31 May: Orchestra Pro Musica Uganda

Cellist Guy Johnston is playing the Elgar Cello Concerto on 31 May at Cadogan Hall with the Orchestra Pro Music Uganda conducted by Sir Roger Norrington. The concert is a fund-raiser for the Friends of Kampala Music School and seeks to help raise £190,000 towards the refurbishment of the school., which gives underprivileged Ugandans the chance to pass international exams, win scholarships, and embark on professional careers. The concert also includes Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture and Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony. Further information from the Cadogan Hall website.

23 May: Verdi Study Day

Masterclass & Co are having another study day in their Divas and Scholars series. On 23 May there as a day on Verdi's operas with the opportunity to study with eminent specialists and opera singers who will guide you through the history and the music of Verdi's operas. The lectures will be illustrated by live performance.

Postcard from Montenegro - On Lake Skadar

On Lake Skadar, Montenegro

Postcard from Montenegro - 1500m above sea level

Very late snow in Montenegro
The approach to the Njegos Mausoleum on Thursday
1500 metres above sea level

June at the Barbican

Circa & I Fagiolini: How Like An Angel
 © Chris Taylor

June in the Barbican opens with the Guildhall School of Music and Drama's contribution to Britten 100 with a performance of Britten's Owen Wingrave directed by Kelly Robinson. This is a co-production with the Banff Centre, Canada where Robinson is the Artistic Director of Theatre Arts (5, 7, 10, 12 June). Cellist Yo-Yo Ma joins the London Symphony Orchestra and conductor Michael Tilson Thomas for a trio of concerts which include Shostakovich's two cello concertos, plus Britten's Symphony for Cello and Orchestra. Each of the three concerts includes music by Shostakovich, Copland and Britten, three great contemporaries.  (9, 11, 12 June). The LSO's pair of concerts which were intended to be conducted by Sir Colin Davis have become a memorial with a variety of conductors including the composer's son, in a programme which reflects Davis's wide interests (16, 18 June). Les Arts Florissants directed by Paul Agnew, return for more Monteverdi madrigals, this time the Fifth Book of Madrigals (15 June). And Laurie Anderson joins forces with the Kronos Quartet to premiere a major new commission and their first collaboration. (28 June). Off site I Fagiolin are joined by Circa's brand of contemporary circus in a programme called How Like an Angel at St Bartholomew the Great (25-28 June).

Something intriguing in the trees

Despite living not that far away from Nunhead cemetery, I missed Biped's Monitor which was presented in the cemetery by the Arbonauts. Described as a unique site-based theatrical experience merging highly-visual, surreal environments with an ethereal operatic score,  it involved  strange and evocative installations created for the disused chapel and trees of Nunhead Cemetery. Now the group plan to bring the event back this summer for six evenings. Biped's Monitor is inspired by the Italo Calvino folktale, The Baron in the Trees which follows a young aristocrat who takes to the trees. The Arbonauts promise a surrel experience that allows the audience to explore and encounter characters and spaces at their own pace.

Arbonauts was formed in 2011 by Helen Galliano and Dimitri Launder. They are a multidisciplinary collective which includes theatre maker Helen Galliano, designer Dimitri Launder and composers Alex Nikiporenko and Louise Drewet. They specialise in 'performative installations inspired by unusual spaces and surreal narratives. Our work is often voyeuristic and provocative – made for a curious audience.'

You can hear some of their work, Aria Arboria, on the Sound Cloud website

They recently had a successful experimental night at Battersea Arts Centre trying out ideas for a new piece called The Desire Machine set to Madrigale by Aldo Clementi.

For August they are looking for local singers and choirs to perform with them further information (and contact info) from the Arbonauts webpage.

