Wigmore Hall
Spence, Perez, Richardson, Wigmore Hall review - a Shakespearean journey in songMonday, 30 December 2024“O stay and hear,” sings Twelfth Night’s jester Feste in his song “O mistress mine”, “your true love’s coming,/ That can sing both high and low.” And loud and soft, earthbound and airborne, Heldentenor-grave and night-club frivolous: Nicky Spence’s... Read more... |
The English Concert, Bicket, Wigmore Hall review - a Baroque banquet for ChristmasMonday, 23 December 2024Enough is as good as a feast, they say. But sometimes, especially at Christmas, you crave a properly groaning table. At the Wigmore Hall, The English Concert, directed by Harry Bicket, concluded their festive Baroque banquet with Bach’s Magnificat... Read more... |
Rajakesar, Selaocoe, The Hermes Experiment, Wigmore Hall review - a joyful, fascinating laboratory of noiseMonday, 25 November 2024There were points when this concert felt like the musical equivalent of watching the atom split – as well as notes there were animal shrieks, sinister rattles, sibilant serpentine sussurations, and primal throaty rumbles. Indian-American composer... Read more... |
La Serenissima, Wigmore Hall review - an Italian menu to savourTuesday, 19 November 2024For 30 years, La Serenissima have re-mapped the landscape of the Italian Baroque repertoire so that its towering figures, notably Vivaldi, no longer look like isolated peaks but integrated parts of a spectacular range. The ensemble founded by... Read more... |
Roman Rabinovich, Wigmore Hall review - full tone in four stylesTuesday, 19 November 2024Is this the same Roman Rabinovich who drew harp-like delicacy from one of Chopin’s Pleyel pianos, and seeming authenticity from a 1790s grand which may have belonged to Haydn, both in the Cobbe Collection at Hatchlands, Surrey? He clearly cares... Read more... |
Fauré Centenary Concert 5, Wigmore Hall review - a final flightWednesday, 06 November 2024As Steven Isserlis announced just before the final work, in more senses than one, of a five-day revelation, the 79 year old Fauré’s last letter told his wife that “at the moment I am well, very well, despite the little bout of fatigue which is... Read more... |
Fauré Centenary Concert 1, Wigmore Hall review - Isserlis and friends soarMonday, 04 November 2024Earlier this year, Steven Isserlis curated a revelatory Sheffield Chamber Music Festival spotlighting Saint-Saëns, with plentiful Fauré towards the end. Now it’s the younger composer’s turn, marking his death 100 years ago on 4 November 1924, but... Read more... |
'His ideal worlds embraced me with their light and love': violinist Irène Duval on the music of FauréSaturday, 02 November 2024"I always enjoy seeing sunlight play on the rocks, the water, the trees and plains. What variety of effects, what brilliance and what softness... I wish my music could show as much diversity." Gabriel Fauré, who wrote those words and is indisputably... Read more... |
Aci, Galatea e Polifemo, La Nuova Musica, Bates, Wigmore Hall review - thrilling Handel at full throttleSaturday, 02 November 2024Last time I saw the lovelorn Cyclops from Handel’s richly turbulent cantata, Aci, Galatea e Polifemo, he was in a warehouse at Trinity Buoy Wharf earlier this year, posturing moodily as an Italian film director. The London Handel Festival’s... Read more... |
Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective, Wigmore Hall review - warm and colourful Bartók and BrahmsSaturday, 19 October 2024Last Monday my colleague Boyd Tonkin was delighted by the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective’s playing at Hatfield House – and on Thursday it was my turn to be impressed by their colourful Wigmore Hall recital, which featured the marvellous... Read more... |
Christian Gerhaher, Gerold Huber, Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford review - an unforgettable recitalFriday, 18 October 2024Christian Gerhaher, the most compelling and complete interpreter of German Lieder of our time, makes no secret of the fact that – unlike his devotion to, say, Schumann – his relationship with the songs of Brahms has never been comfortable.In a... Read more... |
Elisabeth Leonskaja, Wigmore Hall review - a universe of sound and emotion in Schubert’s last three sonatasMonday, 30 September 2024Wonders never ceased in Elisabeth Leonskaja’s return to the Wigmore Hall. Not only did she play Schubert’s last three sonatas with all repeats and the full range of a unique power undiminished in a 78-year old alongside a never too overstated pathos... Read more... |
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