Virtuosity & discipline: John Wilson & the Sinfonia of London in Respighi's Roman trilogy & Walton's Cello Concerto

Walton: Cello Concerto - Jonathan Aasgaard, John Wilson, Sinfonia of London - BBC Proms at Royal Albert Hall (Photo: BBC / Chris Christodoulou)

Verdi: Overture to La forza del destino, Walton: Cello Concerto, Respighi: Roman Festivals, Fountains of Rome, Pines of Rome; Jonathan Aasgaard, Sinfonia of London, John Wilson; BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall
Reviewed 24 July 2026

Italian warmth and vivid orchestral detail in a concert that gloried in technical virtuosity allied with real control and style, giving us a sense of magic, plus a more intimate view of Walton's concerto

Having seen John Wilson and the Sinfonia of London recently at the Cheltenham Music Festival in an all-English programme [see my review], it was a pleasure to catch their first BBC Prom (they return in September) at the Royal Albert Hall on Friday 24 July 2026 for a programme redolent of Italy. They began with Verdi's overture to La forza del destino and ended with Respighi, all three of his Roman tone poems - Roman Festivals, Fountains of Rome and Pines of Rome. In the middle was Walton's Cello Concerto with soloist Jonathan Aasgaard (principal cellist of Sinfonia of London), a work that Walton wrote whilst living at La Mortella in Ischia.

This was a big band concert, the Walton apart. The stage was full for the Verdi and by the time we came to 'The Pines of the Via Appia' from Pines of Rome things were full to bursting with around 120 orchestral players and sixteen extra brass.

Respighi: Pines of Rome - John Wilson, Sinfonia of London - BBC Proms at Royal Albert Hall (Photo: BBC / Chris Christodoulou)

Verdi's overture opened with vivid brass and tight, urgent string sound. What was notable was the clarity of detail that Wilson brought to the music along with a sense of control with singing lines allied to a disturbing undertow, leading to urgent, incisive drama. An insouciant clarinet melody was overwhelmed by urgent brass and strings, the music driven to climax, then crisp excitement to the end. I know that this overture is very much complete in itself, but Wilson's account made you wonder what he'd be like conducting the whole opera.

It was Francesca Caccini's score, & Vache Baroque's performance, that surprised & captivated: La liberazione di Ruggiero at Buxton International Festival

Francesca Caccini: La liberazione di Ruggiero - Jon Stainsby, Camilla Seale - Vache Baroque at Buxton International Festival (Photo: Genevieve Girling)

Francesca Caccini: La liberazione di Ruggiero dall'isola d'Alcina; Camilla Seale, Jon Stainsby, Phoebe Rayner, Vache Baroque, director: Eloise Lally, music director: Jonathan Darbourne; Buxton International Festival at Pavilion Arts Centre

Dazzling instrumental playing with music that seduced in a trifle over-serious staging but with some fine individual performances make this a notable revival of Francesca Caccini's rarely staged gem

La liberazione di Ruggiero dall'isola d'Alcina by Francesca Caccini has the reputation as the first opera by a woman composer. Certainly, it is Caccini's only surviving opera, written for the Medici court in Florence in 1625. It remains, however, on the fringe of the repertoire though Brighton Early Music Festival (BREMF) staged it in 2015 [see my review]

Vache Baroque have been presenting their production of Caccini's La liberazione di Ruggiero at Buxton International Festival in the Pavilion Arts Centre (seen 21 July 2026), directed by Eloise Lally (who directed Donizetti's L'Elisir d'Amore for St Paul's Opera last year, see my review) with Jonathan Darbourne as music director. Designs were by Zahra Mansouri and lighting by Katie Kelly. Camilla Seale was Alcina, Jon Stainsby was Ruggiero, Phoebe Rayner was Melissa and Filippo Turkheimer was Nettuno with Betty Makharinsky, Harriet Burns, Alina Miyagi Magnell and Tom Kelly. Jonathan Darbourne directed from the harpsichord with an instrumental ensemble of three violins, viola da gamba, violone, three recorders, three sackbuts, theorbo and organ. The staging encompassed the whole stage with the instrumental ensemble spread around the auditorium. Caccini's full scoring does not survive; no credit was given in the programme so I presume that it is to Darbourne we have to thank for the particular orchestration here.

Francesca Caccini: La liberazione di Ruggiero - Phoebe Rayner - Vache Baroque at Buxton International Festival (Photo: Genevieve Girling)

The plot, based on Ariosto, is similar to the one from Handel only here Ruggiero is rescued by another sorceress, Melissa, and Alcina turns people into plants rather than animals. Eloise Lally's concept of the plot took her some way from Caccini's court entertainment which was written for a visiting prince (and originally ended with a horse ballet). Here magic was played down. Lally explained her concept in the programme book:

'Set within a world on the brink of collapse, this work explores the tension between preservation and reinvention. Through the opposing forces of Alcina and Melissa, it questions who has the right to shape the future: those who uphold existing systems of power, or those who seek to dismantle and rebuild them entirely.'

Katie Kelly's lighting was certainly atmospheric but it did rather obscure some of the details of the staging, making the plot a little opaque. The production worked best when it forgot about explaining the mechanics of the plot and concentrated on personal interactions and the sheer seductive power of Caccini's music.

