Schubert
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... |
Classical CDs: Mandolins, trumpets and hot soupSaturday, 01 February 2025
Reynaldo Hahn: Piano Quartet, Piano Quintet, Songs Karim Sulayman (tenor), Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective (Chandos)I’ve been a fan of the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective for some time, having heard them in concert and on their excellent... Read more... |
Classical CDs: Mandolins, multiphonics and multiple pianosSaturday, 09 November 2024
Brahms: Piano Sonata No. 1, Schubert: Wanderer Fantasy Alexandre Kantorow (piano) (BIS)I’d previously encountered pianist Alexandre Kantorow via his exuberant set of Saint-Saëns piano concertos, sparky, lovable performances conducted by his... Read more... |
Classical CDs: Leaves, prisms and sub-bassSaturday, 26 October 2024
Schubert: Sonata in G major D. 894, Moments Musicaux D. 780, Fantasy in F minor D. 940 Maurizio Pollini, Daniele Pollini (pianos) (Deutsche Grammophon)What a superb cover image for the last recording by Maurizio Pollini (1942-2024). Pollini ‘... Read more... |
Elisabeth Leonskaja, Wigmore Hall review - a universe of sound and emotion in Schubert’s last three sonatasMonday, 30 September 2024
Wonders never ceased in Elisabeth Leonskaja’s return to the Wigmore Hall. Not only did she play Schubert’s last three sonatas with all repeats and the full range of a unique power undiminished in a 78-year old alongside a never too overstated pathos... Read more... |
Pavel Kolesnikov, Wigmore Hall review - unpredictable magicTuesday, 24 September 2024
All five finalists in the Leeds International Piano Competition, at which Pavel Kolesnikov was one of the jurors, should have been given tickets, transport and accommodation to hear his Wigmore recital the evening after the prizegiving. Not that... Read more... |
Bostridge, Osborne, Edinburgh International Festival 2024 review - the heights and the abyssFriday, 16 August 2024
When you stop to think about it, Schwanengesang is a pretty ridiculous thing. Schubert’s final song cycle was famously put together by his publishers after his death, and so it’s barely a cycle at all. Therefore, unlike Die schöne Müllerin and... Read more... |
Prom 31, Mutter, West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Barenboim review - beauty against barbarismMonday, 12 August 2024
Founded by Daniel Barenboim and Edward Said, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra first performed at the Proms – to a rapturous welcome – in 2003. For two decades the visits, and the audience rapture, have continued, while the region of most WEDO... Read more... |
Schubert Piano Sonatas 4, Paul Lewis, Wigmore Hall review - feverish and sometimes violentWednesday, 27 March 2024
“Death doesn’t scare me at all,” said my friend Christopher Hitchens during our last telephone conversation. “After all, it’s the only certainty in life. Dying, however, scares me shitless”.However hard one tries to remove these three final sonatas... Read more... |
Winterreise, Clayton, Aurora Orchestra, Collon, QEH review - new maps for the great journeyFriday, 15 March 2024
Like Hamlet or Fidelio, Schubert’s Winterreise can withstand and overcome (almost) any kind of re-imagining. In the case of Hans Zender’s 1993 “composed interpretation” of the work for chamber orchestra – and sundry sound effects – the new model has... Read more... |
Classical CDs: Smocks, sins and sea swellSaturday, 13 January 2024
LICHT: 800 Years of German Lieder Anna Lucia Richter (mezzo-soprano), Ammiel Bushakevitz (hurdy gurdy, harpsichord, clavichord, fortepiano, piano) (SWR2/Challenge Classics)LICHT, 800 Years of German Lieder, from Anna Lucia Richter and Ammiel... Read more... |
Paul Lewis, Wigmore Hall review - Schubert sonatas revisitedWednesday, 06 December 2023
A decade has passed since Paul Lewis concluded an endeavour of a kind never previously undertaken: to perform, over two and a half years and across four continents, every work Schubert wrote for piano between 1822, the year he was diagnosed with... Read more... |
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