tue 05/08/2025

David Nice

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Bio
The classical music and opera editor of theartsdesk, David writes, lectures and broadcasts on music. A former music critic for The Guardian and The Sunday Correspondent, he has made regular appearances on BBC Radio 3, not least in the long-running series Building a Library. He has written short studies on Elgar, Richard Strauss, Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky and the history of opera, and is currently working on the second volume of his Prokofiev biography for Yale University Press. He runs two Zoom lecture series, Opera in Depth on Mondays and a symphonies course on Thursdays.

Articles By David Nice

Sheku Kanneh-Mason & Friends, Bold Tendencies review - intimate tenderness under a car-park roof

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Prom 59, The Dream of Gerontius, Clayton, Barton, Platt, LPO, Gardner review - most sure in all its ways

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Patience, Charles Court Opera, Wilton's Music Hall review - bar room bliss

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Duval, Isserlis, Beatson, Fidelio Cafe review - in seventh heaven with the greats

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Prom 42, Lisiecki, BBC Scottish SO, Dausgaard review - concerto partnership made in heaven

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theartsdesk at the Kilkenny Arts Festival 2022 - a safe space to reflect on horrors

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Prom 39, Hartwig, BBCSO, Oramo review - bright and breezy followed by a curate's egg

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La Voix humaine/Les Mamelles de Tirésias, Glyndebourne review - phantasmagorical wonders

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Prom 35, Wang, Oslo Philharmonic, Mäkelä review - crystalline fantasy and levitational brilliance

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theartsdesk at the Pärnu Music Festival 2022 - conductors from 15 to 85, and the greatest players

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Prom 2, Walker, Sinfonia of London, Wilson review - sensuousness and subtlety in excelsis

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Prom 1, Verdi's Requiem, BBCSO, Oramo review - introspective sorrow and consolation between the blazes

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theartsdesk at the Ravenna Festival 2022 - body and soul in perfect balance

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The Turn of the Screw, Garsington Opera review - terrors and tragedy

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theartsdesk at the East Neuk Festival 2022 - on Cloud Nine for five days of the greatest music-making

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Così fan tutte, Royal Opera review - vibrant youth and vocal beauty

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Oslo Stories Trilogy: Dreams review - love lessons

Rising temperatures, prickling skin, longing’s all-consuming ache: first love’s swooning symptoms overtake 17-year-old Johanne (Ella Øverbye) in...

Káťa Kabanová, Glyndebourne review - emotional concentration...

Even more perhaps than straight theatre, opera seems to draw attention to the meaning behind what may on the face of it appear a simple story....

The Count of Monte Cristo, U&Drama review - silly telly...

Alexandre Dumas’ novel has been filmed an immeasurable number of times (there was a new French version only last year) and...

theartsdesk Q&A: filmmaker Dag Johan Haugerud on sex, lo...

"First love is always both terrible and wonderful at the same time", says the 60-year-Norwegian dramatist-novelist-director...

Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews: Lost Lear / Consumed

Lost Lear, Traverse Theatre ...

Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews - Alison Spittle / Christopher...

Alison Spittle, Monkey Barrel ★★★

Alison Spittle is fat, she tells us at the top of the show. But not as...

Blu-ray: Two Way Stretch / Heavens Above

The years between 1955’s The Ladykillers and 1964’s Dr Strangelove were the years of what Sanjeev Bhaskar recently described as...

Make It Happen, Edinburgh International Festival 2025 review...

You could distinctly hear the murmurs of recognition from the Edinburgh audience – responding to knowing mentions of the city’s Leith and...

Folkestone Triennial 2025 - landscape, seascape, art lovers...

A rare cloud form envelopes the headland and to the east and the west Folkestone is cut off from the known world. This mist shortens...