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Reformation: Mishka Rushdie Momen on mixing Renaissance piano music with later periods at the London Piano Festival

Sat, 04 Oct 2025 08:26:10 +0000

Mishka Rushdie Momen (Photo: Benjamin Ealovega)

Pianist Mishka Rushdie Momen will be making her debut at the 10th anniversary edition of the London Piano Festival, which runs at Kings Place from 9 to 14 October 2025. Her solo recital features music from her recent disc, Reformation. There will be keyboard pieces by Byrd, Gibbons, Bull and Sweelinck alongside her own arrangement of Dowland's In Darkness Let Me Dwell and Thomas Adès' Darknesse Visible. Mishka will also be taking part in the Two Piano Gala, joining other pianists for works by Elena Langer and Brahms.

Unusually, perhaps, Mishka has not won a major competition. But she counts amongst her mentors Richard Goode and András Schiff, who presented her as one of his ‘Building Bridges’ artists (a series of international recitals for three chosen young musicians). She studied at the Purcell School and her later teachers included Imogen Cooper and, at the Guildhall School, Joan Havill. Her disc Reformation was released on Hyperion earlier this year and was her first solo recording on the label. Her exploration of Renaissance repertoire arose as a COVID lockdown project. First discovering Byrd's Fantasia in A minor, she then delved into the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book and the collection of John Bull’s keyboard music published in Musica Britannica.

Mishka Rushdie Momen playing Mozart with Angela Hewitt at the Trasimeno Music Festival, July 2023 (Photo: Adriano Scognamillo

Mishka sees the music of such composers as Byrd and Gibbons as being part of the canon. We have also become used to hearing Renaissance and Baroque music on the piano; both Glenn Gould and Alfred Brendel played music from this period, it is an important part of our heritage. Composers of the period wrote and played music on a variety of instruments (Gibbons wrote pieces for virginals or organ). They would have expected a variety of different sound worlds and she finds that it suits the piano. The sonorous, singing sound of the modern piano works with music that was often based on popular songs. Some of the pieces she is playing were originally for organ, and these work well on the piano. There are running passages in Walsingham, dazzling scales that sound thrilling on the modern piano.

Thomas Adès' 1992 piece, Darknesse Visible, speaks well as a response to the Renaissance music. Adès based the work on John Dowland's In Darkness Let Me Dwell which he splits into musical cells and puts them under the microscope. For Mishka, Adès has a genius for the different sound possibilities of the piano, using the resonances of the different registers. A lot of the piece is quiet, mezzo-piano at the most, but there are explosive moments. She points out that timings of performances (including Ades' own) can vary from seven to eleven minutes, which means the performer has some leeway and is allowed some spontaneity. As part of the recital, Mishka will be talking to Ella Lee. She finds that she is doing this more and more; it is important that if the audience is less familiar with the works, they should learn the background motivations.

Mishka found the pieces in her recital immediately accessible with a directness that people warm to. She calls it honest music.

The piano teamwork gala at the festival is something different. She does so many solo recitals that she really loves being able to work with other pianists. She will be playing Elena Langer's RedMare, which was commissioned for the 2017 London Piano Festival. Mishka describes as an extrovert, rather physical piece. She will also be playing Brahms with Ronan O'Hora, who was her professor at the Guildhall School.

Though Mishka's main concentration is on music from Mozart through to Schumann, her recitals include repertoire stretching back to the Renaissance and reaching forward to the present day. She comments that pianists have the luxury of selecting repertoire from over such a long period of time that they are spoiled for choice. This means that you have a great deal of liberty with selecting works for concert programmes, and she enjoys constructing narratives and putting together works that speak to each other. Last year, she gave recitals pairing Schubert with Renaissance pieces. For Mishka, the intimacy and fluidity of Schubert's writing goes well with the Renaissance works.

She plays a fair bit of contemporary music, and she sees it as important to be in touch with the music of our time. It is also important to consider the way the present engages with the past, and she mentions in this regard not only Thomas Adès but George Benjamin, whose music she has also been playing recently. At the Aldeburgh Festival in June 2025, she played Renaissance music from her Reformation disc alongside music by Thomas Adès, Daniel Kidane and Héloïse Werner, plus with George Benjamin's Shadowlines.

Her concert repertoire varies between solo recitals, chamber music and concerto appearances. The exact mix varies from season to season, and she admits that she finds it hard to say no. But this means that she does take on a wide variety of projects, which is something she enjoys.

She likes the intensity and intimacy of solo recitals, but she would be bereft if she were not able to play chamber music, and she feels that the one informs the other. Also, at their best, concerto performances can be large-scale chamber music.

As a child, she learned both the piano and violin, but at a certain point, it was clear that the piano was going to be dominant. The piano seemed to come naturally to her. She loves the self-sufficiency of the instrument. She fell into piano playing by accident as she was simply copying her sister. Her sister was learning at school, and the young Mishka was copying her sister a lot at the time. But having taken up the instrument, she found it compelling and was obsessed.

In addition to her teachers, she counts the great pianists of the past, such as Alfred Cortot and Radu Lupu, as influences, commenting that the internet means we have access to the great recordings of the past.

On 9 October 2025, Mishka opens the Hatfield House Music Festival with a programme that pairs Renaissance English keyboard music with Couperin and Ravel.

Coming up, she has a recital with cellist Tim Posner in an all-Beethoven programme, which they present at Mill Hill Music Club on 26 October. She will be joining pianist Alistair Beatson for piano four-hands. Later in the season, she will be touring the USA and Japan. This will be her first visit to Japan, and she will be giving a Beethoven recital as well as performing Vaughan Williams' Piano Concerto, a work that is new to her.

Further information from Mishka Rushdie Momen's website.

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Elsewhere on this blog

Strong emotions, vocal virtuosity : Rossini's Ermione & Stabat Mater with Jakob Lehmann & Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique - concert review
Explaining the unexplainable: a magical album from Lotte Betts-Dean, Dimitris Soukaras, everything you've ever lived on Delphian - record review
Clarinet & strings: Coleridge-Taylor & a new Jago Thornton piece from Sacconi Quartet & David Campbell at Conway Hall - concert review
Letter from Florida: Tianyi Lu conducts Bartók & Brahms with Lukas Vondracek & New World Symphony - concert review
Engaging rom-com energy: Martin Constantine's production of Donizetti's The Elixir of Love at English Touring Opera - opera review
La Grande Audition de Leipzig: Paul Agnew & Les Arts Florissants take us to Leipzig in 1722 & 1723 - concert review
One little book sitting in a convent: Laurie Stras introduces the background to Musica Secreta's new recording of music from the Biffoli-Sostegni manuscript - interview
A declaration of love to a composer: pianist Vanessa Wagner on Philip Glass' Etudes - feature
Iphigenia in Blackheath: community opera dares to go where few UK companies do with a compelling account of Gluck's French tragedy - review
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Ivor Gurney’s ‘Carol of the Skiddaw Yowes’: An Appreciation Part I

Sat, 04 Oct 2025 05:00:00 +0000

Many years ago, in the National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh, I discovered a Nativity scene by the Scottish artist William Bell Scott (1811-90). This had been painted around 1872. The artist had used the landscape of south Ayrshire as his inspiration. This Nativity was set in a dilapidated barn near Penkill Castle. In the background can be seen the rural lowland Scottish landscape: one of the approaching shepherds is playing the bagpipes. It was this painting that made me realise that the Nativity is universal. European Renaissance painters had set it in their local landscapes, both rural and urban. So why not Ayrshire, or anywhere?

In his poem ‘The Carol of Skiddaw Yowes’, the Lake District poet Edmund Casson made the ‘translation’ from the fields (fellside) around Bethlehem to the slopes of Skiddaw in Cumberland. Michael Pilkington, (1989) has summed up the mood of this ‘carol’ as the ‘Shepherds on Skiddaw in the Lake District pray for warmth and protection in the cold of Christmas-tide.’

