Classical Reviews

Beethoven Ninth, RLPO, Petrenko, Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool

Glyn Môn Hughes Wednesday, 28 September 2016

The new season at the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic is focusing on revolutionaries. Bach, Beethoven and Berlioz all feature strongly over the next few months, as will Stravinsky and – where else but Liverpool? – The Beatles.

Mariinsky Orchestra, Gergiev, Cadogan Hall

Sebastian Scotney Tuesday, 27 September 2016

This year, Valery Gergiev is marking the Prokofiev 125th anniversary with concerts and projects in no fewer than 17 countries. Yet much of last night’s concert, the first of a three-night stint in London, made this whole endeavour feel more like a duty than either an imperative – or a pleasure.

Stravinsky: Myths and Rituals 4, Philharmonia, Salonen, RFH

David Nice Monday, 26 September 2016

Stravinsky's music, chameleonic yet always itself, offers so many lines of thought. One struck me immediately with the descending, even harp notes and tender, veiled strings at the start of his 1947 ballet Orpheus last night: the inexorable beat of time is so often pitted against an expressive, human voice. Esa-Pekka Salonen, who started out as a rhythm and textures man, now gets the humanity too.

Lammermuir Festival 2016, East Lothian

David Kettle Sunday, 25 September 2016

It’s just a short trip down the A1 from Edinburgh. But East Lothian – with its big skies, wide-open spaces, empty beaches and seemingly inexhaustable supply of quaint, historic villages – feels like a long, long way from the Scottish capital.

Benedetti, LPO, Jurowski, RFH

Gavin Dixon Saturday, 24 September 2016

Vladimir Jurowski began his latest season as Principal Conductor of the London Philharmonic with a typically bold and adventurous programme. At its core were the two Szymanowski violin concertos performed by Nicola Benedetti, and these were framed by Debussy’s Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune and Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin Suite.

Classical CDs Weekly: Copland, Charlemagne Palestine, Lincoln Trio

graham Rickson Saturday, 24 September 2016

Copland: Orchestral Works Volume 2 Jonathan Scott (organ),BBC Philharmonic Orchestra/John Wilson (Chandos)

Jeremy Denk, Wigmore Hall

Gavin Dixon Sunday, 18 September 2016

Medieval to Modern – Jeremy Denk’s Wigmore Hall recital took us on a whistle-stop tour of Western music, beginning with Machaut in the mid-14th century and ending with Ligeti at the end of the 20th. The programme was made up of 25 short works, each by a different composer and arranged in broadly chronological order, resulting in a series of startling contrasts, but punctuated with equally surprising, and often very revealing, continuities.

Modulus Quartet, Brunel Museum, Rotherhithe

David Nice Saturday, 17 September 2016

"Total immersion", the term used for the BBC Symphony's one-composer days, takes on a whole new meaning in the Thames Tunnel Shaft now transformed – but fortunately not subject to makeover – under the mantle of Rotherhithe's Brunel Museum.

Classical CDs Weekly: Michael Nyman, Stravinsky, Emily Pailthorpe

graham Rickson Saturday, 17 September 2016

Michael Nyman and The Tempest – Prospero’s Books and Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs (MN Records)

Two Quixotes, The English Concert, Bicket, Wigmore Hall

David Nice Thursday, 15 September 2016

They dreamed the impossible dream in 1970, turning aspects of Cervantes' Don Quixote into the musical Man of La Mancha. But Purcell, Eccles and the lively dramatist Thomas D'Urfey - anyone know his hit song "The Fart"? - got there first nearly 300 years earlier when the Knight of the Woeful Countenance trod the boards at Drury Lane's Theatre Royal in a seven-hour entertainment.