema, completed in 1933, is a Super-Cinema, which means it has a projection box, proscenium arch, fly-tower, orchestra pit and rising-lift organ. Picture Palace and theatre in one.

Underused and under threat, its loyal supporters formed a trust, acquired it in 2000, and have done it up. They love their gold leaf, rainbow relief, stucco and concealed lighting, and indeed they programme noir classics and musicals of the thirties and forties in great style. But they are not wading ankle-deep in aspic. They also run the latest digital and live projection. Puccini live from New York Met and the latest from the National Theatre on London’s south bank, live, to the south bank of the Mersey.

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up to Market Place by whichever narrow, sculpted route you choose. I’m one for Mealhouse Brow, which runs up to a medieval two-storey meetinghouse and lockup cells for the court leet. At the top of the Brow look back along the shops towards St Mary’s church. Seven shops, in fact, in front of eighteen apartments and two enclosed courtyards. This is a new build development from 2006, by Stockport architectsTADW for Northern Counties Housing Association. It is a textbook example of how good design can integrate with a sensitive streetscape.

Lunch in the high first floor Plaza café is a Stockport special. The rarebit is a bubbling concoction of Cheshire cheese and generous splash of Robinson’s ale. Tables are glass topped, chairs are genuine Lloyd loom and the nippies are in crisp white and working black. Across town, a short’ish walk to Hillgate and a new old lunchtime rival.

Frederick Robinson’s sons and heirs have been Stockport brewers for 175 years. Their Unicorn brewery put its entrance on the street in 1913 and the rest of the brewer’s chemistry set is housed in a labyrinth from the late 1920’s. The great thing about industrial buildings is that the best of them mould and morph according to requirements. The latest Unicorn addition is the new Brewery Visitors Centre.

This well thought out set-up is more than a merchandising opportunity. Meet the shire horses, Regent and Royale, see the dray, mash tubs and casks, study the Robinson family tree, learn something of the brewer’s alchemy, and cross the top-lit oak floored foyer to the bar dining area. This brand new space is beautifully fitted and furnished in covetable contemporary Swedish design.

It lacks a window, let alone a terrace, but the graceful interior is enough to guarantee satisfaction. Robinson’s will train staff here, in catering and cellar work, and the whole operation speaks volubly of the old brewers new tricks. TV chef Simon Rimmer is helping Robinsons refine specialist bottled ales for meat, poultry and fish dishes. The operation opens in late March 2013 and promises to be a popular symbol of Stockport’s town centre revival.

In celebration, you can raise a glass of Unicorn, Dizzy Blonde or Build a Rocket Boys (the charity beer Robinson’s brews in collaboration with Mercury prize winning band Elbow), in the Arden Arms on Corporation Street, below the Market Place.

In a town renowned for its pubs, too many of which are closed or in decline, the Arden shows that great management, a good kitchen, traditional values and high standards are more than enough to buck the trend. If there’s a better pub in the northwest, I haven’t found it.

I don’t know whether you were allowed to take bottles of Old Tom Ale into the Stockport Air Raid Shelters, the unique tunnels cut deep into the sandstone raft that juts out onto Churchgate. Whether you could or not, I’d guess six thousand Stopfordians souls were grateful for the rocky roof over their heads when the sirens wailed. And I bet they all came in wearing hats. Stockport, Reddish, Denton and Failsworth put hats on the world in the days before we all got in our cars. Hatters, felters, blockers and finishers for Christy’s, Brachers or Failsworth Hats.

There’s some great film archive in The Hat Museum, but you’ll need a torch if you want to view the historic collection. I can understand that precious old fabrics need conserving, but I’ve never been in darker, more forbidding gallery spaces.

Market Place is a plateau on the brow of which is St Mary’s church. What makes this place so special is the integrity of the withholding buildings. On the North East side, Staircase House, which houses the Stockport Information Centre, is the oldest.

Some remaining bits date from the 15th century. Essentially, it’s a mash-up of buildings across half a millennium and it is frankly astonishing that it exists as a single useable structure in the present day. Go and find the tiny internal courtyard and wonder at the glorious mess of buildings you are in the middle of. The indoor Produce Market is the older of the market buildings. It has a grand, tall, three-part entrance and is a joy to move around. The food hall has been joined, upstairs, by a vintage market. Look out for leather luggage and ‘seventies hi-fi systems, in amongst the ‘fifties frocks and three-piece suits.

