Classical Reviews
Pioro, Julien-Laferrière, BBC Philharmonic, Schwarz, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - joy on a Saturday nightMonday, 14 November 2022
This was at first sight a somewhat ordinary looking programme for the BBC Philharmonic: Beethoven, Brahms … even Stravinsky doesn’t frighten a Saturday night audience in Manchester these days. Read more... |
Ott, LSO, Stutzmann, Barbican review - highways to hell (and back)Friday, 11 November 2022
In a Renaissance artist’s studio, a wannabe master proved his skill by drawing a perfect circle. Perhaps playing Beethoven’s A minor Bagatelle (aka “Für Elise”) as an encore should count as the pianist’s equivalent. At the Barbican last night, Alice Sara Ott did just that with the ubiquitous ring-tone earworm. Read more... |
Kavakos, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Harding, Barbican review - elegance without poiseSaturday, 05 November 2022
The Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam began their two-concert visit to the Barbican with a crowd-pleasing programme: Brahms and Beethoven. We are used to hearing the pinpoint precision and transparent textures of the London Symphony Orchestra from the Barbican stage, but the Concertgebouw has a different sound. Read more... |
The Hermes Experiment, Purcell Room review - familiar objects, unfamiliar soundsSaturday, 05 November 2022
The Hermes Experiment are the cool kids of the contemporary music school, who have brought a "build-your-own-repertoire" approach to generating music for their unique combination of soprano, clarinet, harp and double bass. As their name would suggest, they are firmly in the experimental tradition, using improvisation, extended techniques and graphic scores. Read more... |
Britten Weekend, Snape review - diverse songs to mostly great poetry overshadow a problem operaTuesday, 01 November 2022
In usual circumstances, a fully staged opera and every voice-and-piano song-cycle by a single genius in one weekend would be an embarrassment of riches. The only problem about Britten hitting the heights, above all in setting toweringly great poetry by Auden, Blake, Donne and Hölderlin, at the top of a long list, meant one sitting and squirming at most of Ronald Duncan’s wretched lines for an opera which even in its very subject is problematic, The Rape of Lucretia. Read more... |
An Anatomy of Melancholy, Barbican Pit review - stunning journey into an Elizabethan heart of darknessTuesday, 01 November 2022
We enter the Barbican Pit as if visiting an apothecary. On the walls of the passage approaching it there are scientific diagrams and documents, while the stage itself is set up with glass cases filled with different potions and experiments. Read more... |
Australian Chamber Orchestra, Tognetti, Milton Court review - from Beethoven to didgeridooFriday, 28 October 2022
I’ve not heard a didgeridoo in concert before so was grateful to the Australian Chamber Orchestra for giving me the opportunity, as part of a busy programme at Milton Court last night. Read more... |
Orfeo ed Euridice, Opera North review - more than a concertThursday, 27 October 2022
Though billed as a “concert performance”, this was really much more than that. With the resources of their own theatre, Opera North’s team present a staging that employs a big, built-up and raked floor, with a simple platform in the centre and a starry-night black back-cloth, and their principals and chorus move and act in simple but effective style. Read more... |
Mulroy, Aurora Orchestra, Kings Place review - old and new worlds of songTuesday, 25 October 2022
You invariably come away from an Aurora Orchestra concert with ears refreshed and mind revived. As a storm swept across London on Sunday, the audience at Kings Place enjoyed their own cleansing wind in the form of this genre-spanning gig in the “Voices Unwrapped” season, led by tenor Nicholas Mulroy. It took us all the way from Baroque Europe to the socially-committed “new song” movements of modern Latin America. Read more... |
Path of Miracles, Tenebrae, Short, St Martin-in-the-Fields review - a modern choral classicFriday, 21 October 2022
This is the third time I’ve heard Path of Miracles live this year and I’d happily hear it another three times before Christmas. I reviewed the amateur Elysian Singers sing it in February, and the BBC Singers took it on for the first time in May – but last night’s triumphant version by Tenebrae was surely the best of the lot. Read more... |
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