A scream and an outrage - 2

A weekend music marathon at the Barbican and other places: curated by Nico Muhly

The Sixteen

Session 4 began far LSO St Lukes traversing music from the renaissance to present day with The Sixteen, led by Harry Christophers, who were on angelic form.

too early on Sunday morning but we were back in

The first three pieces in the concert, written by the 16^th century composer Thomas Tallis (1505 – 1585), were beautifully performed - The Sixteen glided through the trademark Tallis dissonances that could be right at home in a 21^st Century composition. Tallis was a local man, living in Greenwich towards the end of his life. A contemporary of Byrd, he managed to survive four monarchs and the switches in religion which claimed many lives. The three pieces performed here were all written during the reign of Queen Elizabeth the first, who, despite being fervently Protestant, permitted the Catholic Tallis and Byrd to write and publish music. This is the kind of music that would have been performed in the first incarnation of St Luke's and is still right at home in today’s rebuilt performance space.

22 May: Luke Bedford premieres

Luke Bedford
(c) Ben Ealovga

Luke Bedford's new piece Renewal will be performed twice by the London Sinfonietta at the concert on May 22 at the Purcell Room on London's South Bank. In between the two performances Bedford will talk about the work, giving the audience insight into the work before they are able to hear it again. I wish that more premieres were like this. (In an ideal world we'd be issued with free scores beforehand too!). Also in the programme will be the UK premiere of Bedford's Wonderful no-headed nightingale in its version for ensemble as well as Gerard Grisey's Periodes from Le espaces acoustiques. Bedford won the Royal Philharmonic Composition Prize in 2000 for composers under 29 and was the Wigmore Hall's first ever composer in residence. Further information about the London Sinfonietta concert from the South Bank Centre website.

20 May: Tales from Ovid

Christopher Ainslie

Ian Page and Classical Opera are back with a concert which examines the 18th century's fascination with Ovid and his Metamophoses. The group will be performing Dittersdorf's symphony based on the rescue of Andromeda by Perseus, plus music from Gluck's opera Orfeo et Euridice, Haydn's Philemon et Baucis (actually an opera for marionettes) and Mozart's first opera Apollo et Hyacinthus. Performers include counter-tenor Christopher Ainslie, soprano Anna Devin and tenor Benjamin Hulett. The concert takes place on Monday 20 May at the Wigmore Hall. Further information from the Wigmore Hall website.

17 May: Fanfare for Fran

A Fanfare for Fran - Celebrating Frances Andrade does exactly what the title says. The concert on 17 May 2013 at St. James's Piccadilly celebrates the life of violinist Fran Andrade. The Chamber Ensemble of London (an ensemble with which she was associated) are performing with soprano Gillian Rae-Walker and violinist Eri Konii, directed by Peter Fisher. The concert will help support the Rape And Sexual Abuse Support Centre in Guildford, where she lived. The event opens with Clive Jenkins' Fanfare and fugue in memorian Frances Andrade and there is music by Telemann, Monteverdi, Schubert, Harold Darke and Bach, plus Dido's Lament from Purcell's Dido and Aeneas and Lascia ch'io pianga from Handel's Rinaldo. Further information from the Concert-Diary.com page.

A scream and an outrage - 1

Trio Mediaeval

CF-Wesenberg:kolonihaven.no

A weekend music marathon at the Barbican and other places: curated by Nico Muhly

Part pop festival, part classical concert, this weekend was an eclectic mix of music and I’m glad that I got to listen to as much of it as I did. 

The first session I went to was session 2 at LSO St Lukes. While I overheard someone call the space ‘brutal’ I have to disagree. By fusing utilitarian modern with its 18^th century facade, this beautiful Hawksmoor with its dilapidated past is acoustically and aesthetically one of the best music spaces in London.

Before the concert proper Nico Muhly (1981-) and friends played an introduction to the first set of songs. Sat on a little carpet they played a minimalistic drone, based around a single tone with slowly changing chords, which eventually became the accompaniment to the UK premiere of ‘Three songs’. Performed by violinist Pekka Kuusisto and British tenor Allan Clayton, the songs reminded me a little of ‘Fish in the unruffled lakes’ by Benjamin Britten, albeit with guttural statements from the violin. Moments of consonance to the drone and silence were used to highlight words and phrases. When the drone finally ended its loss was keenly felt, even though you probably weren’t sure when it began.