Stockport Market Hall is small, and has lost a couple of bays over time. Notwithstanding, it is the best market hall in the country. The glass and ironwork, lattice framed roof, internal volume and external order make it a pleasure from every aspect. Rarely does a building of any age or type, both command and serve its surroundings in the way that this modest, robust, fit and fitting building does here. And here are the people, and here is what markets do. They exist to serve time and withstand the knocks. Whatever else you may see and do in Stockport, behold this market place. It has real and rare quality, and a new generation is coming through that appreciates it and will make it their own.

On your way to the market, take a look inside the NatWest bank on Great Underbank, the sixteenth century town house of the Ardene family of Arden Hall.

Prepare yourself, it is quite a surprise. And

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What’s on: Greater Manchester Art from Nature – Paintings by Mark Lightowler Bolton Museum, Bolton 27 April - 21 July Mark Lightowler is a well know local artist and butterfly expert, who works at Animal World, Moss Bank Park in Bolton. Over the years, he has produced many works of art based on specimens from Bolton Museum’s collection. This exhibition shows a selection of his work and the techniques he uses. boltonmuseums.org.uk | @boltonmuseums

Unlocking Lock & Co – A fine reputation. The story of the world’s oldest hat shop Hat Works, Stockport 21 July - 2 March 2014 Unlock the story of the world’s oldest hat shop in this wonderful new exhibition.

Established in 1676, James Lock & Co. Ltd. is the oldest hat shop in the world, as well as being one of the oldest family owned businesses still in existence. Over the years, Lock’s have supplied headwear to many tens of thousands of people from all walks of life who have sought out their quality and service including historical figures such as: Sir Winston Churchill, Charlie Chaplin, Sir Anthony Eden, the Duke of Wellington and Admiral Lord Nelson. stockport.gov.uk/hatworks

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Bolton Food and Drink Festival

Salford Food and Drink Festival

Victoria Square, Bolton 23 - 26 August

Salford Civic Centre Lawns, Salford 1 September - 13 October

Bolton Food and Drink Festival has established itself as one of the must-see events in the North West’s food calendar.

The four day event is bursting with cooking demonstrations, speciality markets, live music and entertainment and attracts over 100,000 visitors each year. boltonfoodanddrinkfestival.com @visitbolton

Salford Food and Drink Festival 2013 returns with a delicious menu of mouth-watering food events and activities and a great selection of dining offers across the city. The city’s leading bars, finest restaurants and top local producers will all come together to showcase the quality food and drink that makes Salford proud. visitsalford.info/foodfestival

Rochdale Feel Good Festival 2013

Diggers Festival

Town Centre, Rochdale 30 – 31 August

The Wiend, Wigan 7 September

The Rochdale Feel Good Festival is an explosion of entertainment, food and culture offering something for everyone to enjoy.

There’s live music from big name acts on the main stage located within the grounds of Rochdale Town Hall, open air cookery demonstrations from well known celebrity chefs, a food village selling delicacies from around the world, street theatre performances and a vibrant outdoor market.

There’s also plenty happening for the children with the famous “Bugs, Bees & Beasties” tent making a return, face painting, fair ground rides and much, much more! rochdalefeelgoodfestival.co.uk @FeelGoodFest

The free annual open air festival celebrates, via the medium of poetry, music and song, film and a range of other activities, the life and ideas of Wigan born and bred Gerrard Winstanley (1609-1676) and the 17th Century ‘Diggers’ movement he became the inspirational theorist and spokesperson of.

Also known as the ‘True Levellers’, the Diggers were one of the first truly egalitarian political movements of the poor and property-less anywhere in the World, and the first to argue for full equality of men and women. Winstanley and they famously asserted: “The World was made a common treasury for all!” wigandiggersfestival.org | @WiganDigger

What’s on: Greater Manchester Ramsbottom Festival

Whitefield Halloween Festival

Ramsbottom 13 - 15 September

Hamilton Road Park, Bury 20 – 31 October

The boutique music festival returns for its third year featuring three stages filled with established and new music talent alongside kids activities and the very best local food and beer. ramsbottomfestival.com | @rammyfestival

The North West premier destination for all your spooktacular needs. Activities range from education to creative with something for everyone, alongside the traditional pumpkin carving and lantern making. Join us on a journey of fun and excitement halloweenfest.org.uk | @HalloweenFestNW

Salford Music Festival Salford 26 - 29 September Live bands & DJs will be playing all across Salford, last year there were over 200 bands in 20 different venues throughout the city.