Musically, an evening of complete enjoyment: Olivia Fuchs's playful 'Love Island' setting for Handel's Amadigi in Buxton

Handel: Amadigi di Gaula - Tim Morgan, Hilary Cronin, Rowan Pierce - Buxton International Festival (Photo: Genevieve Girling)

Handel: Amadigi di Gaula; Tim Morgan, Rowan Pierce, Hilary Cronin, James Hall, director: Olivia Fuchs, the English Concert, conductor: Erin Helyard; Buxton International Festival at Buxton Opera House
Reviewed 20 July 2026

By turns playful and distracting, Olivia Fuchs's production allowed a fine young cast to develop strong performances combining enjoyment and engagement with technical bravura

Handel's opera Amadigi di Gaula (1715) belongs to a small group of operas he wrote when he first came to London and the exact form of his style of opera seria was not yet fixed. Like its predecessor Teseo (1713), Amadigi is based on a French source and there are tantalising hints that the original plans for the opera included French elements such as dancing. [see my article on Handel's experimental early London period.] As it is, Amadigi has a freedom of form that makes it attractive to modern directors.

Olivia Fuchs has directed Handel's Amadigi di Gaula for the Buxton International Festival at Buxton Opera House. We caught the final performance on 20 July 2026. Erin Helyard (artistic director of Pinchgut Opera) conducted the English Concert with Tim Morgan (replacing Jake Ingbar) as Amadigi, Rowan Pierce as Oriana, Hilary Cronin as Melissa and James Hall as Dardano. Designs were by Eleanor Bull with lighting by Ben Pickersgill.

Both Cronin and Morgan have form with this opera. Tim Morgan sang the title role with English Touring Opera in 2021 (directed by James Conway, conducted by Jonathan Peter Kenny, see my review), whilst Hilary Cronin sang Oriana in concert with the English Concert (conducted by Kristian Bezuidenhout, see my review).

Handel: Amadigi di Gaula - James Hall - Buxton International Festival (Photo: Genevieve Girling)

The opera has one of those 'black box' plots beloved of opera seria: the characters all confined to a single place. Here, four people in a love tangle: Melissa loves Amadigi who loves Oriana as does Dardano, all complicated by Melissa's power as a sorceress. What elevates the opera is the extraordinary power of the music for Melissa and Dardano, both of whom are disappointed in love.

More than a concert: Mozart's La clemenza di Tito at the Buxton Festival brings out the work's real drama

Mozart: La clemenza di Tito; Maria Stella Maurizi, Indyana Schneider, Xavier Mas, Frances Gregory, director: Corina Würsch, conductor: Adrian Kelly, Buxton International Festival; Buxton Opera House
Reviewed: 19 July 2026

A mainly young cast brings out the dramatic strengths in a semi-staging of Mozart's late opera with compelling performances from Maria Stella Maurizi and Indyana Schneider

Like the Grange Festival [see my review] last month, Buxton International Festival (BIF) has opted to explore Mozart's late masterpiece, La clemenza di Tito via a pair of concert performances (seen 19 July 2026). Adrian Kelly, artistic director of the Festival, conducted the BIF Orchestra (which mixes seasoned professionals with early career players) and the concert staging was directed by Corina Würsch who as assistant director/movement director on the Festival's recent production of Verdi's La traviata. Würsch was also movement director for Blackheath Halls Opera's 2025 production of Gluck's Iphigenia in Tauris [see my review].

Adrian Kelly is also head of the International Opera Studio (IOS) at Zurich Opera and the casting leveraged this connection. Italian soprano Maria Stella Maurizi (Vitellia) and Australian mezzo-soprano Indyana Schneider (Sesto) are current members of the IOS Zurich whilst New Zealand-born baritone Samson Setu (Publio) is a former member. Tito was played by French tenor Xavier Mas with Frances Gregory (whom we recently saw as Idamante in Mozart's Idomeneo with Chelsea Opera Group, see my review) as Annio and Jessica Lawley as Servilia.

The orchestra was on stage which helped put them centre stage for once, though the sound was perhaps a little recessed. Adrian Kelly played the forte piano recitatives and the instrument a little too discreet for the space.

The acting space was a wide strip in front of the orchestra with Würsch's production concentrating on basics. The result was some admirably character-led drama. Costumes were simply variants of modern concert dress, though it was perhaps a trifle confusing to have Maria Stella Maurizi's Vitellia wearing trousers (albeit very elegantly) when two other women in the cast played en travestie. The chorus was off-stage for the conclusion of Act One but for the other appearances the singers efficiently filed on and off stage left.

Against a backdrop of fear, surveillance and political violence, the play explores the absurdity of tyranny, the courage of resistance and the enduring power of art to speak truth when words cannot.

A new play which premieres at Park Theatre on 27 August and runs until 10 October, is set to explore the life and music of Dmitri Shostakovich. Holy Fool by Rosalind Adler and Lea Sellers explores the tightrope he walked to stay in favour with Stalin, whilst resisting his tyrannical regime through music.

The play spans roughly 1936 to 1973, beginning with Stalin's attendance at Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk at the Bolshoi and the subsequent denunciation that transformed Shostakovich's life. It then follows him through the years of censorship, war, political pressure and artistic compromise, right through to the later years of his life. 

Rather than a conventional biographical drama, the play is about the moral choices artists face under authoritarian rule, and asks whether survival itself can become a form of resistance. 

Shostakovich's music plays a central role in the drama, not just Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk but Symphonies Nos. 4, 5, 7, 8 and 9. The long-suppressed Fourth Symphony becomes an important dramatic thread running through the play, representing both his artistic integrity and the personal cost of creating under Stalin's regime.

The play came about partly as a result of Rosalind Adler working on a play with Simon Russell Beale in mind. A meeting with him in his dressing room led her to ask him, "What subject would interest you more than any other?" His reply was instant: "Shostakovich."

Rosalind Adler and Lea Sellers had already worked together on other projects and found they enjoyed collaborating. Whilst neither knew more than a bare minimum about Shostakovich, Sellers' degree was in Russian Studies and she also has a musical family. But the work also included mountains of research.

