fri 07/02/2025

David Nice

David Nice's picture
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

Mahler's 'Resurrection' Symphony, Philharmonia, Hrůša, RFH review - big picture, stunning details

Read more...

La Cage aux Folles [The Play], Park Theatre review - half-cock farce

Read more...

Luisa Miller, English National Opera review - Verdi in translation makes a stylish comeback

Read more...

theartsdesk Q&A: soprano Elizabeth Llewellyn

Read more...

Lise Davidsen, James Baillieu, Barbican review - opulence and the promise of greatness

Read more...

Angelich, Aurora Orchestra, Collon, Kings Place review - warm embraces from good companions

Read more...

Beatrice Rana, Wigmore Hall review - fantasy and sonority writ large

Read more...

Garvey, Quatuor Zaïde, Classical Vauxhall review - vibrant chamber music for all

Read more...

Alice's Adventures Under Ground, Royal Opera review - a blast for children of all ages

Read more...

Siegfried, LPO, Jurowski, RFH review - an incandescent journey to the mountain top

Read more...

Persona, Riverside Studios review - Bergman masterpiece transformed into 'The Mumbling'

Read more...

Denis Kozhukhin, QEH review - lyric mastery and subtle elegance

Read more...

Shostakovich 24 Preludes and Fugues, Igor Levit, Barbican review - an eagle's-eye view

Read more...

Bach Sunday with the Suzukis, RAM / Appl, AAM, Milton Court review - father, son and Holy Ghost

Read more...

Watkins, Clayton, Philharmonia, Salonen, RFH review - a rainbow cornucopia

Read more...

Sukanya, RFH review - Ravi Shankar's bright-eyed, varied fable

Read more...

Pages

latest in today

Help to give theartsdesk a future!

It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.

It followed some...

Elektra, Duke of York's Theatre review - Brie Larson...

We live in tragic times given over to cataclysmic events that require outsized emotions in return. That may be one reason to account for the...

Widmann, LSO, Pappano, Barbican review - razor-sharp attack...

Perhaps all great music counterpoints and comments on the times, but Antonio Pappano and the London Symphony Orchestra have been searingly...

Bring Them Down review - ramming it home in the west of Irel...

“You know what they say: where there’s livestock, there’s dead stock,” says Jack (a brilliant Barry Keoghan). Never a truer word. There’s an awful...

Album: Rats on Rafts - Deep Below

Deep Below’s first track is titled “Hibernation.” “A winter breeze blows through my mind,” intones a colourless, dispirited male voice....

First Person: writer Lauren Mooney on bringing bodies togeth...

It started with a Guardian long-read. I’m ashamed to admit it since so many shows could say the same, but that was the beginning.

It was the...

The Marriage of Figaro, English National Opera review - long...

Who’s in and who’s not – on the secret, the joke, the relationship, the family, the club? That’s the fulcrum of Joe Hill-Gibbins’ ingeniously...

September 5 review - gripping real-life thriller

There’s a common understanding about journalists, especially ones at the top of their game, that they’re flying by the seat of their pants –...

Oedipus, Old Vic review - disappointing leads in a productio...

The opening scene of the Old Vic’s Oedipus is dominated by a giant backdrop of a skull-like face, eyes shut and rock-like. It...

Album: Hifi Sean & David McAlmont - Twilight

It was only six months ago that Hifi Sean and David McAlmont released their Daylight album. A fine disc of summery dance pop that was...