For all the lastest information on who's playing where and a full list of all events can be found here. salfordmusicfestival.co.uk

Robin Hood Octagon Theatre, Bolton 15 November – 11 January 2014 Together with Maid Marion, Friar Tuck and a whole host of Merry Men, Robin Hood will bring the tales of Sherwood Forest to life – a world of heroic quests, love, gallantry, outlaws, castles and kings! Suitable for ages 5 and over. octagonbolton.co.uk | @OctagonTheatre

Homegrown The Met, Bury 18 & 19 October Enjoy the very best of English folk music at Homegrown, a unique festival welcoming established names and rising stars to Bury, giving you the opportunity to experience the best of today's musicians influenced by traditional english music. themet.biz/homegrown

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Manchester Voices

Elaine Constantine As a city rich in musical heritage Manchester isn’t short on musicinspired stories; however the story of northern soul is lesser-known than most. Bury-born photographer, Elaine Constantine, is looking to change that with her debut feature ďŹ lm, Northern Soul.

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Can you tell us about your experiences of making the film?

Your film, Northern Soul, covers an important chapter in defining the North West’s musical heritage. For those unfamiliar with the scene, can you tell us a bit about its origins?

Northern soul music and culture started at the Twisted Wheel club in Manchester in the late 1960s. It was a continuation of ‘mod culture’ where smartly dressed young people danced all night to black, American 60s soul music. After ‘The Wheel’ closed in 1971, the crowd moved to other venues and by the mid-70s northern soul had its biggest following with huge clubs like Wigan Casino and Blackpool Mecca. These places were packed to the rafters every weekend.

Northern soul in some form or another has never gone away and has managed to remain an underground scene.

What can we expect from the finished film?

The film tracks the story of two young lads as they aspire to be DJs on the northern soul scene of the mid-1970s. Through this journey there is lots of dancing, fighting, love, lust, loyalty, a little bit of sex – and loads of great music. It’s a gritty, and I like to think, authentic portrayal of that period.

It’s a film about breaking out and aspiring beyond what’s expected of you. I think more than anything, this film will enable the viewer to get a sense of the excitement anyone feels when they discover great music for the first time and how special it is to be part of something different.

The main towns associated with the northern soul scene included Manchester and Wigan as well as nearby Stoke.

Why do you think these towns played such a big part?

I think that Manchester in particular was a perfect breeding ground for this phenomenon because of the scale of the city and all the huge mill towns around it. These places were densely populated but not media driven, therefore things got a chance to develop before they got commercialised Mod was relatively short lived in London and lot of kids had moved into glam rock. The media followed whatever was dominant in the charts and so did the London club scene.

In a way northern soul happened almost everywhere except London.

Filming in the North West was an amazing experience, totally different to shooting anywhere else. Everyone we came across was so welcoming and supportive, we couldn’t have wished for a better time of it.

We had previously set up dance sessions for kids in Bolton. Anyone who wanted to be involved with the film had to attend regularly for at least ten sessions prior to filming. Most of them ended up doing this for over a year or so due to the delay of filming, so once shooting came around a real community had developed - strong friendships had formed and because of this the energy was tangible.

How did you go about recreating an authentic look, feel and sound in the film?

This has been a labour of love for me for the last twelve years and making everything perfect was so important.

I began collecting clothes years ago and I was particularly tough on the cast and insisted they grow or cut their hair rather than use wigs. Also I wanted all the dancers to learn the etiquette on the dance floor rather than just the moves - we needed them to fully understand what it was like being on that scene back then.

A number of famous faces pop up in the film. Can you tell us a bit about them and how they got involved?

We have some cameos by some well known actors. Steve Coogan plays a school teacher; Ricky Tomlinson plays the granddad; and Christian McKay and Lisa Stansfield play the lead’s parents. I think they all came on board because they loved the script. The main cast is relatively unknown and all under 30. Most of them had been involved in the process for two or three years and came through the dance sessions we held in London and Bolton.

Finally, you’re originally from Bury and have spent a lot of time in Manchester.

What would you recommend that visitors to see and do in both places?

The Two Tubs is a brilliant old pub that I used to drink in when I lived in Bury and Steven Street Chippy is the bomb.

