violin
Sebastian Scotney
The duo partnership between violinist Esther Yoo and pianist Yekwon Sunwoo is still at a very early stage. The announcements which both musicians made to the audience from the Wigmore Hall platform were almost completely inaudible, but it did sound as though this recital could actually have been their first public performance together. Both have Korean heritage, both have had major successes in international competitions, and during the pandemic they have spent time back with their respective families in Seoul. There is clearly an affinity between them which will, if circumstances allow, Read more ...
David Nice
There should eventually be a plaque on the outside of the Fidelio Orchestra Café in Farringdon, to the effect that London’s musical life after lockdown re-ignited here. And how, in early July, with Steven Isserlis exuberantly stepping up to play Bach before a rapt small audience. Even now that so many venues have started cautiously opening up, it was still a physical and emotional jolt of the best kind to hear another of the greatest string sounds in the world, that of violinist Viktoria Mullova, and the double-bass thrumming in the resonant woody space of her son Misha Mullov-Abbado at the Read more ...
David Nice
The Fidelio Orchestra Café is where you go for electric-shock and deep immersion therapy from the greatest of musicians. It happened last week with Steven Isserlis in Bach, and last night Alina Ibragimova sent high voltage shooting through the body with the very first gesture of Janáček’s Violin Sonata, joined in supernatural high wire acts by Samson Tsoy on the Bechstein now filling more than the space occupied last week only by the cellist. The two advertised sonatas are febrile masterpieces, but we hadn’t bargained for the deep-meditation extras by Arvo Pärt and Olivier Messiaen, the Read more ...
Steven Isserlis
So Ida has left us – a legend has departed. What a violinist! What a woman! Magnificent, unique, incorrigible – she was a law unto herself.First, the playing: a film about her was aptly entitled: “I AM the Violin.” And she was! The violin was her life; she mastered it, devoted so much of her existence to it, cared so much about it. Every performance was an event, which she took absolutely seriously, giving each concert her all. She spoke through her violin, proved herself through it, lived within the music she made. She was a marvel, an icon; each note she played was the result of total Read more ...
David Nice
Three deep-veined masterpieces by two of the 20th century's greatest composers who just happened to be British, all fading at the end to nothing: beyond interpretations of such stunning focus as those offered by violinist Vilde Frang, conductor Antonio Pappano and the London Symphony Orchestra, these works could ask for nothing more than intense silence from the third point of what Britten called the magic triangle with composer and performers - the audience. With hardly anyone these days daring to cough in a concert, and only those present who felt healthy, brave or foolhardy enough to turn Read more ...
Boyd Tonkin
Alina Ibragimova’s solo journey (in 2015) through the peaks and abysses of Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas gave me vivid Proms memories to treasure for a lifetime. The Russian-born violinist’s Bach abounds in both majesty and tenderness, as well as a consuming fire of intensity when the music so demands. She brought something of the same quality to her performance last night of Mendelssohn’s E minor concerto at the Barbican. Nathalie Stutzmann conducted the London Symphony Orchestra in a menu of well-seasoned 19th-century favourites that began with generous chunks of Wagner’s Tannhäuser and Read more ...
David Nice
If you're going to run a music festival with flair, it's not enough just to have a run of star performers who pop up for single events. The 11th Wimbledon International Music Festival can offer those – Christian Tetzlaff and Lars Vogt, for instance, were there a week ago. But founder and festival director Anthony Wilkinson had also witnessed the phenomenal programming of violinist Hugo Ticciati at his own O/Modernt festival in Sweden, and booked him as Artist in Residence for five events. I heard two of them on Saturday, Labyrinths: A Double Bill, and witnessed some of the most hyper-refined Read more ...
David Nice
Throughout his 11 years as Principal Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra to date, Vladimir Jurowski has focused on two elements, programme-wise: tellingly-linked concerts of the rich and rare, and fine-tuned interpretations of the repertoire's cornerstones over the seasons. Next month he'll be reprising his meticulously calibrated view of Mahler's "Resurrection" Symphony; last night it was again the turn of Tchaikovsky's "Pathétique" - an absolute pinnacle of depth and discipline, building on the sound which stunned us when the team unfolded Russian rarities at the Proms, but also Read more ...
David Nice
In the Netherlands, Mark Wigglesworth is already a musical legend for his work with Dutch youth orchestras. Hopefully, in addition to the year and a bit when he wrought miracles at English National Opera, he will become so in the UK after his training of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. That culminated in last night's Prom, with more than a little help from co-inspirer Nicola Benedetti. It's worth beginning at the very end to note how, 12 years on from the (then) Simón Bolívar National Youth Orchestra of Venezuela's game-changing Prom with Gustavo Dudamel, the NYOGB not only Read more ...
David Nice
You should not die or be born on Svalbard, 1,985 kilometres above Norway's northernmost coast, and at 18 you work or leave for the mainland. Hunting is over, mining nearly so. Tourism, carefully managed, and Arctic research are the future; the Global Seed Vault is also here, and Syria has been the first country to take from it. Excursions outside the biggest settlement, Longyearbyen, are advisable only with an armed guard; dangerous polar bears outnumber inhabitants and occasionally crash into town. A special Svalbardian variety of reindeer and arctic foxes seem comfortable ambling around Read more ...
Tim Cumming
As Martin Scorsese’s new feature film, Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story, hits Netflix and cinemas, and a new 14 CD boxed set enters the official Bootleg Series, theartsdesk talks exclusively to Scarlet Rivera, the violinist on Desire and the Rolling Thunder Revue tours of 1975 and 1976, about her experiences of encountering, recording and touring with Dylan.I wrote to Scarlet Rivera via her website, expecting only the outside chance of a reply, because few who have worked and spent time with Dylan tend to open up about their experiences in public. I stressed my interest in the Read more ...
Miranda Heggie
Playing with such energy, such synergy and such general camaraderie at the start of a tour must surely pave the way for even greater things to come. The Scottish Chamber Orchestra with Nicola Benedetti kicked off their European tour at Birmingham Town Hall, ahead of performances in Denmark, Switzerland and Germany. Opening with Mozart’s Third Violin Concerto, Benedetti gave a captivating solo performance, while directing the orchestra with assurance and style. Commanding the SCO, Benedetti’s leadership from the violin was strong and compelling, as were her cadenzas, where her solo playing Read more ...