What lies beneath: a brilliant reinvention of Judith Weir's Blond Eckbert at the heart of ETO's exploration of German Romanticism

Judith Weir: Blond Eckbert - English Touring Opera

Do not take my story for a fairytale, Judith Weir: Blond Eckbert; Abigail Kelly, Amy J Payne, Matthew McKinney, Mark Nathan, Aoife Miskelly, Flor McIntosh, William Morgan, Alex Otterburn, conductor: Gerry Cornelius, director: Robin Norton Hall; English Touring Opera at Hackney Empire
Reviewed 5 October 2024

A brilliant reinvention of Judith Weir's opera places a modern interpretation of German Romanticism at the centre of this intriguing and thought-provoking programme, full of terrific performances all round

The reworking, reinterpretation and repurposing of folk tales is at the centre of English Touring Opera's Autumn season. Things opened last week at the Hackney Empire with Rimsky Korsakov's The Snow Maiden (which we will be covering in a few weeks' time), alongside a new opera by Joanna Marie Skillett and Tatty Hennessy, The Wellies based on a Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale. The Wellies is a highly participatory, sensory and interactive piece for audiences with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and early years audiences and is touring to special schools, libraries and studio theatres.

The final element in the tour opened at Hackney Empire on Saturday 5 October 2024, a double bill which paired a new pasticcio, Do not take my story for a fairytale performed by Abigail Kelly, Amy J Payne, Matthew McKinney and Mark Nathan, with Judith Weir's Blond Eckbert performed by Aoife Miskelly, Flora McIntoch, Will Morgan and Alex Otterburn. The conductor was Gerry Cornelius and the director was Robin Norton-Hale with designs by Eleanor Bull. Both works took early German romanticism as their starting point, with the pasticcio using the music and words of early German romanticism with its folk-influences, and Judith Weir's opera being based on a story by Ludwig Tieck, one of the founders of German romanticism.

Judith Weir: Blond Eckbert - English Touring Opera

A glorious noise: from one to eight choirs in I Fagiolini's evening of music from 17th-century Venice and Rome

I Fagiolini during recording sessions for the Benevoli project

From Venice (to Rome) with Love - Benevoli: Missa Benevola, Monteverdi motets, Carissimi: Jephte; I Fagiolini, the Choral Scholars of St Martin-in-the-Fields, The Lyons Mouth, Robert Hollingworth; Church of St Martin-in-the-Fields
Reviewed 4 October 2024

An evening of glorious musico-spatial magic as I Fagiolini revive a rare 17th-century mass for four choirs written for St Peter's Basilica in Rome

In July 2000, I sang in a performance of Orazio Benevoli's Missa Tu es Petrus, a mass for four choirs based on Palestrina's motet Tu es Petrus. Benevoli, a 17th century Roman composer, was a name that was knew to me and the mass was an astonishing experience. Since then, Benevoli's music has remained somewhat obscure, but in 2023, Robert Hollingworth and I Fagiolini started a project exploring Benevoli's multi-choir works. Their first disc, released last year on Coro, featured the Missa Tu es Petrus and now they have returned to the composer with his Missa Benevola, also on Coro.

On Friday 4 October 2024, Robert Hollingworth and I Fagiolini brought Benevoli's Missa Benevola (Missa Maria Prodigio Celeste) to the Church of St Martin-in-the-Fields in their programme From Venice (to Rome) with Love. The programme featured Benevoli's mass performed by I Fagiolini, the Choral Scholars of St Martin-in-the-Fields and The Lyons Mouth interspersed with smaller scale motets by Monteverdi and completed by a performance of the Historia di Jephte by Benevoli's almost exact Roman contemporary, Giacomo Carissini. Continuo was provided by Catherine Pierron (organ), Aileen Henry (harp) and Eligio Quinteiro (chittarone).

17th century Rome responded to the elephantiasis happening to the church buildings by expanding choral forces for grand occasions. This expansion however, did not involve the sort of mammoth choirs that we have come to expect, following late 18th-century and 19th-century practice in Bach and Handel. Instead, the number of parts was increased, music for three choirs and music for four choirs, and the number of choirs might increase further so that a mass for four choirs would be performed by eight choirs dotted around St Peter's Basilica. Each with their own conductor and organist, the result must have been glorious and, sometimes, a complete mess.

After the humans are gone, the instruments still sing and it is important to listen - Jake Heggie on his song cycle, Intonations: Songs from the Violins of Hope

Jake Heggie (Photo: James Niebuhr)

Jake Heggie's song cycle for soprano, violin and string quartet, Intonations: Songs from the Violins of Hope is receiving its UK premiere at violinist Madeleine Mitchell's The Red Violin Festival which takes place in Leeds from 14 to 19 October 2024, where Intonations will be performed by mezzo-soprano Siân Griffiths, violinists Chloe Hanslip and Hong Chow, with Madeleine Mitchell leading the London Chamber Ensemble. I recently chatted to Jake to find out more about the work's inspiration in The Violins of Hopeproject and how the work links to a group of other works inspired by stories arising from the Holocaust.

Intonations was commissioned by Music at Kohl Mansion, a performing arts series South of San Francisco. He explains how he was originally contacted in 2017 by Patricia Moy, artistic director of the performing arts series, as she was arranging to bring The Violins of Hope to the West Coast of America for the first time. She wanted a new work featuring the violins themselves.

The Violins of Hope project presents instruments that were owned by Jewish musicians before and during the Holocaust, representing strength and optimism for the future during mankind’s darkest hour. They have been refurbished by luthiers Amnon and Avshalom Weinstein, founders of The Violins of Hope. Until Patricia Moy contacted him, Jake had never heard of The Violins of Hope before and found it an astounding story. The question was, how to write a piece that featured the instruments and shared their resonance. The request had been for a chamber work, but Jake felt he does song and story-telling best. He asked whether he could write a song cycle and he approached Gene Scheer, who has written the texts for several works for Jake including the opera Moby Dick.