Rosalind Adler comments that "We enjoyed the picture that emerged of a generous, anxious, shy, brave man. We also fell in love with his music, both as an expression of his deepest self and as a response to the times he lived in. Our play is full of music...The more we felt deeply involved in Shostakovich's life and relationships, the more we relished working on the play. While being faithful to the facts, so many of which are dramatic in themselves, we also chose to test the character by pitting him against challenges and characters we invented."

Dramaturg Ali Bodin-Saphir also worked on tightening the script, and Kate Fahy directs.

Full details from the Park Theatre website. 

 

Conducting is a profession of lifelong learning: Vasily Petrenko on nurturing talent & broadening horizons

Vasily Petrenko’s Academy for Young Conductors in Yerevan, Armenia (Photo: © Primavera Foundation of Armenia)

Vasily Petrenko’s Academy for Young Conductors takes place each year in Yerevan, Armenia. The Academy brings together Vasily Petrenko, Music Director of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and a select group of emerging conductors from around the world for an intensive week of masterclasses, individual tuition and orchestral work with the Armenian National Philharmonic Orchestra. This year, the orchestra marks its centennial anniversary, making the 2026 edition a particularly significant occasion. 

Following the success of his 2026 Academy for Young Conductors, Vasily Petrenko reflects on what it takes to shape the next generation of conductors – and what he wishes he’d been taught in his early years.

"This week, as I wrapped up the Academy for Young Conductors in the Armenian capital of Yerevan for another year, I was struck by a recurring thought: I wish something like this had been organised when I was a student conductor. The moments I have seen across the last four days when Academy participants were able to ask questions openly and get proper answers would have been immensely valuable to me as a developing conductor – they might even have cut my journey of musical development significantly shorter. That’s what the Academy for Young Conductors is about: using what I’ve learned over decades of experience on the conductor’s podium to nurture young conductors and support their growth. Not everyone has to learn ‘the hard way’.

"Since we launched the Academy in 2024, recognition of the programme has grown – we received applications from 22 countries this year – and the support we offer has grown with it. Participants on the 2026 programme rehearsed with the National Philharmonic Orchestra who co-organised the course alongside the Primavera Foundation Armenia and I. We have been working together across the last two years (and beyond) to help young musicians develop and progress to next stage of their career – and, ultimately, their life.

Vasily Petrenko (Photo: Ben Wright)

"In today’s world, there is unfortunately not enough attention paid to culture and, because of that, budgets tighten and it is more and more difficult for orchestras and concert organisations to take risks. These organisations, therefore, end up offering fewer and fewer chances for the young conductors. My Academy offers a rare chance for developing conductors to be gain visibility on the world stage here in Armenia.

"As well as supporting the country’s future conductors, the Academy works to nurture Armenia’s audiences of tomorrow too, with the Academy’s gala concert free to attend and specifically aimed at young people. We feel the future generation is key to promoting classical music, promoting conducting – and music – as a career.

"The Academy’s deep roots in Armenia are hugely significant – both for me as a conductor, and for what we’re able to offer. I first visited the country in the 1980s and was immediately struck by the warmth and hospitality of its people. This year, five out of six Academy participants were visiting Armenia for the first time, so the Primavera Foundation Armenia organised a sightseeing tour – it was all they talked about the following day.

"For me, travel has always been a source of enrichment for both my cultural understanding and my musical development: beyond the notes, a conductor has to learn a lot about context and history. We learn about each composer’s life, when each piece was written, why it was written, what the composers wanted to say – not just musically, but philosophically and historically. I began travelling at a very young age, first in a boys’ choir, and then later on as a singer and a conductor. To me, every trip was a chance for me to reach other cultures, see other traditions, other ways of life. This diversity of cultures in the world is what makes our planet so unique. I hope travel has enriched this year’s Academy participants too. As well as their experience with a professional orchestra and my advice, what I hope participants take away from their time at the academy is a piece of the culture of Armenia – and of its rich cultural and classical heritage – and I hope they will share it with the world.

"Conducting is a profession of lifelong learning. Every day we're trying to be better than yesterday, and through the Academy for Young Conductors we’re working to make that learning process easier to progress through. Since our launch in 2024, our goals have remained the same - but we now have a clearer vision of how we can support even more young musicians.

"In the future, I would like our programme to grow into a wider Academy for young musicians and perhaps even a festival, something like Verbier, Aspen or Tanglewood. With our committed co-organisers, and talented participants – particularly those hailing from Armenia – it’s just a matter of time."

 

Compelling music drama: Wagner's Tristan und Isolde returns to Longborough Festival Opera with Peter Wedd & Catharine Woodward, conductor Anthony Negus

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde - Peter Wedd - Longborough Festival Opera (Photo: Matthew Williams-Ellis)

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde; Peter Wedd, Catharine Woodward, Catherine Carby, Robert Hayward, Alistair Miles, director: Carmen Jakobi/Guido Martin-Brandis, conductor: Anthony Negus; Longborough Festival Opera
Reviewed 12 July 2026

An Isolde who prized tonal beauty, a vividly intense and heroic Tristan welded into a compelling performance where detailed personen regie was allied to strong musical values and an admirable lack of irritating concepts

Wagner's Tristan und Isolde was premiered in Munich in 1865 with Ludwig and Malvina Schnorr von Carolsfeld in the title roles. Their being husband and wife solving one of the work's problems - that the story and Wagner's treatment of it was considered somehow improper! But this was Wagner's first attempt at staging the work, even the well-funded Hofoper in Vienna had failed. Despite over 70 rehearsals between 1862 and 1864, Vienna entirely failed to stage the opera.

The confounding thing about Tristan und Isolde was not so much its length: works by Halévy and Meyerbeer at the Paris Opera lasted as long. But even Meyerbeer's Le prophète (the success of which Wagner both despised and envied), with its taxing tenor lead role, had long stretches when the tenor did not sing, the focus turning to other characters or large scale ensembles.