In Manchester if you want to go and dance to lots of dance genres I’d recommend Bop Local. It’s a night put on for people with kids so it starts early and ends early. The Mark Addy is a good pub and does traditional northern food. The Mint Lounge hosts great bands and Matt & Phred’s is a nice little jazz club. If you want to find out about any local northern soul nights, check out soul-source.co.uk.

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England’s great outdoors To the south east of Greater Manchester lie the historic county of Derbyshire and the Peak District National Park.

It is home to some of England’s most impressive family seats – including the world-famous Chatsworth – and more than its fair share of chocolate-box towns – such as Bakewell and Buxton. Here, we take a look at what there is on offer to tempt the ‘city breakers’ from Manchester over to the Peaks.

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Active Peak: Whether you’re a hardened hiker or cyclist, or you like your activity at a more leisurely pace, the Peak District offers plenty of scope to get active. From the bracing moorland to the manicured parkland of one of the many historic estates in the area, the Peak’s impressive network of footpaths, traffic-free cycle trails and bridleways make it a pleasure to explore. It’s not just feet and wheels to get worked out.

The region’s incredible rock formations and crops offer excellent climbing conditions, vast water masses like Carsington Reservoir means that sailing, windsurfing and canoeing are on offer in the most landlocked part of the country. And don’t let being ‘landlocked’ put you off – Dame Ellen Macarthur is from the quiet Derbyshire village of Whatstandwell no less.

A little piece of history: the Peak District is the place to experience a wealth of history from across centuries – as far back as 13,000 year old cave engravings from Creswell Crags, and as recent as the Rolls Royce engines integral to World War II, which are displayed at Derby’s Silk Mill museum.

Examples of industry are dotted throughout the countryside, as the river Derwent running through the core of Derbyshire brought factories, mills and employment for thousands of people during the 18th and 19th centuries. In fact, Cromford Mill along the Derwent Valley boasts being ‘the birthplace

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of the Industrial Revolution’; it’s the place where Richard Arkwright chose to build a cotton mill in 1771 and then another mill at neighbouring Matlock Bath in 1783.These were the first successful cotton mills and they became the blueprint for factory production as it is today, and were copied not only throughout the country, but throughout the world. If you’re a die-hard factory fan, you’ll be pleased to know that the 15 miles stretch down the Derwent Valley from Matlock Bath to Derby containing a fascinating series of historic mill complexes, is now a World Heritage Site.

Stately splendour: an incredible number of historic houses and gardens are on offer to visitors to the Peak District, and several are still owned and lived in by the same family, and have been for generations. Who hasn’t heard of majestic Chatsworth, with over 30 rooms to explore in the ancestral home of the Cavendish family, the setting for many period films including the most recent Pride and Prejudice? But do fit in to your visit other historic gems such as Renishaw Hall and Gardens, home to the renowned Sitwell family and a ‘little piece of Italy in Derbyshire’ with its very own vineyard, or the picturesque Tissington Hall set in its own attractive village on the edge of Dovedale. Over ten historic houses and gardens open for visitors are located across the Peak District, and all have incredible stories to tell about the people who lived and worked there.

Food and Drink: comes in abundance for visitors to the Peak District. Locally brewed beer, Derbyshire sparkling wine, Derbyshire spring lamb, Bakewell puddings, and Derbyshire oatcakes are just some of the delicacies on offer from just across the county. The Peak District is proud of its food and drink offer, and understandably so with miles of luscious pasture to rear healthy, happy animals and produce top quality ingredients. Country pubs with awardwinning food and beer can be found in many villages and towns, many with incredible views from the beer gardens and warming log fires to relax in front of after a long walk in the countryside. Derbyshire is becoming renowned for its micro-breweries, with over

a dozen producing delicious ales and bitters to an increasingly diverse market. Gone are the days when ales was seen as a ‘man’s drink’. You’ll see plenty of people of all age and either gender enjoying locally-brewed ale in pubs and restaurants and at festivals across Derbyshire today.

The provenance and quality of food couldn’t be more pertinent than at the Tideswell School of Food, an impressive set up in the heart of the area which offers a range of courses to teach people of all ages how to grow, cook, make, brew, and sell local food and drink.

Fine dining can be enjoyed from exquisite locations including on the edge of the Chatsworth estate, up on the Derbyshire moors or in the heart of market towns like Ashbourne, from Michelin starred places to delightful tearooms selling fabulous afternoon tea or morning coffee.

Images facing page: Chatsworth House; Masson Mill, Matlock Bath.