Innate theatricality: composer Adrian Sutton definitively moves out of the theatre with a challenging yet engaging concerto for violinist Fenella Humphreys

Adrian Sutton: Violin Concerto, Short Story, A Fist Full of Fives, Five Theatre Miniatures, War Horse Suite; Fenella Humphreys, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Michael Seal; Chandos
Reviewed 2 October 2024

Best known for his music for the stage, Adrian Sutton turns to pure music with an imaginative response to the image of seagulls flying alongside a repurposing of theatrical cues to create an engaging satisfying and thoughtful disc

Composer Adrian Sutton is perhaps best known for his music for War Horse, the stage adaptation of Michael Morpurgo's story though his output is far wider than that, crossing over to concert music. This latest release from Chandos features Michael Seal conducting the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra in a programme of Sutton's music. War Horse is there, but the focus remains firmly on concert music and the centrepiece is the large-scale Concerto for Violin and Orchestra with violinist Fenella Humphreys, alongside a selection of shorter pieces, Short Story, A Fist Full of Fives, and Five Theatre Miniatures, plus the War Horse Suite.

When Sutton was asked to write a work as a response to RVW's The Lark Ascending, his imagination turned to the images of the flight of seagulls, whilst Richard Bach's Jonathan Livingston Seagull found its way there as well. The resulting concerto is a long work, some 25 minutes in three movements which are intended to play as one long journey, Thermals, Far Cliffs and Life Force.

Masters of Wit

Composer and pianist Louis Mander, fresh from the premiere of his opera The Waves (inspired by Virginia Woolf's novel) at the Oslo Opera Festival, is joining forces with narrator Zeb Soanes and tenor Will Diggle for an evening celebrating music and wit in the parlour. 

Masters of Wit at St Peter's Church, Belsize Park on 11 October 2024 will feature songs by Arthur Sullivan, Cole Porter and Noel Coward, along with other gems, plus wit and wisdom from Noel Coward, Oscar Wilde and a host of others including aphorisms, diary entries and anecdotes.

Zeb Soanes is perhaps best known for reading The Shipping Forecast on BBC Radio, but he regularly presents on Classic FM and has created a series of graphic stories with James Mayhew about Gaspard the Fox, inspired by a London urban fox.

Will Diggle played Neville in the premiere of Louis Mander's The Waves, and in 2023 Florence caught him in the premiere of Edward Lambert's The Masque of Vengeance [see Florence's review]. In 2022, Louis Mander's musical Peter Pan, with book and lyrics by Pam Ayres, premiered at the Stroud Arts Festival with a narration by Zeb Soanes.

Full details from Zeb Soane's website.

Eternity In An Hour: Keval Shah and Jess Dandy on their unique reimagining of the Bhagavad Gita

ETERNITY IN AN HOUR - Jess Dandy and Keval Shah by Clare Park

On Tuesday 15 October at Oxford International Song Festival, contralto Jess Dandy and pianist Keval Shah will give the world premiere of Eternity In An Hour, a concert-meditation-ritual combining Western art song and Godsongs, a new set of Sanskrit songs by Indian-American composer, Reena Esmail [one of whose pieces was included in the most recent BBC Ten Pieces earlier this year, see our article].

Esmail’s songs set portions of the Bhagavad Gita, a central scripture of Hinduism and Vedantic thought. Godsongs will be interspersed with works from the western song canon, all linked with connecting improvisations, creating an unbroken dialogue between European and Indian classical cultures and soundworlds, and exploring ways in which the philosophical traditions of East and West converge and diverge.

In advance of their performance, Keval Shah and Jess Dandy reflect on the process of bringing to life this unique concert experience.

Here be monsters: Music in the Round presents Jonathan Dove's The Monster in the Maze

Jonathan Dove's The Monster in the Maze was commissioned and first performed in 2015 by the Berlin Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra with Sir Simon Rattle. A modern re-telling of the myth of the Minotaur (there is no Ariadne in this version) for actor, soloists, adult, youth and children's choruses and orchestra, the work was due to get its second outing at the Grange Festival in 2020 with the Grange Festival Community Chorus, however this performance was cancelled.

The Monster in the Maze will now be receiving its second UK performance in Sheffield on 1 and 2 November 2024 as part of Music in the Round's 40th anniversary celebrations. At the Crucible Theatre, people of all ages from Sheffield will be coming together with Ensemble 360, Consone Quartet, Bridge Ensemble, Sheffield Music Hub Senior Strings, Sheffield Youth Choirs featuring Junior Voices, Youth Voices & Concordia and singers from across Sheffield.

This will be a new arrangement of the opera in collaboration with Jonathan Dove and the music director, John Lyon. The original score has no upper strings, but parts have been created so that the whole of Sheffield Senior Strings can take part, making it a world premiere of this arrangement.

This opera is just one aspect of Music in the Round’s Learning & Participation programme, which engages over 10,000 people around the country each year. It presents storybook concerts for young people aged 3-7, Close Up concerts for 7 to 11-year-olds and ‘Relaxed’ concerts, which are adapted to suit people who may prefer a more relaxed environment when attending an event. Another project is ‘Bridge’, which supports young musicians from backgrounds under-represented in chamber and classical music as they embark on their professional careers. This has recently focused on string players, and the current group is a wind quintet that will perform in The Monster in the Maze.

Full details from the Music in the Round website.

A focus on the flute: London Handel Players in a group of cantatas Bach wrote in 1724 with virtuoso flute parts

Pierre-Gabriel Buffardin
Principal flautist in the Hofkappelle in Dresden

Bach: Cantatas BWV94, BWV114, BWV8, Buffardin: Flute Concerto in E minor; Hilary Cronin, Clint van der Linde, Charles Daniels, Edward Grint, Rachel Brown, London Handel Players, Adrian Butterfield; Wigmore Hall
Reviewed 1 October 2024

Focusing on a group of cantatas Bach wrote with virtuoso flute parts, London Handel Players craft an esoteric but fascinating programme

When Bach arrived in Leipzig in 1723 he embarked on an ambitious cycle of weekly cantatas for the church's year, each geared to that day's readings. Whilst he did use flutes, he did not make significant use of the transverse flute but from mid-August to mid-November 1724 he produced a weekly cantata that included a significant, challenging flute part. We don't know who the flautist was, but clearly Bach had access to a player of some considerable talent and commentators speculate that one of the flautists from the Dresden court must have travelled to Leipzig and the most likely candidate is the French flautist, Pierre-Gabriel Buffardin.

