Classical Reviews
Kožená, LSO, Rattle, Barbican review - Berlin to Broadway, and backSaturday, 30 April 2022
As Walter Huston croaked in 1938, it’s a long, long while from May to December. And Kurt Weill – who wrote his evergreen “September Song” for Huston in that year – spanned several musical epochs within not so many years as he travelled from the Weimar avant-garde to Hollywood and Broadway. Read more... |
Esfahani, CBSO, Morlot, Symphony Hall Birmingham review - ghostly enchantmentsFriday, 29 April 2022
Bent Sørensen has christened his new harpsichord concerto Sei Anime: “six souls”. The six concise movements, written for Mahan Esfahani and a chamber-sized orchestra, are modelled, apparently, on the dance movements of a Bach keyboard suite. But as Sørensen explained from the stage – standing next to Esfahani’s gleaming black harpsichord – two further anecdotes explain the name. It’s borrowed from a range of French womenswear, seen in a Copenhagen shop: the audience laughed. Read more... |
Beethoven Cello Sonatas 1, Elschenbroich, Grynyuk, Fidelio Café review - towards epic songThursday, 28 April 2022
London’s musical life began its halting road to recovery when in July 2020 a great cellist, Steven Isserlis, stepped out with obvious delight to play Bach to a live audience at the Fidelio Café. Another, Leonard Elschenbroich, joined by the full-on spirit of delight that is Alexei Grynyuk, hit more than one high note last night, proving that this special space will never lose its magic. Read more... |
Six Brandenburgs: Six Commissions, Chamber Domaine, Malling Abbey review - metaphysical brillianceMonday, 25 April 2022
"Contemporary classical", for want of a better term, works best in concert as a cornucopia of shortish new works offering a healthy range of styles and voices. Add to the mix six of the most exhilarating and original chamber concertos ever, by no means casting complementary premieres in the shade, put together some of the UK’s best musicians and make it an afternoon marathon taking place in the round aatn extraordinary venue, and success should be total. Read more... |
Faust, English Baroque Soloists, Gardiner, St Martin-in-the-Fields review – gusto and graceMonday, 25 April 2022
More than half a century has passed since John Eliot Gardiner’s choir and orchestras first won their historically-informed licence to thrill. A feverish Saturday night at St Martin-in-the-Fields proved that Gardiner and the English Baroque Soloists can still quicken the pulse and rinse the ears of the most jaded concert-goer. Read more... |
Moore, LSO, Zhang, Barbican review – virtuosity worn lightlyMonday, 25 April 2022
Xian Zhang is clearly a versatile conductor. In this concert, with the London Symphony Orchestra, she presented a fascinating strings work by Chinese composer Qigang Chen and a new trombone concerto by Dani Howard, all framed with favourites from Ravel and Stravinsky. Read more... |
Hallé, Wilson, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - valedictory Vaughan WilliamsFriday, 22 April 2022
The baton passed, metaphorically, to the Hallé last night in the Vaughan Williams symphony cycle shared between them and the BBC Philharmonic to mark the composer’s 150th anniversary. Literally, that baton was in the same hand as on the last date, for it was John Wilson who conducted the Ninth Symphony, as he had the second and seventh 12 days ago. This time VW was paired with Holst, as the second part of the concert consisted of The Planets. Read more... |
Gillam, NYOS, Hasan, Usher Hall, Edinburgh - stunning variety from the new generationMonday, 18 April 2022
I expected the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland’s Usher Hall concert to be jam-packed with a joyful melee of admiring friends and relatives. This is a vast orchestra of over 100, and it wouldn’t take that many aunts and uncles to fill the Usher’s cavernous spaces, but in the event the audience for this inspiring and diverse programme was disappointingly thin. Read more... |
Bach and Pärt St John Passions, Voces8, ECO, Cadogan Hall / Gesualdo Six, St Martin-in-the-Fields review - contrasting Easter storiesSaturday, 16 April 2022
Having not heard a Passion live for several years I decided to do two in close succession, to compare pieces from different ends of the musical spectrum. Read more... |
Bournemouth SO, Karabits, Lighthouse, Poole review - more voices from the eastTuesday, 12 April 2022
The last of this season’s Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra concert series Voices from the East featured music from Azerbaijan with Kirill Karabits focusing on works by the contemporary composer Franghiz Ali-Zadeh and her teacher Kara Karayev. Read more... |
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