Haydn
Classical CDs: Elephants, bells and warm blanketsSaturday, 08 February 2025
Michael Tilson Thomas: The Complete Columbia, Sony and RCA Recordings (Sony)Big box sets continue to arrive. This one’s a whopper: 80 discs celebrating Michael Tilson Thomas’s 80th birthday. Artistic qualities aside, the production values here... Read more... |
Tiffin Youth Choir, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus, Jurowski, RFH review - perfect detachment suits public statementsTuesday, 21 January 2025
When Vladimir Jurowski planned this typically unorthodox programme, he could not have known that a disaster even greater, long-term, than 9/11 was going to befall the USA two days after the concert. There is no bad time for a tricky commemoration of... Read more... |
Hardenberger, BBC Philharmonic, Storgårds, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - splendour and a trumpeter's voluntaryMonday, 07 October 2024
Two splendid pieces of orchestral virtuosity began and finished the second Saturday concert by the BBC Philharmonic under John Storgårds at the Bridgewater Hall. It was given the title of “Mischief and Magic”, an apt summary.For mischief we had... Read more... |
The Creation, Alder, Clayton, Mofidian, LPO, Gardner, RFH review - dancing gay in green meadowsSunday, 03 March 2024
Light and grace must flood the concert hall in Haydn’s The Creation, after a striking-for-its time evocation of Chaos, and periwigged creatures skip around the Genesis picture. With Edward Gardner keeping the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus... Read more... |
Fung, BBC Philharmonic, Weilerstein, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - clever and comicalMonday, 19 February 2024
Placing the UK premiere of Katherine Balch’s whisper concerto (for cello and orchestra) after Haydn’s Symphony No. 100 was probably an inspired idea from the BBC Philharmonic and conductor Joshua Weilerstein.In its day, the so-called “Military”... Read more... |
Classical CDs: Fringes, canons and contestsSaturday, 27 January 2024
Leif Ove Andsnes: The Warner Classics Edition 1990-2010 (Warner Classics)It’s good to review a compendious box set celebrating a musician who’s very much still around. The 36 discs in this set certainly aren’t what you’d call historical... Read more... |
The Creation, Choirs of King's College & New College Oxford, Philharmonia, Hyde, King's College Chapel, Cambridge - sublime setting for mundane performanceMonday, 06 November 2023
“Let his words resound on high,” sings the choir in the final chorus of The Creation. In King’s College Chapel in Cambridge, it is hard not to want to look up, to admire the splendour of the largest fan vaulting anywhere in Europe. King’s truly is... Read more... |
Classical CDs: Penitence, pipe smoking and soot spritesSaturday, 05 August 2023
Otto Klemperer: The Warner Classics Remastered Edition (Warner Classics)The young Otto Klemperer’s conducting career was encouraged by no less than Gustav Mahler, Klemperer’s meteoric rise leading him to become director of Berlin’s Kroll Opera... Read more... |
Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, Wigmore Hall review - virtuoso brilliance and thoughtfulness reveal Haydn's rangeTuesday, 21 February 2023
In a recent interview with the New York Times, Jean-Efflam Bavouzet mischievously described interpreting Haydn’s piano sonatas as “putting clothes on a rather naked skeleton… You have this joy of bringing it to life with all the tools you can... Read more... |
Faust, English Baroque Soloists, Gardiner, St Martin-in-the-Fields review – gusto and graceMonday, 25 April 2022
More than half a century has passed since John Eliot Gardiner’s choir and orchestras first won their historically-informed licence to thrill. A feverish Saturday night at St Martin-in-the-Fields proved that Gardiner and the English Baroque Soloists... Read more... |
Takács Quartet, Wigmore Hall review - intimate letters and holy songsTuesday, 09 November 2021
The Takács Quartet is hard to pin down. The group was founded in 1975 in Budapest, but since 1983 has been based in Boulder, Colorado. Cellist András Fejér is the only remaining founding member, and the violist, Richard O’Neill, only joined in 2020... Read more... |
Dennis, SCO, Whelan, Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh review - period touches and classical sparkleSaturday, 30 October 2021
Peter Whelan is best known to Scottish audiences from his years of service as principal bassoon in the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. He left to pursue other projects several years ago, the most illustrious of which has probably been his work with the... Read more... |
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