This was an odd concert – supposedly with a Polish link, in that its bookends were two symphonies from that country, and two symphonies at that which were born out…
Tag: London Symphony Orchestra
Katya Kabanova: orchestral drama from the LSO and Sir Simon Rattle
Perhaps the most perfectly proportioned of Janáček’s operas, certainly one of the most emotionally and dramaturgically correct—which, in Janáček’s case, is saying quite something—Katya Kabanova has not wanted for recent…
Sorrow and Serenity from Sir Simon Rattle and the LSO at the Barbican Hall
There seems to be much sorrow in the world at the moment, but little serenity. This concert by the London Symphony Orchestra thus offered a welcome balancing of affekts, the…
Rattle’s Stravinsky Journey with the LSO
Criticism of Simon Rattle as a conductor might be justified in several ways; as a creator and innovator of concert programs, however, such criticism would be very wide of the…
Il prigioniero: Pappano and the LSO give an exceptional performance of Luigi Dallapiccola’s opera of torture and Inquisition
When it comes to the style and essence of their music Ottorino Respighi and Luigi Dallapiccola really come from entirely different places. Church Windows and Il prigioniero, heard side by…
Brilliant Weill from Kožená, Rattle and the LSO at the Barbican
The Seven Deadly Sins is perhaps the most interesting of the collaborations between Kurt Weill and Berthold Brecht. Composed ‘post-rift’ in 1933, this ballet chanté is sophisticated both musically and…
Mesmerising performances from the LSO and Noseda at the Barbican
‘He liked to think that he wasn’t afraid of death. It was life he was afraid of, not death. He believed that people should think about death more often, and…
Exile and Isolation: Julian Anderson’s Suite from Exiles, the LSO and Simon Rattle
Often you go to concerts and the programming isn’t especially obvious – why are these works being played besides each other? This is particularly the case with concertos and symphonies.…
Kirill Karabits conducts the LSO in mixed performances at the Barbican
Dedicated to the memory of Bernard Haitink, this Barbican concert with the London Symphony Orchestra could have been stymied by cancellations of conductor and soloist. But Ukrainian-born Kirill Karabits (more…