1940s
Feng, CBSO, Gražinytė-Tyla, Symphony Hall Birmingham review - pulling it out of the hatThursday, 18 January 2018
Say what you like about Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla’s partnership with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra – and plenty has already been written – but sometimes the facts speak for themselves. At the end of this midweek matinee concert, an... Read more... |
The Rake's Progress, Wilton's Music Hall review - mercurial Stravinsky made cumbersomeTuesday, 21 November 2017
If you're not going to mention the imaginative genius of Stravinsky, Auden and Kallman within the covers of your programme, and the only article, by the director, is titled "Acting Naturally", then the production had better deliver. That remarkable... Read more... |
Messiaen & Shostakovich, St John's Smith Square review - Osborne and Gerhardt anchor 1940s masterpiecesWednesday, 15 November 2017
Only connect. As the Southbank Centre's International Chamber Music Series at St John's showcased supreme eloquence in two searing but perfectly-proportioned meditations from the Second World War, over the road at Smith Square Europe House was... Read more... |
Professor Marston and the Wonderwomen review - Rebecca Hall to the rescueFriday, 10 November 2017
Wonder Woman was the film that defied all the predictions: a big-budget superhero movie directed by a woman which managed to please not only the feminists and their daughters but also the boys who love DC and Marvel. In its slipstream comes... Read more... |
Schubert Ensemble, Kings Place review - spot-on introductions, dazzling performancesFriday, 10 November 2017
To demonstrate what makes chamber masterpieces tick and then to play them, brilliantly, is a sequence which ought to happen more often. Perhaps too many musicians think their eloquence is confined to their instruments. Not violinist Simon Blendis... Read more... |
The Consul, Guildhall School review - blowsy melodrama rooted by committed studentsTuesday, 31 October 2017
Fancy that: the day after the last major Menotti staging I can remember in the UK, The Medium at the Edinburgh Festival, "splendid piece of post-Puccinian grand guignol" turned up in two different reviews (moral: don't discuss the performance with... Read more... |
Tove Jansson (1914-2001), Dulwich Picture Gallery review – more than MoominvalleyFriday, 27 October 2017
Born into an artistic Swedish-speaking household in Helsinki, Tove Jansson’s first, and most enduring, ambition was to be a painter. Although best known as the illustrator behind the creatures of Moominvalley, those plump white hippopotamus-like... Read more... |
Prom 61 review: Fleming, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Oramo - heliotropic ecstasiesThursday, 31 August 2017
No sunshine without shadows was one possible theme rippling through this diva sandwich of a Prom. Even Richard Strauss's chaste nymph Daphne, achieving longed-for metamorphosis as a tree, finds darkness among the roots; and though Renée "The... Read more... |
Proms 34 & 35 review: Oklahoma!, John Wilson Orchestra - music triumphs, words and drama sufferSaturday, 12 August 2017
Only one thing could equal the "wow!" factor of seeing and hearing a youngish Hugh Jackman launch into “Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin’“ at the start of the National Theatre’s 1998 staging of Oklahoma!: John Wilson and his orchestra trilling and... Read more... |
Man in an Orange Shirt, BBC Two review - soft-focus view of 1940s gay love affairTuesday, 01 August 2017
As chat-up lines go, “I can’t do my fly up single-handed” is pretty full on – even if it is true. Thomas March (James McArdle) is speaking to James Berryman (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), who not only went to the same public school but has also just saved... Read more... |
Buxton Festival review - early Verdi, earlier Mozart and refreshing BrittenMonday, 10 July 2017
“The subject is neither political nor religious; it is fantastical” wrote Verdi to the librettist Piave about his opera Macbeth. “The opera is not about the rise of a modern fascist: nor is it about political tyranny. It is a study in character”... Read more... |
Ariadne auf Naxos, Glyndebourne review – seriously compelling revivalTuesday, 27 June 2017
It’s often said that Ariadne auf Naxos is all about The Composer – not only Richard Strauss but an affectionate parody of his younger self – and Katharina Thoma takes this idea seriously in her Glyndebourne production. In the role, Angela Brower... Read more... |