The Carol of Skiddaw Yowes

The shepherds on the fellside

That is by Bethany,

Had not on finger

Redder blains than we:

Jesu that is God's light,

Warm us in the cold night.

The yowes that men were minding

Long and long ago,

Were not more like to die

Than ours in the snow:

Jesu, that knows Thy sheep,

Skiddaw yowes tend and keep.

The angels that were singing,

Long and long agone,

Were not a whiter host

Than snow-flakes falling down;

Jesu, the true fold,

Gird us on the rocks cold.

Skiddaw (3054 ft) is one of the highest mountains in the Lake District. I have climbed it on two occasions: the first was on a warm summer’s day when the view from the summit was hidden in heat haze. The second was on a bitterly cold day at the end of October. The vista from the summit was stunning. With my binoculars, I could just about make out Snowdonia well over 110 miles away. Nearer at hand was the Isle of Man, the Mull of Galloway in southern Scotland and The Cheviot in Northumberland. I would be imagining what I saw, if I included the hills above Belfast and Goatfell on the Island of Arran. However, keen-eyed climbers have spotted these distant places on an exceptionally clear day.

The poet Thomas Edmund Casson was born during January 1883 at Vale View, Pennington near Ulverston, in the old county of Lancashire. His father was a local grocer and sub postmaster. Casson was educated at Trent College in Derby, before going up to Merton College in Oxford.

During 1911 he was an assistant schoolmaster at Keswick School. The following year, Casson married a local woman, Margaret Macintyre.

Edmund Casson’s first book, A Ballad of Urswick Tarn was issued in 1905 by Ulverston publisher James Atkinson (Caxton Printing Works). His next literary work was A Masque of King Dunmail, which had been ‘designed [for], and shall be presented, by members of Keswick School, May 1912.’ Two years later, Masques and Poems was published by Erskine MacDonald of London. This short book contained the present ‘Carol of Skiddaw Yowes.’ It would have been from this volume that Ivor Gurney took the text for his song.

Subsequent books included The Wise Kings of Borrowdale (1927), The Red Rose of Lancashire (1928), Lord Derwentwater’s Fate and other poems (1930), The Tragedy of King Aella (1944), and George Fox, a poem (1947). In 1938 Frederick Warne published a collection of Casson’s poetry. Thomas Edmund Casson died in Ulverston during February 1960.

Interestingly, the score of the ‘Carol of Skiddaw Yowes’ wrongly attributes the text to Ernest Casson.

The poem is written in three regular stanzas, each with six lines. The rhyming scheme is interesting: ABCBDD. This is the same structure as W.B. Yeats’s used in his iconic ‘The Wild Swans at Coole.’ Yeats’ poem first appeared in the June 1917 edition of the Little Review: Casson’s Carol was published in 1914.

The ‘Carol of Skiddaw Yowes’ is written largely in standard English, with one or two Cumbrian dialect words. That said, these locutions are not exclusive to Cumbria. Clearly, the most obvious are the words ‘yowes’ and ‘blains.’ ‘Yowes’ (pronounced here to rhyme with ‘yews’) is a little more complicated. Enthusiasts of Robert Burns will know the beautiful song ‘Ca the yowes/To the Knowes’ which was collected and edited by the poet around 1794. In Burns, the appropriate rhyme would be with ‘cows.’ ‘Yowes’ can refer to sheep in general or ‘ewes.’ ‘Blains’ means an inflammatory swelling, ‘chapped hands’ or ‘blisters.’ ‘Agone’ is an archaic word which simply means ‘ago.’ The final line of the poem begins with the word ‘gird.’ In this sense it means ‘surround us’, being a possible metaphor for a stone sheepfold.

The most remarkable allusion is contained in the lines: ‘The angels that were singing…Were not a whiter host/Than snow-flakes falling down.’ The most significant cultural transition from Bethany to Skiddaw is the presence of snow in Casson’s poem. It is true that snow falls occasionally in Palestine, but more often in Cumberland. Producers of Christmas cards frequently depict Mary, Joseph, the Magi and the Shepherds in a snow scene. This is artistic license, a conceit. Another critical difference is the sheep themselves. Skiddaw ‘yowes’ provide both wool for clothes and meat for the table. The shepherds at Bethlehem would have overseen a flock of sheep for sacrificial purposes at the Temple in Jerusalem.

Finally, Trevor Hold (2002) has drawn attention to the fact that the North Country of Casson’s poem is ‘reminiscent’ of the nativity sequence in the Wakefield Mystery Cycle:

Lord what these weders ar cold: and I am yll happyd [wrapped]

I am nere hand dold: so long haue I nappyd

My legys thay fold: my fyngers ar chappyd...

Brief Bibliography:

Blevins, Pamela, Ivor Gurney and Marion Scott: Song of Pain & Beauty (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2008)
Hold, Trevor, Parry to Finzi: Twenty English Song-Composers (Woodbridge, The Boydell Press, 2002)
Lancaster, Philip, ‘Ivor Gurney: Catalogue of Musical Works’, The Ivor Gurney Society Journal, (IGSJ) Volume 12, 2006.
Pilkington, Michael, Gurney, Ireland, Quilter and Warlock in the English Solo Song: Guides to the Repertoire (London, Thames Publishing, 1989)
Thornton, R.K.R. (editor), Ivor Gurney: Collected Letters (Manchester, Mid Northumberland Arts Group/Carcanet Press, 1991)
Walter, George, Chronology of Gurney’s Life and Work (http://www.geneva.edu/~dksmith/gurney/chronology.html) [Accessed 27/08/25]
The files of The Gramophone, Ivor Gurney Society Journal, etc

To be continued...

With thanks to the Ivor Gurney Society Journal, Volume 23, 2017 where this essay was first published.

Chicago Makes Another Try At A Period-Instrument Baroque Orchestra

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 18:05:00 +0000

The city has had notable trouble keeping such a group. The long-established Newberry Consort performs earlier repertoire; Baroque Band folded in 2016; Haymarket sticks to opera; the long-dominant Music of the Baroque clings resolutely to modern instruments. Now a new group, Bach in the City, is giving things a go. – Early Music America

Australian Brings Baton, Charm, Ranging Taste To New Post In America

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 17:02:44 +0000

GREENSBORO, N.C. – Christopher Dragon, the affable, buoyant, and enthusiastic new music director of the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra, readily embraces pop and film music – everything: "Orchestras need to adapt to this modern time."

The post Australian Brings Baton, Charm, Ranging Taste To New Post In America first appeared on Classical Voice North America.

Film Composer Joe Hisaishi Is Philadelphia Orchestra’s New Composer-In-Residence

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 13:35:00 +0000

In the position, which runs for the next two seasons, the beloved composer for Studio Ghibli animated features will get a major commercial recording, curate a contemporary music concert series, provide mentorship for composition students, and conduct the world premiere of his Piano Concerto in spring 2027. – Moto Perpetuo

Oum – A Son’s Quest for His Mother review – hybrid forces bring Bushra El-Turk’s haunting score to vivid life

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 12:14:50 +0000

Barbican, London
A tour-de-force by actor Nadia Amin centres this tale of the inherited trauma of exile while a trio of singers virtuosically blend Middle Eastern and European operatic idioms

‘I wish she could have died soundlessly,” says Wahab, the 19-year-old at the heart of Oum – A Son’s Quest for His Mother. As he struggles to reach the hospital where his mother lies dying, he is angry and afraid, tormented by memories of their changing relationship. He recalls the moment the phone rang with the command to hurry to her bedside, the moment he witnessed a fatal attack during the conflict that drove them from their home, the moment he ceased to recognise his mother’s face, calling her only “the woman with the blond hair”, such – we gather – was the traumatic impact of exile on them both.

