Youth and Experience: 2024 Purbeck International Chamber Music Festival

Founded in 2009, cellist Natalie Clein's Purbeck International Chamber Music Festival is celebrating Youth and Experience in its 2024 festival which runs from 29 August to 1 September 2024, featuring concerts set in the stunning landscapes of Dorset and the Isle of Purbeck.

Alongside artistic director and cellist, Natalie Clein, performers will include violinists Henning Kraggerud, Priya Mitchell, and Nurit Stark as well as Aoife Ní Bhriain, at home both in the classical repertoire and Irish folk music, plus pianist Einav Yarden who will also be giving a solo recital dedicated to Fathers and Children, composer and viola player Brett Dean, and cellist Tatu Kauppinen, and mezzo-soprano Lotte Betts Dean.

There will be the world premiere of Brett Dean's I Starred Last Night, I Shone, written for his daughter, Lotte Betts Dean who will be joined by a string trio including Natalie Clein. Brett Dean has also arranged Schumann's Mary Stuart Song for mezzo-soprano (Lotte Betts Dean) and string quartet. Violinist Henning Kraggerud will perform alongside his daughter Alma Kraggerud also a violinist making a name for herself, and her brothers Franz and Hector on piano and cello.  All the string players in the festival will be joining together to perform Mendelssohn's Octet/

Full details from the festival website.

More Buffy the Vampire Slayer than German Romanticism: Gothic Opera's Der Vampyr at the Grimeborn Festival

Marschner: Der Vampyr - Milena Knauß - Gothic Opera (Photo: Craig Fuller)

Marschner: Der Vampyr, in a version by Julia Mintzer & Kelly Lovelady; Giuseppe Pellingra, Milena Knauß, Jack Roberts, Amber Reeves, Conall O'Neill, Madeleine Todd, Matthew Scott Clark, Gráinne Gillis, director: Julia Mintzer, conductor: Kelly Lovelady, Gothic Opera; Grimeborn Festival at the Arcola Theatre
14 August 2024

A brave revival of the important German Romantic opera, reinvented as a Vampire romp, performed with a gusto that rather lost the subtleties of Marschner's score.

A younger contemporary of Weber, Heinrich Marschner wrote operas in the same vein of German Romanticism, with its fascination with supernatural, exploring heightened emotions and the dramatic possibilities that the orchestra and an increased used of reminiscence motifs offered. Marschner's leading male characters are often flawed individuals, Don Giovanni-like, psychologically complex and his operas had an important influence on Wagner. However, they have their limitations, these composers and their librettists were developing a new German opera and the tradition lacked the depth of experience that Italian librettists could draw on. And from a modern stand-point, heroines tend to be passive and lack any sort of agency.

Marschner's 1827 opera, Der Vampyr remains on the very fringes of the repertoire, partly because its libretto (by Marschner's brother-in-law) is ultimately based on John Polidori's 1819 short story, The Vampyre. But in English-speaking countries, productions of the opera remain rare. I am not sure when it last received a large-scale production in the UK, and its last significant outing was on TV in 1992 as a TV soap-opera! But then, this reflects the general lack of interest in pre-Wagnerian German Romantic opera, as much tends to me made of its dramaturgical limitations.

Gothic Opera was founded with a production of Marschner's Der Vampyr in 2019, and director Julia Mintzer and music director Kelly Lovelady returned to the opera, revisiting that adaptation. The production opened at Arcola Theatre's Grimeborn Festival on Wednesday 14 August 2024. Giuseppe Pellingra as Ruthven, Milena Knauß as Malwina, Jack Roberts as Aubrey, Amber Reeves as Emmy, Conall O’Neill as Davenaut, Madeleine Todd as Janthe, Matthew Scott Clark as Georg and Gráinne Gillis as Vampire Master. Designs were by Charles Ogilvie.

Marschner: Der Vampyr - Giuseppe Pellingra, Amber Reeves - Gothic Opera (Photo: Craig Fuller)

The opera was sung in German, but with new English dialogue by Julia Mintzer and the production was best understood as being after Marschner, as Mintzer and Lovelady created a rather irreverent romp inspired by more modern vampire films, the production leaned into humour rather a lot and the finale veered between schock-horror and Monty Python. Somewhere along the line, Marschner's brand of German romanticism got well and truly lost.

Past, present and future: a diverse range of music and performers to look forward to in the Autumn Season of Conway Hall's Sunday Concerts series

Simon Callaghan and the Piatti Quartet at Conway Hall in December 2022

The 2024/25 season Conway Hall's Sunday Concert series opens on 15 September 2024 when the Zoffany Ensemble returns to the hall with a programme that combines the original nonet version of Brahms' Serenade No. 1 with a chamber version of Richard Strauss' Til Eulenspiegel and the Septet by the 19th century French composer Adolphe Blanc.

