Northern Silent Film Festival 2023 brochure

Northern Silent Film Festival 2023

Celebrating new music with film across the North throughout October

We’re thrilled to present the Northern Silent Film Festival 2023 line-up of live-scored cinema events.

Formerly known as Yorkshire Silent Film Festival, the festival now takes place across the North - from Morecambe to Hull, Sheffield to Kendal, and various villages, towns and cities in between.

Tickets available at northernsilents.com

Northern Silent Film Festival

Let us transport you to an era of cinema where storytelling unfolded through breathtaking visuals, from the slapstick of Buster Keaton and Laurel & Hardy, to the jagged angles and shadows of Weimar Germany, and the lush Hollywood of Cecil B DeMille. Every show is enlivened by freshly-created music from a wide range of talented players drawn from across the North and beyond.

Whether you’re a devoted cinephile or a curious newcomer, the Northern Silent Film Festival 2023 promises an unforgettable experience.

A month long, open-access, region-wide celebration of live-scored film

For the first time, Northern Silent Film Festival opened up to venues and organisations across the North wanting to present film with live music. This year, the festival includes events in cinemas, theatres, music venues, arts centres and churches.

Where to our events

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to find events

Over the coming years, we hope the festival will grow and foster the further development of live-scored film presentation in the North. All kinds of venues and organisations are welcome to participate. Get in touch with us at hello@northernsilents.com if you’d like to get involved in 2024.

Festival events are supported with funding from the National Lottery by Arts Council England and Film Hub North on behalf of BFI’s Film Audience Network.

Northern Silent Film Festival Team

Artistic Director

Jonny Best

Marketing Manager

Olivia Kehoe

Technical Manager

Symon Payne

35mm Projection

Dion Hanson and Projected Picture Trust

Acknowledgements

FPA Classics: Steve Hills at Eureka, Patricia Heckert at Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, Maria Chiba at FPA Classics, Hannah Prouse and Laura Berkely at BFI. Huttson Lo, Andrew Beadling, and all at Film Hub North. Deborah Parker at Cinema for All. Ben McCabe and Kathryn MacDonald at More Music. Vanessa Toulmin, Helen O’Neil, and the volunteers at Morecambe Winter Gardens. Andy Cook at Yellow Arch. The Rev Keith Griffin at Holy Trinity Church, Holmfirth. Dion Hanson and all at Projected Picture Trust. Symon Payne and Sandra Lemons. Shelagh Bourke at Lethal PR. Paul Terry at Second on the Left (graphic design) and Sam Hemmings of Design Fibre (website design).

Meet the Northern Silent Film Festival musicians

TREVOR BARTLETT Percussion

Trevor graduated with a Masters Degree in Percussion Performance from the Royal Northern College of Music in 2011. He performs with a number of chamber ensembles, including Sticks&Strings, and is a member of Nothern Silents’ resident quartet Frame Ensemble.

ROB BENTALL Nyckelharpa, electronics

Rob is a composer-performer and sound designer. He is co-director of Emergence Collective, an improvising ensemble based in Sheffield, and is Associate Professor in Sound Design, Composition and Performance at Leeds Conservatoire.

JONNY BEST Piano

Jonny studied piano at Chetham’s School of Music. He founded Northern Silent Film Festival and researches contemporary and historic silent film accompaniment practices. He’s also a founder member of Frame Ensemble, a Clore Leadership Fellow, and one of BFI Southbank’s house pianists.

NEIL BRAND Piano

Neil has been a silent film accompanist for over 30 years, regularly in London at the Barbican and BFI National Film Theatres, throughout the UK and at film festivals around the world. He is a regular presenter on Radios 3 & 4, a Fellow of Aberystwyth University, and a Visiting Professor at the Royal Academy of Music.

JULIANA DAY Recorders, whistles, electronics

Juliana is a recorder player, whistle player and vocalist based in Sheffield, specialising in folk, contemporary classical/experimental and improvised music. She studied recorders at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire and has played for theatre, television and radio.

NEIL DIFFLEY Banjo, guitar

Neil is a Holmfirth-based musician specialising in guitars. Over a career spanning four decades, he has performed every style of music from classical guitar recitals to punk rock gigs, taking in folk, bluegrass, country and gypsy jazz on the way.

ADAM FAIRHALL

Piano

Adam is a jazz pianist, improviser, composer and scholar based near Manchester. He has released 12 albums and is often heard on Radio 3. He studied at Leeds College of Music and Manchester Metropolitan University, receiving his PhD in music in 2008.