This is the background to London Handel Players' slightly esoteric but fascinating programme at Wigmore Hall on Tuesday 1 October 2024. Directed from the violin by Adrian Butterfield and featuring flautist Rachel Brown, the ensemble performed three of Bach's cantatas from this period, Was frag ich nach der Welt BWV94, Ach, lieben Christen, seid getrost BWV114 and Liebster Gott, wenn werd ich sterben BWV8 plus Buffardin's Flute Concerto in E minor, one of his few surviving works. The soloists were soprano Hilary Cronin, alto Clint van der Linde, tenor Charles Daniels and bass Edward Grint.

The result was a programme that shed an intriguing light on a particular period of Bach's life, though the focus on a particular part of the church's year meant that we had three rather intense cantatas on weighty subjects. And these are substantial pieces, the first half of the concert, which included BWV94 and BWV114 lasted around an hour. 

Celebrating a long partnership: Brighton Festival Chorus joins the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for an all-Mozart programme at Cadogan Hall

Brighton Festival Chorus (BFC) was founded in 1968 and for that first performance they sang Walton's Belshazzar's Feast with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. BFC has gone on to have a long partnership with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) and the two will be performing together at Cadogan Hall on 20 October 2024 during Cadogan Hall's celebrations for its own 20th anniversary. The programme is an all-Mozart one with conductor James Morgan.

Katherine Lacy, principal clarinet with the RPO will be performing Mozart's Clarinet Concerto, and Brighton Youth Choir will perform Mozart's Ave Verum Corpus, with the Requiem concluding the programme.

BFC's recent performances have included Vaughan Williams's A Sea Symphony and Dona Nobis Pacem for the Brighton Festival in 2022 and 2023 with the Philharmonia Orchestra and Britten Sinfonia respectively, a gala with the BBC Concert Orchestra celebrating the work of Raymond Gubbay in the Royal Albert Hall, Bach's St. Matthew Passion with the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra in Brighton Dome in February 2023. Highlights of 2024 include the UK premiere of Arnesen’s The Stranger at the 2024 Brighton Festival. 

Full details from the BFC website.

Ever adventurous: Gothic Opera plans the UK stage premiere of Donizetti's Maria de Rudenz at Battersea Arts Centre on Halloween

Having given the UK premiere of Gounod's opera La nonne sanglante in 2021, Gothic Opera are planning the UK stage premiere of another 19th century opera inspired by Matthew Gregory Lewis' gothic novel, The Monk. 

At Halloween, Gothic Opera is presenting Donizetti's Maria de Rudenz at Battersea Arts Centre. The production, a collaboration between Gothic Opera and Battersea Arts Centre, will be conducted by Anna Castro Grinstein and directed by Lysanne van Overbeek with a new chamber orchestration by composer Leon Haxby.

Anna Castro Grinstein is a Britten Pears Young Artist and she made her debut at Opera Holland Park this Summer as conductor of the young artists performance of Rossini's The Barber of Seville. Lysanne van Overbeek directed Will Todd's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with IF Opera in 2023 [see my review] in a production celebrating the work's 10th anniversary. Leon Haxby's chamber reduction of Bartok's Duke Bluebeard's Castle was used Gothic Opera's radical new version which premiered in 2021 [see my review]. We caught Gothic Opera at the Grimeborn Festival this year when they revived their debut production of Marschner's Der Vampyr [see my review]

Described as a dramma tragico, Maria de Rudenz premiered in Venice in 1838 and was described by Donizetti as 'a fiasco', and further performances of the opera in Rome were unsuccessful, but performances with superior casts led to the opera being more successful. It was presented in concert in the UK by Opera Rara (and recorded) in 1974 but has never been staged here.

Maria de Rudenz came at a time of transition for Donizetti, between the premiere of Roberto Devereux in Venice and the failure to bring Poliuto to the stage in Naples because of censorship problems. Poliuto would be radically reworked as Les Martyrs for the Paris Opera, and from henceforth Donizetti's focus was on performances in Paris.

Full details from Gothic Opera's website.

10 emerging groups & 17 established ensembles awarded £100,000 in the Continuo Foundation's eighth round of grants

Chelys Consort of Viols, one of 27 groups awarded grants
in the Continuo Foundation's eighth round

The Continuo Foundation has just announced its eighth round of grants, with £100,000 going to 27 early music ensembles to enable them to pursue ambitious concert and recording projects, with audience growth and community building at their heart. This brings the amount provided by Continuo Foundation for historical performance projects covering 900 years of history, and played on period instruments, to a total of £850,000.

As a result of the latest round of grants, ten emerging groups formed since 2020 and 17 established ensembles will perform in 48 different locations, ranging from Cornwall and the Scilly Isles, Hastings and Helensburgh to Belfast and Presteigne, East Anglia to South Devon. Their programmes, whether concert, audio recording or film projects, offer a vibrant perspective on the UK’s infinitely varied, world-class historical performance sector. The broad geographical reach of the funded projects is matched by the list of venues, ranging from purpose-built concert halls to art galleries, churches, community colleges and cafés. 