The season continues with pianist Patrick Hemmerlé in a programme that moves from Bach and Beethoven, to Albeniz's Iberia, Granados' Goyescas and Spanish-inspired movements from Debussy's Préludes. Then horn player Ben Goldscheider joins the Heath Quartet for a a fascinating programme which includes horn quintets by Mozart and York Bowen, along with Eleanor Alberga's The Shining Gate of Morpheus for horn quintet. The series artistic director, pianist Simon Callaghan, joins the Brompton Quartet for a programme of Haydn, Grażyna Bacewicz and Dvorak, and there is a pre-concert recital from the Tondo Duo (Sophia Elger, saxophone, Declan Hickey, guitar). The Gildas Quartet will be mixing things up with William Alwyn and Jessie Montgomery alongside Haydn  and Debussy.

As part of the Bloomsbury Festival, Darragh Morgan (violin) and Mary Dullea (piano) explore themes of ‘human’ qualities and ‘kindness’ in their programme of Arvo Pärt, Deirdre McKay, Hannah Kendall, Evis Sammoutis, Chick Corea and César Franck. The Autumn series ends on 15 December 2024 when the Primrose Piano Quartet move from a duo by Mozart to a trio by Schubert to a piano quartet by Brahms.

I write the programme notes for the concert series, and give occasional pre-concert talks. My next one is on Sunday 8 December, with Past, present and future, looking at the music of Caroline Shaw, Schumann and Beethoven in advance of the Kyan Quartet's concert.

Full details from the Conway Hall's website.

Substantial and satisfying listening: Stuart Hancock's score for the new film, Kensuke's Kingdom

Michael Morpurgo's 1999 book Kensuke's Kingdom might have very modern concerns with its bringing issues about care for the environment and the natural world into what is a traditional adventure story, but the new animated film based on the book which was released last month has a refreshingly traditional approach to the genre. The film, directed by Neil Boyle and Kirk Hendry with Peter Dodd as animation director and Michael Shorten as art director, features traditional hand drawn animation along with a fine symphonic score by British composer Stuart Hancock.

Hancock's score has a strong dramatic sweep to it and the original motion picture soundtrack, on MovieScoreMedia, makes for substantial and satisfying listening. The film was produced by Lupus Films, and the soundtrack was recorded by the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra, conductor David Hernando Rico, and the Holst Singers, conductor Michael Waldron, and the score even has a solo for actor Ken Watanabe who plays Kensuke.

I enjoyed listening to the soundtrack immensely, the album has 31 tracks lasting 73 minutes, which is a lot of music for a film, from short cues to longer sequences. Hancock's music has a depth and complexity to it, which is reflected in the fact that the performers include the full Bratislava Symphony Orchestra and the Holst Singers. Even from just listening, there is a strong emotional range, and I can't help but hope Hancock has time, energy and impetus to create a concert suite from the music. 

Hancock says of the writing process, "Kensuke’s Kingdom has very little dialogue – a gift for a composer! The two lead characters cannot speak each other’s language, so the music has space to flourish and help tell their story. I composed initial character themes and sketches, working closely with the directors from the storyboard/animatic stage onwards. I honed the music as the animation gradually fell into place, culminating in fantastic recording sessions with full symphony orchestra, choir and solo musicians in late 2022. Personal highlights included recording Ken Watanabe’s singing (remotely from Tokyo) and having author Michael Morpurgo’s glowing seal of approval at regular intervals!"

Stuart Hancock's score for Kensuke's Kingdom is available via MovieScoreMedia and can be streamed on Spotify or YouTube. Full details of the film from the Kensuke's Kingdom website.

White-hot dramatic impetus: a new recording of Meyerbeer: Le prophète on LSO Live might use a traditional version but captures the work's essential drama

Giacomo Meyerbeer: Le prophète; John Osborn, Elizabeth DeShong, Mané Galoyan, Edwin Crossley-Mercer, London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre des Jeunes de la Méditerranée, Lyons Opera Chorus, Maîtrise des Bouches-du-Rhône, Mark Elder; LSO Live (with Palazzetto Bru Zane)
Reviewed 12 August 2024

Captures the essence of this remarkable opera, listening to this performance really conveys why the opera captivated so many in the 19th century

The first critical edition of Meyerbeer's 1849 opera, Le prophète, was published in 2011 and the 2017 recording from Essen (on Oehms Classics) conducted by Giuliano Carella was the first to record it. But that simple statement hides something more complex, the critical edition is not so much a definitive version as a template for various versions, owing to the work's complex history. 

