Viola da gamba and electronics - Liam Byrne's SOLO recital

Liam Byrne - photo Marc Gascoigne

SOLO is a new concert series in London, curated by composer Alex Groves, offering intimate recitals musicians showcasing unusual works for solo instruments. The first recital on 26 July 2016 presents the viola da gamba player Liam Byrne in the crypt of St Andrew's Church, Holborn, EC4A 3AB. Byrne will be mixing period music with cutting edge electronics, bringing together viol consort works by Picforth and Ortiz realised for the first time with live electronics, contemporary works by Judah Adashi and Edmund Finnis, and a world première by Alex Groves.

In a Q&A on the SOLO website, Byrne talks about his processes in presenting the consort music in the concert, 'What I'm doing with the laptop is taking a few of my favourite pieces for multiple viols or voices, and by using techniques including delays and looping, will sort of disassemble and reassemble these pieces in front of the audience. I guess it's using a technological process to highlight the bizarre and beautiful structural aspects of the piece, while still also allowing you to listen to the pretty piece of music more or less as it's meant to sound.'

Full details from the SOLO website.

Chorus vel Organa: Music from the Lost Palace of Westminster

Nicholas Ludford, William Cornysh, John Sheppard; Choir of Gonville and Caius College, Geoffrey Webber, Magnus Williamson; Delphain
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 15 2016
Star rating: 4.0
Late-Tudor polyphony for the Palace of Westminster, exploring the little known use of the organ in pre-Reformation worship

This latest disc from Geoffrey Webber, the Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge and organist Magnus Williamson on the Delphian label, explores the music used in the chapels of the pre-Reformation Palace of Westminster. The music movements from Nicholas Ludford's Missa Lapidaverunt Stephanum and Lady Mass Cycle, William Cornysh's Magnificat, and John Sheppard's Sancte De pretiose. What makes the disc all the more fascinating is the inclusion of an organ, exploring the use of organ in the repertoire; something that rarely gets a mention in recitals of pre-Reformation music.

The collegiate chapel, St Stephen's College, in the Palace of Westminster was founded by Edward I and maintained a strong musical tradition until the college was dissolved in 1548 when the chapel became the first permanent meeting place of the House of Commons. It is known that the chapel had an organ, but no English organs survive from the period, and precious little music. What organ music does survive is in post-Reformation copies.

The St Teilo organ in situ in St Teilo's Church at St Fagans

The organ used on the disc owes its existence to a remarkable survival, in 1977 a pre-Reformation organ soundboard was discovered in a church in Suffolk, and this has enabled organ builders to create a pre-Reformation English style organ. Goetze & Gwynn built such an organ for Bangor University's 'The Experience of Worship' project, and the organ is housed at St Teilo's Church which is now at St Fagan's in Cardiff.

Royal part-books bearing the coats of arms of Henry VIII and Katharine of Aragon contain a cycle of Masses for Our Lady (for each day of the week) including Mass Propers as well as the Ordinary, set for three parts. And on this disc we hear the Kyrie (from Tuesday), Sequence (from Wednesday), Agnus Dei (from Thursday) and Gloria (from Monday). The music has organ versets, which are improvised by Magnus Williamson based on a few surviving originals from the 1530's. John Sheppard's Sancte Dei Pretiose is performed in a similar manner.

National Children's Orchestras

National Children's Orchestras - Main Orchestra

The National Children's Orchestras are having a busy summer. The Main Orchestra is performing in Preston Guild Hall on Saturday 30 July 2016 conducted by Natalia Luis-Bassa, then the Under 13 Orchestra has its concert at Leeds Town Hall on Saturday 13 August 2016 conducted by Roger Clarkson, and the Under 12 Orchestra performs on Saturday 20 August 2016 at Birmingham Town Hall conducted by Roger Clarkson.

The Main Orchestra, which is made of up children aged 14 and under,  will perform quite a  challenging programme in Preston with guest conductor Natalia Luis-Bassa, including Berstein's overture to Candide, Prokofiev's Symphony No. 5, Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition (in Ravel's orchestration) and Marquez' Conga del Fuego Nuevo. In Leeds the Under 13 Orchestra will be performing Saint-Saens' Danse Macabre, Mussorgsky's On the steppes of Central Asia, and Robert Russell Bennett's Porgy and Bess: A Symphonic Picture.

Full information from the National Children's Orchestras website.

