Last year was strange and upsetting for all of us, but for actor-musician Giles Terera, summer 2020 was particularly tough.

Black Matter
www.fane.co.uk

Last year was strange and upsetting for all of us, but for actor-musician Giles Terera, summer 2020 was particularly tough. The 44-year-old, who won a 2018 Olivier Award for his performance as Burr, assassin of the title character in Hamilton, was rehearsing Death of England: Delroy, a 90-minute monologue by Roy Williams and Clint Dyer, which had been ­chosen to reopen the National Theatre after the first lockdown, when sudden serious illness forced him to pull out. But, while recovering during the second lockdown, he worked on Black Matter, a song cycle about pandemic life in the Soho district of London where he lives.

Terera recently recorded the piece behind closed doors at Brasserie Zédel, a London cabaret venue, and the show is streaming from 24-31 March on the Fane website (fane.co.uk). Draped in a shawl over casual clothes, Terera stands with a guitar or sits at the piano for an hour of songs, each based around a particular capital character.

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