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde - Ludwig & Malvina Schnorr von Carolsfeld - Hofoper, Munich 1865

Tristan und Isolde has none of these, Wagner's focus is largely on the two protagonists and the early attempts to stage it fell because singers struggled to learn the roles and the number of requisite voices able to sing them was probably small. Tristan requires a very different type of stamina to the Meyerbeer's large tenor roles, though later in the 19th century a tenor like Jean de Reske would sing both Meyerbeer and Wagner in the same season [see my 2015 review of Karen Henson's book Opera Acts: Singers and Performance in the Late Nineteeth Century].

Longborough Festival Opera's production of Tristan und Isolde (its first ever) debuted in 2015, the product of the husband and wife team of director Carmen Jakobi and conductor Anthony Negus. Revived in 2017, it returned this year (seen 12 July 2026) with Guido Martin-Brandis as associate director. Peter Wedd returned to Tristan (a role he sang here in 2015 and 2017) and Catharine Woodward made her role debut as Isolde. Catherine Carby was Brangäne, Robert Hayward was Kurwenal, Alistair Miles was King Mark, Brian Smith Walters was Melot, Peter Bronder was the shepherd. Designs were by Kimie Nakano. Lucy Cullingford was movement director and intimacy coordinator.

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde - Peter Wedd, Catharine Woodward - Longborough Festival Opera (Photo: Matthew Williams-Ellis)

There have evidently been changes to the production since 2015 and what we saw this year combined simple yet effective abstract stage pictures with strong and detailed personenregie. The produced was admirably free of concepts. An intimacy coordinator was credited, so even before the first notes of the prelude we knew this was not one of those productions where Tristan and Isolde never actually touch. In fact, I felt that the maker's of Catharine Woodward's non-smudge lipstick deserved their own credit. Costumes were atmospheric and non-specific, though there was something evocative of The Last Samurai about Peter Wedd's outfit.

Style & enjoyment: John Wilson & Sinfonia of London bring Cheltenham Music Festival to a close with a light music programme culminating in Eric Coates's rarity Cinderella

John Wilson & Sinfonia of London at Cheltenham Town Hall, Cheltenham Music Festival
(Photo: Still Moving Media for Cheltenham Festivals)

Sullivan, Delius, Vaughan Williams, Richard Rodney Bennett, Walton, Eric Coates, Elgar, Haydn Wood, Robert Farnon, Vivian Ellis; Sinfonia of London, John Wilson; Cheltenham Music Festival at Cheltenham Town Hall
Reviewed 11 July 2026

Eric Coates rarely performed Cinderella Phantasy was the climax of a delightful summer programme benefitting from the way John Wilson and the orchestra combined technique with style and enjoyment

Last year, Cheltenham Music Festival celebrated its 80th anniversary, bringing the festival to a close with a concert where Gergely Madaras and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales explored music performed at the first festival and music commissioned by the festival, with Elgar, Arnold and Britten [see my review]. For the final concert of this year's festival on Saturday 11 July 2026 at Cheltenham Town Hall, John Wilson conducted his Sinfonia of London. If the 2025 concert was an exploration of British music in the 20th century, the John Wilson and his orchestra seemed to offer an alternative view, taking us from Sullivan and Elgar, through Delius's The walk to the Paradise Garden, Vaughan Williams's Lark Ascending (with Charlie Lovell-Jones), and Walton, to Richard Rodney Bennett, Robert Farnon, Haydn Wood, Vivian Ellis and Eric Coates ending with a rare performance of Coates's tone poem Cinderella.

We began with Sir Arthur Sullivan's overture to The Yeoman of the Guard, one of the few Savoy Opera overtures that Sullivan actually wrote. This is music that benefits from being played by a fine orchestra. Here Sullivan's orchestration sparkled, everything crisp and clear: light strings, classy wind, fine-toned brass and vivid excitement.

In his spoken introduction to the concert John Wilson said for him the best definition of light music was that 'the tune is more important than what you do with it'. What followed in the first half was less light music than composers in more approachable mode. 

There is no iceberg, no skeleton key; Finnegans Wake is not a cipher. It is only itself.

A drawing of Joyce (with eyepatch) by Djuna Barnes from 1922, 
the year in which Joyce began the 17-year task of writing Finnegans Wake

"Finnegans Wake has been ill-used by approaches that attempt to 'decode' it through what is absent: in ignorance of the sheer joy that the language embodies. There is no iceberg, no skeleton key; Finnegans Wake is not a cipher. It is only itself", opines composer Alastair White thus giving us an intriguing lead-in to his ambitious thirteen-year project to create a cycle of works based on James Joyce's epic, modernist novel.

White's project is intended to lead up to the work's centenary in 2039 (!) It is worth bearing in mind, however, that Joyce took 17 years to complete Finnegans Wake: he started sketching in 1922 and the work was finally published in book form in 1939. Joyce died twenty months later in Zürich, on 13 January 1941.

As an initial line in the sand, white is presenting the opening concert of the cycle, Finnegans Wake: Here Comes Everybody at the London Irish Centre on Saturday 5 September 2026.

This first instalment — a one-hour reimagining of an operatic overture — is performed by veteran avant-gardists Roger Redgate and Ensemble Éxposé. Ensemble Exposé was formed in 1984 by the composers Richard Barrett, Roger Redgate and Michael Finnissy, and is recognised for championing the most challenging of contemporary music.  

Full details from the London Irish Centre's website.