Wahab’s reminiscences loop, falter, intertwine. The resulting spoken monologue, adapted by Wout van Tongeren from a novel by Lebanese-Canadian writer Wajdi Mouawad, runs almost continuously through the work. In Oum’s UK premiere, it was a tour-de-force delivered by Dutch actor Nadia Amin, who conjured the unthinkable on the nearly empty stage of Barbican Hall as she ran and froze, stamped and cowered.

Spotlight. An Amazing Experience

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 12:00:00 +0000

Geoff Pearce is impressed by Canadian soprano Dory Hayley's new album. '... subtly shifting timbres.'

Strong emotions, vocal virtuosity & orchestral colours: Jakob Lehmann conducts Rossini's Ermione & Stabat Mater with Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 11:58:51 +0000

Rossini: Ermione - Beth Taylor (Ermione) - Jakob Lehmann, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Hall (Photo: Paul Marc Mitchell)

Rossini: Ermione (excerpts), Stabat Mater; Ana Maria Labin, Beth Taylor, Hannah Ludwig. Alasdair Kent, Anthony Robin Schneider, Monteverdi Choir, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique, Jacob Lehmann; Cadogan Hall
Reviewed 2 October 2025

Both sacred and profane Rossini in an evening of extremes from strong operatic emotions, to bouncy quasi-opera buffa solos, all supported by strong, vivid orchestral detail

Thursday 2 October's concert at Cadogan Hall was billed as the start of a new collaboration between conductor Jakob Lehmann [see my recent interview with him] and the Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique exploring historically informed Rossini. For this first event, rather than a complete opera, we heard substantial excerpts from Rossini's 1819 opera seria, Ermione alongside his Stabat Mater from 1842. It worked, because Ermione is one of Rossini's most serious, neo-classical operas whilst the Stabat Mater leavens its seriousness with a perkiness that is rather operatic.

Jakob Lehmann, the Monteverdi Choir and the Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique were joined by soloists Ana Maria Labin, Beth Taylor, Hannah Ludwig, Alasdair Kent, Anthony Robin Schneider with soloists from the choir, Angharad Rowlands, Elinor Rolfe Johnson, Xavier Hetherington and Marcus Swietlicki. The scenes from Ermione were done off the book with an minimal element of staging, director Thomas Guthrie.

Rossini: Stabat Mater - Alasdair Kent, Ana Maria Labin - Jakob Lehmann, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Hall (Photo: Paul Marc Mitchell)

With a full chorus and orchestra, it was a remarkably busy stage giving the singers a relatively narrow strip at the front. We began Ermione and the overture introduced us to its remarkable sound world. Ermione was one of a sequence of operas Rossini wrote for Naples where the lavish facilities and ample rehearsal time meant that he was able to explore and experiment. His operas there included spectacular scenic effects (Moise in Egitto) and complex ensemble scenes with multiple choral groups (La donna del lago) of the type we now take for granted. Ermione pushed other boundaries as Rossini paid more attention to text and dramatic situations. There are few crowd-pleasing moments and the title character's final mad scene eschews the standard operatic forms of the day to create something more striking. It was not a success, so much so that Rossini rather than trying to salvage it, reused the music.

The overture, which includes the off-stage male chorus (here on-stage) was a mix of strong drama and vivid detail. Throughout the opera, Lehmann's approach to the music brought out the strength of Rossini's musical framework and for all the elaborate vocal detail, there was something neo-Classical, almost sculptural about the music. The opening chorus proper was strong and serious, with focused intensity from the choir and a mix of hard edges and fine detail in the orchestra.

Hannah Ludwig was impressively fierce as Andromaca, projecting her opening scene with compelling focus. Her cavatina featured an expressive use of register changes, with focus on a strong lower register yet with fine filigree upper notes. This was ornament as an expressive tool rather than just for show. Her caballeta displayed real fire, with Ludwig projecting the character's fierceness and control. The smaller roles of Cefisa, Attalo and Fenicio (Anghard Rowlands, Marcus Swietlicki, Anthony Robin Schneider) provided fine support.

We then jumped to the second scene of the opera for something lighter, a delightful celebratory chorus and aria with Elinor Rolfe Johnson on delightfully bouncy form as Cleone. But the real highlight of this scene was the opening with its fabulously raspy horns (all four of them).

Rossini: Ermione - Alasdair Kent (Oreste), Xavier Hetherington (Pilade) - Jakob Lehmann, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Hall (Photo: Paul Marc Mitchell)

The scene for Oreste (Alasdair Kent) and Pilade (Xavier Hetherington) is typical Rossini in the way he extends what is a traditional double aria for Oreste into something more, both by stretching the music but also by including Pilade as an active participant in the drama. Oreste is here conflicted, he loves Ermione (who does not love him) and is supposed to ensure she marries someone else. We began with strong drama in accompanied recitative where the two men's elaborate lines projected strong emotion. Kent's account of Oreste's cavatina was fearless. The role goes alarmingly high (it was written for Giovanni David who created several such role for Rossini) yet Kent weaved this into the whole, approaching the peaks in the right spirit. And then his cabaletta featured some insanely fast passagework. Hetherington's Pilade got to show off too, but only ever in a supporting role yet Hetherington gave as good as he got in the dramatic interchanges.

But the focus of the excerpts was scenes two and three from Act Two, where Ermione (Beth Taylor) struggles with the fact that Pirro does not love her and is marrying Andromaca. Ermione persuades Oreste to kill Pirro, saying she will then marry him, but is wracked with remorse. The two scenes have Ermione on stage at all time and push the character through a series of extreme emotions. Rossini's music does not aim for crowd-pleasing show, this is ultimate drama 1819 style. Lehmann supported the whole with strong orchestra gestures and fine detail.

The scenes began with a terrific face off between Beth Taylor's Ermione and Hannah Ludwig's Andromaca, though alas Andromaca leaves the stage early. Like Ludwig earlier, Taylor made great use of her lower registers, using change in register as a means of colouring the vocal line and switching emotion up a gear. Yet there was delicacy too. When she sang of her love for Pirro, the aria was elaborate yet moving. Perhaps more striking was the moment when she reacted to hearing the off-stage wedding march for Andromaca and Pirro, with Taylor projecting stylised dramatic statements over the strong orchestral contribution.

Rossini: Ermione - Elinor Rolfe Johnson (Cleone) - Jakob Lehmann, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Hall (Photo: Paul Marc Mitchell)

When Alasdair Kent's Oreste and the chorus appeared, Rossini introduced the crescendo passage from the overture, but there was no bouncy fun here. This was strong emotions, compelling drama and vocal spectacle. The scene ended with Taylor's vivid outpouring of emotion in a fast, bravura aria as Ermione has just sent Oreste off to kill Pirro. This brought Rossini's Gran Scena Ermione to a conclusion though frustratingly we did not get to hear the opera's final scenes.

This hour of music from the opera was a wonderful taster for the full thing, and I was impressed by the way the singers were able to conjure the characters and strong emotions from a few scenes. Orchestrally, the mix for strength and delicacy was particularly noticeable. There were lots of individual instrumental highlights and in many places the complexity of Rossini's orchestral writing was matched by a fine array of timbres and textures.

Rossini began his Stabat Mater in 1831, two years after his final opera William Tell. The first version of the Stabat Mater featured half Rossini and half a friend, Giovanni Tadolini. When a publisher wanted to print it, Rossini hastily wrote the remaining parts so that the version performed in 1842 is all him. This was over 20 years before the Petite Messe Solennelle but that work's fascination for large-scale counterpoint is still present along with a rather sly nod to operatic textures.