The Grant Round Eight award recipients are - Apollo's Cabinet - Azur Ensemble - Baroque in the North - Bloomsbury Players - The Brook Street Band - Ceruleo - Chelys Consort of Viols - Concert Trombone Quartette - Dialogue Viols -Ensemble Augelletti - Ensemble Molière - Ex Cathedra - Fiori Musicali - Florilegium - Istante Collective - Le Foyer des Artistes - Liturina - Londinium Consort - London Obbligato Collective - Lowe Ensemble - Lux Musicae London -Manchester Baroque - Players of the Hampstead Collective -Saraband - Sestina Music - Sounds Historical - Spiritato. Full details from the Continuo Foundation's website.

Performances associated with these projects can be found through the Continuo Connect website. This digital platform opens access to a fascinating world of music through comprehensive event listings, festivals guide, artist profiles, articles and playlists.

A special treat: strong individual performances & superb ensemble in WNO's revival of Puccini's Il trittico

Puccini: Il tabarro - Yvonne Howard, Natalya Romaniw - Welsh National Opera (Photo: Craig Fuller)

Puccini: Il trittico, Dario Solari, Natalya Romaniw, Andrés Presno, Anne Mason, Haegee Lee, Trystan Llŷr Griffiths, director David McVicar/Greg Eldridge, conductor Alexander Joel; Welsh National Opera at Wales Millennium Centre
Reviewed 29 September 2024

Partially re-cast, WNO's latest revival of David McVicar's fine production reveals a strong ensemble of singing actors with compelling performances including Natalya Romaniw on top form

David McVicar's production of Puccini's Il Trittico debuted at Scottish Opera last year and was revived by Welsh National Opera (WNO) earlier this year, associate director Greg Eldridge. The production returned to Wales Millennium Centre on Sunday 29 Septemer, conducted by Alexander Joel with significant cast changes from WNO's earlier outing. Newcomers included Natalya Romaniw as Giorgetta and Suor Angelica, Dario Solari as Michele and Gianni Schicchi, Andrés Presno as Luigi, Anne Mason as the Princess and Zita, with Haegee Lee as Sister Genovietta and Lauretta and Trystan Llŷr Griffiths as Rinuccio.

The production remains a remarkable achievement, particularly given the problems besetting the company with leaflets being distributed outside the Millennium Centre by Equity in support of the WNO orchestra and chorus, and the chorus taking their final bow (after Suor Angelica) in support WNO t-shirts.

McVicar and designers Charles Edwards and Hannah Clark set the operas in the mid-20th century, creating similar solutions to the opera's challenges as Richard Jones did in his 2011 production for Covent Garden [see my review of the 2016 revival]

Puccini: Il tabarro - Dario Solare, Andrés Presno - Welsh National Opera (Photo: Craig Fuller)

Embodied sound: Zubin Kanga on his innovative approach to new technology through his interdisciplinary musical programmes

Alexander Schubert: Steady State - world premiere 7 May 2024 - Zubin Kanga at National Concert Hall, Dublin
(Photo: Roisin Murphy O'Sullivan)

Pianist, composer and technologist Zubin Kanga is known for both his championing of contemporary music as well as his innovative interdisciplinary musical programmes, exploring what it means to be a performer through interaction with new technologies. Zubin has a busy Autumn lined up with four world premières by Laurence Osborn, Alex Groves, Alex Ho and Claudia Molitor, plus a performance of Steady State, a ground-breaking work by Alexander Schubert which expands Zubin's use of new technologies.

Zubin Kanga (Photo: Raphael Neal)

On 10 October Zubin will premiere Laurence Osborn's piano concerto, Schiller's Piano with the Manchester Collective in a programme entitled Fever Dreams at the Royal Northern College of Music, repeating the programme at the Southbank Centre on 12 October. Osborn's work calls for Zubin to play both the piano and a keyboard controlling samples. These samples are all sounds that Osborn recorded in the Southbank Centre's piano workshop where the centre's pianos are restored and looked after. Thus Osborn has captured the sound of different components being restored, along with visceral sounds from the inside of the piano.

The work is inspired by Osborn seeing a replica of Schiller’s piano. In 1942 the furniture in Friedrich Schiller's house in Weimar was replaced by replicas, with the originals stored underground. The replicas were made by prisoners in Buchenwald, and when it came to the piano they copied the outside only, it was unable to play music. This replica piano is now at Buchenwald, and in writing Schiller's Piano, Osborn has responded to fascism’s empty attempts to recreate the past. Osborn came to Zubin with the concept for the piece and the two were in frequent contact as Osborn was writing it. Zubin describes Osborn as writing virtuosic piano music, so there were practical considerations related both to the physicality of playing two keyboards and the timing of the sounds from the different sound worlds. There were plenty of technical intricacies and they spent six months working on the piece, and when I chatted to Zubin they were still working on details.

This type of collaboration with the composer is what Zubin always does with a new work. He likes collaborating and feels that it is good for the performer to be part of the creation process and in fact, wrote his PhD on the topic! When working with new technology this becomes even more important, especially as they might need to get advice about the technology itself.

Compelling performances: Stephen Hough, YL Male Voice Choir, Santtu-Matias Rouvali and the Philharmonia launch Nordic Soundscapes

Akseli Gallen-Kallela: Kullervo Sets Off for War
(Mural, 1901, in the Old Student House, Helsinki University)

Sigfúsdóttir: Oceans, Grieg: Piano Concerto; Sibelius: Kullervo; Stephen Hough, Johanna Rusanen, Tommi Hakala, Ylioppilaskunnan Laulajat (YL) Male Voice Choir, Philharmonia, Santtu-Matias Rouvali; Royal Festival Hall
Reviewed 26 September 2024

A contemporary composer spanning orchestral and post-rock, and two 19th century composers balancing Nationalism and the Germanic symphonic tradition. A fascinating start to Nordic Soundscapes

Sibelius' Kullervo remains an intriguing, sprawling and sometimes mesmerising work whose importance is immense. It premiered in 1892, only the second large-scale symphonic work to come out of Finland and an important way-marker in the country's musical history and journey to political independence. But the work does not occupy a place on concert platforms as often as it might.