Like other French grand operas, Le prophète was long and so subject to cuts, some sanctioned by the composer. But casting for those 1849 performances was fraught, Meyerbeer got his first choice for Fidès with the great Pauline Viardot, but had to live with Gustave-Hippolyte Roger in the title role. Roger was a lyric tenor who sang originally at the Opéra-Comique and the role of Jean had to be trimmed to suit him. Thus the composer sanctioned cuts do not exactly reflect Meyerbeer's intentions. The recording from Essen used a very full version, giving us nigh on 215 minutes of music (that's a hell of a long time in the theatre).

Le prophète still needs a studio recording which explores all this in the right sort of editorial detail. This is what Palazzetto Bru Zane is good at, but the company has been relatively late to recordings of Meyerbeer's French operas. The new recording of Meyerbeer's Le prophète is a collaboration with the London Symphony Orchestra and issued on the LSO Live label. Recorded live at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence in 2023, it features Mark Elder conducting the combined forces of the London Symphony Orchestra and Orchestre des Jeunes de la Méditerranée, with John Osborn as Jean, Elizabeth DeShong as Fidès, Mané Galoyan as Berthe and Edwin Crossley-Mercer as Oberthal with Lyons Opera Chorus, and Maîtrise des Bouches-du-Rhône.

The recording does not come with the usual editorial superstructure that we might have expected if it had been on Palazzetto Bru Zane's own label. The booklet is frustratingly coy as to what we are exactly hearing, but it seems to be Meyerbeer's sanctioned 1849 version but in the new modern edition. Certainly the Essen recording has more material on it and lasts some 20 minutes longer than the LSO Live recording. Both discs have John Osborn in the title role, and I could quite happily hear him sing this for ever, but the new set has the advantages of Elisabeth DeShong as Fidès, and Mark Elder conducting the LSO.

Songs from two golden ages: Nicholas Mulroy, Elizabeth Kenny & Toby Carr in a recital of effortless beauty with song from 17th century England & 20th century Latin America

De Pasión Mortal: Songs from two golden ages; Henry Purcell, Claudio Monteverdi, Víctor Jara, Tomás Méndez, Silvio Rodríguez, Ariel Ramírez, Ñico Rojas, Rafael Hernández Marín; Nicolas Mulroy, Elizabeth Kenny, Toby Carr, Music for a While; LINN Records
Reviewed 9 August 2024

Combining 17th century European song with that from 20th century Latin America, Nicholas Mulroy and friends create a recital which seduces and engages, by turns lyrical and melancholy, yet always compelling

De Pasión Mortal: Songs from two golden ages on Linn Records features tenor Nicholas Mulroy in a recital that juxtaposes two very different, yet equally intimate song traditions, that of 17th century Europe (here England and Italy) and 20th century Latin America. Mulroy is joined by Elizabeth Kenny on archlute, guitars and theorbo, Toby Carr on guitars and theorbo, and Music for While (Margaret Faultess and Rachel Stroud, violin, Anna Curzon and Francesca Gilbert, viola, Andrew Skidmore, cello).

The recital features music by Henry Purcell and Claudio Monteverdi, alongside 20th century Latin American composers, Víctor Jara, Tomás Méndez, Silvio Rodríguez, Ariel Ramírez, Ñico Rojas, and Rafael Hernández Marín. Perhaps, at first, the combination might seem slightly unlikely, but all feature the same intimacy of a voice and one or two stringed instruments. The majority of tracks feature both Elizabeth Kenny and Toby Carr, though each gets an instrumental solo, and four tracks feature the instrumental ensemble Music for While as well.

Everything is connected: Barbican Quartet on their debut album, Manifesto on Love, on Genuin label

Barbican Quartet (Photo: Andrej Grilc)

The Barbican Quartet (Amarins Wierdsma, violin, Kate Maloney, violin, Christoph Slenczka, viola, Yoanna Prodanova, cello) is so-named partly because the founding members, Amarins, Christoph and Yoanna met at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama during their studies, first playing chamber music together for pleasure and later becoming more serious. The present line-up was formed in 2022 when Kate joined them, and that year the quartet won the 71st ARD International String Quartet Competition in Munich. 

One of the prizes that the quartet took away from the competition was a recording with the Genuin label. That recording, the quartet's debut, came out in June. Manifesto on Love features Leoš Janáček’s String Quartet No.2 "Listydůvěrné" (Intimate Letters), The Ear of Grain by Dobrinka Tabakova and two works by Robert Schumann, String Quartet No. 3, Op. 41 in A major and Wenn ich ein Vöglein wär. The works in the programme, including the new piece commissioned from Dobrinka Tabakova by the competition, are all linked by the idea of the love letter, as Schumann's quartet can be seen as a love letter to his wife Clara. The idea of storytelling is something that the quartet focuses on, it gives them great pleasure. Though they felt that it made sense for their album to have a theme, Manifesto on Love also enabled them to make a wonderful connection between two pieces they love, with the nickname for Janáček's extremely direct quartet seeming to give them their theme.

