Classical Reviews
Ensemble InterContemporain, Pintscher, RFH review - a visit from the gentle ghost of BoulezTuesday, 17 October 2017
The Royal Festival Hall rather belied its name for a visit to London on Saturday of France’s premier new-music ensemble. It can’t be helped that the more intimate space of the Queen Elizabeth Hall next door is presently closed for renovation, but with the balcony and back of the stalls both empty and unlit, the place presented a more dismal aspect than usual. Read more... |
Jonas Kaufmann: Tenor for the Ages, BBC Four review - a musical megastar with sword and shortbreadMonday, 16 October 2017
Now we know who sent Jonas Kaufmann the Union Jack boxer shorts for the Last Night of the Proms. Whether the sender’s identity is the bigger surprise, or the hint of ambiguity over whether the "Greatest Tenor in the World" had previously heard of one of Britain’s favourite baritones – well, you decide. And no, we don’t learn who threw the knickers at him from the arena. Read more... |
BBCSO, Brabbins, Barbican review - commanding vistas of earth and seaSaturday, 14 October 2017
Dances of earth and songs of sea – the BBC Symphony Orchestra's latest programme offered an inspired coupling, where similar inspirations balanced contrasting styles. Read more... |
Uchida, SCO, Ticciati, Usher Hall, Edinburgh review - Berlioz steals the showFriday, 13 October 2017
"Mitsuko Uchida plays Mozart" might have been the marketing tag to sell out this first concert in the Scottish Chamber Orchestra's 2017-18 season (despite student and free under-18s take-up, the Usher Hall still wasn't full). Read more... |
London Piano Festival, Kings Place review - feasts of fearless fingerworkTuesday, 10 October 2017
What has 12 hands, 18 legs, 176 keys and two page-turners? Party night at the London Piano Festival, of course. The six-pianist, two-piano marathon on Saturday evening was a high point of this delectable four-day event – though far from the only one. Read more... |
Widmann, CBSO, Gražinytė-Tyla, Symphony Hall Birmingham review - when Mirga met JörgFriday, 06 October 2017
Apparently it was Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla’s idea to invite Jörg Widmann to be the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra’s Artist in Residence this season – indeed, according to backstage rumours she made the phone call herself. Read more... |
Roman Rabinovich, Hatchlands review - poetry from Chopin's very own Pleyel pianoThursday, 05 October 2017
What pianist wouldn't long to lay fingers on keyboards impregnated, as Roman Rabinovich put it in his introduction yesterday afternoon, with the DNAs of Haydn and Chopin? Read more... |
Anne Schwanewilms, Charles Spencer, Wigmore Hall review - going deep in SchubertTuesday, 03 October 2017
They say that Wigmore Hall audiences know their Lieder singers, but last night's far from packed house dispelled that illusion; the hall has been full for much lesser artists than German soprano Anne Schwanewilms. No matter; she gave her usual masterclass, ineffably poised between tone-colour, phrasing and word-pointing. Read more... |
Goode, LPO, Jurowski, RFH review - tender Mozart, dynamic BrucknerMonday, 02 October 2017
Richard Goode is one of the world’s great pianists, but you wouldn’t guess it from his humble and unpretentious stage manner. He wears thick glasses and squints into the music, and when he plays he sings along under his breath. When he is not playing, he often turns and gestures vaguely at the orchestra, not so much aping the conductor as moving with the flow of the music. He clearly lives every note, and everything he does is to the service of the score. Read more... |
Kuusisto, Philharmonia, Salonen, RFH review - Icelanders fare better than SibeliusFriday, 29 September 2017
London orchestras do communicate with each other, sometimes at least, when it comes to programming. Read more... |
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