Classical Features
First Person: conductor Johannes Vogel on Beethoven’s Ninth as re-orchestrated by MahlerThursday, 17 December 2020
Think of the finale at a big fireworks show: the anticipation; the build up. There is nothing bigger than the Ninth Symphony. It is the climax of this year’s Beethoven celebrations. Read more... |
Not-quite-solitude on the 34th floor: violinist Maxine Kwok on the short film 'Rising'Thursday, 03 December 2020
2020: a year that at some point felt like the end of live performance for the world of the performing arts, certainly for the foreseeable future. Artists spent months without any form of collaboration, leading to a serious lack of motivation due to the decimation of performance opportunities. Read more... |
First Person: Avi Avital on 'Art of the Mandolin'Saturday, 28 November 2020
The mandolin is an instrument everybody has heard of without necessarily knowing much about it. Its history has been written by lovers of the instrument, often amateur players who are drawn to its approachable and appealing character, integrating it into their own lives, and in turn popularising it throughout the world. Read more... |
First Person: horn player Alec Frank-Gemmill on authenticity and enlightenment in lockdownSaturday, 14 November 2020
The UK’s music industry is in dire straits and my heart goes out to friends and colleagues in financial need. For a proper discussion of the current situation, I refer you to Sophia Rahman’s excellent article for theartsdesk. What I have written here is comparatively superficial. Read more... |
First Person: Jessica Duchen on writing about Beethoven's Immortal BelovedTuesday, 10 November 2020
The identity of Beethoven’s “Immortal Beloved” is one of the biggest cans of worms in musical history. I hadn’t the slightest intention of writing a novel about it. At first I thought I’d create a narrated concert for the anniversary year... but that was then. Read more... |
'Josquin has defined our career': The Tallis Scholars’ Peter Phillips on the end of a major recording projectSaturday, 07 November 2020
I have never been a fan of recording “Complete Works”. These projects almost inevitably include music that one would not normally spend time and money on, just to claim that one has done it all. For this reason the Gimell catalogue, from the earliest days, will be found to have marked out the Renaissance territory, one disc per composer, each disc a distillation of the best of the writer in question... Read more... |
First Person: Cellist Alban Gerhardt on why concert-hall life must go onSaturday, 31 October 2020
With horror I heard on Wednesday that the proud cultural nation of Germany, which invests probably more money per capita in its concert, opera and theatre life than any other country in the world, had decided to close down what I as a German citizen am particularly proud of - precisely this rich cultural life. Read more... |
First Person: harpsichordist Chad Kelly on reimagining Bach's Goldberg VariationsThursday, 15 October 2020
As musicians took tentative steps into the unfamiliar world of PPE, socially-distanced rehearsals and audiences watching from home on a computer screen, a common water-cooler question was, “What did you do during lockdown?”. I am grateful to the Baroque violinist Rachel Podger that part of my lockdown involved rediscovering and reimagining a piece of music that I thought I knew well: the Goldberg Variations, the popular name we ascribe to Bach’s fourth Clavierü... Read more... |
First Person: composer Brian Elias on the Music@Malling Festival's retrospective of his worksTuesday, 13 October 2020
It is my very good fortune to be offered by Music@Malling what is, in effect, a retrospective of my work. The music that will be performed was written between 1969 and 2019, exactly half a century. Read more... |
First Person: Gregory Batsleer on choirs for the 21st centurySaturday, 03 October 2020
Choral music is one of the UK’s oldest and most-loved art forms. It has been at the centre of my life ever since I started singing in primary school and has grown to become a crucial part of my identity as both a musician and artist. I am a signed-up evangelist of choral music; I do not need convincing of its power. Read more... |
Pages
inside classical music
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...
Out There, ITV1 review - drugs and thugs disfigure the Welsh...
If nothing else, ITV’s new thriller Out There is a fabulous advertisement for the Welsh countryside. Many scenes were shot in Brecon and...
William Tell review - stirring action adventure with silly d...
Despite Rossini’s banger of an overture and a Looney Tunes cartoon starring Daffy Duck as William Tell, I’ll wager that few non-German-speakers...
Album: Tunng - Love You All Over Again
This is Tunng’s ninth album, their first in five years, and marks their 20th anniversary by consciously going full circle to the...
Tiffin Youth Choir, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus...
When Vladimir Jurowski planned this typically unorthodox programme, he could not have known that a disaster even greater, long-term, than 9/11 was...
Celtic Connections: Orchestral Qawwali Project, GRIT Orchest...
Once again, Glasgow’s annual winter festival of traditional...
David Lynch: In Dreams (1946-2025)
David Lynch’s final two features mapped a haunted Hollywood of curdled innocence and back-alley eeriness. Mulholland Drive (2001) seemed...
Kyoto, Soho Place Theatre - blistering, darkly witty play ra...
It took a while for journalists to identify the chain-smoking, Machiavellian figure who was a permanent presence at early international gatherings...
A Good House, Royal Court review - provocative, but imperfec...
Most Brits don’t know much about South Africa today, but we do know about house values, so this new comedy by South African playwright and...