They comment that everything is connected in some way, and it is easy to make such connections even if these are somewhat abstract, there are different ways of storytelling. It is not just about having a theme, stories can involve the way pieces relate, but also the more personal element with all four individual voices creating a narrative. This sense of four different voices creating a single whole is one that the quartet works on a lot in rehearsals, admitting that it can be hard work. What they are aiming for is that sense of understanding each other without the need for words. So, the storytelling need not be literal, they can use colour and sound, as well as the sense of communication between the four voices. An abstract piece of music might have a story based on colour and mood, an essence of feeling as in a short story. Sometimes the story simply comes from a visual image as in Dobrinka Tabakova's piece on the disc, inspired by a Joan Miró painting of the same name and links to the Brothers Grimm story.

German conductor Anja Bihlmaier has been appointed principal guest conductor of the BBC Philharmonic,

Beethoven: Violin Concerto - Tobias Feldmann, Anja Bihlmaier, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra - BBC Proms (Photo: BBC/Andy Paradise)

German conductor Anja Bihlmaier has been appointed principal guest conductor of the BBC Philharmonic, starting in September, working alongside the orchestra's chief conductor, John Storgårds. Bihlmaier conduct the BBC Philharmonic at the BBC Proms last night (8 August 2024) in a programme the consisted of Beethoven's Violin Concerto with soloist Tobias Feldmann, Brahms' Symphony No. 4 and Sarah Gibson’s warp & weft, inspired by the work of Canadian artist Miriam Schapiro.

Bihlmaier commented, "From our first concert at Bridgewater Hall, playing Shostakovich and Dvorak, I felt a special bond and mutual trust with the musicians. I love their dedication, their virtuosity and willingness to experiment, their sense of humour and most importantly their great passion for the music, and how they bring it to life for their audience. Our Proms concert last year and Bruckner 7 in Manchester were unforgettable highlights. I look forward to continuing our journey, hoping to achieve something special in the vibrant city of Manchester and at the BBC Proms."

Bihlmaier studied at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg and the Mozarteum Salzburg, where she was a pupil of Dennis Russell Davies and Jorge Rotter. She has been chief conductor of the Residentie Orkest since August 2021, conducted the August performances of Glyndebourne’s production of Carmen.

Prom 26 is available on BBC Sounds. Full details from the BBC website.

Reconsider the Familiar: Glasgow Cathedral Festival returns with its eighth season

Glasgow Cathedral Festival in 2022

Glasgow Cathedral, the city's oldest building, is hosting the eighth Glasgow Cathedral Festival from 19 to 22 September 2024, featuring a diverse programme of live music, film, art, multi-media collaborations, talks and tours, all offering audiences the chance to reconsider, rediscover, reimagine, to expand their imaginations, explore beneath the surface and refresh their senses.

The first stone cathedral was dedicated in 1136, in the presence of King David I. Fragments of this building have been found beneath the structure of the present cathedral, which was dedicated in 1197, although much of the present cathedral dates from a major rebuilding in the 13th century. The cathedral is dedicated to Saint Mungo, the patron saint of Glasgow, whose tomb lies at the centre of the building's Lower Church, and following its foundation in 1451, the University of Glasgow held its first classes within the cathedral's chapter house.

The festival opens with a recital from Scottish mezzo-soprano Rowan Hellier and pianist Jonathan Ware. She Represents sees fashion and song intersect; exploring the role of symbolism and sensuality in the modern female identity, Hellier and Ware perform music by French composer Rita Strohl (1865-1941), Francis Poulenc, Kurt Weill, Arnold Schoenberg, Mischa Spoliansky (including the wonderful Ich bin ein Vamp), and Cathy Berberian's amazing Stripsody, with outfits created by designer Rebekka Dornhege Reyes.

Silent film has become a popular part of the festival's programme and this year it is the American horror classic Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1920), with a live soundtrack from Odeon Leicester Square’s organist Donald MacKenzie.

Image by Kirsty Matheson

The Hebrides Ensemble will be performing Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire with soprano Stephanie Lamprea, alongside Helen Grime's Pierrot Miniatures and the Scottish premiere of Brushstrokes of Nightmares and Dreams by Electra Perivolaris and an exhibition of new paintings by Kirsty Matheson, an artist in whose work music and art intertwine and who has done a sequence of 21 paintings for the 21 movements of Schoenberg's work.

Fiddle/harp duo Twelfth Day will be presenting their unique blend of classical skill and folk roots in the cathedral's cloister in an event aimed at families, whilst in the evening the crypt is the location for Twilight in the Crypt with saxophone improvisations from Scottish jazz legend Tommy Smith, and Octandre Ensemble making their Scottish debut with time-space-sound-light, a reflective sequence of music by Christian Mason.