17-19 May: Sacconi Chamber Music Festival

May 17 to 19 sees that Sacconi Chamber Music Festival filling Folkestone with some fine chamber music. The festival is organised by the young Sacconi Quartet, who open on Friday 17 May with a concert of quartets by Haydn, Ireland and Beethoven. They continue on May 18 with  a programme of Bridge, Britten's Serenade for tenor, horn and strings, RVW and Elgar which involves Mark Padmore (tenor), Richard Watkins (horn) and the Royal College of Music Chamber Orchestra.  Mark Padmore and Gary Matthewman join the quartet for RVW's On Wenlock Edge, plus Britten's Winter Words and Tippett's Boyhood's End on Sunday 19 May. Richard Watkins plays Mozart's Horn Quartet in a programme which also includes Haydn and Britten String Quartets. In between these events there are Mozart's duos for violin and viola, late night folk-fusion and a talk on Britten. The Sacconi Quartet are also involved in outreach in the area and on May 4, there is a performance of Britten's Noye's Fludde with the Canterbury Cantata Trust, schoolchildren and community musicians. Further information from the festival website.

15 May: Villazon - Verdi - the concert

Following up his recent CD of arias from Verdi operas (see my review), Rolando Villazon will be singing a selection of Verdi arias in concert at the Royal Festival Hall on 15 May 2013 as part of a European tour. Further dates include Amsterdam (12 June),  Stuttgart (15 June), Nurnberg (18 June), Baden-Baden (21 June), Toulouse (24 June) and Barcelona (27 June). For the London concert Villazon will be accompanied by the Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by the Russian-born, Barcelona-based Guerassim Voronkov. Arias featured in the concert will include items from Don Carlo, Luisa Miller, Macbeth, plus arias from lesser known operas such as Il Corsaro and   Oberto, plus Verdi's songs orchestrated by Luciano Berio. Later this month Villazon will be appearing in L'elisir d'amore at the Liceu in Barcelon and in July he will be singing the lead role in Mozart's Lucia Silla at Salzburg.

14 May: Schumann - Under the influence

American pianist Jonathan Biss continues his exploration of Schumann's music and influence, with a pair of concerts at the Wigmore Hall, Schumann: Under the Influence. On 14 May 2013, Biss is joined by the Elias String Quartet for performances of Schumann's Piano Quartet and String Quartet in A Minor, Opus 41 no. 1. In between these two there will be the premiere of a new work by Timothy Andres commissioned by Wigmore Hall, San Francisco Performances, Carnegie Hall and Het Concertgebouw Amsterdam. The concert opens with a selection of Purcell's Fantasias. The concert is preceded by a talk with Jonathan Biss in conversation with Geoffrey Norris. Then on 22 May, Biss has a solo recital at the Wigmore Hall in which he plays Schumann's Davidsbundlertanze and Phantasiestucke interspersed with excerpts from Janáček's On an overgrown path. Biss will also be playing Berg's Piano Sonata No. 1. The overall question which the concerts seek to answer is where does Schumann's music belong in the general musical scheme of things, so expect unexpected links and connections. Further information from the Wigmore Hall website.

Reduced service

There will be a reduced service on Planet Hugill for the next week or so as I will be off on holiday. Not that I will be putting my feet up, I'll be joining friends walking in Montenegro.

Competition!

Gregg Kallor, whose recent album I reviewed, has an intriguing competition going. Post a coffee themed picture of yourself on Gregg's Facebook page and the winner will get their photo as the cover photo on his Facebook page as well as receiving tickets to the album launch in NYC and an autographed copy of the CD. Further details on Gregg's Facebook page. You have until May 13, so get posting!