Full circle: Blackheath Halls Community Opera celebrates 20 years with a return 'Carmen', the opera that launched the company

Twenty years ago, Blackheath Halls launched an ambitious annual community opera project with a production of Bizet's Carmen. This September, the project returns to the opera that started it all, celebrating two decades of creativity, collaboration and community.

The company has never been one to shy away from a challenge. Last year they presented Gluck's rarely staged Iphigenia in Tauris [see my review] and other works have included Bernstein's Candide [see my review], Blow's Venus and Adonis [see my review], Mozart's Idomeneo, and Weber's Der Freischütz (The Magic Bullets).

For the 20th anniversary production, Carmen will be directed by Harry Fehr and conducted by Christopher Stark [the team responsible for Blackheath's production of Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana in 2024, see my review] with performances from 20 to 27 September 2026. Mezzo-soprano Katie Bray will make her role debut as Carmen with Oliver Johnston as Don Jose [he sang Turiddu in Blackheath's Cavalleria Rusticana], Chuma Sijeqa as Escamillo and Meeta Raval as Micaela. The production brings together professional opera singers, Trinity Laban vocal students, community orchestra and a community chorus of local performers aged 8 to 80+, including students from partner school Charlton Park Academy, a Special Academy for students with complex special educational needs.

Blackheath Halls Community Opera has welcomed thousands of people from across south-east London since 2007, creating an extraordinary intergenerational community brought together through opera. Several members of this year's community chorus and orchestra also performed in the very first production of Carmen, and they are returning to the stage alongside first-time participants. 

Tom Butler, who is performing Morales, sang in the Blackheath Halls Opera chorus as a child, and he is currently studying at the Royal Academy Opera School at the Royal Academy of Music. He comments:

"Blackheath Halls is pretty much the entire reason that I’ve gone into opera - I sang in multiple productions as part of the children’s chorus, and as one of Noah’s Sons in Britten’s 'Noye’s Fludde', then again in the chorus as a teenager for Weber’s 'The Magic Bullets'.

My brother also sang in the children’s chorus before me and my Dad now sings in the chorus every year, so it’s a big part of my life, and I’ve gone to see the opera every year! It’s thrilling to be able to return as a principal, and I’m honoured to be involved again." 

Full details from Blackheath Halls' website. 

New research links Handel's organist in Dublin with the Scottish fiddler & composer Charles Macklean

Dr Aaron McGregor (Photo: Campbell Parker)

Advertisements for Handel's performances in Dublin in 1741 and 1742 (when he premiered Messiah) give the name of his organist as “Mr M’Lean” or “Mr Maclaine” and that is all we knew. 

Until now, when research by Dr Aaron McGregor of the University of Aberdeen has linked this figure with an 18th-century Scottish fiddler and composer, Charles Macklean, thanks in part to documents arising from Macklean's complex marital history.

Dr McGregor explains: "Charles Macklean has always been a fascinating but somewhat shadowy figure in Scottish musical history. He appears in north-east Scotland as a music teacher, establishes himself among Edinburgh’s leading musicians, produces some remarkable Scottish fiddle music and publishes a collection of violin sonatas, but then seems to disappear from the historical record. Once I started to delve into the sources, the project grew enormously."

Dr McGregor originally began investigating Macklean because of his connections to north-east Scotland, where he taught and was later appointed master of Aberdeen’s music school. Macklean was already known to scholars of Scottish music as a violinist and composer of Scots tunes and Italianate sonatas, but his wider career and connections beyond Scotland remained largely unexplored. 

Central to the discovery was a complex legal petition compiled by Macklean’s wife, Jean Larini, after he abandoned her, and she needed to prove the validity of their marriage. The daughter of a celebrated 18th-century acrobat noted for her ability to perform on a rope, Larini belonged to a travelling performance troupe in which Macklean himself appears to have been involved during the early part of his career. 

The document brought together detailed testimony about Macklean’s travels, employment and personal life, thus allowing Dr McGregor to make the connection to Dublin and Handel, placing Macklean in Handel’s professional circle during the composer’s celebrated Irish season of 1741–42, which culminated in the premiere of Messiah. 

Research also uncovered evidence linking Macklean romantically and professionally with the soprano Christina Maria Avolio, one of Handel’s leading singers. Avolio later appeared in Dublin, where records suggest she performed under the name 'Mrs McLean'. There is evidence that Macklean and Christina Maria Avolio were living together in Edinburgh by 1741, with Macklean’s profession recorded as an organist.

Dr McGregor has completed a scholarly article on Macklean’s life and work, further details from the University of Aberdeen website. 

The research also informs a performance at the Glasgow Barons Early Music Festival, taking place at Govan Old Parish Church on 24 July. The performance will launch the new early music ensemble The Curious Collection, featuring Dr McGregor on violin alongside soprano Mhairi Lawson, cellist Alison McGillivray, and harpsichordist William Cole. Further details from the ensemble's website.

Upping its game: 10th anniversary Windsor Festival International String Competition concludes with concerto finale with orchestra for the first time

The 2026 Windsor Festival International String Competition (WFISC) is the 10th anniversary competition and for this WFISC is upping its game and introducing a concerto final. The competition runs from 27 September to 2 October 2026 with semi-finals on 29 and 30 September and then the final on 2 October. 

The final will allow the final three competitors to perform a complete concerto with full orchestra, selecting a concerto from a set list that includes works by Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Tchaikovsky (violin), Stamitz, Hoffmeister, and Walton (viola) and Haydn, Schumann, and Elgar (cello).

The first prize includes a cash prize, a solo recording opportunity with WFISC recording partner Champs Hill Records, a concerto performance with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, in Windsor Castle during the 2027 Windsor Festival and further concerto performances with the orchestra on tour. Another first for WFISC is a concerto commission from Sally Beamish, and world premiere London performance with Orpheus Sinfonia in 2027.

