Russia
theartsdesk in Moscow: Blood brothers on filmSunday, 06 July 2014
“We are not politicians – we are artists.” It’s the familiar cry of creatives all around the world, but it came with an added, rather surprising accent when uttered by Moscow International Film Festival (MIFF) president Nikita Mikhalkov at the event... Read more... |
Eugene Onegin, GlyndebourneMonday, 19 May 2014
Is this the same Tatyana whose life depended on every word of her letter to straw idol Onegin at the 2009 Cardiff Singer of the World Competition? Then, Ekaterina Shcherbachenko – she’s since dropped the first “h” in transliteration – gave the most... Read more... |
Lugansky, Queen Elizabeth HallThursday, 15 May 2014
Am I alone in a readiness to sacrifice all four Rachmaninov piano concertos – though maybe not the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini – in favour of the second sets of Preludes and Études-Tableaux? Probably not, after last night, when Nikolay Lugansky... Read more... |
Shostakovich Cycle, Jerusalem Quartet, Wigmore HallThursday, 01 May 2014
Under what circumstances can Shostakovich’s Eighth String Quartet, the most (over)played of the 15, sound both as harrowing as it possibly can be and absolutely fresh? Well, the context helps: hearing it at the breaking heart of the fourth concert... Read more... |
Generation War, BBC TwoSunday, 27 April 2014
This German-made drama about World War Two scored huge ratings when it was shown in its homeland last year, but has also prompted scathing criticism. Chiefly, its detractors don't buy the series' portrayal of five photogenic young German friends as... Read more... |
Uncle Vanya/Three Sisters, Wyndham's TheatreFriday, 25 April 2014
London has had its fair share recently of Chekhov productions from Russia, though none anywhere near as quietly truthful as these from Moscow's Mossovet State Academic Theatre. Veteran film and theatre director-designer Andrey Konchalovsky... Read more... |
Khovanshchina, Birmingham Opera CompanyWednesday, 23 April 2014
Has anyone ever sat through Musorgsky’s last, not quite finished, opera about the struggle for power in Moscow at the time of Peter the Great’s accession in the 1690s, and come away with the slightest idea of what it’s all about? If Khovanshchina... Read more... |
CD: Olga Bell – KraiSunday, 20 April 2014
Krai – Край – is employed in Russia to label tracts of land separating regions or marking borders. These liminal places each have their own name, defined limits and character, and have inspired the second solo album by the Brooklyn-based Olga Bell.... Read more... |
Rodin, Eifman Ballet, London ColiseumWednesday, 16 April 2014
Before Boris Eifman’s second visit to London this week, ballet lovers who missed the divisive Russian dancemaker last time round will have been weighing up the merits of a punt on a ticket. If they were basing their calculations on reviews, I... Read more... |
Prince Igor, Novaya Opera, London ColiseumWednesday, 02 April 2014
Had this Moscow production any serious ideas in its head until its suddenly effective epilogue, much might have been pertinently said about an opera in which an imperialistic campaign ends in disaster, and where the Polovtsian “enemy” shows far more... Read more... |
LSO, Gergiev, BarbicanMonday, 31 March 2014
The Tchaikovsky de nos jours, is Theodore Gumbril’s dismissal of Skryabin in Aldous Huxley’s Twenties novel Antic Hay. For some reason, Alexander Skryabin has suffered more than most from snap judgements of this kind. He has been the woolly... Read more... |
Josefowicz, BBCSO, Oramo, BarbicanThursday, 27 March 2014
Depth, height, breadth, a sense of the new and strange in three brilliantly-programmed works spanning just over a century: all these and a clarity in impassioned execution told us why the BBC Symphony Orchestra was inspired in choosing Finn Sakari... Read more... |