The festival ends with another family-friendly lunchtime event: a recital from organist Katherine Dienes-Williams, Director of Music at Guildford Cathedral, whose programme evokes everything from Hollywood glamour to Scottish folk songs—with a sighting of some penguins along the way!

There are tours of the cathedral and wider Glasgow including the necropolis, and which links up with the museum of Glasgow Royal Infirmary across the precinct.

Full details from the festival's website.

Vivacity, humour & pathos: Opera Holland Park & Charles Court Opera in Gilbert & Sullivan's The Yeomen of the Guard

Gilbert & Sullivan: The Yeomen of the Guard - Stephen Gadd - Opera Holland Park (Photo: Ellie Kurtz)

Gilbert & Sullivan: The Yeomen of the Guard; William Morgan, Matthew Kellett, Llio Evans, Ellie Laugharne, Samantha Price, Stephen Gadd, Amy J PAyne, John Savournin, Jack Roberts, Darren Jeffrey, director: John Savournin, City of London Sinfonia, conductor: David Eaton; Opera Holland Park in collaboration with Charles Court Opera
Reviewed 7 August 2024

Gilbert & Sullivan's more serious opera in a production that balances vivacity, humour and pathos whilst filling the theatre with colour and movement

W.S. Gilbert's librettos for Arthur Sullivan tend to be rather complex mechanisms that do not lend themselves to too much radical reinvention, and most productions content themselves with tweaking the era and the setting. The Yeomen of the Guard, one of their finest collaborations, is one opera that rather resists much tinkering, the entire plot focused on the Tower and its influence. Neither of the recent productions, at ENO [see my review] and the Grange Festival [see my review], was in any way radical though both adjusted and modernised the setting.

For his production of Gilbert & Sullivan's The Yeomen of the Guard at Opera Holland Park, director John Savournin chose to return the work to its Victorian roots. The production, which opened on Wednesday 7 August 2024, was the fourth collaboration between Opera Holland Park and Charles Court Opera, and featured designs by Alyson Cummins which placed the setting firmly in a Victorian view of Tudor England, and Cummins' set made it clear that we were in a Victorian theatre. This gave scope for Savournin to keep Gilbert's cod-Tudor dialogue (which is often modernised).

Gilbert & Sullivan: The Yeomen of the Guard - John Savournin, Matthew Kellett - Opera Holland Park (Photo: Ellie Kurtz)

David Eaton conducted the City of London Sinfonia with William Morgan as Colonel Fairfax, Matthew Kellett as Jack Point, Llio Evans as Elsie Maynard (though illness meant that the role was sung from the pit by Ellie Laugharne), Samantha Price as Phoebe, Stephen Gadd as Sir Richard Cholmondeley, Amy J Payne as Dame Carruthers, John Savournin as William Shadbolt, Jack Roberts as Leonard Meryll and Darren Jeffrey as Sergeant Meryll.

Turning Punch and Judy on its head: the Opera Makers' Mr Punch at the Opera puts a new, family oriented twist on Pergolesi's La Serva Padrona

If Birtwistle's 1968 opera Punch and Judy took the children's puppet entertainment into the adult realm, The Opera Makers plan to the opposite with their new show Mr Punch at the Opera which is an interactive, pantomime-style adaptation of Pergolesi’s La Serva Padrona, intended as a fun (and short) way for children and families to access classical opera this Summer.

Mr Punch at the Opera is at the Arcola Theatre from 21 to 24 August 2024 as part of the Grimeborn Festival. The new adaptation of Pergolesi’s La Serva Padrona features a new English book by Becca Marriott and stars Matthew Kellett and Grace Nyandoro, with puppeteer Professor James, cellist Alison Holford and pianist Panaretos Kyriatzidis.

Mr Punch at The Opera explores all the ways puppets and opera singers can interact – as the heroine of the piece takes control of her story and her lazy boss Hubert, and lays siege to the mischievous Mr Punch’s theatre. For its time, La Serva Padrona was a progressive, feminist show with a feisty leading lady, and Mr Punch at The Opera takes this further, using an outdated narrative to red-flag representations of women in theatre and literature then - and now - turning the traditional anti-women idea of Punch & Judy on its head.

Full details from Arcola Theatre website.

Prom 24: Vividness & virtuosity in an astonishing danced staging of Purcell's The Fairy Queen with Les Arts Florissants & Mourad Merzouki's Companie Käfig,

Purcell: The Fairy Queen; Les Arts Florissants, singers from Le Jardin des Voix, dancers from Companie Käfig - BBC Proms (Photo: BBC/ Chris Christodoulou)

Purcell: The Fairy Queen; Les Arts Florissants, singers from Le Jardin des Voix, dancers from Companie Käfig, director: Mourad Merzouki, conductor Paul Agnew; BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall

Merzouki's staging showcased the astonishing virtuosity of his dancers and the engaging way singers and dancers combined, conveying their sheer enjoyment of the music

Everyone has their own idea about what to with Purcell's The Fairy Queen. Containing some of his finest theatre music, the work as originally performed, with nearly two hours of sub-par spoken dialogue, does not appeal to regular theatre going, though I think to hear and see The Fairy Queen in a production that recreated the effects of the original would be revelatory. For most dramatic performances, Purcell's music is taken on its own with a new storyline, though frankly, I think Benjamin Britten had the right of it, cutting and reshaping the music into a more satisfactory whole.