The Windsor Festival was founded in 1969 with Yehudi Menuhin and Ian Hunter as Artistic Directors. Based around the participation of the Menuhin Festival Orchestra with Yehudi Menuhin using St George's Chapel, the State Apartments of Windsor Castle and other venues around Windsor and Eton. WFISC was launched in 2008, in memory of festival founder, and violinist, Yehudi Menuhin and recent winners include: Jiyoon Lee, Nathan Meltzer, Jonathan Swensen and Daniil Bulayev.

The competition is open to all violinists, violists, and cellists, aged 16-26, of all nationalities and the closing date for applications is 29 July 2026. Full details regarding eligibility, timeline, repertoire requirements, and the application process can be found on the official website. 

The Bridgewater Hall celebrates its 30th birthday drawing together various strands of Manchester's music making

The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester

The Bridgewater Hall in Manchester is celebrating its 30th birthday! The opening concert was on 11 September 1996 and the hall has just announced a celebratory 2026/27 season.

Manchester's historic concert venue, the Free Trade Hall (which was built in 1853-56 on the site of the Peterloo Massacre) was damaged in World War Two and patched up in the 1950s. It remained a somewhat unsatisfactory concert venue until the Bridgewater Hall's plans came to fruition. The new hall is named for the 3rd Duke of Bridgewater whose eponymous canal runs through Manchester (and is often described as the first great achievement of the canal age). Ironically, the Bridgewater Hall actually sits on a specially constructed arm of the Rochdale Canal!

Almost to the day there is a 30th anniversary concert which brings together various strands of Manchester's music making including guest artists Rowetta, Matt Wilde, Banksie, Roberto and Vulva Voce. The evening will also see the debut of the Greater Manchester Youth Orchestra which is being led artistically by Untold Orchestra, a Manchester-based collective known for innovative, genre-crossing orchestral work.

The BBC Philharmonic continues its season in the hall beginning with Sibelius' Symphony No. 5, and featuring Simone Young and pianist Cédric Tiberghien in Schumann's Konzertstück Op. 92 and Introduction and Concert Allegro Op. 134 plus Strauss's Alpine Symphony (quite a concert!),  Tchaikovsky's Pathétique, Brahms' Requiem, Mahler's Symphony No. 4, and ending with Beethoven's Symphony No. 9. The Hallé Orchestra opens its bold season under music director Kahchun Wong with Thomas Adès, whose work These Premises Are Alarmed was premiered at the Hall's very first concert in 1996, returning as Principal Guest Conductor (see my season preview for further details)

The International Concert Series brings orchestras from Germany, Ukraine and Japan to Manchester alongside recitals, opera and chamber music, opening with The Sixteen and concluding with trumpeter Matilda Lloyd and the Goldmund Quartet. 

Visiting orchestras include NDR Philharmonie Hannover under Stanislav Kochanovsky; Stuttgart Philharmonic with pianist Jeneba Kanneh-Mason; the London Philharmonic Orchestra pairing Beethoven's Emperor Concerto (with Benjamin Grosvenor) with Shostakovich's Symphony No. 10; Sinfonia of London under John Wilson in Walton’s Viola Concerto with Edgar Francis, and Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances; the Ukrainian National Philharmonic Orchestra under Theodore Kuchar, and Osaka Philharmonic under Tadaaki Otaka with Viktoria Mullova in Prokofiev.

Opera North present Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde and other visitors include pianist Angela Hewitt, Sir Karl Jenkins conducting The Armed Man, Freya Ridings, Katherine Jenkins, African Soul Rebels, Bellowhead and Rebecca Ferguson. 

Associate Artist Jonathan Scott presents a season of lunchtime organ concerts celebrating 30 years of the Hall's Marcussen Concert Organ, while Manchester Midday Music - one of the UK's longest-running lunchtime concert series, founded in 1915 - returns for a full new season.

Further details from the hall's website. 

Jacob was wrestling in the arms of a stranger: London Concord Singers to premiere Robert Hugill's 'Aubade & Love Song'

Back in the late 1990s one of the origins for ideas for new musical works was the moment during mass when I tuned the homily out and my mind went into a sort of free association. 

I sang in the Latin Mass choir at St Mary's Cadogan Street; both the choice of readings and the Gregorian chant that we sang fed into my musical ideas. Jacob wrestling with the angel (from Genesis) was one such moment.

A striking yet somewhat unsatisfactory image, the story has a tantalising, gnomic quality as if something was being missed out. There is, of course, a famous Gauguin painting inspired by the story, Vision after the Sermon (Jacob Wrestling with the Angel) now in the Scottish National Gallery, along with other interpretations by Rembrandt, and others.

And he rose up that night, and took his two wives, and his two women servants, and his eleven sons, and passed over the ford Jabbok. And he took them, and sent them over the brook, and sent over all that he had. And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name? And he blessed him there. - Genesis 32

But my thoughts of 'what if' led to the idea of filling in the gaps in the story, making the wrestling a metaphor for something far more sexual. The result was Jacob and the Angel - a nocturne for choir and orchestra, which was premiered in June 1999 by my own choir, FifteenB, conducted by Paul Ayres with the Camerata Santa Dorotea.

The work is in five movements, the first and the last - Nocturne and Envoi - use my own text based on the Genesis story. The second movement, Ludus has a wrestling scene very much inspired by the one in D. H. Lawrence's Women in Love, and following this are two movements setting lines from the Song of Songs - Aubade and Love Song. In both these latter, my selection of text deliberately focused on the more homo-erotic lines from the Song of Songs, and there are some remarkably spicy ones!

