Classical Reviews

Accentus, Insula, Equilbey, Barbican

Peter Quantrill Tuesday, 22 September 2015

The frail bridge between Baroque and Classical aesthetics was the theme for this debut UK appearance by Insula, the period-orchestra extension to Laurence Equilbey’s superb vocal ensemble accentus.

Baroque Alehouse, Eike, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

alexandra Coghlan Tuesday, 22 September 2015

Sunday evening may have been all about melancholy at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, but last night Bjarte Eike and his uproariously talented Barokksolistene traded wails for ales and one of their legendary alehouse sessions at the Globe’s Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. There was music, certainly, but also dancing, storytelling, drinking (yes, really) and more joy than it’s possible to imagine from this tight-knit bunch of musical mavericks.

Perahia, Richter, LSO, Haitink, Barbican

Sebastian Scotney Monday, 21 September 2015

Last night's perfectly-judged, superbly communicated performance of Mahler's Fourth Symphony served as a reminder that the passion, experience and astonishing musicality of 86-year-old conductor Bernard Haitink are things to be cherished and never taken for granted. The symphony, first performed in 1901, was the main work in this second of Haitink's three concerts with the LSO before they leave together for Japan.

The Image of Melancholy, Eike, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

David Nice Monday, 21 September 2015

“Sounds a bit depressing,” said several friends when I urged them to attend the theatrical incarnation of The Image of Melancholy, inspirational violinist Bjarte Eike’s award-winning CD with his stunning Norwegian-based group Barokksolistene. Creative melancholy, though, is not the same as stuck depression, and the sequence on the disc was well-balanced with songs and dances as well as superbly engineered sound.

theartsdesk at the Lammermuir Festival

David Kettle Monday, 21 September 2015

It’s hard to believe that East Lothian’s Lammermuir Festival has only been around for six years. In that short time, it’s become a cherished fixture in Scotland’s musical calendar. For regular concert-goers, it’s a calmer antidote to the August festival mayhem of Edinburgh, just half an hour away, and just a couple of weeks after the capital’s wall-to-wall chaos ends.

Classical CDs Weekly: Bernstein, Fučík, Wartime Consolations

graham Rickson Saturday, 19 September 2015

Bernstein: Symphony No. 3 'Kaddish' Baltimore Symphony Orchestra/Marin Alsop (Naxos)

Hofmann, Royal Danish Orchestra, Boder, Symphony Hall, Birmingham

Richard Bratby Thursday, 17 September 2015

There’s just something about an opera orchestra when it’s let out of the pit. The Royal Danish Orchestra is more than that, of course – it makes much of its six centuries of history, and since its past members included John Dowland, Heinrich Schütz and Carl Nielsen, why wouldn’t it?

Comment

Shibe, Egmont Ensemble, Wigmore Hall

David Nice Tuesday, 15 September 2015

It was a sad coincidence that this Monday Platform “showcasing talented young artists” took place only weeks after the death in a road accident of Roderick Lakin, Director of Arts for 31 years at the Royal Over-Seas League which was last night's backer. For no concert could have been more sensitively tuned to a personal farewell. Overt melancholy only surfaced in the slow-movement theme of Brahms’s Second Piano Trio. But wouldn’t you want Dowland, Bach and Schubert at your memorial concert...

Anne Boleyn's Songbook, Alamire, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

alexandra Coghlan Monday, 14 September 2015

Later this week David Skinner’s Alamire ensemble will collect the Early Music Gramophone Award for The Spy’s Choirbook, but last night it was the group’s follow-up album that was in the spotlight (or rather the candlelight) in a performance at the Globe’s Sam Wanamaker Playhouse. Anne Boleyn’s Songbook is the central panel of a planned trilogy of releases, with a story every bit as compelling as its predecessor.

Dunedin Consort, Butt, Brunton Theatre, Musselburgh

David Kettle Monday, 14 September 2015

It was, admitted the Lammermuir Festival’s co-artistic director James Waters, ‘a bit of an experiment’. And trying to recreate the fertile atmosphere – intellectual, musical and culinary – of a Leipzig coffee house from the 1730s, complete with Bach, coffee and cake, could so easily have become just an excuse to expand the waistline in the name of art. Or worse, a tempting tasty marketing ploy to bring in reluctant new audience members.