On Thursday 26 September 2024, Santtu-Matias Rouvali and the Philharmonia opened their 2024/25 season at the Royal Festival Hall with the first concert in their Nordic Soundscapes season, performing María Huld Markan Sigfúsdóttir's Oceans, Edvard Grieg's Piano Concerto with soloist Stephen Hough and Jean Sibelius' Kullervo with soprano Johanna Rusanen, baritone Tommi Hakala and Ylioppilaskunnan Laulajat (YL) Male Voice Choir.

Sibelius: Kullervo - Johanna Rusanen, Tommi Hakala, Ylioppilaskunnan Laulajat Male Voice Choir, Philharmonia, Santtu-Matias Rouvali - Royal Festival Hall (Photo: Philharmonia/Mark Allan)

It was a long concert, Kullervo lacks the concision of Sibelius' later symphonic utterances, the young Sibelius had been listening to a bit too much Bruckner in Vienna. There was a sneaking suspicion that, perhaps, we did not quite need another performance of Grieg's eternal piano concerto, but then that was to countered by the remarkable charisma that soloist Stephen Hough.

Investing in the magic of Purcell's music: The Fairy Queen from The Sixteen at Cadogan Hall

Dorset Garden Theatre in 1673 where Purcell's The Fairy Queen premiered

Purcell: The Fairy Queen; Antonia Christophers, Matthew Brook, Robin Blaze, Katy Hill, Alexandra Kidgell, Charlotte Mobbs, Mark Dobell, Oscar Golden Lee,, Ben Davies, The Sixteen, Harry Christophers; Cadogan Hall
Reviewed 25 September 2024

Focusing on the music, a stylish and engaging performance that drew us into Purcell's magical world, aided by a delightful narration

After the performance of Purcell's The Fairy Queen with Les Arts Florissants and Mourad Merzouki's Companie Käfig at the BBC Proms [see my review] where Purcell's music seemed to take second place to the virtuosic hip-hop-inspired dance, it was a pleasure to reencounter the work in an entirely different and more sympathetic musical context.

On Wednesday 25 September 2024, Harry Christophers and The Sixteen presented Purcell's The Fairy Queen at Cadogan Hall as part of Choral at Cadogan 2024. The soloists consisted of two visitors, countertenor Robin Blaze and baritone Matthew Brook, along with six members of the choir sopranos Katy Hill, Alexandra Kidgell, and Charlotte Mobbs, tenors Mark Dobell and Oscar Golden Lee, and baritone Ben Davies. The whole was drawn together using a narration by Jeremy Sams, performed by the actor Antonia Christophers, who is co-founder and co-artistic director of the theatre company, Box Tale Soup.

We had an orchestra of 21 and a choir of 18 (including those singing solo roles), so this was a generously proportioned performance. The choir remained stationery and for much of the 'action' the soloists simply stepped forward and retreated, but some episodes, notably the Drunken Poet (Matthew Brook with Charlotte Mobbs and Katy Hill), and Coridon and Mopsa (Matthew Brook and Robin Blaze), were more dramatised. What drew everything together was the delightful narrative. Antonia Christophers (who has in fact played Titania in the play) presented a slightly amused narrator cum Titania who repeatedly broke the fourth wall to mix descriptions of what should have been on stage with lamentations about the present lack of scenery, staging and actors. The result could have been horribly arch, but despite some rather false-sounding amplification, Antonia Christophers made the whole extremely engaging and helped to bind the disparate elements together.

Leonardo dreams of flying machines & Harriet Quimby flies across the English Channel: Dominic Ellis-Peckham & London Oriana Choir launch their 2024/25 season

London Oriana Choir and Dominic Ellis-Peckham

London Oriana Choir, musical director Dominic Ellis-Peckham, celebrated its 50th anniversary last season, and they are continuing the excitement with a 2024/25 season full of good things. The season opens on 18 October at St Paul's Church, Covent Garden with Take Flight, a programme celebrating the night sky with Cecilia McDowall's Night Flight (with cellist Gabriella Swallow) and Eric Whitacre's Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine plus music by Bob Chilcott, Ben Parry and many more. 

Cecilia McDowall's Night Flight was written in 2014 to mark the centenary of Harriet Quimby's pioneering flight across the English channel, setting texts by Sheila Bryer on the mysterious powers of the sea, earth, and air. It won the 2014 British Composer Award in the Choral category. Written in 2001, Eric Whitacre's Leonardo Dreams of His Flying Machine uses a text by Whitacre's friend and long-time collaborator Charles Anthony Silvestri which tries to imagine what it would it sound like if Leonardo Da Vinci were dreaming? 

December sees the choir in Christmas carol mode with two candlelight concerts at St James' Piccadilly with music by Sir David Willcocks, Cecilia McDowall, Errollyn Wallen and Eric Whitacre. March 2025 finds the choir performing a Baroque masterpiece, Bach's Mass in B Minor at Holy Sepulchre, Holborn Viaduct, and in May they perform a programme of motets by Brahms and Bruckner at Our Most Holy Redeemer Church, Exmouth Market, and the choir then takes this programme to Padua and Venice. A packed season ends in July 2025 when they are joined by guests Maz O’Connor, Will Lang and Niopha Keegan for Four Corners, folk stories and sounds from the four corners of the Isles at Cecil Sharp House.

Full details from the choir's website.

High-quality music-making & imaginative programming in the special natural setting of Exmoor & Dartmoor: I chat to Tamsin Waley-Cohen of the Two Moors Festival

Tamsin Waley-Cohen performing at the Two Moors Festival in 2022

Founded in 2001, the Two Moors Festival takes place each October in venues across Dartmoor and Exmoor. This year's festival runs from 3 to 13 October 2024 under the artistic direction of violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen, who took over the festival in 2020. For this year's theme, Tamsin has chosen the daily 24 hour cycle of various lights and darknesses, wakefulness and slumber that we all experience.

