Schubert
East Neuk Festival 2016Friday, 08 July 2016
All the best festivals develop organically, with a guiding hand from the best directors. When I first came to the East Neuk Festival two years ago, on its 10th anniversary, it was already a special case, thriving on the spirit of place and including... Read more... |
theartsdesk in Reykjavík: Nocturnes for MidsummerSunday, 26 June 2016
After a grey start, there was a spectacular sunset around midnight on the second of my two days in Reykjavik. It's what brings one of Iceland's most brilliant younger-generation talents, pianist Víkingur Ólafsson (and yes, he's worked with Björk),... Read more... |
theartsdesk at the Istanbul Music Festival: classics alla TurcaSunday, 12 June 2016
Flashback to 1981, when the Bolshoy Ballet danced Swan Lake Act Two to a tinny Melodiya recording in Istanbul's Open-Air Theatre (seats were cheap for Interrailing students). Turkey was friends with the Soviet Union then. It hadn't been in the 1950s... Read more... |
The Dark Mirror: Zender's Winterreise, Barbican TheatreFriday, 13 May 2016
Elasticity is a surprisingly reliable test for great art. How far can you stretch, bend, or reshape a work before it loses its essence, its identity? Hamlet, The Well-Tempered Clavier, Antigone, Pride and Prejudice can all take almost anything... Read more... |
Schubert Lieder, Gerhaher, Huber, Wigmore HallFriday, 01 April 2016
In the Wigmore's Lieder prayer meetings, baritone Christian Gerhaher is the high priest. There are good reasons for this, but given that the innermost circle of Wigmore Friends pack out his concerts, you do feel that the slightest criticism might... Read more... |
Tsybuleva, Institut Français/TAM Estonia, St James PiccadillyMonday, 21 March 2016
Cherrypicking from 17 concerts to come up with the one by last year's Leeds International Piano Competition winner may seem a bit unfair to the French Institute's ever more ambitious annual It's All About Piano! Festival. It was hard, for instance,... Read more... |
Seong-Jin Cho, St John's Smith Square, LondonSaturday, 12 March 2016
It’s always heartening to see a full house for a debut recital, though when expectations run so high, the stakes for the pianist can be dangerously raised. No worries at St John’s Smith Square, though, for Seong-Jin Cho. The diminutive, young South... Read more... |
Classical CDs Weekly: Louis Aubert, Schubert, Claudio AbbadoSaturday, 27 February 2016
Louis Aubert: Sillages, Violin Sonata etc Jean-Pierre Armengard (piano), Alessandro Fagiuoli (violin), Olivier Chauzu (piano) (Grand Piano)Louis Aubert's piano work Sillages is ranked alongside Ravel's Gaspard in the sleeve notes to this disc, and... Read more... |
Classical CDs Weekly: Schubert, Rufus Wainwright, EIOSaturday, 28 November 2015
Schubert: Piano Music Steven Osborne (Hyperion)This is marvellous, an unexpected treat from a versatile pianist more commonly associated with 20th-century repertoire. Though Steven Osborne does have form in Schubert, having made a superb... Read more... |
Leonskaja 70th Birthday Concert, Wigmore HallMonday, 23 November 2015
It was a massive but never overbearing three-parter, a three-and-a-half hour celebration, a mini-festival of youth and experience. Wouldn’t we all want to mark a major birthday in the company of friends of all ages? Elisabeth Leonskaja, much-loved... Read more... |
theartsdesk Q&A: Soprano Elizabeth WattsSunday, 08 November 2015
Not many people write conspicuously brilliant tweets, but Elizabeth Watts is someone who does. Working on the most demanding aria on her stunning new CD of operatic numbers and cantatas by the lesser-known of the two Scarlattis, father Alessandro... Read more... |
Kovacevich, Argerich, Wigmore HallTuesday, 03 November 2015
“People think when a person becomes old, he has to become serene,” declared that great pianist Claudio Arrau in his mid-seventies. “That’s absurd. The expressive intensity is, I feel, much stronger, much more concentrated in my playing than years... Read more... |