A remarkable swansong - Tristan und Isolde

The Grange

Wagner Tristan und Isolde; Rachel Nicholls, Bryan Register, Sara Fulgoni, Stephen Gadd, Mats Almgren, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Martyn Brabbins; Grange Park Opera
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 16 2016
Star rating: 4.0
A remarkably concentrated and intense of Wagner's music drama

Grange Park Opera closed its 2016 season with a pair of concert performances of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. The performances were memorable for non-musical reasons. Cast changes meant the last minute announcement of Rachel Nicholls as Isolde (replacing Anje Kampe) and Mats Almgren as King Mark (replacing Clive Bayley). And the performance on 16 July 2016 represented the last time that Wasfi Kani's company performed at Northington Grange; after 18 years the company is moving to a new theatre at West Horsley Place in Surrey whilst opera at the Grange at Northington continues with a new company, the Grange Festival headed by Michael Chance.

Martyn Brabbins conducted the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra with Bryan Register as Tristan, Rachel Nicholls as Isolde, Sara Fulgoni as Brangäne, Mats Almgren as King Mark and Stephen Gadd as Kurwenal. Tristan und Isolde is a suitably valedictory work for such an occasion, and the performance was as remarkable as the circumstance. Billed as a concert performance, the opera was performed in an adaptation of the set from Grange Park Opera's recent production of Verdi's Don Carlo, with the orchestra in the pit (and not on-stage as often happens in concert performances). Both Rachel Nicholls and Bryan Register were off the book, giving a fully dramatic account of their roles and this was echoed by the other principals. Though Mats Almgren, Sara Fulgoni and Stephen Gadd used scores, none was score-bound and their performances were as dramatic and reactive as those of the two principals.

The results were more akin to a stripped back stage production, and given the thrilling immediacy of experiencing the opera in the relatively small confines of the theatre at Northington Grange, the result were gripping. This was due in the main thanks to strongly dramatic and involving performances from the two principals, but also from Martyn Brabbins and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra.

Brabbins' account of the famous prelude was notable for having a sense of dynamism, a feeling that the music was actually going somewhere rather than being a series of luscious chords placed in space.

Nocturnal Variations - Ruby Hughes and Joseph Middleton

Schubert, Berg, Mahler, Britten; Ruby Hughes, Joseph Middleton; Champs Hill Records
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 06 2016
Star rating: 4.0
Songs exploring the night in highly evocative performances

We seem to be having a rash of themed recitals at the moment. This new disc Nocturnal Variations from soprano Ruby Hughes and pianist Joseph Middleton on Champs Hill Records, gives us night-themed songs by Schubert, Mahler, Berg and Britten, with Schubert's Nachtstück, Romanze, Abendstern, Die Sterne and Im Abendtrot, Mahler's Wo die schönen Trompeten blasen and Urlicht (both from Des Knaben Wunderhorn) and Um Mitternacht (from Rückert Lieder, Berg's Vier Gesänge, Britten's Evening and Night (from This way to the Tomb), Um Mitternacht, and At the mid hour of night.

In many ways this is a traditionally constructed recital, with a clear sequence from Schubert through Mahler to Berg, and ending with a group (mainly) in the singer's own language. It just happens that the theme of the songs dwells mainly on the night, a theme which brings great variety whether it be drama, sunsets, contemplation, dreams or even the supernatural.

Ruby Hughes

Schubert's Nachtstück starts with a sombre, serious piano prelude, then Ruby Hughes sings in a highly intimate manner with fine attention to the words. The song develops a lovely sense of flow, and Hughes finishes with her voice on a thread. Romanze (not strictly a lied but a song from Schubert's incidental music to Rosamunde) is sung with a delicate yet elegant sense of line. Abendstern is quietly thoughtful with a feeling of fragility when she fines the tone down. Die Sterne has Hughes' lyric line enhanced by Middleton's rhythmic accompaniment, creating a slight sense of suppressed excitement. Finally Im Abendrot starts with another lovely piano prelude, then Hughes sings in an intimate and relaxed manner.


Beautifully performed as these songs are, I was aware of a great particularity in the style of performance. Hughes often thins her voice down to a slender thread, giving intimate and thoughtful performances. Whilst speeds are not overly slow, there is a great sense of having all the time in the world.

Dartington International Summer School and Festival

Dartington Hall

The Dartington International Summer School and Festival opens on 30 July for a month of workshops, classes and concerts. There is lots going on, and if you don't want to take part then artistic director Joanna MacGregor has put together an amazing programme of 80 concerts all in the beautiful setting of Dartington Hall. There is the chance to experience not only classical music but also the best in folk, jazz, Middle Eastern and South American music, installation and spoken word. Performers include Alison Balsom, Alfred Brendel, Jane Glover, Chloë Hanslip, Adriano Adewale, Škampa Quartet, Simon Armitage, Emma Kirkby, Martynas Levickis, Marina Warner, Kathryn Tickell, Hilary Summers, Heath Quartet, Andy Sheppard, Black Voices, Judith Weir, Margaret Faultless, and Sian Edwards.