She explains, "I’ve chosen to explore this year’s theme from different perspectives, from the 24 hours of the day and the 24 keys of western music, to magic and dreamscapes, the bright sunlight of the baroque to the reflected moonlight of romanticism, and our connection to the Earth’s daily turn on its axis. This promises to be a Festival full of evocative experiences and storytelling from both internationally established and exciting up-and-coming artists."

The festival brings together locations in two National Parks, an area where a lot of people live but which is one of the most sparsely populated places in the UK. The festival was created by John and Penny Adie in 2001, in response to the devastation caused by foot and mouth disease. And then, of course, Tamsin took over in 2020, shortly before the COVID pandemic hit.

Tamsin describes the aims of the festival as to perform chamber music and song with top international artists in beautifully intimate venues in a special natural setting, thus bringing high quality music making to the doorstep of the people living in the National Parks. The festival also attracts visitors, people come for a weekend away from business, combining nature with music. Tamsin describes the audience as a mix of people, they have a dedicated core of local followers, many of whom travel to the various concerts, whilst the festival also encourages and welcomes visitors.

George Xiaoyuan Fu performing at the Two Moors Festival in 2021

A superb sense of community: Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana at Blackheath Halls Opera

Mascagni: Cavalleria Rusticana; Katherine Broderick, Oliver Johnston, Janis Kelly, Michel de Souza, Idunnu Münch, director: Harry Fehr, conductor: Chris Stark, Blackheath Halls Opera;  Blackheath Halls
Reviewed 24 September 2024

Professionals and non-professionals come together to create a real sense of community in a production that had real clarity to the story telling and strong performances from all concerned.

A bell rings and the villagers fill the stage with movement and song. At the heart of Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana are the villagers themselves; the whole action takes place in and around village events with the Easter Hymn as one of the centrepieces. So, the opera makes a lot of sense for a community company like Blackheath Halls Opera. For their 2024 production at Blackheath Halls, the company brought together the community performers of Blackheath Halls Chorus, Blackheath Halls Orchestra and Blackheath Halls Youth Opera Company, students for Charlton Park Academy and Greenvale School, under musical director Chris Stark and director Harry Fehr for Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana (seen 23 September 2024). Katherine Broderick was Santuzza, Oliver Johnston was Turiddu, Janis Kelly was Mamma Lucia, Michel de Souza was Alfio and Idunnu Münch was Lola. Designs were by Elliott Squire and Alice McNicholas. Students and recent graduates from Trinity Laban provided section leaders for the chorus and the orchestral brass section.

LSO Jerwood Composer+ A deep dive into the potential of the violin & bringing the Isle of Mull’s wild Atlantic rainforest to LSO St Luke's

LSO Jerwood Composer+ supports early-career composers in planning and delivering two artistic projects, with two composers selected each year for a 15-month placement. Mentored by LSO staff, they are encouraged to develop entrepreneurial skills around programming for specific audiences, planning, marketing, budgeting, fundraising and evaluation.

The 2023/24 composers were Anselm McDonnell [see my review of his recent disc, Kraina] and Rufus Isabel Elliot, and some of the fruits of their labours are going to be apparent as two LSO Jerwood Composer+ showcases at LSO St Luke's are curated by Anselm McDonnell and Rufus Isabel Elliot.

On Saturday 12 October 2024, The Expanded Violin, curated by Anselm McDonnell, features music by McDonnell, Judith Ring, Leo Chadburn, Kahlevi Aho, Catherine Lamb and Kaija Saariaho, performed by four violinists, Mira Benjamin, Larissa O’Grady, Chihiro Ono and Amalia Young. The evening is described as a deep dive into the potential of the violin, expanding and enhancing the instrument through microtonality, electronics, and the sound of multiple violins. The music includes Kalevi Aho’s soulful tribute to the young Finnish violinist Sakari Laukola, Saariaho’s Nocturne, which is an intimate tribute to Lutosławski, and the evening ends with McDonnell's new work Genesis Cradle, exploring alternative tunings through Just Intonation – intervals that are tuned to fit with the naturally occurring relationships in the harmonic series. [Further details]

On Saturday 16 November 2024, Waves Crash on Old Street, curated by Rufus Isabel Elliott, features music by David Fennessy, Christian Mason, Barbara Monk Feldman, Martin Arnold, Britta Byström, Ryoko Akama, Stuart MacRae and a premiere by Rufus Isabel Elliott. The performers are David Alberman, violin, Louise McMonagle, cello, and Mark Knoop, piano. Elliott has collaborated with artists Miek Zwamborn and Rutger Emmelkamp, based in Knockvologan, on the Isle of Mull, and the evening promises to bring the Isle of Mull’s wild Atlantic rainforest of Tireragan to LSO St Luke’s. [Further details]

Remembrance and renewal: Peter Seabourne's My Song in October

Peter Seabourne: Steps Vol 8: My Song in October, September, Just September; Karen Radcliffe, Michael Bell; Sheva Contemporary
Reviewed 20 September 2024

A step in contemporary composer Peter Seabourne's mammoth cycle of solo piano pieces, a touching act of remembrance for both composer and pianist, and a fine introduction to Seabourne's style

Peter Seabourne is a composer whose work you are, perhaps, more likely to hear on disc than in the concert hall though he has had some significant success. On disc, Sheva Contemporary have issued a remarkable sequence of Seabourne's music. The disc My Song in October features two works by Seabourne, Steps Vol 8: My Song in October performed by pianist Michael Bell, and September, Just September performed by soprano Karen Radcliffe and pianist Michael Bell.

There is a strong air of remembrance to the disc. Pianist Michael Bell is a long time collaborator and friend of Peter Seabourne and both men lost their wives in 2020. The piano cycle Steps Vol 8: My Song in October subtitled Nineteen album leaves caught by the wind features one of several in memoriam pieces Seabourne wrote, whilst the song cycle September, Just September was recorded by Michael Bell and his wife, soprano Karen Radcliffe some 20 years ago and reissued here in remastered form as something of a tribute to her.