Handel's L'Allegro at the Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music

image credit Jonathan Rose

Somewhat like London buses, Handel's L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato has made two London appearances in short succession after an absence of a number of years. Following on from the performance of the work as the close of the London Handel Festival (see my review), the Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music opened this year with a performance of L'Allegro given by Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort and Players at St John's Smith Square on Friday 10 May 2013 with soloists Gillian Webster, Laurence Kilsby, Jeremy Ovenden and Ashley Riches.

image credit Jonathan Rose

Like Laurence Cummings at the London Handel Festival, McCreesh chose to solve L'Allegro's textual problems by going back to Handel's original version, first premiered in 1740. Following on from this premiere, Handel would continue to tinker with the piece, adjusting it to the various forces available as was his wont. But also part of the tinkering seems to have been a dissatisfaction with theil Moderato. Handel adjusted this rather a lot and even dropped it entirely. Handel's revisions to his works are rarely complete improvements, and Paul McCreesh made the point in the programme that though by choosing the original version we lose some delightful music, we also gain the tautest and most vivid version of the work. One area where McCreesh returned even closer to the premiere was to use a treble, Laurence Kilsby, as Handel did rather than a second soprano, thus having a clear division between il Penseroso (soprano soloist) and l'Allegro (three male soloists, treble, tenor and bass). I did wonder whether the three male voices were intended in some way to reflect the three ages of man (youth, mature vigour, and old age), though at this performance there was no hint of old age in Ashley Riches' performance, I hasten to add.
concluding section, Charles Jennens'

Mercadante's I due Figaro

A forgotten opera by a relatively unknown composer: I due Figaro by Saverio Mercadante is the latest to be revived by Riccardo Muti and the Orchestra Giovanile Luigi Cherubini recorded live at the 2011 Ravenna Festival. Mercadante was the nearly man of early 19th century Italian opera, a younger colleague of Rossini's who had a long and influential operatic career. Trained in Naples, he ended up as director of the conservatoire there from 1840, and it is this Neapolitan connection which provides the link to Muti's other revivals of operas by Pergolesi and Cimarosa. Though in fact I due Figaro was written for Madrid.

Mercadante had a long operatic career. A few years younger than Rossini he wrote operas from 1819 to 1857 (the year Verdi wrote the original version of Simon Boccanegra and four years after the premiere of La Traviata). His middle period operas such as Il giuramento  (1831) and Elena da Feltre (1839) are important in the modernisation of operatic technique. Mercadante followed his younger colleagues, Donizetti and Bellini, in updating his technique and he banished cabalettas and crescendos, simplified the vocal lines. His operas of this period had an important influence of Verdi (whose first opera dates from 1839). And it is the younger composer who has eclipsed Mercadante, though during his lifetime many of Mercadante's operas were more successful in Italy than Verdi's early works.

But the work that Muti has chosen to revive is a comedy dating from 1826, the earlier part of Mercadante's career, and written whilst he was working in Madrid. Mercadante's comedy dates from some years before Donizetti's well known comedies, L'Elisir d'Amore (1832) and Don Pasquale (1843). Its libretto is based on a comic play by French playwright Honore Antoine Richard Martelly dating from 1795, which somewhat satirised the characters from Beaumarchais' play Le Mariage de Figaro by inventing further intrigues for them. The libretto by Felice Romani was first set by Michele Carafa in 1820. Mercadante's version was intended for Madrid in 1826, but a dispute with his leading lady put the opera on hold and it did not appear until 1835.

Opera North new season

Opera North open its 2013/14 season with a trilogy of operas celebrating Britten's centenary, with revivals of Peter Grimes and A Midsummer Nights Dream alongside the company's first ever Death in Venice. In the Winter 2014 season there is a revival of Verdi's Macbeth plus a new production of Puccini's La Fanciulla del West (The Girl of the Golden West). Then in the Spring 2014 season they complete their Ring with performances of Gotterdammerung with Puccini's La Boheme as the unlikely partner in the season.

Phyllida Lloyd's 2006 production of Peter Grimes return with Jeffrey Lloyd-Roberts in the title role, Giselle Allen as Ellen Orford and Robert Hayward as Captain Bulstrode, conducted by Jac van Steen, the Dutch conductor who has been principal guest conductor of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales since 2005.