Following the premiere the piece rather lay fallow, a work I intended to come back to but never did. Then early this year, we were discussing the programme for London Concord Singers' 60th anniversary celebrations. My music has been a feature of the choir's programmes for a number of years, with the 50th anniversary and 40th anniversary programmes both including a premiere of one of my pieces. The choir's conductor, Gerard Lim, asked if I had any settings of the Song of Songs. 

This was one of those moments when the gap between thought and deed was quite small. The two movements from Jacob and the Angel happen to be my only settings of the Song of Songs and the string accompaniment transferred to organ with relative ease. The resulting work, Aubade and Love Song is something more than a simple transcription. Decisions needed to be made about voicing and more, and then I decided to use material from the rest of the cantata to link the two original movements together.

The new/old work, Aubade and Love Song will be premiered at St Giles Cripplegate on Friday 10 July 2026 by London Concord Singers, conductor Gerard Lim, organist Hilary Punnett as part of a programme that includes Arvo Pärt's Berliner Messe, Jonathan Dove's Seek Him That Maketh The Seven Stars, and music by Pierre Villette, Britten, Finzi, and Dowland.

Full details from TicketSource.

 

 

Gutsy & vivid: Verdi's La traviata at St Paul's Opera imaginatively reinvents the work as parable of punk London

Verdi: La traviata - Christian Joel, Isobel Hughes, Ted Day - St Paul's Opera (Photo: Julian Guidera)

Verdi: La traviata; Lizzie Ryder, Christian Joel, Owain Gwynfryn, director: Edwina Strobl, music director: Adrian Salinero, St Paul's Opera; St Paul's Church, Clapham
Reviewed 4 July 2026

A varied and vivid incarnation of Violetta's demi-monde as punk with an upfront, take-no-prisoners account of the title role from Lizzie Ryder

The problem for any production of Verdi's La traviata is not so much that we no longer have a demi-monde but that its denizens, in the modern world, have changed radically from the 1850s. Period productions generally hide this culture clash behind nice frocks and few stagings manage to evoke the outrage that surrounded the first London performance of the work in 1856. Yet changes in attitudes mean that simply moving the setting to modern day rarely works, the culture clash just is not compelling enough.

In her production of Verdi's La traviata for St Paul's Opera, director Edwina Strobl's decision to choose a punk setting for Violetta's milieu might have had a big element of budgetary necessity (punk outfits come cheaper than big frocks), but it works in terms of dramaturgy and emotional journey.

We caught the final of St Paul's Opera's performances of Verdi's La traviata at St Paul's Church in Clapham on Saturday 4 July 2026. Directed by Edwina Strobl and designed by Pin Chen with choreography by Agur Arrien, the work featured Lizzie Ryder as Violetta, Christian Joel as Alfredo, Owain Gwynfryn as Germont, Salome Siu as Flora and Rebecca Hart as Annina. Music director Adrian Salinerno directed a small instrumental ensemble.

Verdi: La traviata - Christian Joel, Ted Day, Lizzie Ryder, Salome Siu - St Paul's Opera (Photo: Julian Guidera)

Designer Pin Chen's abstract set did admirable duty for all the opera's locations and having Violetta's bed raised up towards the rear of the stage in the final scene worked well. The set also successfully disguised the fact that we weren't actually in a theatre but a church. The costumes for the punks - effectively everyone but Alfredo (Christian Joel) and Germont (Owain Gwynfryn) - were varied and vividly imaginative with two or three having direct reference to Vivienne Westwood (later a Clapham resident), Malcolm McLaren and their circle.

The production set the action within the context of Violetta's funeral during the prelude, and throughout the opera Strobl's production used a great deal of the space including the church's Angelus bell.

The colour of love: a film of Augusta Holmès's Au bois dormant celebrates lovers in Soho

Irish-French composer Augusta Holmès's Au bois dormant from Paysages d’Amour is an uplifting song, full of joys the love-drunk lovers, and was recorded by tenor Thomas Elwin and pianist Lana Bode on the 2025 album le vase brisé [see my review]. Here the song forms the soundtrack to a lovely new film, released for Pride, which celebrates a pair of lovers, Ru Charlesworth and Michael Magennis, wandering around Soho, the colour of love gradually emerging in the film.

See on YouTube. 

Carmen to the fore

Bizet's perennially popular opera Carmen, a work capable of multiple reinventions, is popping up in two UK regional productions. Northern Ireland Opera has announced cast and creatives for its first-ever production of Carmen which debuts at Belfast's Grand Opera House on 12 September 2026. Before then, Devon Opera present Carmen at the Northcott Theatre in Exeter on 24 July.

Northern Ireland Opera's production of Carmen is directed by the company's artistic director, Cameron Menzies [read my 2023 interview with him], with Greg Arrowsmith as musical director (he was the musical director for the company's production of Sondheim's Follies last year). The production is very much a reinvention with Arrowsmith creating arrangements for an on-stage instrumental quintet who will perform in partnership with the orchestra in the pit.

Don Jose and Carmen are played by American guests, Noah Stewart who is no stranger to these shores and Ruby Dibble, Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition national finalist. Local talent includes soprano Mary McCabe as Micaëla, mezzo-soprano Jenny Bourke as Mercédès and soprano Petra Wells as Frasquita.

Further details from the Grand Opera House website. 

Founded as New Devon Opera in 2004 with an amateur chorus, Devon Opera now produces full professional performances in the original language. The company's production of Carmen is directed by Anna Gregory, with Pavel Timofeyeski as music director. Don Jose and Carmen are played by Matthew Curtis and Emma Roberts. Curtis was Lensky in HGO's recent production of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin, and Roberts was awarded the 2nd prize for Bampton 2025 Young Singers Competition.

Further details from Devon Opera's website. 