Both audience & player go on a journey together: Latvian pianist Reinis Zariņš discusses Messiaen's Vingt Regards which he performs at the London Piano Festival

Reinis Zariņš (Photo: Andris Sprogis)

Latvian pianist Reinis Zariņš will be performing Olivier Messiaen’s Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant-Jésus, a work for which he is becoming known, at the London Piano Festival, co-Artistic Directors Charles Owen and Katya Apekisheva, at Kings Place on Sunday 6 October 2024. 

Written in 1944 and completed shortly after the liberation of Paris, the work premiered in 1945. A two-hour long, 20-movement meditation on the infancy of Jesus, Messiaen's work has a distinct wow factor and it has played a significant role in Reinis' performing life. Katya Apekisheva heard him playing it and was determined to find ways to get him to perform it again. He is delighted to be performing it at the London Piano Festival and somewhat amazed that the festival has found a way to include a recital that consists solely of one religiously flavoured piece. He understands how tricky programming is nowadays, so this result is a landmark achievement!

He first studied the work at Yale, during the Messiaen centenary when the members of his class each learned a couple of movements. He was given movements 5 and 6, two of the more difficult ones and these set him on his journey, learning the other movements and hearing other pianists performing the work, taking several years. He describes it as an absolutely genius concert piece, with its two-hour length there is nothing quite like it. Reinis feels that the thematic arrangement of the work with Messiaen's use of leitmotifs makes it rather like an instrumental opera, which is how he thinks of it, and it is this hidden narrative which contributes to the work's impact.

Word of Mouth: Nordic Music Days comes to Glasgow as the festival leaves the Nordic region for only the 3rd time in its history

Nordic Music Days was established in 1888 by the Council of Nordic Composers; curated by composers and creators, Nordic Music Days now presents almost entirely contemporary classical music and sound, featuring artists from Greenland, Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland with partnership and exchange being key to the festival’s legacy which is also focused on sustainable practice and social responsibility.

For only the third time in its history, Nordic Music Days is taking place outside the Nordic countries. From 30 October to 3 November, the festival will be taking over Glasgow, and this year's curator team includes, Tróndur Bogason (Faroe Islands), Lauri Supponen (Finland), Guoste Tamulynaite (Norway), Gillian Moore (Scotland) and Pippa Murphy (Scotland). The Festival is an initiative of the NKR (Council of Nordic Composers) which works in collaboration with the lead partner in Scotland, Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

The festival sees concerts, sound installations, talks, screenings and participatory events as well as a wide-ranging industry programme happening across the city – from Glasgow Royal Concert Hall and The Old Fruitmarket, through the Centre for Contemporary Arts and City Halls to Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum and Glasgow Film Theatre.

The theme running through the festival is Word of Mouth. It invokes something personal, informal and close: the passing on, movement and the spreading of ideas, stories, knowledge and traditions. Highlights include:

• the opening concert, Qullaq, features the Scottish Ensemble and fiddle player Aidan O’Rourke alongside musicians from Norway, Finland, and Greenland, with music by Jukka Tiensuu (Finland), Seyoung Oh (Scotland), Anna Thorvaldsdottir (Iceland), David Fennessy (Scotland), and a collaboration between Aidan O’Rourke (Scotland), Nive Nielsen, Hans-Henrik Suersaq Poulsen, and Mikè Fencer Thomsen (Greenland)
  
• the closing concert, Echoes on the Edges, paired with a programme in the Glasgow Cathedral Festival, will bring the drama and philosophy of the Faroe Islands’ Klæmintsgjógv sea cave
  concerts to St Mungo’s Cathedral. A concept pioneered by Kristian Blak
  
• a world-wide, mass-participation project phōnḗ, a new work for massed choirs by Finnish composer Tytti Arola, underlining the importance and value of communication between people and cultures
• major orchestral concerts featuring:
• BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra with An Extraordinary Voyage! including Maja S K Ratkje’s trombone concerto Considering Icarus and music by Britta Byström, Faroese composer Eli Tausen á Lava and a choral work from Hildur Guðnadóttir
  
• Scottish Chamber Orchestra with Borealis with Swedish composer Anders Hillborg’s Viola Concerto and music by Madeleine Isaksson, James MacMillan and Jay Capperauld
  
• Royal Scottish National Orchestra, conductor Thomas Søndergård in Rune Glerup’s Dark to Light, plus music by Errollyn Wallen, Aileen Sweeney, and Bent Sørensen along with new work from Lisa Robertson, where the RSNO is joined by the young musicians of Big Noise Govanhill
  
• Hebrides Ensemble performing alongside Sámi vocalist Ánnámáret and Scottish composer / performer Clare Johnston
• the Vienna-based Chaos String Quartet make their first visit to Scotland, joining soprano Stephanie Lamprea and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s principal double bass, Kai Kim, for the UK premiere of a new work from Greenland’s Arnannguaq Gerstrøm, plus music by Danish composer Sandra Boss
• RSNO’s viola player Katherine Wren founded Nordic Viola in 2016 with the goal of exploring cultural connections between Scotland and the North Atlantic region. Arctic Edgelands is a collaborative music project featuring Katherine Wren, Greenlandic composer and flautist Arnannguaq Gerstrøm and Shetland-based percussionist, composer and sound recordist Renzo Spiteri.
• Finnish composer Anna Näkkäläjärvi-Länsman’s Bálvvosbáiki (meaning place of worship) is a work in which indigenous Sámi yoik is combined with electronic music, Carelian bowed lyre, and video art. Based on the yoiks of the Sámi artist Ánnámáret, this work explores and expresses how the Sámi relationship with nature, the ancient religion of nature, and the Sámi worldview continue to manifest themselves in Sámi life today
  
• From shops to concert halls to galleries and Glasgow’s parks, Nordic Music Day pops up across the city and across lifestyles to reach audiences on their doorsteps and in their daily lives

The is alos a daily programme of industry focused discussion and presentations, rooted in the concept of sustainability – both environmental and artistic – called NordEX which, among others, will bring Scotland, the Nordics and our neighbours in Canada, Ireland and the Baltics together to look at sustainability in the music sector

Full details from the festival's website.

