‘Melancholy can be overcome only by melancholy.’ One imagines that countertenor Iestyn Davies and lutenist Thomas Dunford have taken heed of the words of the English clergyman Robert Burton –…
Author: Claire Seymour
Ghosts, guilt and giggles: two contrasting Pocket Operas at Wexford Festival Opera
The opening weekend of Wexford Festival Opera 2022 offered not just three operas on the main stage of the National Opera House, but also a lunchtime recital, pop-up events around…
Félicien David’s Lalla-Roukh at Wexford Festival Opera: a forgotten gem
On 23rd September 1876, the ‘Occasional Notes’ column in The Musical World reported that after a performance of the opera Lalla-Roukh by Félicien David (1810-76), one of the musicians made…
Halévy’s La tempesta opens the 71st Wexford Festival Opera
“Be not afeard,” Caliban reassures the comic conspirators, Stephano and Trinculo, “This isle is full of noises,/ Sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not.” Indeed, the whole…
The English National Opera announces departure of Stuart Murphy, CEO, in September 2023
The English National Opera (ENO) today announces that Stuart Murphy, current Chief Executive of the ENO and London Coliseum, will leave the company in September 2023. His five year contract…
Patricia Petibon blurs musical and theatrical boundaries at Oxford Lieder
Back in August, when I spoke to Sholto Kynoch about this year’s Oxford Lieder Festival, he told me that one of the things he was most looking forward to, as…
Revisiting familar forms and formats at Oxford Leider
If regular concertgoers thought that they knew what to expect from a lute-song recital or a lieder programme, the second evening of this year’s Oxford Lieder Festival would certainly have…
The Voice of Black Opera Competition
Twelve international singers are bound for Birmingham to compete for cash prizes and career development opportunities, with five singers advancing to the Grand Final on 5 December Black British Classical…
Battle Cry: Helen Charlston and Toby Carr at Oxford Lieder
The ‘Battle Cry’ presented by mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston and theorbist Toby Carr in this early- evening Oxford Lieder recital in the Sheldonian Theatre was a distinctively female one, the programme…
Danielle de Niese to perform in English National Opera’s UK premiere of It’s a Wonderful Life
This November, ‘opera’s coolest soprano’ (The New York Times Magazine) and Australian-American actress Danielle de Niese makes her ENO operatic debut at the London Coliseum, opening the festive period with…