This was the third performance by VOCES8 that I’d attended or viewed in two weeks, which confirms that their virtuosity is matched by their versatility, and that they have a…
Author: Claire Seymour
Longborough Festival Opera appoints inaugural Ring Cycle Conducting Fellow
Longborough Festival Opera has appointed Harry Sever as its first Ring Cycle Conducting Fellow. Sever will work alongside Longborough Music Director and eminent Wagnerian Anthony Negus for the next three seasons as the festival builds…
A Christmas Cracker from VOCES8
Christmas crackers usually come stuffed with a flimsy paper crown, a tacky toy, a plastic puzzle and a bad joke. But, open a VOCES8 Christmas Cracker and you’ll find the…
Magical music-making from Padmore and Biss at Milton Court
‘Glorious and emblazoned in their gentlest blood marriage, they stand there before us, the gentlest of all arts, the art of poetry and the art of music.’ Robert Schumann’s essay,…
Bampton Classical Opera 2021 Young Singers’ Competition – winner announced
Bampton Classical Opera is delighted to announce that the winner of the 2021 Young Singers’ Competition is Australian soprano Cassandra Wright. The second prize has been awarded to soprano Jessica Cale. The winner of the…
Scenes from the Wild: a stunning new orchestral song-cycle from Cheryl Frances-Hoad
Dara McAnulty’s Diary of a Young Naturalist, the winner of the 2020 Wainwright Prize, chronicles the turning of the seasons from the spring equinox of 2018, when McAnulty was fourteen,…
New Worlds – South America: The AAM and VOCES8 at Milton Court
The Academy of Ancient Music’s New Worlds series stopped off in South America this week, by way of Cambridge and London, when they were joined by VOCES8 to explore the…
A patriarchy-punching Magic Flute directed by Polly Graham at the Royal College of Music
At first glance, Polly Graham’s decision to set Mozart’s The Magic Flute in a secondary school seems an inspired one. After all, in Schikaneder’s journey from darkness to light the…
Glyndebourne begins 2022 with Pay the Piper, a brand new youth opera from an all-female composer team
On 25 February 2022 Glyndebourne will present the world premiere of Pay the Piper, Glyndebourne’s first youth opera since 2017. The opera has been jointly composed by the four participants of…
CCM names Voice Professor Stuart Skelton as J. Ralph Corbett Distinguished Chair in Opera
An internationally acclaimed and award-winning heldentenor, Skelton will guide one of the nation’s preeminent opera training programs in his new role at CCM Grammy nominee and 2014 International Opera Awards…