East meets West

Narrative, live music and contemporary dance make up the ingredients of South, the Vayu Naidu Company’s mythical, time-zone hopping exploration of life in a multicultural society. Find out how the story unfolds when “as the needle points south, our three strangers are stranded in the light of the ripening sun”.

The first performance will be at the Gulbenkian Theatre, Canterbury, on May 1, followed by an extensive tour taking in cities from London to Birmingham, and unusual venues from Ludlow to Grassington in Yorkshire.

Tour details: www. vayunaiducompany.org.

Inside a spectacle

Tattoo is the latest work from IOU, a company that likes a challenge. This one is designed for “unusual spaces”, and, to prove that, opens this evening in Eureka! car park, Discovery Road, Halifax. The 40-minute show promises to “engulf anyone watching it as towering machines spout wet wobbly eggs” against an enveloping ambient soundscape. Watch out for precarious glasshouses and insect-like troopers in “a multi-sensory experience that affects, fascinates and engrosses” while it provides audience members with “proximity to the weird characters”. Experience it in Falkirk, Brighton, Bradford, Liverpool, Woolwich and Stockton-on-Tees. For tour information: www.ioutheatre.org.

Latin rhythms

London’s Latin Music Festival La Linea still has some treats for salseros and lovers of Spanish rock. On May 2, Aterciopelados from Colombia make their UK debut. Time magazine has described them as “one of the 10 best bands on planet Earth”. Spanish Harlem Orchestra + Motimba will perform salsa tomorrow evening, and Alejandro Escoveda brings celebrations to a close on May 5. Tickets: 020 7960 4242; www.rfh.org.uk.

Chekhovian tales

To run alongside its production of The Seagull, the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester presents an unusual post-Chekhov piece. Ward 6 interweaves some of the 400 stories written by the great playwright. His favourite themes - thwarted love, mortality and impending revolution - will be expressed by characters such as a visionary student, a struggling doctor and an aged professor. More surprisingly, there will also be “a shape-shifting female presence guided by a lone jazz player”. Until May 9.

Tickets: 0161 833 9833.

Screen art

The National Film Theatre in London has begun a monthly series under the title Artists’ Film and Video Season. On May 20, Michael Curran will present a celebration of his work featuring video pieces, but focusing on his 60-minute film Love in a Cold Climate, based on The Snow Queen. Similar evenings will feature Graham Gussin (June 24) and Breda Beban (July 22).

Tickets: 020 7928 3232.

Sounds of Australasia

Queen’s University, Belfast, plays host to antipodean music in its 2003 Sonorities Festival of contemporary music. Its title, You Hit Him He Cry Out is pidgin for piano, and it is New Zealand pianist Dan Poynton who opens proceedings on April 29. Other artists include the ensemble Lontano playing work by composers from New Zealand and Northern Ireland, percussionist Neil Foster and classical guitarist Alan Banks playing music by Australian composers. Tickets: 02890 245133.

Asian Stafford

Anyone who missed the hilarious stage and film versions of Ayub Khan-Din’s multicultural family comedy, East is East, could do worse than set out for the New Vic Theatre in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, where it will be revived from May 9-31. Tickets: 01782 717962.