FIELD LINES CARTOGRAPHER Electronics

Mark Burford has been crafting a body of work that revels in gradual imperceptible shifts and slow-burning realisations for some years now. Mixing analogue and digital, he creates immersive, sometimes dark, soundscapes, described as ‘Shimmering… unsettling’ by The Wire, while Electronic Sound magazine describes his work as ‘The sound of big, strange worlds’.

JANE GARDNER

Piano

Jane has delighted many a silent film audience with her sympathetic accompaniments, including at BFI Southbank, the Commonwealth Games, and Scotland’s Hippodrome Silent Film Festival. Last year she contributed to the 4-disk blu-ray/DVD box set ‘Cinema’s First Nasty Women.’

BEN GAUNT Piano, electronics

Ben is a composer, pianist, improvisor, and professor based in Leeds. His music has been performed by the LSO, Psappha, London Sinfonietta and many others. He has been nominated for a British Composer Award and an Ivor Novello.

LIZ HANKS Cello

Liz is a cellist, composer and collaborator based in Sheffield. She is also a member of Frame Ensemble. Liz has just released her debut solo album, and in recent years has performed, recorded and collaborated with, among others, Martin Simpson, Jasdeep Singh Degun, Liam Gallagher, Jason Singh, Thea Gilmore and Richard Hawley.

BEN McCABE Percussion

Ben plays drums, french horn and sings. He performs with Deep Cabaret, Paddy Garrigan and the Stroller Priests, Natural Causes, Neil C Young Trio and Striding Edge Ceilidh band. He is the musical director for Off the Rails creative jazz orchestra and leads More Music charity’s vibrant community band, Baybeat Streetband.

WILL POUND Harmonicas, melodeons

One of the finest harmonica and melodeon players of his generation, a musician of extraordinary virtuosity and improvisational skill, combined with deep traditional roots, Will has pushed the technical boundaries and repertoires of these instruments and performed across Europe and as far away as Australia.

SUSANNAH SIMMONS Violin

Susannah combines a first violin position with the Orchestra of Opera North with a busy freelance career. She likes to mix things up a bit with performances ranging from Wagner’s epic Ring Cycle to folk, jazz, and studio work. She is a specialist in Argentinian tango and has soloed with some of the world’s leading tango ensembles.

Morecambe Winter Gardens

Sunday 1 October

Northern Silent Film Festival opens with three shows at Morecambe’s beautiful Winter Gardens.

A BUSTER KEATON TRIO

2pm (doors 1.30pm) | Rating:

Three of Buster Keaton’s short films, with live music by Will Pound (harmonicas/accordions) and Jonny Best (piano). In The Love Nest , Buster escapes an unhappy love affair by taking to sea in a little boat, and in The Balloonatic , he floats away on a hot-air balloon. In Cops, Buster is chased through the streets by an entire police department.

Supported by Film Hub North with National Lottery funding on behalf of the BFI Film Audience Network. Additional funding from Morecambe Town Council.

WOULD YOU BELIEVE IT

4pm (doors 3.30pm) | Rating:

Walter Forde plays a hapless inventor whose latest idea is a remote-controlled tank. Dastardly foreign spies pursue him, leading to a spectacular finale as Walter’s tank runs amok through an English village.

Jonny Best (piano) and Trevor Bartlett (percussion) will bring this rarely-shown English comedy alive with improvised music.

Screening in 35mm.

CHICAGO

Northern Silent Film Festival

Opening Night Gala

7pm (doors 6.30pm) | Rating:

Seventy-five years before Bob Fosse’s Broadway musical, the true story of jazz-loving murderess Roxie Hart was brought to the screen by Cecil B. DeMille. A cracking satire on fame and the media, this sensational film will be brought to life by a live 1920s-style jazz score.

Come as you are, or dress up in your finest, 1920’s-style!

WHAT’S ON WETHERBY & KENDAL

SLAPSTICK AFTERNOON

Wednesday 4 October

2pm | Rating:

Wetherby Cinema

A trio of slapstick mayhem with Buster Keaton and Laurel & Hardy. In One Week , Buster Keaton attempts to build his own house. In Big Business, Laurel & Hardy go door-to-door selling Christmas trees in Los Angeles. In Liberty, they find themselves trapped at the top of builder’s scaffolding, high above the city.

Adam Fairhall and Jonny Best will improvise live piano accompaniments.

ANOTHER FINE MESS!

Friday 6 October

7.30pm | Rating:

Brewery Arts, Kendal

A trio of Laurel & Hardy comedies. In Duck Soup, they pretend to be a pair of toffs, and in Do Detectives Think , they play a pair of inept policemen. And in The Finishing Touch, they’re house builders whose professional skills leave something to be desired.

