19th century
Adam Sweeting
Verdi's La Traviata has become one of the best-loved and most-performed works in the operatic repertoire, but this is no thanks to sections of the English press. In this entertaining romp through the opera's history, presenters Tom Service and Amanda Vickery drooled over the juiciest bits from some of the reviews from La Traviata's London debut in 1856 – for instance The Times of London deplored "an exhibition of harlotry upon the public stage", adding that this was "the poetry of the brothel" – before splitting up to examine the musical and historical background of the piece.Once you'd got Read more ...
Florence Hallett
For all the wrong reasons, the work of Dexter Dalwood serves as a useful metaphor for this exhibition. Trite, tokenistic and desperate to look clever, Dalwood’s paintings are as tiresomely inward-looking as the show itself, which is a dismal example of curatorial self-indulgence at the expense of public engagement. It’s not always a bad thing to give free rein to theorising curators, but this show compares unfavourably with exhibitions at, notably, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Courtauld Gallery that have successfully introduced the public to sound, but arguably arcane academic Read more ...
Nick Hasted
Heimat was already one of cinema’s most extraordinary, majestic achievements. Edgar Reitz’s three series of films for German TV spent 53 hours exploring the humanity of the inhabitants of Schabbach, a Rhineland village much like Reitz's own roots, throughout Germany’s cataclysmic 20th century. It was a chronicle built from often fond, sometimes horrifying memories, mesmerically deep, leisurely detail, and a gorgeous cinematic eye. Reitz was 79 when he added nearly four further hours, revisiting Schabbach in 2012. This could have been hubris. Instead it’s a wonderful (presumably) last visit to Read more ...
Marina Vaizey
It is irresistible to watch Andrew Roberts, the ambitious historian of one of history's most ambitious figures, narrating a three-part account of his hero’s life and times. He is giving us a superb analysis of Napoleon Bonaparte’s gifts, flaws, insecurities and achievements. The first instalment opened with a glorious sunset over the South Atlantic, and several views of the dramatic scenery of the volcanic island of St Helena where the exiled Napoleon was held for six years, 4,000 miles from home, as the prisoner of the British, until his death in 1821 at the age of 51. We saw pivotal Read more ...
Matt Wolf
Beauty transforms itself into a beast but an inner grace shines forth regardless: such is the enduring power of Bernard Pomerance's stage play The Elephant Man, first seen in London almost 40 years ago and a Broadway semi-regular ever since. The latest New York revival has transferred lock, stock and star-driven barrel to the West End, where local audiences can discover something I've had occasion to remark upon twice over the years on Broadway – for all his A-list screen actor status, Bradley Cooper is entirely at home on the stage.That the thrice Oscar-nominated actor (now Tony- Read more ...
stephen.walsh
Debussy completed only one opera (though he started plenty), but it’s the most perfect work imaginable, not only in sheer musical refinement and narrative precision, but in psychological penetration and above all in that exact grasp of the irrational nature of the medium that distinguishes the greatest operas from the merely effective. Maeterlinck’s Pelléas et Mélisande is a sometimes uneasy blend of the mundane and the mysterious, but Debussy – in his quite faithful operatic version – fuses these two elements so successfully, through his music, that the distinction ceases to matter. His Read more ...
alexandra.coghlan
With Kavakos, Faust, Shaham and Skride already been and gone, and Jansen, Ehnes, Bell and Ibragimova still to come, the LSO’s International Violin Festival has nothing left to prove. We’re not short of star power in London’s concert scene, but even by our spoilt metropolitan standards this is a pretty unarguable line-up. With excellence a given, then, it takes quite a lot to startle a crowd into delight – especially on a Sunday night. But that’s what Christian Tetzlaff did with the unassuming freshness and brilliance of his Beethoven.Ever thoughtful, Tetzlaff has taken the cadenzas that Read more ...
alexandra.coghlan
Fashion is a funny thing, in opera no less than the sartorial trappings that go with it (everything from tight, hipster trews to billowing ballgowns at last night's Glyndebourne season opening, in case you were wondering). Donizetti's classical tragedy Poliuto is historically a miss rather than a hit, never quite finding its footing in the repertoire, despite some early success. But on the strength – and strength of appropriately gladiatorial proportions it really is – of Glyndebourne's exceptional cast, Poliuto may yet make its case as a classic: a sober meditation on Read more ...
David Nice
Crotch-grabbing, suggestions of oral and anal sex, stylized punching and kicking and other casual violence offer diminishing returns in your standard Calixto Bieito production. Sometimes a scene or two flashes focused brilliance, which only makes you wonder why he doesn’t apply the same rigour throughout. His 17-year-old Carmen has more such fitful insights than most of his other shows, and they’re very much complemented here by assured conducting and singing to make this punchy edition of Bizet’s amazing score, shorn of most of its dialogue, flash past at an energetic and colourful pace in Read more ...
Florence Hallett
What strange things netsuke are. Tiny sculptures, usually made from wood or ivory and depicting anything from figures, to fruit to animals, they were first made in the 17th century as toggles to attach pockets and bags to the robes worn by Japanese men. For as long as they have existed they have been considered highly collectible, and perhaps it is this, and the rapturous appreciation they inspire in their devotees, that to me at least makes them seem hopelessly, unspeakably kitsch.Listening to the potter Edmund de Waal talking last night as part of the Brighton Festival, it struck me that Read more ...
Peter Quantrill
This was a very "concert" performance indeed. Across the stage music stands stood like sentinels lest any rash singer attempted to stand out and – surely not – act. Such fears were misplaced (or the stands did their job) in the end, as the music was what mattered and everyone stood and sang, with one outstanding exception, the Kundry of Mihoko Fujimura.It can be no coincidence that of all the singers on stage she knew her role most intimately, and had worked for some years with Stefan Herheim in his celebrated production at Bayreuth. That said, Burkhard Fritz (pictured below) has sung the Read more ...
fisun.guner
If it’s about magic, and features sanitised cobbled streets and dark gothic interiors, then Harry Potter comparisons will no doubt be inevitable.And so it has been with this seven-part adaptation of Susanna Clarke’s hefty 2004 novel, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, directed by Toby Haynes. The comparison seems fitting, for though this is a mini-series that has the sumptuous look and high production values of a typically lavish BBC costume drama, everything else about it says children’s drama. Surely the BBC schedulers are wrong to put it out after the watershed? Even more than Harry Read more ...