For this performance the soloists were Ana Maria Labin, Hannah Ludwig, Alasdair Kent and Anthony Robin Schneider. The Introduzione began deep and dark with Rossini' extending the movement into something complex involving both chorus and soloists. This was Rossini at his most serious and academic. Yet the following tenor aria is notorious for its bouncy jollity. Alasdair Kent managed to imbue the aria with real emotion and Lehmann's orchestra gestures were strong, but that perky bounce was still opera buffa Rossini. After some fabulous playing from hand-stopped horns, the duet from Ana Maria Labin and Hannah Ludwig gave us two contrasting operatic voices full of rich character, with some superbly elaborate duet moments. Having played a supporting role in the first half, Anthony Robin Schneider came into his own with voice displaying both warmth and amplitude, along with a great sense of line in his solo, followed by the striking unaccompanied chorus with bass recitative.

Rossini: Stabat Mater - Ana Maria Labin, Hannah Ludwig, Alasdair Kent, Anthony Robin Schneider - Jakob Lehmann, Monteverdi Choir, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Hall (Photo:

The 'Sancta Mater' quartet was fast and perky, we were definitely back in opera land and Lehmann really built the excitement. This lead to a strong solo from Ludwig in her cavatina, again exploiting fine chest colours. Similarly, Labin was on strong form in her cavatina, bringing in striking contrasts of tone. Perhaps the most daring movement, however, is the penultimate one where Rossini write an extended unaccompanied ensemble for the four soloists. Here they were terrific, and there were no tuning issues as Lehmann launched that amazing final chorus.

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Elsewhere on this blog

Explaining the unexplainable: a magical album from Lotte Betts-Dean, Dimitris Soukaras, everything you've ever lived on Delphian - record review
Clarinet & strings: Coleridge-Taylor & a new Jago Thornton piece from Sacconi Quartet & David Campbell at Conway Hall - concert review
Letter from Florida: Tianyi Lu conducts Bartók & Brahms with Lukas Vondracek & New World Symphony - concert review
Engaging rom-com energy: Martin Constantine's production of Donizetti's The Elixir of Love at English Touring Opera - opera review
La Grande Audition de Leipzig: Paul Agnew & Les Arts Florissants take us to Leipzig in 1722 & 1723 - concert review
One little book sitting in a convent: Laurie Stras introduces the background to Musica Secreta's new recording of music from the Biffoli-Sostegni manuscript - Read more

A superb Asmik Grigorian in a Madrid recital with a disappointing program

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 22:55:14 +0000

Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov: Asmik Grigorian (soprano), Lukas Geniušas (piano). Teatro Real, Madrid, 30.9.2025. (JMI) This recital by Asmik Grigorian had raised great expectations, especially after her recent performance in the role of Desdemona in Verdi’s Otello (review here) which can be described as truly exceptional. Added to this was her triumph last season in Rusalka at ... Read more

A beautiful Barrie Kosky production of The Cunning Little Vixen in Barcelona

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 22:53:38 +0000

Janáček, The Cunning Little Vixen: Soloists, Orfeó Catalá Children’s Chorus (director: Glòria Coma), Grand Teatre del Liceu Chorus (conductor: Pablo Assante) and Orchestra / Josep Pons (conductor). Gran Teatro del Liceu, Barcelona, 29.9.2025. (JMI) The Cunning Little Vixen is one of Leoš Janáček’s mature operas, and its great originality is the inclusion of both forest creatures ... Read more

Can’t Stop The Music: Russian Musicians Defy Putin

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 16:31:00 +0000

Musicians have become influential activists and symbols of political resistance, just as they were in the final years of the Soviet Union. The Kremlin has repeatedly tried to suppress the music scene and punish its leaders, a sign that Putin seems to understand the danger they pose. – The Atlantic (Yahoo!)

Mass MoCA (Yes, The Museum) Is Starting Its Own Record Label

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 16:04:00 +0000

The huge contemporary art museum, in the old factory town of North Adams in Massachusetts’s northeast corner, is launching Mass MoCA Records, which will feature both music recordings from studio sessions, live concerts, and museum residencies as well as spoken-word performances and sound art appearing at the museum. – Artnet

Christian Tetzlaff: Elgar and Adès Violin Concertos album review – refreshing and exhilarating

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 14:31:32 +0000

Tetzlaff/BBC Philharmonic/Storgårds
(Ondine)
The violinist’s performance of these two concertos is energetic but also thoughtful, with the BBC Phil sounding electric

Not everyone who loves Elgar’s Violin Concerto is going to love Christian Tetzlaff’s new recording of it, but nobody will find it bland. What’s perhaps most striking is the pace of the performance, which knocks minutes off anybody else’s: Tetzlaff could have packed up and left the building by the time, say, Vilde Frang gets offstage. Egged on by the conductor John Storgårds – who has the BBC Philharmonic sounding electric – Tetzlaff often runs towards moments of burgeoning intensity, rather than broadening out into them, and the effect is exhilarating. The downside is that some of the more densely woven passages sound fragmented this way; Tetzlaff is like a cat playing with a mouse, continually tensing, ready to pounce.

It’s not by any means all rushed, though. Sometimes Tetzlaff is introspective where other violinists are assertive, and vice versa; the phrases that tug at the heart are not always those you would expect. It’s a genuinely refreshing performance.

Ensemble. A Strong Individual Voice

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 12:00:00 +0000

Malcolm Miller is impressed with Beethoven and Anton Rubinstein played by British pianist Tyler Hay

Jessie Montgomery on Making Music and the Creative Possibilities in the Everyday

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 10:00:00 +0000

A few months ago, Jessie Montgomery was seated in the audience for the world premiere of Jasmine Barnes’ opera She Who Dared with her fellow members of the Blacknificent 7. The revolutionary Black composer collective — whose members include Montgomery, Barnes, Damien Geter, Shawn Okpebholo, Dave Ragland, Carlos Simon, and Joel Thompson — had gathered … Continued

The post Jessie Montgomery on Making Music and the Creative Possibilities in the Everyday appeared first on I CARE IF YOU LISTEN.

Explaining the unexplainable: a seductive & magical album from Lotte Betts-Dean, Dimitris Soukaras, everything you've ever lived on Delphian

Thu, 02 Oct 2025 06:35:22 +0000

everything you've ever lived: Baden Powell, Ravel, Seiber, de Falla, Richard Rodgers, Burt Bacharach, My Brightest Diamond, Vincente Asencio, Debussy, Sinead O'Connor, Caroline Polachek, Britten, Asik Veysel, Jorge Cardoso, Paurillo Barroso, Armando Soares; Lotte Betts-Dean, Dimitris Soukaras; Delphian Records
Reviewed 1 October 2025

A mysterious and seductive recital from a voice and guitar duo that moves smoothly and hauntingly through countries, eras and styles to create a little bit of magic

There is a phrase in Megan Stellar's rather flowery booklet note for mezzo-soprano Lotte Betts-Dean's latest disc which helps to elucidate the rather elusive nature of the programme. "That melange of ambiguity and subconscious understanding lifts alongside Lotte and Dimitris's interest in harmonic connection and the subtle stories that can be told...".

For the disc, everything you've ever lived on Delphian Records, Lotte Betts-Dean is joined by guitarist Dimitris Soukaras for a recital which moves effortlessly and nearly seamlessly through Baden Powell, Ravel, Seiber, de Falla, Richard Rodgers, Burt Bacharach, My Brightest Diamond, Vincente Asencio, Debussy, Sinead O'Connor, Caroline Polachek, Britten, Asik Veysel, Jorge Cardoso, Paurillo Barroso and Armando Soares.

The album is described as 'exploring ideas of nostalgia, childhood memory and the state between waking and sleep'. Which covers a remarkable amount of ground. What is distinctive for me is not so much the subject matter of the songs as the way one flows into another with hardly a ripple.

