Classical music
Simon Thompson
There’s a Korean strain to the Edinburgh International Festival’s programme this year, more in the drama programme than in the music one, but it came to the Usher Hall in Friday night’s concert from the KBS Symphony Orchestra (★★★★). They play a similar role in Korea to what the BBC Orchestras do in the UK (KBS stands for Korean Broadcasting System) and if this concert is anything to go by then they’re a jolly impressive bunch of musicians.Their overall sound was full of confidence, with a golden glow to the brass and a bright sheen to the strings. That came in very useful in illuminating the Read more ...
Boyd Tonkin
“Very traditional, but fun,” ran the verdict of one fellow-traveller as we waited for a bus outside the Royal Albert Hall on Saturday night. No one can gainsay the infectious fun that the Budapest Festival Orchestra bring to every gig. For all its musical accomplishment, Iván Fischer’s all-singing (yes, they did) if not quite all-dancing (yet) outfit never forget that they belong to a, rather elevated, branch of show business.As for the “traditional” tag, I might beg to differ. True, for their first Prom (out of three this year) they delivered a triple-decker stack of mainstream Romantic Read more ...
Simon Thompson
You’d feel short-changed if an orchestra like the Budapest Festival Orchestra came to the Edinburgh Festival and didn’t play some Hungarian music, so why not put together a whole concert of the stuff? The musicians of the BFO are fiercely proud of their Hungarian heritage, and do a lot of work in local communities, so in many senses they are natural heirs to the heritage of Bartók and Kodály, which made them perfect composers for the middle night of their Edinburgh International Festival residency (★★★★★).And, oh, how naturally they play them! They were joined for Bartók’s Third Piano Read more ...
Simon Thompson
It’s an everyday story of festival folk. The festival’s Queen’s Hall concert on Wednesday morning was meant to be a song recital from Günther Groissböck, but he cancelled at (I’m told very) short notice due to illness and the festival team had to scrabble around to find a replacement pronto.Luckily, Edinburgh hosts several good singers at this time of year, not least thanks to the fact that the Scottish Chamber Orchestra are rehearsing The Magic Flute for this weekend. Step forward Turkish tenor Ilker Arcayürek, who will sing Tamino on Saturday. He stepped into the breach to sing alongside Read more ...
Simon Thompson
And we’re off! This concert marked the beginning not just of the 2023 Edinburgh International Festival but, perhaps more importantly, of Nicola Benedetti’s tenure in charge as the EIF’s Director. She came onstage for a chat before a note of music was played. Part of her mission as director appears to be to make the arts more accessible, and if her introductory chat wasn’t much more than a gentle hello then it still did the job. Any aim to demystify classical music has to be welcomed.That brief seems to have been passed on to violinist Stefan Jackiw, the artist around whom this programme Read more ...
David Nice
Programming works from the same decade – in this case the 1940s – can reveal fascinating contrasts: what an impressive gulf, for instance, between two masterpieces by Hindemith and Strauss in this first half, and what sensitivity to very different styles from the NYOGB under Carlos Miguel Prieto. Be careful what you choose as the big symphony, though. I’d always had my doubts about Copland’s Third, and though it couldn’t have been more compellingly lit and shaped, it paled by comparison.Let’s get the elephant in the Royal Albert Hall room out first, for in every other respect, encores rich in Read more ...
David Nice
Circumstances matter here. The annual visit to what remains my favourite music festival in the world was going to be kyboshed by the date fixed for a big hospital operation. But the Pärnu Music Festival worked overtime to get me rebooked to the first slice of the 10 days, while my Macmillan nurse fixed up five crucial meetings and tests on the two days before my new departure date. I went, came back the evening before the 12-hour op and still can’t believe it all happened.That also shifted my usual expectations: I like to go for the big chamber concert featuring the world-class musicians of Read more ...
Bernard Hughes
Yuja Wang and Klaus Mäkelä, two of the classical world’s biggest hitters, have recently united to make that even more powerful item, the “power couple”. But much as they are both photogenic and charismatic, their reputations are also based on musical excellence, as was on display at last night’s sizzling Prom.But far from wallowing in romantic excess, they gave a reading of Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini that was refreshingly no-nonsense in its approach, nimble, mercurial and the opposite of self-indulgent.Wang’s playing had momentum from its very opening, which never sat back Read more ...
Bernard Hughes
It is a complicated business running a summer school for 170 people in the British countryside. Not only laying on a stimulating programme of musical events, providing pastoral care for the under-18s and interval drinks for the over-18s, but more basic needs. As I arrived and was greeted by Voces8 Foundation CEO Paul Smith he was grappling with the news that a tree had come down on a nearby power line and there was likely to be no power to the site for 5 hours. This was a challenge both for the provision of lunch but also for the supply of electricity to the church so the organ could be used Read more ...
graham.rickson
Otto Klemperer: The Warner Classics Remastered Edition (Warner Classics)The young Otto Klemperer’s conducting career was encouraged by no less than Gustav Mahler, Klemperer’s meteoric rise leading him to become director of Berlin’s Kroll Opera from 1927 to 1931. The first two CDs in this set comprise recordings made during his tenure there; dim mono sound aside, these fiery readings of Wagner, Brahms and Strauss defy their age. The following decades saw the conductor faced with exile in Los Angeles and range of physical and personal catastrophes, including brief imprisonment. Do listen Read more ...
graham.rickson
May 2021 should have seen the appearance on Netflix of a new restoration of Abel Gance’s silent epic Napoleon, lasting nearly seven hours and timed to coincide with the 200th anniversary of Napoleon’s death. The release was delayed, but, in anticipation, theartsdesk spoke to the composer and conductor Carl Davis, who has died aged 86. Davis’s soundtrack for the groundbreaking 1980 screening of the film, assembled by historian Kevin Brownlow, brought him international acclaim, though his career scoring silent films had started several years earlier.GRAHAM RICKSON: I became aware of your name Read more ...
Bernard Hughes
It stunned me to discover that last night was only the sixth time Carmina Burana had been heard at the Proms. It seems tailor-made for the festival: large-scale and bombastic in a way that fits the proportions of the Albert Hall, familiar to occasional concert-goers but with much more to it than the "famous bit". And in this performance the CBSO and an array of choirs went at it with gusto, raising the audience to its feet at the end. Carmina Burana may be an utterly manipulative piece – knowing the buttons to press and pressing them shamelessly – but it is a pleasure sometimes to be Read more ...