The roaring success of the comedy festival’s Silent Disco at the ORNC last Saturday (see photographic evidence below) left me wondering whether conventional music consumption could ever really be as good again.  Well, the people of Greenwich are not daunted, as this week’s events are something of a musical tour de force, and none of them involve wireless headphones.

Greenwich Theatre has not one, but two, musical plays showing this week.  Dancing in my Dreams is a new play based on World War 2 evacuee memoirs and featuring evocative songs of the era such as Dancing Cheek to Cheek.  Then on Sunday A Funny Valentine tells the real story of jazz trumpeter Chet Baker, whose prodigious skill only loosely masked a lifelong fight with a drug addiction that caused his imprisonment and eventually contributed to his premature death.

For something a little more on the cheerful side head to Deptford on Saturday evening, where the Albany is staging the energetic Teatro Vivo’s Hothouse, followed by a free tango lesson.  The disco trend continues with the Indigo2 hosting the renowned Ultimate Boogie Night, also on Saturday. This week the journey to the past pays homage to the ‘Lovers Rock’ genre, a form of romantic reggae that originated here in South London in the 1970s and has remained popular ever since.

If you think you have a singing voice but aren’t quite brave enough for those terrifying X factor auditions, Blackheath Halls are running a two-day beginners singing course this weekend.  The sessions will focus on establishing the range and pitch of your voice and giving you a few pointers, as well as providing plenty of opportunity to try out your newfound talent.

Finally, St Thomas’ Church in Charlton is hosting what is probably the best value music event in London, with a cello and violin concert on Sunday afternoon.  The £8.50 entry price not only buys you the enjoyment of listening to two extremely accomplished baroque musicians, but also includes pizza and wine.  Ah, if only they transmitted it all wirelessly, it would be perfect…

Photos from the Silent Disco

With a colourful marketing campaign stretching as far as Charing Cross station (gasp), the Greenwich Comedy Festival obviously means business.  The impressive setting, the Old Royal Naval College, is matched by an equally impressive line up – Russell Howard, Jo Brand, Sean Hughes to name but a few – and the events run every day from Monday to Sunday.

The stand up comedy routines will no doubt do what they say on the can, and do it very well, but there are also some other interesting things happening as part of the festival.  Most intriguing is the outdoor Silent Disco on Saturday night; the music gets transmitted from the DJ box to wireless headphones, so there are no speakers and to the outside world it appears as though all the revellers are dancing and singing along to nothing.  Also notable is the Bad Film Club on Saturday at the Observatory, the idea being that the cheesiest, most cringe-worthy films become comedy gold if you’re watching them in a group.   I confess that logic is a bit too cool for me: in my eyes this is just a condonable opportunity to watch films that I secretly love but would never normally admit to liking, and it’s free!

Back in the real world, there’s a ‘talky’ theme to the other Greenwich events this week.  The Oscar-winning costume designer Julie Harris is talking about her incredible career this Thursday at the Fan Museum and Frances Ward is celebrating the career of George Formby with a talk at Charlton House on Friday evening (7pm).   There’s also a Marie Curie information evening atDeptford Methodist Church on Tuesday, providing a chance to hear more about what the charity does in this area and how you might get involved.  Along similarly charitable lines, if you go down to the woods (aka Greenwich & Bexley Cottage Hospice) on Sunday, you’d better go in disguise, as there’s a Teddy Bear’s Picnic to raise money for the hospice.

I’m sticking close to the river for this week’s ‘What’s On’, with a raft (geddit) of events current-ly (ha ha) happening alongside the Greenwich stretch of the Thames. Ok, river puns over now, I promise.

On Saturday, the Thames Discovery Programme are hosting an archaeology lecture at Greenwich Heritage Centre, showcasing their work to discover more about the river’s history.   Their expert speakers will also be discussing the remains of what is believed to be a large warship, possibly the HMS Duke of Wellington, discovered at Charlton.

Whilst you’re down at the riverside in Woolwich, the Firepower museum at Royal Arsenal is also taking a trip to the past with it’s Second World War Evacuee Day, also on Saturday.  This informative and moving commemoration features first-hand written accounts from evacuees and memorabilia from the time, as well as the obligatory in-character guides such as an air-raid warden and soldiers to entertain the younger visitors.