Large scale performances include Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610 with soloists from Stile Antico, Purcell's Dido and Aeneas paired with Lampe's Pyramus and Thisbe, Handel's Alexander's Feast, Gilbert & Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance, Haydn's Nelson Mass, Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale, and Bizet's Carmen with Georgia Bishop as Carmen.  As well as the chance to hear Joanna MacGregor in Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, Emma Kirkby in John Dowland, Terry Riley's In C, and Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition performed by brass ensemble.

The complete Schumann & more - I chat to Sholto Kynoch about the 2016 Oxford Lieder Festival

Finnegan Downie Dear (piano) with Gareth Brynmore John (baritone) at Exeter College Chapel
Oxford Lieder Festival 2015 credit Robert Piwko

Sholto Kynoch is the founder and artistic director of the Oxford Lieder Festival and I recently caught up with him to chat about this year's festival which concentrates on the songs of Schumann, as well as talking about plans for next year. The festival is perhaps best known for its 2014 festival when, over the course of three weeks, all of Schubert's songs were performed.

Sholto Kynoch -  Credit Raphaelle Photography

I interviewed Sholto last year before the 2015 festival (see my article) and was interested to find out how he thought it had gone. For 2015, the festival took the decision not to try to compete with the Schubert festival, returning to two weeks and having the theme of composers and poetry, rather than a single composer. Sholto feels that this was very much the right decision, the 2015 festival had great attendance with audiences enjoying the mix of recitals and words. One of the highlights was an innovation for 2015, free pop-up daytime recitals at venues such as Exeter College Chapel, the Bodleian Library and the Ashmolean Museum. Each recital concentrated on a masterpiece lasting 15 to 40 minutes, and afterwards people came up to Sholto in the street (one even spoke to him outside his house) saying that they had never been to a song recital before and that attending the pop-up event had changed their perspective. Some had gone on to attend more festival events. One man, having never been to a recital, ended up going to six pop-up recitals including one of Shostakovich's Michelangelo Sonnets, hardly an easy listening piece. For Sholto, this shows that this approach works and that people have the appetite for challenging events if presented in the right way. The festival will be having some similar free events this year.

The main focus of the 2016 festival is the complete songs of Schumann, a project which Sholto admits that this is far more manageable than Schubert's output. Not only are there half the number of songs, but Schumann did not write the large scale ballads that Schubert did. In 2014 they had to find a way to programme the dozen or so songs by Schubert which last 15 minutes or more; this year there is no such challenge, the longest Schumann song is five or six minutes in length.

This also means that there is space to include other composers such as Schumann's contemporaries Mendelssohn and Brahms, Schubert whom Schumann revered and other more unusual composers. Sholto admits that though it was fantastic having a three-week festival for the Schubert songs in 2014, the festival is unlikely to do this again, finding the two week duration far more manageable.

When I ask about highlights for this years festival, Sholto immediately mentions Christian Gerhaher who is singing on the opening night, but the first few days of the festival also include Sarah Connolly and Sophie Karthäuser, Christopher Maltman, Joan Rodgers and Dietrich Henschel. But Sholto is clearly pleased with the whole line-up this year and suggests that all sixteen nights of the festival are highlights.

It is not just the evening recitals, this year he explains that they have tried to 'up the stakes' in the lunchtime recitals, so there are recitals from the 2015 Kathleen Ferrier Award winners (sopranos Soraya Mafi and Gemma Lois Summerfield, and pianist Ian Tindale), Benjamin Appl, Roderick Williams, Felicity Lott and Mhairi Lawson.

Young blood: Maxwell Davies Kommilitonen! in Barry

WNO Youth Opera is performing Sir Peter Maxwell Davies' opera Kommilitonen at the Memo Arts Centre, Barry from 27 to 30 July 2016. Conducted by Alice Farnham, the production will be directed by WNO Genesis Assistant Director, Polly Graham and will be the first time that WNO has performed a full scale opera in Barry.

Kommilitonen was commissioned by the Royal Academy of Music, London and the Juilliard School, New York and was premiered in 2011. With a libretto by David Pountney (artistic director of Welsh National Opera) the opera intertwines three separate stories of student revolution in the 20th century in Germany, China and the USA.