Images this page: Stanage Edge; Lathkill Dale; Pudding Shop, Bakewell.

Stay: and with these restaurants and hotels come plenty of places to stay the night or two. Whether it’s a bolt hole for two in Derbyshire Dales, or a grand holiday cottage for a party of twelve, the Peak District has places to put you up, whatever your budget and needs. Bed and breakfasts give direct access to some of the most stunning walks the area has to offer, and all booked with Visit Peak District are of a standard to make it feel like home from home. The same quality mark can be found with the hotels recommended by Visit Peak District, which range from boutique to big, from country chic to modern mode. And staying over in the Peak District on a budget couldn’t be easier, with scores of campsites and caravan parks in incredible countryside to really get the feel of the area.

Festivals and Events: there are art shows, music festivals, food and drink fairs, outdoor cinema, well dressings, literary festivals, toe wrestling, raft races, walking events, fun runs, wildlife trails, classic car rallies, country fairs, agricultural shows, chicken races, illuminations, theatre, Shrovetide football, markets and so, so much more on offer throughout the year in the Peak District, home to Britain’s first national park.

For more information about Derbyshire and the Peak District, check out: visitpeakdistrict.com

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If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re visiting Manchester, why not come by train? Each day we run over 175 trains linking the North of England and Scotland to Manchester and the Airport so getting there couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be easier.

tpexpress.co.uk

*Subject to availability. First TransPennine Express Advance Purchase tickets only. Please buy in advance to avoid disappointment. For full terms and conditions please visit www.tpexpress.co.uk

Transport information Manchester is one of the most accessible cities in the UK thanks to its location and level of connectivity with national transport infrastructure. Once you have arrived in the city, getting around couldn’t be easier thanks to a fleet of buses, trains and trams...

Trains There are four main stations in the city centre: Piccadilly, Oxford Road, Victoria and Deansgate. Piccadilly welcomes the majority of visitors and is the main arrival point for those flying into Manchester Airport or travelling up from London. The city has direct rail services south to Birmingham, Bournemouth, Reading, Bristol and Plymouth as well as north to Edinburgh and Glasgow. Operators include: CrossCountry Trains (crosscountrytrains.co.uk / @crosscountryuk) First Great Western (firstgreatwestern.co.uk / @FGW), Northern Rail (northernrail.org / @northernrailorg) and TransPennineExpress (tpexpress.co.uk / @TPExpressTrains).

Bus & Coach Within the city centre, Metroshuttle provides a free ‘hop on, hop off’ service that links all of the main rail stations, shopping districts and business areas. It runs every ten minutes from 7am - 7pm Monday to Saturday and 10am - 6pm on Sundays. Across Greater Manchester, Arriva (arrivabus.co.uk), First (firstgroup.com / @FirstManchester) and Stagecoach (stagecoachbus.com) operate a comprehensive network to get you out and about.

Further afield, National Express provides services from all over the country into Chorlton Street Coach Station in the heart of the city (nationalexpress.co.uk / @nationalexpress)

Road Manchester is well connected to the rest of the UK via excellent motorway links. The M60 ring road connects the city to motorways north, south, east and west.

In the city, NCP has over 13,000 car parking spaces across 43 sites, including a number of exclusive parent and child bays and green bays for vehicles with low emissions. Parking with NCP in the city centre starts from just £1.60 an hour. ncp.co.uk / @ncpcarparks

Trams The city’s Metrolink network is one of the most successful light rail systems in the UK, carrying nearly 20 million passengers every year. With services roughly every five to ten minutes, it is great mode of transport for those not on a strict timetable. Don’t forget to purchase your ticket on the platform before you board. metrolink.co.uk / @OfficialTfGM

Journey Planning Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) is the official public transport body for the city.

Its website has a wealth of information to help you plan your journey, including details of Park & Ride services, accessible transport, bus service maps and a journey planner. For service information, call: +44 (0)871 200 22 33 (10p per minute from landlines). tfgm.com / @OfficialTfGM

System One Want to travel on any bus? Or a combination of bus and train, or even bus, train and tram? Why not purchase a System One Travelcard. It covers a wide-reaching area from Bolton and Bury in the north to Stockport and Altrincham in the south, Oldham and Rochdale in the east to Standish and Wigan in the west. It can make your travel planning much simpler and save you money too. systemonetravelcards.co.uk / @OneManchester

@visit_mcr | visitmanchester.com

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Manchester Airport Manchester Airport is the largest airport outside London and has received numerous “Best Airport” awards.