The rejuvenation of one of the borough’s other rivers – I know, there are others! – is celebrated this week with the River Quaggy’s Annual River Walk.  Five years on from the success of the Quaggy Waterways Action Group’s efforts to transform Sutcliffe Park from wasteland into a wildlife haven, they re-visit the park to see how it’s thriving.

Back at Greenwich town’s riverside hub, the Cutty Sark Gardens, there’s a Continental village market on Friday and Saturday.  It’s mainly a food market, featuring the best cuisine from France, Greece, Spain, Turkey and Germany (to name but a few) and it will be moving inland to Eltham on Sunday.

Rounding up the non-river events, if you ever wondered what happened to Tony from Eastenders, well he’s alive and well and featuring in a new take on Dickens’s The Signalman at Greenwich Theatre this week.  For budding DJs, this Friday the British Music Experience at the o2 is featuring a Q&A session with some top name DJs from independent dance label Hospital Records.  And if space exploration floats your boat (sorry, couldn’t resist…), the Invaders of Mars showcase runs until Monday at the Planetarium, narrated by Tom Baker of Little Britain / Dr Who fame.

Every week in my ‘What’s On’ article, I attempt to glean a vague a theme out of the coming week’s events, but this week the sheer diversity is making it tricky, so I’ve instead gone for a collection of goings-on that have almost nothing in common.  After all, random events are nearly always the best kind.

If you’re not totally festival-ed out for this summer or are keen to squeeze one last fest in before September descends (bringing immediate winter of course), there’s the Well Hall Summer Festival at the eponymous Pleasaunce on Sunday afternoon.  As well as the usual proliferation of sugary food, balloon-related activities and brass instruments to send your kids loopy there is also a promising Abba tribute band and some owls and falcons on display.   Not simultaneously, I hope; falcons don’t strike me as the Mamma Mia! types.

If you’re keen to stretch your legs and meet some new people then St Alfege’s Church is leading a multi-faith walk on Saturday.  The informal walk takes participants around some of the different religious centres in Greenwich and Blackheath encompassing, amongst others, the Muslim and Quaker communities.  The walk’s itinerary also promises abundant refreshments so you’ll be well taken care of.

The indigo2 are going for the longest name for a tournament in Greenwich’s history, with the G Force Street Dance Weekend UK Championships on Sunday.  Apparently Britain’s Got Talent champs Diversity are past winners of this competition, so the standard is likely to be high and it will no doubt be an energetic, grafity-defying spectacle – how do break dancers do it?

In anticipation of the forthcoming Greenwich Comedy Festival, The Albany are hosting their own brand of funny stuff with the Sweetfellows Comedy Show on Friday evening with some well-known urban comedians taking to the stage.

Over on the Blackheath side of town, the Railway pub are holding their cider festival, aptly name CyderFest, all next weekend with live music and… cider.  Young jazz/folk singer Janet Penfold is also performing at the British Oak on Old Dover Road on Saturday evening.
Finally, for those of you on the home stretch with the summer holidays, there’s a Wildlife Drop in at Greenwich Park on Wednesday morning.  The squirrels are out in force at the moment and don’t seem to be too bothered by having kids chase them so now seems like a good time to find out a bit more.

Those of you who follow Greenwich.co.uk on Twitter will have noticed that in last weeks column I shamefully omitted to mention the annual Rose and Crown ‘Drag Race’. In light of this I wanted to go in search of a few more left field options for activities this week, inspiring us to do something a little bit different.

Prize for ‘most different’ must go to the Crossness Pumping Station, who this Sunday are holding a public steaming day. It sounds a little dubious given the context (in case you weren’t aware it’s a sewage pumping station) but as Andrew Gilligan assures us, Crossness is actually a beautiful building, Grade 1 listed and noted for its Romanesque Victorian cast ironwork.  Andrew also assures us that the smell is more or less non-existent, so I’d say its worth a visit.

Also having a good go at inspiring young people to try something new are the London Councils, who are teaming up with TARA and the Greenwich Theatre to run a two-week workshop from today called Sailing to Britain. The participants’ task is to develop a play based on the lascars, migrant workers who sailed to Britain in the 19th/20th centuries. The workshop is part of a wider three year project that will culminate in performances of the devised plays on river boats during the 2012 festivities.