On 6 August 2024, Purcell's The Fairy Queen was presented at the Royal Albert Hall as part of the BBC Proms in a semi-staging by choreographer Mourad Merzouki which was a collaboration between Les Arts Florissants and Merzouki's Companie Käfig. Paul Agnew conducted Les Arts Florissants with singers from their young artist scheme, Le Jardin des Voix, Paulina Francisco, Georgia Burashko, Rebecca Leggett, Juliette Mey, Ilja Aksionov, Rodrigo Carreto, Hugo Herman-Wilson and Benjamin Schiilperoort, and eight dancers from Companie Käfig, Baptiste Coppin, Samuel Florimond, Anahi Passi, Alary-Youra Ravin, Daniel Saad and Timothée Zig.

Purcell: The Fairy Queen; Les Arts Florissants, singers from Le Jardin des Voix, dancers from Companie Käfig - BBC Proms (Photo: BBC/ Chris Christodoulou)

The 29-strong instrumental ensemble, led by Augusta McKay Lodge, was pushed to the rear of the stage with the front area being taken over by the staging. Costumes by Claire Schirck were uniform, black suits and white shirts in the first half, with coloured shirts in the second half, and lighting by Fabrice Sarcy brought out the theatrical nature of the undertaking.

Concerto Copenhagen makes its Scottish debut as Ensemble in Residence at the Lammermuir Festival

The Collegiate Church of St Mary the Virgin

Concerto Copenhagen, led by Lars Ulrik Mortensen, will be making its Scottish debut on Monday 9 September 2024 when it gives the first of four concerts as Ensemble in Residence at the Lammermuir Festival, the first ensemble that the festival has invited from outside the UK.

All four concerts are in St Mary's Church, Haddington. The first focuses on Dietrich Buxtehude and composers in his circle, with names - Tunder, Erben, Kirchhoff, Schmelzer, Weckmann - that are probably unfamiliar but help us understand the musical culture. Their second concert, Stylus Phantasticus focuses on Heinrich Biber, along with Buxtehude, Schmelzer and more, then focus turns to Georg Muffat (whose ancestors were Scots named Moffat!), with four sonatas (in fact they are more like concerti grossi) from his Armonico Tributo. 

Finally, they focus on violinist Johan Helmich Roman, young Swedish violinist who left the German orientated musical scene of Stockholm and came to London where, with Handel newly arrived from Rome, musical taste was much more Italian. He played in Handel’s orchestra and met composers from all over Europe, returning to Stockholm in 1721 where he worked in the Royal court for the rest of his career.

Concerto Copenhagen's concerts take place in The Collegiate Church of St Mary the Virgin, one of the great ecclesiastical buildings of mediaeval Scotland, founded in 1380 and known for centuries as The Lamp of Lothian. Severely damaged in the 16th Century, after the Reformation only the nave was used as a parish church, with the choir and tower remaining roofless.  It was finally restored to its former glory in the 1970s, and is Scotland's longest church as well as one of its most beautiful, with a wonderfully warm, resonant acoustic.

And there is more! The festival's delights range from Veronique Gens in concert to Scottish Opera in Britten's Albert Herring.

Full details from the festival's website.

Prom 23: riveting symphonic theatre from Benjamin Grosvenor, Edward Gardner & London Philharmonic Orchestra in Busoni's Piano Concerto

Busoni: Piano Concerto - Benjamin Grosvenor, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Edward Gardner - BBC Proms (Photo: BBC/Andy Paradise)

Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances, Busoni: Piano Concerto; Benjamin Grosvenor, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Edward Gardner; BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall
Reviewed 5 August 2024

Problem, what problem. Busoni's mammoth Piano Concerto turned into riveting symphonic theatre in what was only the work's second Prom performance after a gap of 36 years!

Ferruccio Busoni's Piano Concerto is such a significant undertaking that the work is rarely part of the regular concert repertoire. What is a surprise, is to find that it has not been a regular part of the BBC Proms repertoire either. On Monday 5 August 2024, Benjamin Grosvenor was the soloist in a performance of Busoni's Piano Concerto at the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall with Edward Gardner conducting the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and this was only the second performance of the work at the Proms, a reflection perhaps of the status of Busoni's music in the later 20th century than the work's challenging nature. 