Celebrating Jommelli in style: Ian Page & The Mozartists with Fflur Wyn, Ambroisine Bré, Hugo Brady make a compelling case for this neglected music

Jommelli: a celebration - Fflur Wyn, Ambroisine Bré, Ian Page, The Mozartists at Wigmore Hall (Photo: Benjamin Ealovega)

Jommelli - a celebration: Fflur Wyn, Ambroisine Bré, Hugo Brady, The Mozartists, Ian Page; Wigmore Hall
Reviewed 18 September 2024

Celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jommelli's death with an evening of his fascinating and unjustly neglected music in killer performances from a trio of soloists that combined virtuoso dazzle with emotional commitment and great style

Opera composer Niccolò Jommelli died 250 years ago this year, not that you would know it looking at opera companies schedules. In a world where pre-Mozartian 18th century opera seems to start at Handel and stop at Gluck, with a brief stop at Vivaldi, exploring further is rare. Jommelli was enormously popular in his day, wrote some 80 operas and was something of a revolutionary. But since his death in 1774 he has been substantially ignored.

In 2016, Ian Page and The Mozartists revived Jommelli's opera Il Vologeso and now they followed that up with a concert exploring the composer's whole operatic output, 12 arias and duets spanning a 34 year period. At Wigmore Hall on Wednesday 18 September 2024, Ian Page conducted the Mozartists in Jommelli - a celebration, with soloists Fflur Wyn, Ambroisine Bré and Hugo Brady. 

Jommelli: a celebration - Fflur Wyn, Ian Page, The Mozartists at Wigmore Hall (Photo: Benjamin Ealovega)

Shortly before the concert, a conductor's worst nightmare happened; faced with a programme of rare and unperformed virtuoso vocal music, soprano Emily Pogorelc became ill and was unable to sing. Enter soprano Fflur Wyn who with remarkable virtuosity, killer sight-reading skills (presumably), superb aplomb, and a fabulous frock, sang the soprano solos. And don't forget that at that period, the soprano was the diva, so Wyn got to be Dido dying and Armida vowing her revenge on Rinaldo, along with much else besides.

Fire and water in the library: Siren Duo in an imaginative flute and harp recital for Temple Music

Siren Duo (Claire Wickes, flute, and Tomos Xerri, harp) in Middle Temple Library.

Debussy, Mozart, David Watkins, Astor Piazzolla, Adina Izarra, Toru Takemitsu, William Alwyn; Siren Duo (Claire Wickes, Tomos Xerri); Temple Music Foundation at Middle Temple Library
Reviewed 17 September 2024

Temple Music's first concert in the attractive 1950s neo-classical library with a wonderfully imaginative flute and harp programme based around images of fire and water

Temple Music puts regular concerts on in the grand historical spaces of Middle Temple Hall and Temple Church, but on Tuesday 17 September 2024, they presented their first concert in a smaller, more modern space, Middle Temple Library. Siren Duo (Claire Wickes, flute, and Tomos Xerri, harp) gave a chamber recital of music themed on Fire and Water (a theme perhaps not dear to the librarians' hearts) with music by Debussy, Mozart, David Watkins, Astor Piazzolla, Adina Izarra, Toru Takemitsu and William Alwyn.

The origins of Middle Temple Library are lost in the mists of time, but a new building was created in 1625, to be eventually replaced in the 1860s by a Gothic style building which was badly damaged in the Blitz. The present library was designed by Sir Edward Maufe and opened in 1958. Inside it is striking, mid-Century classical with the main library room having a mezzanine running around it. The acoustic was on the dry side, but highly sympathetic for an intimate chamber recital.

An interview with the Snow Maiden: I chat to Ffion Edwards about taking on the title role in Rimsky Korsakov's opera with English Touring Opera

Rimsky Korsakov: The Snowmaiden - rehearsals - English Touring Opera (Photo: Craig Fuller)

Rimsky Korsakov wrote some fifteen operas across his career yet if you discount performances by visiting companies, the number of his operas performed in the UK remains alarmingly low and each time one comes along it is something of an event. Having performed Rimsky Korsakov's The Golden Cockerel in 2022 [see my review], English Touring Opera (ETO) is returning to Rimsky Korsakov and presenting The Snow Maiden as part of its Autumn 2024 tour. The work is being directed by Olivia Fuchs and will be conducted by Hannah Quinn with a cast including Ffion Edwards, Hannah Sandison, Edward Hawkins, Joseph Doody and Kitty Whately. 

The production opens at the Hackney Empire on 28 September 2024 and tours to Snape Maltings, Saffron Hall, Buxton Opera House, The Hawth in Crawley, Northcott Theatre in Exeter and The Lighthouse, Poole, [further details] as part of an Autumn season that also includes Judith Weir's Blond Eckbert [see my recent interview with Aoife Miskelly who sings Bird in that production]. In a break from rehearsals, I recently chatted to Ffion Edwards, a former Young Artist at National Opera Studio, about performing the title role in The Snow Maiden.

Rimsky Korsakov's opera The Snow Maiden, which premiered in St Petersburg in 1882, remained the composer's own favourite work. Based on a play by Alexander Ostrovsky (to which Tchaikovsky wrote incidental music in 1873), the story deals with the opposition of the eternal forces of nature. It involves the interactions of mythological characters and real people, centred on the Snow Maiden who is the child of Spring Beauty and Grandfather Frost. 

The opera does not get many outings in the UK, I saw the Chelsea Opera Group performing it in 1986 and the Kirov Opera performed the work in concert at Covent Garden in 2000, more recently University College Opera presented it in 2014, then Opera North staged it in 2017 in a production directed by John Fulljames [see my review], incidentally with Aoife Miskelly in the title role.

When I chatted with Ffion recently, she was in the midst of rehearsals for the production; she was busy as her character is on stage for a lot of the time.