Classical Reviews
Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, Wigmore Hall review - too big a splash in complete RavelFriday, 16 May 2025
It was a daring idea to mark Ravel’s 150th birthday year with a single concert packing in all his works for solo piano. Jean-Efflam Bavouzet knows them by heart, has bags of charisma and energy, so why not? I could give more than one reason, but the main problem was that while Bavouzet perfectly embodied Scarbo, the monster-Puck of Gaspard de la nuit, and other nocturnal flitters, he seemed careless with Undine and her watery companions, of which there were many. Read more... |
Karim Said, Leighton House review - adventures from Byrd to SchoenbergWednesday, 14 May 2025
William Byrd, Arnold Schoenberg and their respective acolytes go cheek by jowl, crash into one another, soothe, infuriate and shine in their very different ways This is all in a typical programme of pianist, conductor, composer and all-round pioneer Karim Said, and last night in the studio of Leighton House, it nearly all worked (when it didn’t, that was the nature of the beast, not the pianist). Read more... |
Stile Antico, Wigmore Hall review - a glorious birthday celebrationTuesday, 13 May 2025
There was a wonderful festal spirit at the Wigmore Hall last night, as the vocal ensemble Stile Antico ran through a Greatest Hits selection in celebration of their 20th anniversary, in front of a packed and enthusiastic audience. The 12-strong group still boasts four founder members, but this was swelled to 10 for the final item, as a swarm of alumni joined in a beautiful rendition of Gibbons’ The Silver Swan. Read more... |
Hallé, Elder, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - premiere of new Huw Watkins workMonday, 12 May 2025
Huw Watkins’ Concerto for Orchestra, the fourth new work of his to be commissioned and premiered by the Hallé and Sir Mark Elder, is another beautifully crafted and highly appealing construction. Read more... |
La Serenissima, Wigmore Hall review - a convivial guide to 18th century BolognaWednesday, 30 April 2025
When Giuseppe Torelli made the journey from his birthplace of Verona to Bologna in the late 17th century, the trumpet was still seen as something of a brash outsider, suitable for military displays but not for sophisticated music ensembles. Within decades, it would seem perfectly natural for both Vivaldi and Bach to write major works featuring the trumpet. Read more... |
Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Isata Kanneh-Mason, Wigmore Hall review - family fun, fire and finesseMonday, 28 April 2025
I came to Isata and Sheku Kanneh-Mason’s Wigmore Hall recital on Saturday armed with a certain degree of scepticism. Not about the siblings’ stupendous talent and technique – their manifold achievements speak for themselves – but about the popular idea that family connections make for closer, more cohesive music-making. Read more... |
Mahler 8, LPO, Gardner, RFH review - lights on highMonday, 28 April 2025
Transcendence is everywhere in Mahler’s most ambitious symphony, from the flaming opening hymn to the upper reaches in the epic setting of Goethe’s Faust finale. You’d think no visuals could match the auditory phantasmagoria, just as dance, music and design flunked the essence of Paradiso in the Royal Ballet’s The Dante Project. Mahler does compose a kind of concert opera in Part Two, though; sound, movement and image accorded well. Read more... |
Philharmonia, Alsop, RFH / Levit, Abramović, QEH review - misalliance and magical marathonSaturday, 26 April 2025
“Let the music guide your imagination” was never going to be the slogan of the Southbank Centre’s Multitudes festival. Its 13 events offer parallel visions, intended in the case of Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé (a shared project between the LPO and Australian dance company Circa I regret missing), not so in Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony: as that masterpiece begins to be freed of its Soviet-era load, William Kentridge shackles it again on his own brilliant terms. Read more... |
Bach St John Passion, Academy of Ancient Music, Cummings, Barbican review - conscience against conformismMonday, 21 April 2025
In a programme note for the St John Passion at the Barbican, the Academy of Ancient Music’s chief executive called their Easter performances of Bach’s compressed gospel tragedy a “ritual”. You understand why that word claims its place. However, there’s not much consciously liturgical about the AAM’s musical approach. Read more... |
MacMillan St John Passion, Boylan, National Symphony Orchestra & Chorus, Hill, NCH Dublin review - flares around a fine ChristSaturday, 19 April 2025
Never make your mind up too soon about any large-scale work by a genius. Back in 2010, I had my doubts about James MacMillan’s first Passion, hearing in the impact of Colin Davis’s Barbican performance a halfway house between the composer's shattering best and his more contrived side. Read more... |
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