Busoni: Piano Concerto - Benjamin Grosvenor, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Edward Gardner - BBC Proms (Photo: BBC/Andy Paradise)

The programme began with a very different 20th century orchestral icon, Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, his final major composition and the only work written in its entirety whilst he was living in the USA. But it is a work of intense nostalgia for the lost Russia, with the motifs taken from Russian church music alongside the famous Dies Irae. The work can sometimes come over as a lush romantic romp, but though it uses a large orchestra Gardner kept things on a tight rein here. There was a clarity to the textures allied to a discipline in the rhythm and focus, which mean that the extensive and lavish woodwind writing, often in counterpoint or countermelody to the strings, was always clear and contributed strongly. Gardner brought out the strong character of each movement, rather than the romantic nostalgia.

A month of essential listening - Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival is back with another visionary festival

Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival returns later this month with its visionary festival of new opera, with events from 24 August to 29 September 2024, a month of essential listening. The festival opens with Will Gardner and Matthew Green's second opera The Prisoner (a work which won the Stephen Oliver Award) at the Royal College of Music's Britten Theatre. The remainder of the festival is at The Cockpit Theatre, Marylebone with the exception of Catherine Kontz' 12 Hours at Kings College, London, which will be a 6-hour extract of a marathon 12-hour performance for voice and electronics.

Performers include eight returning artists and 17 teams who are joining the festival for the first time. Returning alumni include composer Will Gardner (with The Prisoner), mezzo-soprano Rosie Middleton (who performs in Catherine Kontz's 12 Hours and Elif Karlidag and Sam Redway's The Game), and composer Edward Lambert who presents a double bill The Parting / Buster’s Trip based on the texts of Federico García Lorca.

Other highlights include Guy Harries' QueerLove, a celebration of LGBTQ+ relationships through the medium of the love letter, Frank Horvat and Stacie Dunlop's Letters, a solo performance exploring a difficult relationship with a troubled parent, Josh Kaye, Hestor Dart, and Amy Kearsley's You Can't Kill the Spirit, based on the testimonials of female activists of the 1960s and inspired by the 1982 human chain around Greenham Common, and Madeleine Brooks' I Shot Mussolini, a true story led by the direct descendant of Violet Gibson, who very nearly single-handedly changed the course of the twentieth century.

Visiting productions from overseas include Vicky Nizri and Cristina Pardo's A Life of One’s Own, an opera from Mexico about the story of a young woman migrating to build a life for herself, featuring Sephardic music, porte renaud's Andrias Scheuchzeri, an ecological science-fiction project from France, Margarida Gonçalves' The Acts of Brízida Vaz, inspired by renowned Portuguese poet and playwright Gil Vicente and rooted in Portuguese tradition and Gaia Aloisi and Fabrizio Funari's Aqua Tofana, an Italy-UK co-production centred on 17th Century apothecarist Giulia Tofana’s lethal liquid invention.

Rendevous with Revenge features a triple bill, originally written as part of the Royal Academy of Music Opera Makers project, with music and words by Sarah Marze, Yan Ee Toh, Adam Zolty, Ade Bademosi, Noah McCreadie, and Philippa Lawford.

Full details from the festival website.

The encounter that never was: composers Alex Ho and Sun Keting on their collaboration on a new music theatre work interweaving the stories of two very different Chinese women

Echo Nature - Tangram at LSO St Luke's, January 2024

Bound/Unbound is a new music theatre piece created by London-based China-born composer Sun Keting and London-based British-Chinese composer Alex Ho. The two are joint directors of the music collective Tangram who are presenting the work at LSO St Luke's on 9 & 10 August 2024 as part of Tangram's position as Associate Artists at LSO St Luke's and the performances feature soprano Haegee Lee, dancer Yining Chen and percussionist Beibei Wang with Tangram artists and musicians from the LSO. The piece interweaves the stories of two very different Chinese women, Afong Moy, the first Chinese woman to come to the USA in 1834, and Qiu Jin, the 20th-century revolutionary.

Alex Ho & Sun Keting (Image taken from video interview)

Sun Keting and Alex Ho are joint directors of Tangram and this led them to want to co-compose. Alex has experience in opera and stage works whereas Rockey (Sun Keting) has worked with dancers, so they conceived of a piece that would combine their past experiences and see what happened.  The two describe co-composing as a new experience for both of them, interesting in its own right.

The choreographer, Yining Chen, is a specialist in traditional Chinese dance and the work was intended to combine both dance and singing, though the two composers emphasised that it wasn't a case of music, singing and dance, there are sections which involved pure dance and others just singing.

They worked with the librettist, British Chinese writer Xiaolu Guo to create the story which involves Afong Moy (born around 1815/1820), who was taken to the USA to be displayed alongside Chinese goods as 'The Chinese Curiosity', and Qiu Jin (1875-1907), a feminist revolutionary and master swords person who also wrote poetry, yet came to a tragic end as she was executed for trying to overthrow the Manchu government. Qiu Jin's skill with the sword links to the choreography including a sword dance.