Pianists Jonny Best and Adam Fairhall will improvise live music.

There’s a free Q&A after the show.

LOUISE BROOKS IN DIARY OF A LOST GIRL

Friday 13 October

7.30pm | Rating:

Star and Shadow Cinema, Newcastle

Directed with virtuoso flair by the great G. W. Pabst, Diary of a Lost Girl represents the final pairing of the filmmaker with screen icon Louise Brooks, mere months after their first collaboration in the now-legendary Pandora’s Box.

Jane Gardner will improvise a live piano accompaniment.

SUNDAY SLAPSTICK

Sunday 15 October

2pm | Rating:

Marsden Mechanics

Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, and Laurel & Hardy all together in one show - a great way to discover live-scored silent film for the first time. Featuring Buster Keaton’s One Week , Charlie Chaplin in The Immigrant , and Laurel & Hardy in From Soup to Nuts

Susannah Simmons and Jonny Best will improvise musical accompaniments.

WHAT’S ON SHEFFIELD

Yellow Arch Studios

Saturday 21 October

A day of live-scored silent film at one of Sheffield’s most atmospheric music venues, a former Edwardian nuts and bolts factory.

SLAPSTICK FOR CHILDREN

11.30am | Rating:

This 45-minute show brings live-scored silent film alive for children, and includes opportunities to join in with making music and sound effects. The performance is most suitable for children five years old and over, but children and babies of all ages are welcome.

Liz Hanks (cello) and Jonny Best (piano) will improvise live musical accompaniments.

BUSTER KEATON AT

100

4.30pm | Rating:

In 1923, Buster Keaton made his final short film and his first feature. The Love Nest sees Buster escape from an unhappy love affair by putting to sea in his little boat. His first feature, Three Ages, is a trilogy of stories taking place in prehistoric times, Ancient Rome, and the Roaring Twenties.

Jonny Best (piano) and Trevor Bartlett (percussion) will improvise a live musical accompaniment.

AELITA, QUEEN OF MARS

7.30pm | Rating:

Every radio receiver on Earth picks up a cryptic message; Anta…Odeli…Uta. Los, an engineer who dreams of travelling to other worlds, believes the messages are from Mars. He builds a spaceship and travels there, where he discovers Aelita, Queen of the Planet.

Frame Ensemble will improvise a live score.

WHAT’S ON LEIGH & YORK

THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI

Sunday 22 October

2pm | Rating:

Leigh Film Factory

The carnival has arrived in a small German town. Hypnotist Dr. Caligari presents the mysterious sleepwalking man, Cesare, who he claims can predict the future. Nightmarishly jagged sets, sinister atmospherics and disturbing psychology combine in this justly celebrated classic of early cinema.

Live music is by Lancaster-based Field Lines Cartographer.

THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY & BUSTER KEATON IN THE GENERAL

Monday 23 October

7.30pm | Rating:

National Centre for Early Music, York

Harmonica and accordion player, Will Pound, joins forces with pianist Jonny Best to score a pair of silent cinema’s most famous railway chase movies. The Great Train Robbery wowed audiences in 1903 and still packs a punch. Buster Keaton’s The General is both a brilliantly staged Civil War epic and a perfect comedy-thriller.

SO THIS IS PARIS

Tuesday 24 October

2pm (doors 1.15pm) | Rating:

The Old School House, Leyburn

In this frothy comedy, happily-married Suzanna notices that her new neighbours are outrageously over-the-top expressive dancers with revealing outfits, so she sends her husband to complain to them about their lack of morality. Master of comedy, Ernst Lubitsch, keeps the laughs coming and Jonny Best will improvise a piano accompaniment.

THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI

Wednesday 25 October

8pm (doors 7pm) | Rating:

The Old Woollen, Farsley, Leeds

A classic of expressionist Weimar silent cinema with live electro-acoustic score. The carnival has arrived in a small German town and hypnotist Dr. Caligari presents the mysterious sleepwalking man, Cesare, who he claims can predict the future.

Preceded by Edison’s 1910 short, Frankenstein.

Musicians Ben Gaunt, Rob Bentall, and Juliana Day will create a unique live score.

WHAT’S ON CHESTER & LANCASTER

SLAPSTICK FOR CHILDREN

Thursday 26 October

2pm | Rating:

Storyhouse, Chester

This 45-minute show brings live-scored silent film alive for children, and includes opportunities to join in with making music and sound effects. The performance is most suitable for children five years old and over, but children and babies of all ages are welcome.

