At the opening of Kenneth Leighton’s Symphony No.3 ‘Laudes musicae’ (1984), the tenor soloist sings the composer’s own hymn of praise: “O yes, I must sing! And so must you…
Category: Reviews
The choral music of Ivo Antognini is superbly sung by the Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge
On this disc of a cappella choral music by the Swiss-born Ivo Antognini (born 1962), issued earlier this year by Hyperion, the Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge yet again demonstrate…
Le Prophète and Picture a Day Like This at the Aix Festival
Giacomo Meyerbeer was born near Berlin as Jacob Beer. Early in his professional life he joined his maternal grandfather’s given name, Meyer, to his father’s family name, taking on the…
An enlarged, multi-layered Carmen by Oper im Steinbruch intrigues and frustrates
Oper im Steinbruch (Opera in the Quarry) presents an annual spectacular outdoor opera production in the historic St. Margarethen quarry near Eisenstadt in Austria. In 2019, the opera was Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and after a…
Martinů’s The Greek Passion (1954-57): as relevant as ever
In 1954-57 Bohuslav Martinů composed The Greek Passion, an opera about Greek refugees seeking a bit of land in a nearby (likewise Greek) village where they might work and live,…
Stirring performances at the First Night of the BBC Proms
This season opener brought together something new, rare and familiar – and with it, in the first half, a clear plea for freedom explicit in the choice of music by…
Ballets Russes at the Aix Festival
Not to be confused with Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes or Wassily de Basil’s Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, it was Igor Stravinsky’s trilogy of ballet scores created for Paris based,…
A magnificent Philip II rescues Covent Garden’s revival of Don Carlo
Irrespective of the version of Don Carlo used, or the language in which it is sung, this is an uneven opera. The Verdi of the first two acts is, in…
L’Opéra de Quat’Sous at the Aix Festival
That’s The Three Penny Opera. While four “sous” wouldn’t get you in the door, the price of admission was far less than the usual offering at this lofty altar to…
Rolling River from Clare College, Cambridge
The Choir of Clare College, Cambridge has an impressive CD back catalogue, and this recent release of American choral music from harmonia mundi is no exception. Recorded in 2022 in…