In its single contribution to this year’s promenade concerts, the London Philharmonic Orchestra took us to exotic and faraway regions, as far from the Albert Hall as one could imagine.…
Category: Recitals/Concerts
Proms 2025: Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin
Memories of Pierre Boulez continue to hover over this year’s Proms like a spectre at the feast. My first encounter with Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin – his masterpiece, in my…
Proms 2025: Beethoven & Bartók
Music of life-affirming vigour, then chilling intensity was the focus of this curious juxtaposition from the Budapest Festival Orchestra under its founding director Iván Fischer. The unalloyed joy of Beethoven’s…
Proms 2025: Boulez and Mahler’s Das klagende Lied
For my generation, as well as for me personally, Pierre Boulez’s Mahler was probably the most influential of all. My Mahlerian coming of age coincided with his decisive return to…
Proms 2025: An Unremarkable Mahler Resurrection from the Hallé and Kahchun Wong
The Singaporean-born conductor Kahchun Wong is certainly a fascinating one based on this performance of Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony. A winner of the Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition (2016), where he conducted…
Proms 2025: Berio’s Sinfonia in a compelling performance with the CBSO and Kazuki Yamada
Is Berio’s Sinfonia a masterpiece, or a work of its time that today seems outdated? Written in 1968 during a time of revolution it is not in itself a work…
Canto Virginia Delights Audiences of All Ages with Outreach Performance Who’s Afraid of Opera?
Outreach performances are often viewed as a rite of passage for young aspiring opera singers, in many cases involving travel to schools for 8 A.M. assembly performances. The advantage Canto…
An Evening With Loudoun Lyric Opera Brings Art Song to Loudoun County
As part of their Midsummer Opera Dream festival this year, Canto Vocal Programs collaborated for the first time in its ten-year history with Loudoun Lyric Opera on an art song…
Plenty of Variety from the First Night of the Proms
The Proms season began with a curious mélange that was neither a bang nor a whimper. Its festive spirit was duly acknowledged with the Birthday Fanfare for Sir Henry Wood…
Canto Vocal Programs Hosts A Romantic Evening With “The Love Concert”
Mere hours after the wonderful morning outreach performance last Saturday, the singers of Canto Virginia 2025 performed a larger, more formal concert with the theme of love. Canto Vocal Programs…