Out to Lunch Arts Festival, 2-27 January 2013

As we head towards Christmas, time has run out for online deliveries and soon the high street shops will be shutting too. But it’s not too late to buy someone you love a ticket for the Out To Lunch Arts Festival hosted in the Black Box in the New Year. The baby sister of the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival warms the hearts of many of us each January with drama, music and talk. Tickets for weekday lunchtime events include a hot lunch.

Treats that I’ve noticed in the programme include:

Thu 3 Jan at 1pm, Niamh McGlinchey – The Gulladuff vocalist plays mandolin, tin whistle and guitar. Her début mini-album Rainbow Days launched recently.

Sat 5 Jan at 2pm, Zoë Conway & John McIntyre – An incredible pair merging fiddle and guitar. Based on previous performances at OTL and CQAF, not to be missed. This is the Belfast launch of their new album Go Mairir I bhFad – Long Life to You, with pieces commissioned from twelve leading Irish composers (Liz Carroll, Máirtín O’Connor, Steve Cooney, Frankie Gavin, Andy Irvine, Charlie Lennon, Donal Lunny, Tommy Peoples, Peadar O Riada, Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin, Niall Vallely and Bill Whelan).

Tue 8 Jan at 1pm and 8pm, The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs – Original play by Australian Skewiff Theatre Company.

Fri 11 Jan at 1pm, One Rogue Reporter – Rich Peppiatt dissects his former trade and uses tabloid techniques against the tabloids themselves. Sold out at the Edinburgh Fringe.

Tue 15 Jan at 1pm and 8pm, A Thousand Kisses Deep – Award-winning vocalist Christine Tobin presents poetry and song celebrating the words and music of Leonard Cohen, alongside Phil Robson (guitar) and Dave Whitford (double bass).

Thu 17 Jan at 1pm, Lennon v McCartney & John Lennon’s Last Day – Two short plays by Stephen Kennedy. A two hander to definitively sort out the pub argument of which Beatle was greater; and a look at the “strange and tragic events of John Lennon’s last day”.

Sat 19 Jan at 9pm, The Dublin Afrobeat Ensemble – A “twelve piece musical force” rooted in Dublin but drawn from across the world with a “mesmerising flow of extended grooves, Afrobeat originals and covers”.

Sun 20 Jan at 2pm, Four Men and a Dog – Irish trad, Southern rock, rap, jazz, blues, swing and even salsa.

Sun 20 Jan at 8pm, Lucy Porter ‘People Person’ – A regular performer at OTL and CQAF, her new show promises a “feel-good night of comedy” based around a “fascinating true story with a stunning twist in the tale”.

Tue 22 Jan at 1pm, Opera For Lunch (or Sex, Subterfuge and Snuff!) – NI Opera are back with three vocalists and lots of treats from beneath the refined veneer of eighteenth century opera.

Wed 23 Jan at 1pm, The Steve Experiment – Local Northern Irish self-taught guitarist Stephen Catherwood has a reputation for his inventive live performances.

And lots, lots more …