This is not so much a recital of songs as a sequence, lasting just over an hour, that flows smoothly and seductively. And make no bones about it, Betts-Dean's voice, no matter the subject she is singing about, is wonderfully seductive and beautifully smooth and partnered by Soukaras' stunning guitar playing. That at least ten of the tracks on the disc are his own arrangements must be to his credit in creating the sense of coherence and flow.

everything you've ever lived - Lotte Betts-Dean & Dimitris Soukaras - Delphian Records
(Photo: foxbrushfilms.com)

To give you an idea of the effect we move from Canto de Ossanha by the Brazilian composer Baden Powell (his father was a Scouting fan, evidently) to Ravel's A la maniere de Borodine to a French folk-song arranged by Matyas Seiber to three of de Falla's popular Spanish songs in arrangements by Miguel Llobet that make the guitar versions seem obvious and ideal. Then we move into Rodgers' Blue Moon with barely a ripple of disturbance. Later on Debussy's early Romance, which sounds very un-Debussy-like, is followed by the Sinead O'Connor song Jackie.

Now, the risk behind a programme like this is that if the popular songs do not chime a chord with the listeners, then the recital threatens to fall flat. Not here. Betts-Dean and Soukaras make each song work on its own terms, you don't need to know that it is by Sinead O'Connor or even who she is. There are, indeed, people on the album I have never come across before, notably singer-songwriter Shara Nova of band My Brightest Diamond and singer-songwriter Caroline Polachek.

My Brightest Diamond's Have you ever seen an angel proves to be a little bit of magic, where Bette-Dean demonstrates her gift for getting in the cracks between genres, really singing the song yet bending the music just as it needs and supported by Soukaras in a way that creates some hypnotic textures. In Caroline Polachek's Go as a dream, the two manage to bring out the popular inflections of the singer-songwriter's original yet without making the recital lurch off course.

And spread amongst these are a smattering of Latin American tracks which seem to form a thread running through the recital. In fact, this sense of the Latin American experience almost forms a backbone to the recital, bearing in mind that the music can be linked back to the Iberian peninsula and to 20th century French music, amongst others. We even have a song by the Turkish folk singer Asik Veysel which was originally arranged for guitar in 1983 and here rearranged.

Like the de Falla, the three songs from Ravel's popular Greek songs, in Soukaras's own arrangements, also sound as if they were meant to be and the combination of voice and guitar brings a very different quality to the two songs. With the lighter guitar accompaniment, the Chanson de la mariée becomes less upfront, more haunted yet still folk-inflected, whilst Chanson des cueilleuse de lentisques is magical indeed.

A similar thing happens to Britten's The Second Lute Song of the Earl of Essex. Originally from Gloriana, sung by tenor and orchestra, this uses an arrangement by guitar by Julian Bream but somehow with Betts-Dean's mezzo-soprano voice the song under goes another transmutation as her voice floats, mysteriously unsupported, in a way few tenors after Peter Pears have achieved.

The rather evocative paintings used for the disc's cover and booklet are from 2015 and 2017 by Heather Betts, the Australian artist who happens to be Lotte Betts-Dean's mother.

The recording itself is something of a bit of magic too. Soukaras' guitar is recorded with plenty of crunch detail yet with air around the sound which matches Betts-Dean's voice where her seductive, smooth and silky quality is given a positive aura around it. The result is to make the disc a complete package.

everything you've ever lived
Lotte Betts-Dean (mezzo-soprano)
Dimitris Soukaras (guitar)
Recorded 2-3 December 2024 at Crichton Collegiate Church, Edinburgh
DELPHIAN RECORDS DCD34348 1CD [61.21]

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Elsewhere on this blog

Clarinet & strings: Coleridge-Taylor & a new Jago Thornton piece from Sacconi Quartet & David Campbell at Conway Hall - concert review
Letter from Florida: Tianyi Lu conducts Bartók & Brahms with Lukas Vondracek & New World Symphony - concert review
Engaging rom-com energy: Martin Constantine's production of Donizetti's The Elixir of Love at English Touring Opera - opera review
La Grande Audition de Leipzig: Paul Agnew & Les Arts Florissants take us to Leipzig in 1722 & 1723 - concert review
One little book sitting in a convent: Laurie Stras introduces the background to Musica Secreta's new recording of music from the Biffoli-Sostegni manuscript - interview
A declaration of love to a composer: pianist Vanessa Wagner on Philip Glass' Etudes - feature
Iphigenia in Blackheath: community opera dares to go where few UK companies do with a compelling account of Gluck's French tragedy - review
A very fresh, summer album: Hummel & Bertini from Sestetto Classico on MDG - record review
There are no dividing lines: conductor Jakob Lehmann on bringing historically informed Rossini to Cadogan Hall - interview
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A vividly direct performance and production of Gluck’s Iphigenia in Tauris by Blackheath Halls Opera

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 22:59:35 +0000

Gluck, Iphigenia in Tauris (Iphigénie en Tauride): Soloists, Students from Greenvale School and Charlton Park Academy, Blackheath Halls Chorus and Youth Company, Blackheath Halls Orchestra / Chris Stark (conductor). Blackheath Halls, London, 28.9.2025. (MB) Production: Director – Laura Attridge Designs – Peiyao Wang Lighting – Charly Dunford Movement – Corina Würsch Fight director – Mark ... Read more

Quartet Of Productions A Stellar Start For New Boss At Zurich Opera

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 18:19:32 +0000

ZURICH – Just into Matthias Schulz's first season as artistic director, Zurich Opera was named Opera House of the Year 2025 by Opernwelt magazine. The four creative stagings I saw made clear that Schulz expects to uphold that standard.

The post Quartet Of Productions A Stellar Start For New Boss At Zurich Opera first appeared on Classical Voice North America.

Two Years Ago The Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Declared Bankruptcy. Now It’s Back

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 17:15:00 +0000

On the road to their return, the musicians took on side jobs, staged free community concerts and fought to bring the symphony back through legal action. – CBC

Can TikTok Build Interest In Classical Music?

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 16:44:00 +0000

The program will support and elevate a select cohort of 10 U.K.-based creators passionate about classical music who are already making content about the genre on TikTok. The application to be part of Crescendo is now live here through Oct. 30. – Variety

The London Opera Company to perform Götterdämmerung this October

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 14:37:07 +0000

Following sold out and critically acclaimed performances of Tristan und Isolde, Die Walküre [see my review] and Siegfried [see Tony's review], the London Opera Company (LOC) returns to Sinfonia Smith Square (formerly St John’s Smith Square) on Sunday 19 October with a full orchestra for its most ambitious concert yet - Götterdämmerung

The production features a cast of seasoned professionals including Katie Lowe, who made her Royal Opera House (ROH) debut in Die Walküre earlier this year, and Philippa Boyle, who returns as Gutrune following a wonderful Sieglinde for the London Opera Company in 2023. Philippa also performed for the first time at ROH in their award-winning Festen. Harriet Williams sings Waltraute. Neal Cooper takes on the role of Siegfried (currently singing Thibault at ROH) and Cara Mchardy following her excellent reviews for Siegfried and Die Walkūre with LOC continues her role as Brünnhilde.

They are joined by voices fresh to Wagner and an orchestra with a core of professionals playing alongside the best post-graduates from London’s top music colleges. LOC Orchestral Bursary offers a yearly prize and paid opportunity for a talented musician nurturing young talent.

Peter Selwyn conducts the orchestra. This follows his recent success with Opera Holland Park’s Der Fliegende Holländer [see my review], and see my 2022 interview with Peter Selwyn, 'From Bayreuth to Grimeborn'.

The Wagner Tubas and Stierhorn, kindly loaned by the Royal Opera House, will, as with the Company’s much celebrated production of Die Walküre, bring a special grandeur to the performance.

Further details from Sinfonia Smith Square's website.

