Classical music
Bernard Hughes
The fourth Prom of this season featured only two contrasting pieces, pitching the unabashed joyfulness and good humour of Lindberg’s Clarinet Concerto against the angst and defiance of Shostakovich’s “Leningrad” Symphony. It was the former that left the greater impression.Lindberg’s concerto was written in 2002 for his friend and long-time collaborator Kari Kriikku, who has performed the piece widely, including at the Proms in 2007. But here it was taken on by the British clarinettist Mark Simpson, who combines performing with a glittering composing career. It is ferociously difficult – Read more ...
David Nice
Light-filled Cadogan Hall is hosting the most fascinatingly programmed concerts in a Proms season not otherwise conspicuous for its adventurousness. There's also an honourable pledge to premiere at least one new work by a female composer in each event, honouring the centenary of votes for women. Guarantee of quality in this rich starter was the experience of several East Neuk Festivals up in Scotland, where the Californian Calidore Quartet blazed a path with the six Mendelssohn quartets and the younger Castalian Quartet, already their equals, introduced many of us to the metamorphic music of Read more ...
David Nice
How do you go about co-ordinating a spectacular like this, the first ever BBC Young Musicians' Prom? With 23 brilliant soloists from clarinettist Michael Collins, not even the winner of the first event 40 years ago, to 16-year-old Lauren Zhang, who stunned us all with her fleet interpretation of Prokofiev's monster Second Piano Concerto this year, commissions or reworkings dealing with batches were the best idea. And all of them worked superbly. It was only towards the end that the idea of giving the spotlight purely to the wonderful young conductor Andrew Gourlay and a BBC Concert Orchestra Read more ...
Gavin Dixon
The First Night of the Proms is always a tricky one to programme, bringing together themes of the season, perhaps a new work and, most importantly, a grand finale. This year’s Prom No. 1 ticked all the boxes, and without feeling like pick-n-mix. It was an all-British programme, with Vaughan Williams and Holst in the first half, both excellent choices given conductor Sakari Oramo’s track record with this repertoire, and a second half devoted to a new work by Anna Meredith, bringing some grandeur to the occasion, not least with its spectacular light show.But before all that, a hastily added Read more ...
graham.rickson
Mozart: Piano Concertos nos 12 and 13, Double Concerto in Eb Marie-Pierre Langlamet and Joan Rafaelle Kim (harps), Varian Fry Quartet (Indésens)Mozart himself adapted three of his piano concertos for soloist and string quartet. Here, two of them are played by French harpist (and Berlin Philharmonic principal) Marie-Pierre Langlamet. The harp's lighter, cleaner sound means there’s no danger of it overwhelming the strings, and the results are delicious. Langlamet is exceptionally good, and she's smartly accompanied by the Varian Fry Quartet, its players also drawn from the BPO. Mozart doesn’t Read more ...
theartsdesk
Let's be honest, this is the least interesting Proms season on paper for years, at least in terms of adventurous repertoire choices, following on the heels of the best in 2017. Yet in statistical terms it's more comprehensive and multi-media-friendly than ever, starting tonight with a free "Curtain Raiser" performance before the official First Night tomorrow - see David Kettle's choice below – and ending some 75 main Proms and 11 smaller-scale beauties later on 8 September. All are broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and many televised.The conscious spotlighting of women composers, who have in fact Read more ...
James Gilchrist
Debussy is having a good year. It is wonderful to see such wide and varied celebrations of his life and work, and to let the century since his death bear witness to the huge influence he has had on writers in every field of music.Of course, no one can claim to know every field of music. All of us know what we know, and tend to become more proficient and knowledgeable in an area of music that narrows over time. We find where our skill-set fits, what we’re good at. This is certainly true of me: over my working life I’ve found niches in the musical world where I seem to feel comfortable, and ( Read more ...
David Benedict
They started as they meant to go on. Randall Thompson’s lush, consoling six-minute Alleluia, written in 1940, couldn’t be a better opener for Tenebrae, one of this country’s finest, most musically alert and expressive vocal ensembles. Technically, the piece is undemanding so a successful performance of it rests entirely upon expressive control.Their conductor and music director Nigel Short sculpted the sound of his 20 singers to produce gently overlapping waves of the single-word text, ideally phrased with individual and overarching rises and falls. Clean-toned, gleaming soprano lines, Read more ...
graham.rickson
Handel: Sonatas for Violin and Basso Continuo The Brook Street Band (Avie)A slimmed-down Brook Street Band give us nine of Handel's violin sonatas on this disc. Autograph manuscripts only survive for five of them, but the other four sound sufficiently Handelian to have convinced many musicians, despite some scholarly niggles. These performances are winning, the playing fizzing with energy. Violinist Rachel Harris’s bright, clear sound is a consistent pleasure, and she's given fullsome, bubbly support by Tatty Theo and Carolyn Gibley on baroque cello and harpsichord respectively. Handel's Read more ...
David Nice
There is a tide in the best-planned festivals that comes in and out almost imperceptibly, bringing with it changes as the days move on. Put it down to the kind of perfect planning that discards any one rigid theme, and to forging long-term links with performers who don't just pop in for one concert. That in this case has been the work of East Neuk Festival mastermind Svend-Einar McEwan-Brown, who not only ensures artists of a uniquely high quality over the years, but also introduces themes and mini-residencies with impressive subtlety.In the two and a half days I was there this year, Bach, Read more ...
David Kettle
With – unusually – no visiting orchestra at this year’s St Magnus International Festival in far-flung Orkney (the fall-out from delayed funding confirmations, we’re assured), there was a danger that the annual midsummer event might have felt a little – well, quiet.Not a bit of it. In fact, if anything, this year’s festival felt more densely packed than ever – perhaps with events that were smaller in scale, admittedly, but they were no less ambitious and captivating for that. Famously founded by Orkney’s most famous musical resident – Peter Maxwell Davies, who died two years ago – all of 42 Read more ...
graham.rickson
Streya: New works for solo violin and violin with electronics Olivia De Prato (violin) (New Focus Recordings)Combining acoustic instruments with electronics is a dark art, and tantalisingly few details about the process are revealed in the sleeve notes to violinist Olivia De Prato’s recital disc. Are the electronics taped or generated live? How is De Prato experiencing them? And how are the sounds notated, if at all? We're not told. Three electro-acoustic pieces are included here. Most immediate is Missy Mazzoli’s Vespers for Violin, a deep, warm bath of sound which sets solo violin Read more ...