If there were any doubts that it was soon to be curtains for Verdi’s titular, tubercular heroine then the tortured gasps of laboured, languishing breath which preceded Rodula Gaitanou’s new…
Month: May 2018
The Devil, Greed, War, and Simple Goodness: Ostr?il’s Jack’s Kingdom
Here is a little-known opera that, like an opera by the Swedish composer Laci Boldemann that I have reviewed here, and like Ravel’s amazing L’enfant et les sortilègesá, utterly bypasses…
Iestyn Davies and Fretwork bring about a meeting of the baroque and the modern
‘Music for a while/Shall all your cares beguile’. Standing in shadow, encircled by the five players of the viol consort Fretwork, as the summer storm raged outside Milton Court Concert…
Works by Beethoven and Gerald Barry
As a whole, this concert proved a curious affair. It probably made more sense in the context of Thomas Adès’s series of Beethoven and Barry concerts with the Britten Sinfonia.…
Le Concert Royal de la Nuit – Ensemble Correspondances
Le Concert Royal de la Nuit with Ensemble Correspondances led by SÈbastien DaucÈ, the glorious culmination of the finest London Festival of the Baroque in years on the theme “Treasures…
Voices of Revolution – Prokofiev, Exile and Return
Seven, they are Seven , op.30; Violin Concerto no.1 in D minor, op.19; Cantata for the Twentieth Anniverary of the October Revolution, op.74. David Butt Philip (tenor), Pekka Kuusisto (violin),…
Charpentier Histoires sacrÈes, staged – London Baroque Festival
Marc-Antoine Charpentier Histoires sacrÈes with Ensemble Correspondances, conducted by SÈbastien DaucÈ, at St John’s Smith Square, part of the London Festival of the Baroque 2018. This striking staging, by Vincent…
No Time in Eternity: Iestyn Davies discusses Purcell and Nyman
Revolution, repetition, rhetoric. On my way to meet countertenor Iestyn Davies, I ponder if these are the elements that might form connecting threads between the music of Henry Purcell and…
The Moderate Soprano : Q&A with Nancy Carroll and Roger Allam
Nancy Carroll and Roger Allam play Audrey Mildmay and John Christie in David Hare’s play The Moderate Soprano which is currently at the Duke of York’s Theatre in London.