Naxos, World’s Largest Indie Classical Label, Sold To Chinese Corporation

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 13:36:00 +0000

The landmark deal, announced on September 25, gives Beijing-based Kuke Music Holding about 70% ownership of Hong Kong-based Naxos Music Group through two simultaneous transactions worth roughly US$106 million. Naxos encompasses 17 subsidiary labels and distributes another 50 smaller independent labels. – Limelight (Australia)

Classical music news. October 2025 Newsletter

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 12:00:00 +0000

'A Man in a Hurry?', our October 2025 PDF newsletter, has just been published

Bergsonist Explores the Transformative Power of Heritage at Roulette Intermedium

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 10:00:00 +0000

On Thursday, Sep. 18, Roulette Intermedium felt more like walking into someone’s home than a concert venue. Multimedia sound artist Selwa Abd, performing her new work “ASL: صل ⴰⵙⵍ” under the artist name Bergsonist, greeted us with food and drink upon entry. The space was anything but sterile — tables intimately draped in patterned woven … Continued

The post Bergsonist Explores the Transformative Power of Heritage at Roulette Intermedium appeared first on I CARE IF YOU LISTEN.

Clarinet & strings: Coleridge-Taylor & a new Jago Thornton piece in the Sacconi Quartet's Sunday concert at Conway Hall with David Campbell

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 09:11:04 +0000

Jago Thornton

Jago Thornton, Shostakovich, Coleridge-Taylor; Sacconi Quartet, David Campbell; Conway Hall Sunday Concerts
Reviewed 28 September 2025

Coleridge-Taylor's early masterwork paired with a new piece for clarinet and strings by Jago Thornton, commissioned as a pairing and inspired by the cityscape known to both composers.

The Sunday concert at Conway Hall on 28 September 2025 featured the Sacconi Quartet (Ben Hancox, Hannah Dawson, Robin Ashell, Cara Berridge) and clarinettist David Campbell in programme that culminated in Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's Clarinet Quintet in F sharp minor and began with the premiere of Jago Thornton's Study in Submersion for clarinet and string quartet, commissioned as a partner for Coleridge-Taylor's quintet. Between the two, the quartet played Shostakovich's highly personal String Quartet in C sharp minor Op. 110. Before the concert, I gave a preconcert talk looking at Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's early life and training with background to the creation of his quintet and his best known work, Hiawatha.

Named for outstanding twentieth-century Italian luthier and restorer Simone Sacconi, the Sacconi Quartet celebrate they 25th anniversary next year, and still feature the original line up. The four players first got together whilst studying at the Royal College of Music.

Jago Thornton lives in South London not far from where Coleridge-Taylor lived and his new piece takes its inspiration from the area, from its rivers and from ideas of the landscape that has been lost. In three movements, each is named for a lost aspect of London's rural landscape, Wandle, Fleet and The Great North Wood and the piece was accompanied by three poems on these themes by Emily Potter-Thornton. The river Wandle still exists, wandering through South London, often neglected. Wandle began with a series of hesitant string duos, two violins, viola and cello, over which the clarinet produced a gently undulating melody that was reminiscent of English pastoral. As all five instruments joined together the music became more complex without losing the sense of the undulating clarinet line, and after a climax things unwound. The Fleet river is now lost, restricted underground. Fleet was fast and vigorous, with furious strings and a passionate clarinet line over. Whilst the intensity of the music died down, the energy did not and one particular highlight was a lovely duet between clarinet and cello. The Great North Wood referenced the woodland that once covered much of South London. The music began deep and mysterious, the music constructed of timbral effects rather than pitched motifs. The clarinet line rose gradually, with the strings doing similar so was had an intense clarinet over strong string harmonies and textures. Things disintegrated after the climax, leaving the music to evaporate except for a final violin gesture.

You could feel the English lineage of Jago Thornton's music and the links to the past meant the work fitted the programme well, yet there was also a sense of Thornton's own voice too.

Shostakovich's Quartet in C sharp minor is an intriguing piece. Written in a relatively short space of time whilst the composer was working on a film in Dresden, it is full of personal references and quotations. The autobiographical nature of the work links to statements Shostakovich made at the time and the idea the work might be some sort of epitaph. It is in five movements, though the Sacconi quartet's performance made them feel all of a piece and the whole had moved in an arc from the Largo opening, to the Allegro molto and then unwinding slowly through the Allegretto into the final pair of Largo movements where the quotations included material from the opening.

Yet, though the quartet's performance was striking and intense, they brought a rather consoling quality to the various musical quotations. The opening Largo with its weaving of DSCH motifs into considered yet intense counterpoint had a haunted quality, contrasting with the fierceness of the Allegro molto full of attack, vigour and anger which was almost unrelenting, only relieved by the references to earlier works which floated in and out. The Allegretto was lightly dancing yet with a bleak tone that rendered the music unnerving. The music turned darkly powerful, though the players also gave us a feeling that it was struggling to stay together, gradually unwinding towards the return of the opening material and an ending that featured a remarkable stretch of sustained playing, bleak and barely there.

Coleridge-Taylor's Clarinet Quintet is an early work, he was just 20 when he wrote it though he had been studying at the Royal College of Music for five years by then. He wrote more chamber music, but none after 1896 and what later works we have for him are in other genres. There was an interesting energy to the opening movement with a restlessness that at times felt as if we'd plunged into the middle of something. The influence of Dvorak was clear yet there was a sense of the English tradition too. The clarinet melody in the slow movement had a distinctly Dvorakian cast with strongly characterised strings, then the third movement was all eager energy as if something was coming. The fourth movement began with strongly characterised strings and a lyrically engaging clarinet. The middle of the movement featured some big folk energy, almost typically English in style, but the end was all vigour and energy. Throughout the work we sense Coleridge-Taylor the chameleon as he moved between influences, Dvorak to English music that approached Vaughan Williams.

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Elsewhere on this blog

Letter from Florida: Tianyi Lu conducts Bartók & Brahms with Lukas Vondracek & New World Symphony - concert review
Engaging rom-com energy: Martin Constantine's production of Donizetti's The Elixir of Love at English Touring Opera - opera review
La Grande Audition de Leipzig: Paul Agnew & Les Arts Florissants take us to Leipzig in 1722 & 1723 - concert review
One little book sitting in a convent: Laurie Stras introduces the background to Musica Secreta's new recording of music from the Biffoli-Sostegni manuscript - interview
A declaration of love to a composer: pianist Vanessa Wagner on Philip Glass' Etudes - feature
Iphigenia in Blackheath: community opera dares to go where few UK companies do with a compelling account of Gluck's French tragedy - review
A very fresh, summer album: Hummel & Bertini from Sestetto Classico on MDG - record review
There are no dividing lines: conductor Jakob Lehmann on bringing historically informed Rossini to Cadogan Hall - interview
Style, enthusiasm & scholarship: Ian Page and The Mozartists explore Opera in 1775 - opera review
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Huddersfield’s Harmonious Grandmaster

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 05:00:00 +0000

Whilst recently thumbing through From Anecdotes of Great Musicians by W. Francis Gates (1895), I came across this short tale about Walter Parratt. Gates (p.276) wrote:

“Many are the musical prodigies who come before the public, though but few of them reach the great heights of musicianship of which they, in their youth, give promise. Handel, Mozart, and Liszt fulfilled the expectations aroused by their youthful feats. Among those whose fame was not so great was Walter Parratt, who was knighted by Queen Victoria.

He played the organ in a Yorkshire church when only seven years old. At ten he performed all of Bach's forty-eight preludes and fugues without the music before him, and in later life he accomplished the extraordinary feat of playing, blindfolded, three games of chess and one of Bach's fugues at the same time, manipulating the keys of the organ and calling out his moves on the chess-board simultaneously.”