 

Saxophones in the City: saxophonist Jess Gillam invites saxophonists & clarinettists to come & play for massed event as part of CBSO in the City festival

CBSO at New Street Station as part of CBSO in the City, 2024 (Photo: Hannah Fathers)

As part of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO)’s 2026 CBSO in the City festival (27 to 31 August), CBSO Collaborative Artist Jess Gillam is inviting the next generation of Birmingham’s musical talent to ‘come and play’ as part of a new initiative.

Birmingham-based saxophonists and clarinettists will have the chance to rehearse and perform with Jess Gillam. She will lead amateur musicians in a rehearsal session on Saturday 29 August, before performing with the massed saxophone and clarinet ensemble in the city-centre’s vibrant waterside gathering spot, Brindleyplace.

Keen musicians of all ages are invited to sign up on the CBSO website before midday on 20 July. Rehearsal sessions will take place on the morning of Saturday 29 August at the CBSO Centre, while the performance will take place that afternoon in Brindleyplace. 

The CBSO’s annual Birmingham-wide CBSO in the City festival returns for 2026 with five days of free music running from Thursday 27 to Monday 31 August across the summer bank holiday weekend. The 2026 programme will present performances from full orchestral spectacles to duos, quartets and free family concerts. 

Giulio Cesare at the Grange: superb music performances compensate for David Alden's scattershot approach to Handel's masterpiece

Handel: Giulio Cesare - Zheng Jiang, Owen Willetts, Jess Dandy - The Grange Festival (Photo: Richard Hubert Smith)

Handel: Giulio Cesare in Egitto; Tim Mead, Sarah Brady, Jess Dandy, Zheng Jiang, James Atkinson, director: David Alder, Early Opera Company, conductor Christian Curnyn; The Grange Festival
Reviewed 25 June 2026

Superbly satisfying musical performances all round from a cast who enter with a will into director David Alden's eclectic vision, clearly responding to his approach no matter how scattershot the ideas. 

When watching modern productions of Handel's Giulio Cesare it is easy to get a bit blazé. But it is worth remembering quite how far we have come. New York City Opera's ground-breaking production of the work with Beverly Sills dazzling as Cleopatra and a bass Cesare (Norman Treigle), came in 1966, the first uncut performance (in modern times) with voices at the correct pitch was at the Barber Institute in Birmingham in 1972, then English National Opera's production directed by John Copley, conducted by Charles Mackerras with Janet Baker and Valerie Masterson came in 1978. This was cut, but sympathetically, and Copley's production was rather stately yet it demonstrated that this type of opera belonged in the modern opera house. By 2005, at Glyndebourne, David McVicar's production had the confidence to reinvent the work without doing it violence and we now had period instruments in the pit.

Veteran director David Alden's career has paralleled much of this timeline. He began directing at Opera Omaha in the 1970s and his first European production was Verdi's Rigoletto for Scottish Opera in the late 1970s (and yes, I was there). He became famous (infamous) for his productions at ENO during the powerhouse era and I remember his production of Handel's Ariodante as being a powerful example of the way modern theatre direction could be brought to Handel.

Alden's enthusiasm for Handel seems undimmed and the Grange Festival invited him to direct a new production of Handel's Giulio Cesare at this year's festival. It turns out to be the first time Alden has directed by work. We caught the final performance on 25 June 2026. Christian Curnyn conducted the Early Opera Company with Tim Mead as Giulio Cesare, Sarah Brady as Cleopatra, Hugh Cutting as Tolomeo, Jess Dandy as Cornelia, Zheng Jiang as Sesto, James Atkinson as Achilla, Owen Willetts as Nireno, and Tristan Hambleton as Curio. Designs were by Jon Morrell, movement by Tim Claydon and lighting by Matthew Richardson. There was no chorus (the choral numbers were sung by the ensemble), but there was a movement group of five. Continuo was provided by Oliver John Ruthven (harpsichord), Eligio Quinteiro (theorbo) and Andrew Skidmore (cello).

Giulio Cesare is a long opera. When English Touring Opera performed it uncut in 2017 they spread it over two evenings (a brave experiment, see my review). At the Grange it was performed cut (of course) with one interval, mid-way through Act Two.

Alden and Morrell's approach to the work seems to have involved a lot of free association. Egypt, right? So Nireno (Owen Willetts) was a mummy, there were lots of Ancient Egyptian symbols, Tolomeo's (Hugh Cutting) garden was full of oppressive plants and dangerous animals (including snakes). When, at the end of Act Two, Sarah Brady's Cleopatra says she's dying (a metaphorical turn of phrase), the jackal-headed god appeared to row her to the underworld, and elsewhere in the opera she had a fascination with asps! Costumes were similarly eclectic with different frames of reference. Curio (Owen Willetts) was a real Roman centurion, but Cesare (Tim Mead) seemed stuck in the mid-20th century, whilst Sesto (Zheng Jiang) was a schoolboy who when girding himself for action, dressed as an American footballer!

The whole approach felt a bit scattershot, and rather reminded me of the worst of 1980s and 1990s opera direction. Some scenes were (deliberately) funny such as the musical chairs during Tolomeo and Cesare's first meeting. Other moments were found funny by the audience but I was unclear whether Alden intended this. The result was busy, with the stage nearly always full of colour and movement. The hardworking movement group were constantly used. Some decisions were clearly practical: the opening scenes of Act Three were played in front of the curtain because the set for Cesare's emergence from the sea was complex. Yet, given the curtain, Alden could not resist a series of gags with singers crawling under it and failing to find the split in the curtains. Not for the first time, I felt that non-English directors should be given a crash course in English humorous references (curtain gags are pure Morecambe & Wise).

Handel: Giulio Cesare - Hugh Cutting, Sarah Brady - The Grange Festival (Photo: Richard Hubert Smith)