With three terminals handling over 19 million passengers each year, Manchester Airport is the global gateway to the North of England. Sixty airlines ensure Manchester Airport is directly connected to over 190 destinations and no more than one-stop away from anywhere in the world.

Whether travelling for business or pleasure, Manchester Airport offers a host of facilities and services to help ensure hassle-free travel:

Airport Shopping and dining Join the vast number of savvy shoppers already taking advantage of exclusive tax and duty free savings at the airport. Then, make the most of the wide selection of food and drink options available across all three terminals.

Escape Lounges For those looking to start their holiday in style, or simply some peace and quiet to complete last minute business, the Escape lounges in Terminals 1, 2 and 3 offer a tranquil environment. Here you can also enjoy a host of complimentary refreshments and take advantage of the free Wi-Fi.

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For the kids

Airport Parking

If you need to keep the kids entertained or use up some of their excess energy before a long flight, there are now two free soft play areas. These are located in both Terminal 1 and Terminal 2.

There is a parking option to suit every need, from great value Long Stay parking to the ultimate convenience of Meet & Greet parking.

Disabled access A pioneering new access guide has been designed, which provides disabled customers with all the information they need to plan their journey from door to door.

Free Wi-Fi Stay connected to the outside world, with free Wi-Fi for up to 30 minutes, across all three terminals.

The Manchester Airport App For the perfect travel companion download the Manchester Airport app, it’s your onestop guide for flight and airport information.

Even better it’s completely free to download on your smartphone.

For the latest information visit manchesterairport.co.uk or follow @manairport on Twitter.

Fly direct to Manchester from...

Aberdeen (ABZ) Abu Dhabi (AUH) Agadir (AGA) Alicante (ALC) Almeria (LEI) Amsterdam (AMS) Antalya (AYT) Antwerp (ANR) Athens (ATH) Atlanta (ATL) Barcelona (BCN) Basel (BSL) Bastia (BIA) Beauvais (BVA) Belfast City Airport (BHD) Belfast International Airport (BFS) Bergamo (BGY) Bergen (BGO) Berlin (SXF) Beziers (BZR) Biarritz (BIQ) Bilbao (BIO) Billund (BLL) Boa Vista (BVC) Bodrum (BJV) Bourgas (BOJ) Bremen (BRE) Bridgetown, Barbados (BGI)

Brussels National (BRU) Budapest (BUD) Cagliari (CAG) Cairo (CAI) Calgary (YYC) Cancun (CUN) Catania (CTA) Chania (CHQ) Charleroi (CRL) Charles De Gaulle (CDG) Chicago (ORD) Cologne (CGN) Copenhagen (CPH) Corfu (CFU) Cork (ORK) Dalaman (DLM) Djerba (DJE) Doha (DOH) Dubai (DXB) Dublin (DUB) Dubrovnik (DBV) Dusseldorf (DUS) Edinburgh (EDI) Enfidha (NBE) Exeter (EXT) Faro (FAO) Frankfurt (FRA) Friedrichshafen (FDH) Fuerteventura (FUE) Funchal (FNC)

Gdansk (GDN) Geneva (GVA) Gibraltar (GIB) Girona (GRO) Glasgow (GLA) Gothenburg (GOT) Gran Canaria (LPA) Grenoble (GNB) Guernsey (GCI) Hahn (HHN) Hamburg (HAM) Hanover (HAJ) Helsinki (HEL) Heraklion (HER) Holguin (HOG) Hurghada (HRG) Ibiza (IBZ) Innsbruck (INN) Inverness (INV) Islamabad (ISB) Isle of Man (IOM) Istanbul (IST) Izmir (ADB) Jersey (JER) Kalamata (KLX) Katowice (KTW) Kefalonia (EFL) Knock (NOC) Kos (KGS) La Palma (SPC) La Rochelle (LRH)

Lahore (LHE) Lanzarote (ACE) Larnaca (LCA) Las Vegas (LAS) Lisbon (LIS) Ljubljana (LJU) London Heathrow (LHR) Lourdes (LDE) Luxor (LXR) Lyon (LYS) Madrid (MAD) Mahon, Menorca (MAH) Malaga (AGP) Malta (MLA) Marrakech (RAK) Memmingen (FMM) Milan Malpensa (MXP) Mombassa (MBA) Montego Bay (MBJ) Montpellier (MPL) Moscow (DME) Munich (MUC) Murcia (MJV) Mykonos (JMK) Mytilene (MJT) Nantes (NTE) Naples (NAP) New York JFK (JFK) New York Newark (EWR)