More than entertainment: Oliver Webber and the Monteverdi String Band's The Madrigal Reimagined

The Madrigal Reimagined: Claudio Merulo, Johann Nauwach, Claudio Monteverdi, Cipriano de Rore, Cristofano Malvezzi, Giulio Caccini, Emilio de'Cavalieri, Giovanni Gabrieli, Giovanni Perluigi da Palestrina, Lorenzo Tracetti; Hannah Ely, Toby Carr, Monteverdi String Band, Oliver Webber; Resonus Classics
Reviewed 2 August 2024

A wonderfully satisfying recital that mixes didacticism with sheer vocal and instrumental dazzle as Oliver Webber and his ensemble explore how the madrigal went from simple song to something more elaborate and more complex

As Oliver Webber explains in the booklet notes for The Madrigal Reimagined on Resonus Classics, "At a meeting of the Florentine Academy in 1577, the poet Giovanni Battista Strozzi gave a lecture on a poetic form that was rapidly gaining in popularity: the madrigal. A short poem of no fixed rhyme and structure, it was, Strozzi explained, ideally suited to the depiction of gentle scenes of love rather than heroic deeds or tragedy; indeed, rather than profundity, its essence lay in an elusive charm, which Strozzi encapsulated with the phrase un non so che del frizzante, ‘a little something sparkling’ – or, according to some dictionaries of the period, ‘stinging’."

From this intriguing but not exactly earth-shattering beginning grew a significant musical structure as composers reinvented and reimagined settings of these verses. The madrigal is at the heart of seconda prattica and would lead, in one direction, to the first operas, but there are other directions too.

On this disc, Webber and the Monteverdi String Band are joined by Hannah Ely (soprano) and Toby Carr (Renaissance lute and theorbo) for a programme that takes us from the earliest madrigals through vivid instrumental reinventions and ending up with music from Monteverdi's L'Orfeo. Monteverdi's seconda prattica broke rules for expressive purposes. The disc explores the different elements that different composers brought to their exploration of the madrigal.

Bach, Mendelssohn and more : Oxford Philharmonic's 2024/25 season

Marios Papadopoulos and the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra

The centrepiece of Marios Papadopoulos and the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra's 2024/25 season is Bach Mendelssohn Festival focusing on the music of the two composers with concerts, smaller scale concerts and a study day. 

The centrepiece of the festival is a performance of Mendelssohn's Elijah with soloists Masabane Cecilia Ranganwasha, Angharad Lyddon, Adam Gilbert and Bryn Terfel. Things begin with Bach's Mass in B Minor with Marios Papadopoulos conducting the Oxford Philharmonic Choir, and Mahan Esfahani will direct a performance of all the Brandenburg Concertos. The Oxford Philharmonic Choir is joined by the Academy of Ancient Music, conductor Lawrence Cummings for an all-Bach programme including the Magnificat. 

On a smaller scale, pianist Vikingur Ólafsson plays a programme of Bach transcriptions, whilst Andras Schiff plays Bach's The Art of Fugue. Further ahead in the season there are performances of Bach's St Matthew Passion, and programmes that place Bach and Mendelssohn's music side by side.

Other highlights include Maxim Vengerov as soloist and director in an all-Mozart programme, Marc Bouchkov and David Aaron Carpenter as the soloists in Alexey Shor's Violin and Viola Concerto, chamber music in the Holywell Music Room, and Verdi's Requiem with Lauren Fagan, Maria Schellenberg, David Junghoon Kim, Blaise Malaba and the Crouch End Festival Chorus.

Full details from the Oxford Philharmonic's website.

In case you missed it

John Savournin as Sante in Il segreto di Susanna at Opera Holland Park (Photo: Ali Wright)

July on Planet Hugill: Acis, Galatea, Susanna and two Figaros

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New partnership between the British Double Reed Society and Liverpool Philharmonic's In Harmony Liverpool

In Harmony Liverpool's 13 Birthday Concert 2022 (Photo: Mark McNulty)

Liverpool Philharmonic has announced a new partnership between the British Double Reed Society and their flagship learning and engagement programme, In Harmony Liverpool. The partnership is the first of its kind for In Harmony, where a specialist instrumental foundation are supporting the development of the programme. The commitment will cover financial and in-kind support to the programme for three years from 2024-2027. Provision is specifically focused on providing double reed support, activity, and events to In Harmony students.

In Harmony Liverpool provides free music education and instrumental tuition to over 1,700 children across eight settings in Anfield and Everton, two of the city’s most disadvantaged communities. Children make music, learn an instrument, sing, compose, listen, rehearse and perform together each week in and out of school, led by professional musicians.  

Full details from the Liverpool Philharmonic website.