Matmos: Robert Ashley, TV Operas (Barbican, Manor Court, 23 October)

An unexpectedly lovely thing: some buoyant Midwestern metaphysical minimalism, expertly-performed. The operas themselves I found reassuring in the way that I find, say, the conclusion of Einstein on the Beach. It all might be a bit sappy, but I lived long enough in the Midwest to see a hardscrabble intelligence behind it. In this interpretation, the pieces really swung--I find the original a bit less purely enjoyable than this performance was. All credit to the performers.

Performed in London--in the densest part of the city, history-wise--this performance made me, very particularly, want to spend a year in Indianapolis, or somewhere else a bit more spare and Cartesian.