Sir Walter Parratt, born in Huddersfield on 10 February 1841, was a distinguished organist, composer, and teacher whose influence resonated across British musical life. A precocious child, he was appointed organist of Armitage Bridge Church, Huddersfield aged just eleven years.

Over the course of his long life, Parratt held a succession of prestigious posts, including organist at Magdalen College, Oxford, and later at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, where he served with distinction for more than forty years. In 1893, he was named Master of the Queen’s Musick to Queen Victoria, continuing in the role under Kings Edward VII and George V. He had already been knighted in 1892 and was subsequently honoured with several appointments within the Royal Victorian Order. Other positions included Heather Professor of Music at Oxford and president of the Royal College of Organists.

Apart from music, he was a great enthusiast of chess…

Vienna State Opera’s Tosca is almost as good as new in the production’s 665th outing

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 22:59:20 +0000

Puccini, Tosca: Soloists, Chorus and Orchestra of the Vienna State Opera / Pier Giorgio Morandi (conductor). Directed for the screen by Anna Gettel and broadcast from the Vienna State Opera on 27.9.2025. (JPr) This year Puccini’s ‘shabby little shocker’ (musicologist Joseph Kerman) was 125 years old and for almost half that time – 67 years ... Read more

An emphatic Mahler First Symphony from Sir Donald Runnicles in San Francisco

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 22:44:51 +0000

Berg, Mahler: Irene Roberts (mezzo-soprano), San Francisco Symphony / Sir Donald Runnicles (conductor). Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco, 29.9.2025. (HS) Berg – Seven Early Songs Mahler – Symphony No.1 in D major Conductor Sir Donald Runnicles has a long history in San Francisco. As music director of San Francisco Opera from 1992 to 2008 he ... Read more

Movingly engaging – if orgiastic – Oldenburg State Theatre’s La traviata

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 22:30:11 +0000

Verdi, La traviata: Soloists, Chorus, Extra Chorus and Extras of Oldenburg State Theatre, Oldenburg State Orchestra / Carlo Goldstein (conductor). Oldenburg State Theatre, 27.9.2025. (DM-D) As soon as the first notes of the overture sounded from the pit, the curtain opened briskly to reveal, in the middle of an otherwise empty stage, a large bed ... Read more

Vistas of Mediterranean devastation encircle Orchestra Wellington concert

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 22:05:36 +0000

Philipson, Mozart, Shostakovich: Benjamin Baker (violin), Yura Lee (viola), Arohanui Strings, Orchestra Wellington / Lior Balachness, Marc Taddei (conductors). Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington, 20.9.2025. (PM) William Philipson – House of the Faun Mozart – E-flat Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola, K.364 Shostakovich – Symphony No.4 Classical music concerts more often than not display a ... Read more

The Strad As Overpriced Object Of Art

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 17:31:00 +0000

The violins may be rare, excellently made, and, to some, worth the money. But none of that is actually worth a fig if their price outshines their purpose: to provide a little ear tickling and make it pleasurable to be inside your own head. – Literary Review of Canada

Briston Beacon orchestral concerts 2025-2026

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 15:38:46 +0000

Bristol Beacon 2025/26 Orchestral Season Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra – Mark Wigglesworth (conductor) – Sir Stephen Hough (piano) – 2 October Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra – Vasily Petrenko (conductor) – 16 October Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra – Mark Wigglesworth (conductor) – Jess Gillam (saxophone) – 6 November City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra – Osmo Vänskä (conductor) – Helena ... Read more

Venice La Fenice Opera Threatens Strike Over Appointment Of New Music Director

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 15:15:00 +0000

When theater officials announced last week that La Fenice’s new music director would be the conductor Beatrice Venezi, some members of the company were outraged, saying she hasn’t had enough experience. – The New York Times

‘Too soothing’: why have music-hating art duo Gilbert & George gone orchestra mad?

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 14:21:56 +0000

They once described music as ‘the enemy’. But their warts-and-all paintings of sex, money, race and religion are now being given a soundtrack by the Philharmonia. The great contrarians explain all

Gilbert & George are excited. And proud. And smell so good that I’m tempted to ask what colognes they’re wearing. We’ve all just arrived at the Hayward Gallery on London’s South Bank, where their forthcoming show, 21st Century Pictures, is mid-hang. As soon as we’re through the doors, Gilbert darts about like a puppy let off the leash, urgently assessing the installation. “White Bastards!” George says to me, pointing to the 2004 piece as though he’s just spotted an old friend.

The artists may be in their 80s, but all the work here was made in the last 25 years, and the gallery vibrates with rudeness, colour, contrarianism and cheek, their often vast creations luxuriating, as always, in warts-and-all humanity.

Chamber Orchestra Of Philadelphia Leaves Kimmel Center

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 13:35:00 +0000

“Anne Hagan, the group’s executive director, said it had become ‘difficult for us to keep up with payments’ for Kimmel base rent and the other costs of performing there. … The group had been a resident company at the Kimmel’s Perelman Theater since the arts center’s opening in 2001.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer (MSN)

Behold The St. Louis Symphony’s Newly-Renovated Home

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 13:01:17 +0000

They’ve left the classic façade (and the acoustics) of Powell Hall intact and built around it the gleaming new Jack C. Taylor Music Center, which provides some of the desperately needed facilities (dressing rooms for musicians, sufficient bathrooms for the audience) which Powell, once a movie palace, had lacked. – The New York Times

Ensemble. Precision and Elegance

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 12:00:00 +0000

Mike Wheeler reports on the opening of Sinfonia Viva's new Derby/Nottingham season, featuring music by Joseph Bologne, Wolfgang Mozart and Hannah Kendall

5 Questions to Asuka Kakitani (composer)

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Asuka Kakitani is a Minnesota-based composer whose music asks gently for our attention with its joyful minimalism and earnest rainbow palette. A band leader for the Asuka Kakitani Jazz Orchestra and the Inatnas Orchestra, Kakitani’s musical canvases stretch from orchestra and 18-piece big bands down to works for solo marimba, vocal ensemble — and for … Continued

The post 5 Questions to Asuka Kakitani (composer) appeared first on I CARE IF YOU LISTEN.

The youngest female composer ever commissioned by the Ulster Orchestra, marking her debut with national ensemble: premiere of Amelia Clarkson's The Rain Keeps Coming at Ulster Hall

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 09:26:07 +0000

Amelia Clarkson

Amelia Clarkson is a Northern Irish composer from County Down and she currently works between Belfast and Manchester where she is undertaking a PhD at the Royal Northern College of Music. She is the 2022 Mendelssohn Scholar. Awarded to a composer for for advanced study since 1856, this scholarship supports her current PhD where her research is centred on creating new music for dance.

On 10 October, Amelia Clarkson makes her debut with her home orchestra at Belfast's Ulster Hall when the Ulster Orchestra premieres her The Rain Keeps Coming, a stunning new commission by the Orchestra, where the soothing rhythms of rainfall lead through cycles of renewal and reflection.

Reflecting on the piece, she said “The Rain Keeps Coming is a celebration of the relentlessness of life. We move through these constant cycles of joy and pain, leading us to renewal and reflection. At times it feels overwhelming, as though we’re drenched by it all, and yet there is also wonder in that persistence. This piece is about holding resilience and fragility in the same breath, and finding the magic in feeling alive, even when caught in a downpour.”

At 29, Clarkson becomes the youngest female composer ever commissioned by the Ulster Orchestra, marking both her debut with national ensemble and a significant moment in the orchestra’s history.

Andrew Gourlay conducts in a programme that includes Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 with Vadym Kholodenko and Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 4.

Full details from the Ulster Orchestra's website.