If, like me, you don’t usually venture too far for green space due to your (correct) belief that other London parks are pretty disappointing after Greenwich, then this week might be that time to be brave and give another green space a go as Parksfest 2009 comes to Eltham Park South for an afternoon of music on Sunday.  The ubiquitous Trinity College and Greenwich Youth Band will be there to make Greenwich folk feel at home, along with the Bob Hope Theatre company and Crown Woods School.

Other notable quirky happenings are a new art exhibition featuring local talent at Blackheath Village Library and, if you still haven’t given it a go, Oliver’s Music Bar are hosting a jazz jamming session on Saturday evening.

On 10^th August 1675, Charles II climbed the hill in Greenwich Park (or was carried by some minions, or came from the Blackheath side) and laid the first paving stone of the world’s first observatory. Three hundred and thirty four years later the Royal Observatory is still thriving. This Thursday you get a chance to be guided around their North-West Passage Exhibition by their team of curators, who’ll be telling stories about some of the expeditions featured therein.  The Volunteer Guided Tours of the whole museum are also running every weekday this week and for younger audiences the summer programme features almost daily storytelling and interactive craft sessions such as Family Treasures and Play Tuesdays. Makes me wish I were 5 again!

The Park is also playing host to the Garden Opera Company this Sunday for their rendition of Rossini’s The Barber of Seville.  Working hard to overcome the stuffy connotations of the ‘O’ word, the Garden Opera Company’s aim is to make the whole thing as fun as possible; their strap line “Hair dressing, salad dressing, cross dressing” certainly sells it to me and this colourful, stripped down version of an Italian masterpiece should be lively enough to hold the attention of even the newest (and most discerning) opera spectators.

At the more modern end of the musical scale Oliver’s Music Bar is hosting young London based jazz singer Jeanie Barton this Thursday evening; The King is apparently alive and well and coming to Greenwich on Sunday, with an Elvis Anniversary Concert at the indigo2; and there’s pop, rock and soul classics to be bopped to with covers band Nightshift playing at Well Hall Pleasaunce in Eltham on Sunday afternoon.

We’re getting into the third week of the summer holidays now.  The kids are bored of their bikes (ok, X-boxes), you’ve taken them to see Harry Potter 4 times and they’re threatening to make you go and see Ice Age for the 6^th time.  Luckily, you live in Greenwich, so there are plenty of things happening to keep the younger folk entertained this week.

Blackheath Halls are running some rather imaginative workshops every morning aimed at bringing out your children’s creative sides. Activities include making an enchanted garden, learning to dance salsa and having a go at taiko drumming (I’m not quite sure what that is either but I imagine that’s the point!)  There’s even a class teaching Maypole dancing; 4 months out of date, maybe, but at least they’ll know for next year and it is marginally healthier than X-box.

For the very little ones, the Old Royal Naval College are also getting creative on Friday afternoon with their back-to-back ‘Animaltastic’ and ‘Tactile Tales’. The former is a finger-puppet making session and the latter tells the story of kings and queens through a multi-sensory rug. Greenwich Theatre is also showing a musical adaptation of The Gruffalo from Thursday to Saturday, which if you’re anything like me will probably be as much of a treat for the adults as it is for the children.

If your kids are now old enough to not really be kids anymore, but lucky enough to still have summer holidays, they may wish to check out The Albany’s Summer Arts Season, a series of courses for budding film-makers, actors and scriptwriters that starts this week.  Most of the courses run for 3 weeks but there are some 1 week courses available too, all from as little as £10 / week. Throughout August under 16s also get in free to the British Music Experience at the o2, who are hosting their own Summer Kids’ Festival, with master classes in hip-hop, drumming and other ‘cool’ stuff, beginning this week.

Finally, in the ‘Fun for All the Family’ category, this weekend Greenwich Park will be hosting the Thai Festival at the bandstand area.  There’ll be live music, dancing, Thai massage and craft stalls, but, like Thailand, it’s really all about the food.  Our city’s best Thai restaurateurs will be out in force and if you’re feeling brave you can even have a go at making green curry yourself in one of the cookery classes.

Is there anything else happening in Greenwich this week? Add details of your own events in the comments section of this post.