Newquay (NQY) Nice (NCE) Norwich (NWI) Olbia (OLB) Orlando International (MCO) Oslo (OSL) Oslo Rygge (RYG) Palma, Majorca (PMI) Paphos (PFO) Philadelphia (PHL) Pisa (PSA) Prague (PRG) Preveza (PVK) Puerto Plata (POP) Pula (PUY) Punta Cana (PUJ) Rennes (RNS) Reus (REU) Reykjavik (KEF) Rhodes (RHO) Riga (RIX) Rome (FCO) Rzeszow (RZE) Sal (SID) Salzburg (SZG) Santa Clara Airport (SNU) Santorini (JTR) Shannon (SNN) Sharm el Sheikh (SSH)

Sicily (CTA) Singapore (SIN) Skiathos (JSI) Sofia (SOF) Southampton (SOU) Split (SPU) Stockholm (ARN) Stuttgart (STR) Tallinn (TLL) Tel Aviv (TLV) Tenerife (TFS) Thessalonika (SKG) Toronto (YYZ) Toulouse (TLS) Tunis (TUN) Valencia (VLC) Vancouver (YVR) Varadero (VRA) Varna (VAR) Venice (VCE) Verona (VRN) Warsaw Modlin (WMI) Washington (IAD) Waterford (WAT) Zakynthos (ZTH) Zurich (ZRH)

While we make every effort to ensure that this information is as accurate as possible, it is provided to us by third parties. We are therefore not able to verify its accuracy or completeness and shall have no liability for any loss or damage incurred as a result of relying on this information.

Escape Lounge, Terminal 1

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The last word

I'm not quite sure what sparked my interest in Canals. Maybe it's the fact that I was brought up in Worsley; the birthplace of the 'modern' canal, home to Bridgewater's orange waterway - a reminder of the rusty seams of iron ore trapped in the underground mines through which the source water flows. A memento of northern industrial endeavour, a visionary patron and his ambitious engineer that dared build a manmade waterway to bring in the fuel and take out the goods that became known the world over as the industrial revolution.

A canal the colour of Factory Records, thanks to Ben Kelly's obsession with international orange - Pantone 1505 - a colour considered unfit for Royal consumption, that had to be dyed dark brown when the Queen paid a visit to the seat of 19th century enterprise in May 1968.

A colour considered so unpalatable that rather than celebrate it as reminder of that industrial past, Salford City Council and the European Union spent millions trying to filter it out - three settling beds adjacent to junction 13 of the M60 try in vain to remove the stain of history. The fact that the colour is trapped in the muddy sediment on the bed of a canal that deepened over time due to mining settlement and is stirred up into an ochre stew every time a boat slips through, seems to make the European water washers a little pointless.

Water though, is something Manchester's good at. Not only does it fall in plentiful supply from our skies but curiously for a city that's over 40 miles from the sea, water is the mainstay of our 'blue-green' infrastructure, a recreational resource that we'd be remiss if we didn't put it to good use, blue, of course, being a slight misnomer, brown being more accurate but brown conjures up the dullness of ditchwater rather than sun soaked associations with Mediterranean blue.

So Manchester's Docks, now Salford's Quays, host crowds of dedicated open water swimmers, canoeists and dinghy skippers, the towpaths of the canals that connect Manchester United to Manchester City are a runner’s delight. Boaters have places to potter and for those a little more intrepid it's possible to make it from Manchester to New York without setting foot on dry land.

The green part of blue-green is a little more evident although arguably less well sold.

Manchester's parks, 'pocket' parks, plazas, piazzas and places for people to do nothing in particular are plentiful; we've just not told the story that pulls them all together. From the 'Vimto garden' surrounded by what was UMIST, to St. John's Gardens, to Parsonage Gardens, it is possible to plot a perfectly pleasant route linking one space to another; some old, some new, all with with overlapping stories that bind green and blue together.

Maybe the attempted reversal of Worsley's orange stained past is apposite. Maybe we're entering an age where Blake’s dark satanic mills are rebalanced, reworked, reordered and possibly reversed and our city has the capacity to flourish, once again, as a green and pleasant land.

Nick Johnson Chairman of Marketing Manchester

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