Letter from Florida: Tianyi Lu conducts Bartók & Brahms with Lukas Vondracek & New World Symphony

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 08:27:37 +0000

Bartók: Piano Concerto No. 3 - Lukas Vondracek (Photo: New World Symphony)

Brahms: Academic Festival Overture, Bartók: Piano Concerto No. 3, Brahms: Symphony No. 1; Lukas Vondracek, New World Symphony, Tianyi Lu, Ziwei Ma; New World Center, Florida
Reviewed by Robert J Carreras (20 September 2025)

Inspiring accounts of strenuous works by Johannes Brahms and Bela Bartok in New World Symphony's first orchestra concert of the 2025-26 season conducted by Chinese-born New Zealander Tianyi Lu

Only at the very end of Peter Ustinov Reads the Orchestra is the conductor given some shrift. Just before the Finale, Ustinov refers to her as, “...one last member of the orchestra.” The marketing strategy of leaving the best for last escapes no medium, what you will. And if not best, the work of conductor should be described as most. Responsibilities fallen on conductor’s shoulders are as heavy-duty as they are infinite.

Conductor of a major orchestra must be an avid interpreter of music as a language. She must be storyteller to the listener of the composer’s score. She must learn and recall many musical languages; old and new, established and emerging composers are part of standard concert programs. She must be conversant in a vast field of musical-speak.

She must be classically trained and reach the level of concert player in her own instrument, often the piano, and also get an applied grasp on the whole family of instruments of the orchestra. She must develop an understanding of these instruments so as to communicate with sections and individual players in credible and convincing ways.

She must corral orchestral forces – from only a few in chamber music, to a few more, and a group of some 40 players (and singers) or more at a time. And, she must make the music play in a way that translates to audience comprehension, performance after performance.

Equal to these benchmarks is Tianyi Lu, as is sure enough the fresh liveliness and expressiveness she brings to New World Symphony (NWS). This program was an inspiring account of strenuous works by Johannes Brahms and Bela Bartok in NWS’s first orchestra concert of the 2025-26 season. Lu is sure and equal to the task of osmoting much positive influence on this, America’s orchestral academy.

Bartók: Piano Concerto No. 3 - Tianyi Lu, Lukas Vondracek (Photo: New World Symphony)

NWS Conducting Fellow Ziwei Ma opened the concert with a reading of Brahms’ Academic Festival Overture – rather civilized, rather safe. Occupying the denizen of the “Hooked on Classics” genre, Brahms meant for this piece to be jocular and playful in nature, and though the brass were particularly present and available, the music’s humorous heights were not reached until the coda. Overall, the playing was short on keeping Brahms’ main idea constant.

Lukas Vondracek stands, sits and plays over the grand piano in a manner making the instrument seem mini and out-of-scale next to him. For Bela Bartok’s Concerto No. 3 in E major for Piano and Orchestra, Vondracek apostrophizes the composer’s fortissimo markings – the imagery of pulverizing the piano endures. This was in the Adagio religioso of the second movement and at the rondo in the third. That second movement was expounded besides by bombed, zeroed-in pitches on chords.

Vondracek tamed his spirit by conducting himself accordingly, waving his left hand to stave off acceleration and to soften his touch. Rhythmic timing seems to be a strength for Vondracek, insight into speaking Bartok’s traditionally classical bent for this piano concerto a weakness. All in all, the pianist presented a monochromatic tonal palette, not altogether unidiomatic here. He also presented reassured technical prowess in one of the most demanding works for piano in the standard repertoire.

Displaying lovely hand and arm sways and the stretching balance of a Tai Chi master, Tianyi Lu is a superlatively supportive partner to soloist in every conceivable way. She deferred to the piano for communicative intent now and provided most of the subtler impressionistic flavor of this Bartok.

Brahms’ letter to conductor Hermann Levi states well the care to be considered when comparing talents: “You’ve no conception of what it’s like to hear a giant’s footsteps marching behind you.” Lu’s use of the first movement to establish tempi variations echoes the positive influence of Wilhelm Furtwangler. Lu’s is a more intimate and relatable state of exaltation even, and her sound-world – like Brahms’ own – similarly spacious.

Lu seems to see the orchestra much like a choir. If she used the baton at all for Bartok, it was discrete-plus; working open-handed, she seems to pick up the baton for Brahms now only when sensing more rhythmic or precision direction necessary. Her knowledge of the instrument sections is uncommon, drawing out richness and emotive soundscapes also uncommon. This conductor is on the same track as Furtwangler as communicator, playing the orchestra as it were an instrument.

From the syncopated percussion closing Bartok and then opening Brahms’ first symphony, NWS’s playing was fluidly fluent. For the lyricism of the Andante sostenuto, NWS instrumentalists are a natural; Lu appeared to bask in their collective triumph now. There is Lu’s regard again, at the crossroads into the mystery of the third movement. Kudos to concertmaster Natalie Koh for her caressing violin, and in following Lu in the dance with the horn.

Judging by the stamina and symmetry of the last movement, with the fugato bookended by the five part rondo, rehearsals must have been a workout. NWS stretches to and fro with Lu, staying the course rhythmically, colorfully, as the music teases toward a termination somewhere out there. Tianyi Lu’s tonal colors and camaraderie are formidable, and highly complementary features to that of Stephane Deneve’s and his plans for NWS.

By the time of this performance, “...one last member of the orchestra...,” conductor Tianyi Lu, and New World Symphony had done most of their work. Here’s a trade-secret for you: rehearsal time and work is what separates one orchestra from another; here’s another: all of that work can come undone and fall apart at performance time; and, yet another: the music’s not over until the conductor says so. Ustinov concludes his statement with, “...who is very, very important! This is the conductor!”

Reviewed by Robert J Carreras

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) - Academic Festival Overture, Op. 80 (1880)
Ziwei Ma, conductor

Béla Bartók (1881-1945) - Concerto No. 3 in E major for Piano and Orchestra, Sz. 119 (1945)
Johannes Brahms - Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68 (1855-76)
Lukáš Vondráček, piano
Tianyi Lu, conductor
New World Symphony
New World Center, Michael Tilson Thomas Performance Hall, John S. and James L. Knight Foundation Stage
Miami, Florida

Tianyi Lu, New World Symphony (Photo: New World Symphony)

The New World Symphony (NWS) is an American orchestral academy based in Miami Beach, Florida. Founded in 1987 by Michael Tilson Thomas and Lin and Ted Arison, NWS has helped launch the careers of nearly 1,300 alumni worldwide. In fall 2022 Stéphane Denève was named Artistic Director of the New World Symphony.

NWS is a training ensemble for young musicians in preparation for professional careers in classical music. Since 2011, the New World Symphony has its headquarters in the Frank Gehry-designed New World Center in Miami Beach, Florida. The orchestra presents a season of concerts from September to May at the 756-seat concert hall of the New World Center, including full-orchestra concerts, a chamber music series, a new music series, percussion consort series, small ensemble concerts, a family series, and special festivals and recitals.

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Early-Music Recordings Capture Antiquity And Its Modern Reflections

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 04:50:28 +0000

DIGITAL REVIEW – One album shifts the spotlight from William Lawes' familiar instrumental works to his lesser known vocal music. Another, pairing a vocal sextet with a trumpet, traces an arc from the Middle Ages to recently commissioned pieces.

The post Early-Music Recordings Capture Antiquity And Its Modern Reflections first appeared on Classical Voice North America.

Welser-Möst leads a new Deutsch work to open the Cleveland Orchestra’s season auspiciously

Mon, 29 Sep 2025 22:59:05 +0000

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A rather modest performance of Vivaldi’s Farnace at Teatro Real

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The post Scaling Grand Premiere, Dudamel Begins Final Ascent With His LA Phil first appeared on Classical Voice North America.

Lebrecht Weighs In On Our Crisis Of Criticism

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Spotify’s Streaming AI Problem

Mon, 29 Sep 2025 15:35:00 +0000

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