APFTIL

A monthly selection of forthcoming events recommended by The Spectator's regular critics.

POP MUSIC

Duran Duran, London Arena, 22 April. 1 look forward to seeing this latest hi-tech rock venue, but Simon le Bon's enormous wobbling buttocks are a less enticing proposition.

Frank Sinatra's Farewell Concerts with Liza Minnelli and Sammy Davis Jr, Albert Hall, 18-22 April. Frank bows out for the 389th time. Audience members are advised to leave the specially imported bouncers well alone.

Marcus Berkmann

GARDENS

Acres of privately-owned town gardens on the north bank of the Water of Leith will be open to visitors in aid of Scotland's Gardens Scheme on Sunday 9 April, 2-6 Pan.

Water, in the shape of the infant river lichen, flows through the three-acre landscape garden at Cheriton Cottage, Cheriton, three miles south of Alresford in Hampshire, open 2-5 p.m. on 9 April. Ursula Buchan

SALE-ROOMS

Impressionists from the British Rail Pension Fund, at Sotheby's on the 4th. Manet, Monet, Van Gogh, Renoir's pastel of Cezanne, etc. Now we should at last be able to calculate how well the investment has performed.

Vintage cars at Donington Castle, Derbyshire, on the 3rd and at Stratford-upon-Avon Motor Museum on the 4th. Leica and Zeiss cameras at Christie's South Kensington on the 6th.

Peter Watson

EXHIBITIONS

Ruskin & the English Watercolour: from Turner to the Pre- Raphaelites, Whitworth, Manchester, from 7 April. Lengthy title describes show accurately.

Walter Richard Sicked/ Minimalism, Tate Gallery, Liverpool. Contrasting double bill at far-flung cultural outpost. Worth seeing for Sickert alone.

Dame Laura Knight (1877-1970), Castle Museum, Nottingham, from 8 April. The kind of 20th-century artist your child cannot emulate.

New Italian Art, Riverside Studios, Hammersmith, W6. Lively show for any undeterred by latter half of current Italian spectacular at Royal Academy. Giles Auty

DANCE

Rambert Dance Company, Sadlers Wells (278 8916). The season continues until 15 April with premieres of new works by Richard Alston, Trisha Brown, Siobhan Davies and Ashley Page.

April in Paris, The Place, Dukes Road, Euston (387 0031), 10-30 April. A festival of contemporary French choreography featuring the work of such leading avant-garde choreographers as Claud Brumachon, Joseph Nadj, Herve Jourdet. The season finishes with performances by Odile Duboc at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, 29-30 April. Deirdre McMahon

CRAFTS

Royal Treasures of Sweden 1550- 1700, Royal Academy of Arts, till 18 June. Salt cellar designed by Rubens, lovely jewellery associated with Queen Christina, ceremonial armour, good catalogue.

Vase painted in 'Persian' colours, by William de Morgan William de Morgan, V & A, till 18 June. The definitive exhibition of pottery, tiles and associated drawings by this great Victorian designer.

Robin Tanner Remembered: Etcher and Teacher 1904-1988, Crafts Study Centre, Holburne Museum, Bath, till 14 May. Neo-Romantic etcher, collector and pioneer educationalist.

The Minor Arts of China IV, Spink & Son Ltd, King Street, St James, 4-21 April. Lacquer, glass, hardstone carving, wood, amber, shell, illustrative of Chinese skill and Western influences.

Tanya Harrod

CINEMA

Working Girl (15). Melanie Griffith is a typist who wants to get ahead on Wall Street; Sigourney Weaver is her role model and Harrison Ford her lover in Mike Nichols's romantic comedy.

Camille Claudel (15). Isabelle Adjani and Gerard Depardieu (who else'?) in the story of Rodin and his mistress-pupil. They like it in France.

Patty Hearst (18). Paul Schrader tries to make sense of one of the Seventies' most bewildering news stories; Natasha Richardson plays the heiress turned bank-robber.

Pelle the Conqueror (15). An award-winning performance by Max Von Sydow as a farmhand who at the turn of the century takes his small son from Sweden to Denmark to find work.

Hilary Mantel

OPERA

Eugene Onegin, Coliseum (836 3161), 12 April. Mark Elder conducts the ENO's first showing of Tchaikovsky's opera since the old days at the Wells, in a new production by Graham Vick designed by Sally Jacobs.

Medee, Queen Elizabeth Hall (928- 8800). Cherubini's opera as he wrote it (i.e. in French, with dialogue and without Lachner's irrelevant recitatives) in a concert performance by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment conducted by Gabriele Ferro.

La traviata, Theatre Royal, Glasgow (331 1234), 25 April. Nancy Gustafson sings the title role in Nuria Espert's new production for Scottish Opera, conducted by John Mauceri. Rodney Milnes

MUSIC

The London Symphony Orchestra are running a series of three concerts entitled The Art of ltzhak Perlman in the Royal Festival Hall on 24, 27 and 28 April, featuring great violin concerti, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas.

The Wigmore Hall is staging a distinguished series of song recitals: John Aler on the 4th; Thomas Hampson with Geoffrey Parsons on the 9th; Victoria de los Angeles on the 11th (again with Parsons) and 14th; Anne Sofie von Otter on the 27th.

Devotees of Victor Berge will wish to hear him again at the Barbican on 8 April. Peter Phillips

THEATRE

The Plantagenets, Barbican (638 4141). Transfer from Stratford of the RSC trilogy based on Henry VI and Richard Ice Cream, Royal Court (730 1745). New short thriller by Caryl Churchill. Beneath the strong story line is a study of modern xenophobia.

The Black Prince, Aldwych (836 6404). Stage adaptation by Iris Murdoch of her own novel, part intellectual thriller, part farcical comedy. Opens 25 April.

The March on Russia, Lyttelton (928 2252). New David Storey play about retired miner watching the changing world of his wife and grown-up children. Design by Jocelyn Herbert, music by Alan Price, direction by Lindsay Anderson. Christopher Edwards