Theatre, film & music

Joyce DiDonato: 'Lockdown was the sabbatical I really needed, but would never have given myself'

Singer Joyce DiDonato spoke to Henrietta Bredin about gardening, climate change and using music to propagate a topic.

Jonathan Self: The greatest novel of the 20th century? Maybe, but 'Ulysses' still sent me to sleep within three pages

Jonathan Self looks back on some of the great books published exactly a century ago.

In Focus: Vaughan Williams, the composer who wrote 'the world's most beautiful melody'

Ralph Vaughan Williams is one of Britain's great composers, and as a major milestone arrives his fans are celebrating his body of work and life.

In Focus: Handel's Messiah, the Christmas music that was created for Easter

Handel's Messiah

A stunning mews house for sale on the row where Love Actually's most poignant and romantic scene was filmed

Love actually is... a Notting Hill Mews house.

12 best Christmas films to watch with the family

Nothing violent, nothing unpleasant: think drama, comedy, romance, adventure, inspiration and, above all else, schmaltz, says Jonathan Self, as he presents the 12 films you simply must see this Christmas.

Mervyn Millar, the genius puppet master behind War House and more: 'When there’s a puppet on stage, it does something different to your engagement with the storytelling'

Three men become one horse; four become one elephant. The life of a puppeteer is full of magic, discovers Katy Birchall, as she speaks to War Horse supremo Mervyn Millar.

In Focus: Richard Wagner's five-hour operas — 'Singers are like athletes doing long-distance competitions. You get to the point where you’ve reached your physical limits'

Wagner’s stamina-testing operas inspire both passion and dread and the adjective Wagnerian is associated with scale and intensity. Henrietta Bredin acts as a guide for the nervous.

In Focus: How poetry 'offers us something unique at times like this... It does not give us all the answers, but it helps us process the world around us'

As entries for the Country Life poetry competition have begun to arrive, Tim Relf celebrates our countryside poets and the locations that inspired them to write such evocative verse.

Rosie and Jim: 'Some things have longevity, but it feels like maybe this pandemic isn’t one of them'

Our columnists take a break from worrying about their domestic situations to ponder Venice's empty canals, melancholy reminiscence and the debate over who struts better: Mick Jagger or Nick Cave.

Scotland on film, from Harry Potter and Trainspotting, to its surprise stand-in role as London, New York and San Francisco

The brooding horizons, misty glens and dramatic castles of Scotland make it a mecca for film crews shooting anything from historical dramas to Bond films and sci-fi adventures, finds Daniel Pembrey.

Enter the Country Life poetry competition

Calling all budding poets: Country Life is running a poetry competition, with the winning effort to be published in full in the magazine.

The English villages that are hotbeds of murder, intrigue and endless summer days — at least in the minds of novelists

Comforting yet complex, intriguing and alluring, the village setting is territory to which writers — and readers — will return again and again. Flora Watkins looks at how the customs, characters and communities of the English village have long sparked literary inspiration, from Jane Austen to Midsomer Murders.

In Focus: The cello's incredible range, 'the whole way from bass to soprano, very rich and mellow', set to star at the Proms 2021

The four great cello concertos will feature in the same Proms season for the first time in history. Pippa Cuckson discovers why this mellow instrument evokes such emotion.

In Focus: Britain's traditional brass bands, the musicians with the lungs of Olympians, and how they were 'the Justin Biebers of their day'

Those who play in a Northern brass band have a lung capacity similar to that of an Olympic athlete and, as Rebecca Oliver discovers, they’re not likely to run out of puff any time soon.

Glyndebourne, Garsington and The Grange among the summer outdoor operas going ahead in Britain this year

Glyndebourne 2021 and several of the other open-air opera events that are such a feature of the British summer are planning to go ahead as planned, as the country looks beyond the global pandemic. Annunciata Elwes reports.

Gwennap Pit, Cornwall: 'The most magnificent spectacle this side of Heaven’

Annie Elwes kicks off our series on Britain's secret places with a look at Gwennap Pit.

With love from Father Christmas: J.R.R. Tolkien's enchanting Christmas letters to his children

For nearly a quarter of a century, J. R. R. Tolkien sent his children elaborate letters and pictures from the North Pole. Ben Lerwill explores the penmanship, kindness and magic that went into Letters From Father Christmas.

In Focus: The very best of Beethoven, 250 years on from his birth

Curious Questions: How did 'God Save The Queen' become Britain's National Anthem?

As patriotic songs come under the spotlight, Martin Fone takes a look at national anthems across the world.