Classical Reviews
Stefanovich, Currie, Queen Elizabeth HallMonday, 08 December 2014
Tamara Stefanovich and Colin Currie – a dream team for Birtwistle’s The Axe Manual. Both are new music specialists with a gift for grace and dexterity, even in the most complex works. The score sets up a range of sophisticated relationships between piano and percussion, from sympathetic resonances to complex interplays of stretto and hocket. Yet none of this fazes the two players, nor ever challenges their close ensemble, seemingly telepathic in its precision. Read more... |
Garbarek, Hilliard Ensemble, King's College Chapel CambridgeSunday, 07 December 2014
This was “Officium – the final concert.” The Hilliard Ensemble took their decision around three years ago to disband as a group, and – for three of them – to retire, rather than to re-launch with a new generation of voices. They are now on the road doing a series of farewells. Their final bow will be at the Wigmore Hall on December 20th, and between now and then, their victory lap takes in Taunton, Gdansk, Châlons-en-Champagne, Florence and Cologne. Read more... |
Aimard, LPO, Jurowski, Royal Festival HallSunday, 07 December 2014
In words and music Harrison Birtwistle isn’t always as gruff as he’s been painted. Interviewed over the summer during one of his 80th birthday Prom concerts, the composer tossed off enough humorous remarks to suggest that a new career could almost beckon as a stand-up comedian touring the northern clubs. Read more... |
Birtwistle 80th Birthday Concert, London Sinfonietta, Atherton, QEH reviewSaturday, 06 December 2014
Sir Harrison Birtwistle has never sought to make life easy for his audiences, nor for interviewers, often giving short shrift to both. His music is as uncompromising as his carefully curated public persona. But fortunately last night we were treated to more notes and less chat than the printed programme threatened. Read more... |
Karajan's Magic and Myth, BBC FourSaturday, 06 December 2014
There have been legendary conductors, and then there was Herbert von Karajan. He was a colossus of post-World War Two classical music, equipped with fearsome technical mastery allied to a vaguely supernatural gift for extracting exquisite sounds from orchestras. But that wasn't all. An expert skier with a passion for high-performance cars and flying his own jet, he was as charismatic as a movie star or sporting idol. Read more... |
Classical CDs Weekly: Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky, Christina SandsengenSaturday, 06 December 2014
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Levit, LPO, Jurowski, Royal Festival HallThursday, 04 December 2014
If Brahms’s First Symphony has long been dubbed “Beethoven’s Tenth”, then the 23-year-old Rachmaninov’s First merits the label of “Tchaikovsky’s Seventh” (a genuine candidate for that title, incidentally, turns out to be a poor reconstruction from Tchaikovsky’s sketches by one Bogatryryev). Read more... |
Chung, Kenner, Royal Festival HallWednesday, 03 December 2014
In one way, it makes sense to give your London comeback concert in the venue where you made your European debut 44 years ago. Yet the Royal Festival Hall is a mighty big place for a violin-and-piano recital. Read more... |
Queyras, Melnikov, Wigmore HallMonday, 01 December 2014
Even the most reluctant of completists should find the prospect of the Beethoven works for cello and piano undaunting. In their totality, these pieces consist of just five sonatas and three sets of variations, which fit neatly on to just two CDs, or occupy two recital programmes. The works are also very important in the early development of the solo cello repertoire. Read more... |
OAE, Tognetti, Queen Elizabeth HallWednesday, 26 November 2014
As I sat, engaged and occasionally charmed but not always as impressed as I’d been told I would be, through violinist-animateur Richard Tognetti’s lightish seven-course taster menu of string music with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, it was worth bearing two things in mind. Read more... |
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