Jonny Best (piano) will improvise live musical accompaniments.

THE HAUNTED HOUSE

Thursday 26 October

6.30pm | Rating:

The Dukes, at Lancaster Priory

Full of ingenious stunts and sight gags, The Haunted House stars Keaton as a hapless bank teller accused of attempted robbery by his underhand boss. Complementing Buster Keaton will be a collection of spooky silent short films including Edison’s 1910 Frankenstein, and a creepy and experimental adaptation of Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher.

Neil Brand will improvise live musical accompaniments.

ANOTHER FINE MESS!

Saturday 28 October

5pm | Rating:

Hull Truck Theatre

Brighten your weekend with three fantastic Laurel and Hardy silent film comedies, brought to life with live piano. In Duck Soup they pose as aristocrats and squat in a stately mansion. In Two Tars they’re sailors on shore leave, and in Big Business they try selling Christmas trees in sunny Los Angeles.

Live improvised music by pianist Jonny Best.

CHICAGO

Saturday 28 October

7pm | Rating:

Hull Truck Theatre

Seventy-five years before Bob Fosse’s Broadway musical, the true story of jazz-loving murderess Roxie Hart was brought to the screen by Cecil B. DeMille. After murdering her lover, Roxie Hart milks her trial for publicity and becomes famous. A cracking satire on fame and the media, the film is as sensational as the real-life scandal on which it’s based.

Accompanied by a specially-created 1920s-style musical score.

WHAT’S ON ONLINE EVENT

SOUNDING THE SILENTS

Tuesday 17 October 7.30pm

NOSFERATU

Tuesday 31 October

3pm | Rating:

Theatre Deli, Sheffield

A mysterious, spidery vampire with supernatural powers, a sinister, dark castle perched on a mountain top, and a race to defeat the forces of evil - the first screen adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula still has the power to unnerve.

Live improvised music by Liz Hanks on cello, and Jonny Best at the piano.

How do musicians go about creating new music for silent films? How do improvisers make up new music apparently on-the-spot? What are the differences between accompanying slapstick comedy and emotional drama? Just how does it all work?

Musicians from this year’s Northern Silent Film Festival will spill the beans and share their insights in this fascinating online event. There’ll be time for a Q&A with the audience too.

This event will take place online, on Northern Silents’ YouTube channel. Register for free tickets at northernsilents.com

SOUNDING SILENTS

Meet the Festival Musicians

WHAT’S ON AT A GLANCE

See what’s on this October at Northern Silent Film Festival 2023.

VENUE DETAILS

Tickets are on sale at northernsilents.com and information for each venue is below.

Morecambe Winter Gardens

209 Marine Road, Morecambe LA4 4BU morecambewintergardens.co.uk

National Centre for Early Music

St. Margaret’s Church, Walmgate, York YO1 9TL ncem.co.uk

Wetherby Cinema

Crossley Street, Wetherby LS22 6RT wetherbyfestival.co.uk

Brewery Arts

122A Highgate, Kendal LA9 4HE breweryarts.co.uk

The Old School House

Leyburn Arts & Community Centre, Richmond Road, Leyburn DL8 5DL leyburnartscentre.com

Old Woollen

Sunny Bank Mills, 83-85 Town Street, Farsley, Leeds LS28 5UJ oldwoollen.co.uk

Star and Shadow Cinema

Warwick Street, Newcastle upon Tyne NE2 IBB starandshadow.org.uk

Storyhouse Hunter Street, Chester CH1 2AR storyhouse.com

Marsden Mechanics

Peel Street, Marsden, Huddersfield HD7 6BW marsdenmechanics.co.uk

Yellow Arch Studios

30-36 Burton Road, Neepsend, Sheffield S3 8BX yellowarch.com

The Dukes at Lancaster Priory Lancaster LA1 1YZ dukeslancaster.org

Hull Truck 50 Ferensway, Hull HU2 8LB hulltruck.co.uk

Leigh Film Factory

4th Floor, Leigh Spinners Mill, Park Lane, Leigh WN7 2LA leighfilmfactory.com

Theatre Deli Cuthbert House, Arley Street, Sheffield, S2 4QP theatredeli.co.uk

Northern Silents is the trading name of No Dots Limited. Registered office: The Media Centre, Northumberland Street Huddersfield HD1 1RL. Company number: 12410203.

No Dots is supported with funding from the National Lottery by Arts Council England and Film Hub North on behalf of BFI’s Film Audience Network.