18th century
Susanna, Opera North review - hybrid staging of a Handel oratorioMonday, 06 October 2025
Turning Handel oratorio into opera can be a rewarding enterprise. Charles Edwards’ presentation of Joshua, over 15 years ago, for instance, was very effective for Opera North in using projection as well as costume design to make a parallel of the... Read more... |
Scott, Irish Baroque Orchestra, Whelan, RIAM, Dublin review - towards a Mozart masterpieceMonday, 06 October 2025
One miracle of musical performance is that a work you’ve loved for years can be revealed as never before in an outstanding interpretation. That happened to me last week at the New Ross Piano Festival when 22-year-old pianist Magdalene Cho turned us... Read more... |
Ariodante, Opéra Garnier, Paris review - a blast of Baroque beautySaturday, 04 October 2025
The revival of Robert Carsen’s production of Handel’s Ariodante at the Opéra Garnier in Paris under the direction of Raphaël Pichon, with his Ensemble Pygmalion and a top-notch cast, is well worth a trip to Paris. At over four hours, it might seem... Read more... |
Monteverdi Choir, ORR, Heras-Casado, St Martin-in-the-Fields review - flames of joy and sorrowSaturday, 20 September 2025
35 years ago, persona-now-non-grata John Eliot Gardiner revealed how performances of Mozart’s Idomeneo and La Clemenza di Tito allying period instruments with great voices could electrify in a new way. And here we were last night with Pablo Heras-... Read more... |
Waley-Cohen, Manchester Camerata, Pether, Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester review - premiere of no ordinary violin concertoFriday, 05 September 2025
Manchester Camerata is enhancing its reputation for pioneering with three performances featuring Nick Martin’s new Violin Concerto, which it has commissioned, two of them in art galleries rather than conventional music venues.So the concerto had its... Read more... |
Buxton International Festival 2025 review - a lavish offering of smaller-scale workSaturday, 26 July 2025
The Buxton International Festival this year was lavish in its smaller-scale productions in addition to Ambroise Thomas’s Hamlet, the heavyweight offer of the opera programme. And outstanding among them was the combination of Bernstein’s Trouble in... Read more... |
Semele, Royal Opera review - unholy smokeTuesday, 01 July 2025
Poor, slightly silly Semele fries at the sight of lover Jupiter casting off his mortal form, but in Congreve’s and Handel’s supposedly happy ending, everyone else rejoices that Bacchus is the offspring of this dalliance. Or do they? Not in the new... Read more... |
Le nozze di Figaro, Glyndebourne review - perceptive humanity in period settingTuesday, 01 July 2025
Over 100 years ago, John Christie envisaged Wagner’s Parsifal with limited forces in the Organ Room at Glyndebourne. He would have been amazed to see it arrive on the main stage this year. But émigrés Carl Ebert and Fritz Busch persuaded him that... Read more... |
Mazeppa, Grange Park Opera review - a gripping reassessmentMonday, 16 June 2025
Tchaikovsky has precisely two operas in the standard repertoire (including The Queen of Spades, currently playing at Garsington), and readers who love those works might well be forgiven for wondering what happened to the other eight or nine. On the... Read more... |
Tornado review - samurai swordswoman takes Scotland by stormSaturday, 14 June 2025
The opening images of Tornado are striking. A wild-haired young woman in Japanese peasant garb runs for her life through a barren forest and across burnt-orange fields. As her pursuers, a rough-looking band of thieves, draw nearer, she seeks refuge... Read more... |
Pygmalion, Early Opera Company, Curnyn, Middle Temple Hall review - Rameau magic outside the opera houseWednesday, 21 May 2025
With French baroque opera all but banished from the UK’s major opera companies, it’s left to concert halls and country houses to fill the void. There’s a full-length treat ahead this summer with Rameau’s opéra-ballet Les Indes Galantes at Hampshire’... Read more... |
Giulio Cesare, The English Concert, Bicket, Barbican review - 10s across the board in perfect HandelMonday, 12 May 2025
Is Giulio Cesare in Egitto, to give the full title, Handel’s best and shapeliest opera? Glyndebourne’s revival of the legendary David McVicar production last year made it seem so, not least thanks to the presence of two of last night’s soloists,... Read more... |
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