The cast and chorus for this new production feature young singers from WNO Youth Opera 16-25 group which includes singers from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (RWCMD), other UK conservatoires and five members of Only Kids Aloud; WNO Youth Opera 10-14 group will also be involved in the Chorus. As well as the singers, much of the technical and backstage team are young people who are being mentored in areas such as stage management, lighting and props.

For the orchestra, students from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama (RWCMD) and Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music will play alongside WNO Orchestra members, and the opera features an on-stage erhu – a two-stringed bowed instrument – for some of the Chinese scenes which will be played by a RWCMD student.

The role of James Meredith will be played by Oscar  Castellino, from Mumbai, who is being mentored by Marcus Farnsworth who performed the role at the premiere in 2011.

Further information from the WNO website.

On disc at last - Wolf-Ferrari's I gioielli della Madonna

Wolf-Ferrari I gioielli della Madonna; Kyungho Kim, Susanne Bernhard, Natalia Ushakova, Daniel Capkovic, Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra, Friedrich Haider; Naxos
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 12 2016
Star rating: 3.5
The first commercial recording of Wolf-Ferrari's shocker teems with vibrant life if variable performances

If Carlisle Floyd's Wuthering Heights has had to wait 58 years before appearing on disc (see my review), Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari's opera I gioielli della Madonna has had to wait over 100 years for its first commercial recording. Finally bringing the opera to disc on Naxos is conductor Friedrich Haider with Slovak forces including Natalia Ushakova as Maliella, Kyungho Kim as Gennaro, Daniel Capkovic as Rafaele, Susanne Bernhard as Carmel, the Bratislava Boys Choir, the Pressburg Singers, the Slovak National Theatre Opera Chorus and the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra. Though the recording was made at concert performances at Slovak Radio, the performers are all from the Slovak National Theatre's production of the opera which premiered in May 2015 (see my review).

I gioielli della Madonna  was Wolf-Ferrari's fifth opera. The previous three had all been comedies written in a rather neo-classical style so this new opera was something of a departure. The plot owes something to Verismo, and Wolf-Ferrari is clearly interested in depicting the teeming street life of Naples. But he is also interested in what happens to his characters, the consequences of actions and the psychological issues, all handled in ways rather different from Verismo.

With 27 named roles and a large orchestra, the opera is a big undertaking but it repays attention with vibrant life. I have seen the piece twice on stage, once at Opera Holland Park in 2013 (see my review) and once at the Slovak National Theatre at the premiere of the the production on which this recording is based (see my review).

On disc at last - Carlisle Floyd's Wuthering Heights

Carlisle Floyd Wuthering Heights; Georgia Jarman, Kelly Markgraf, Susanne Mentzer, Florentine Opera, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Joseph Mechavich; Reference Recordings
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 12 2016
Star rating: 4.0
Carlisle Floyd's 1958 opera based in Emily Bronte's novel finally on disc

This new recording from Reference Recordings finally brings Carlisle Floyd's 1958 opera Wuthering Heights to disc. Joseph Mechavich conducts Florentine Opera Company and Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, with Kelly Markgraf as Heathcliff, Georgia Jarman as Cathy, Susanne Mentzer as Nelly, Vale Rideout as Edgar Linton, Heather Buck as Isabella Linton, Matthew Burns as Mr Earnshaw, Frank Kelley as Joseph and Aaron Short as Lockwood.

Wuthering Heights is unusual in Carlisle Floyd's output (he has written around a dozen operas). The subject was entirely specified the by commissioners, with Floyd having little input, and it is one of his few operas not to deal with an American subject. His most famous opera Susannah sets the Biblical story of Susannah and the Elders in the Deep South, and he has also done operatic versions of John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men and of Olive Ann Burns' Cold Sassy Tree.

After the success of Susannah (in 1955) at New York City Opera, the soprano Phyllis Curtin (who had sung the role of Susannah) asked Floyd for an aria for a concert, and he wrote a setting of Cathy's monologue from Wuthering Heights which Curtin premiered at Carnegie Hall. It was assumed that his aria came from an opera; it didn't, Floyd thought of it as a concert aria. Eventually his publisher inspired the expansion of the aria into an opera commissioned for Santa Fe in 1958 with Phyllis Curtin in the title role.

Wuthering Heights has received rather less exposure than some of Floyd's comparable pieces, perhaps because of Floyd's identification with American themes thanks to the success of Susannah.

City Music Foundation young artists at the Wallace Collection

The City Music Foundation (CMF), which supports young artists, is presenting its artists in a week long residency at the Wallace Collection. Each lunch time from 25 to 29 July 2016, CMF artists will give a free recital in the great gallery at the Wallace Collection. The performers include the Kaleidescope Saxophone Quartet, guitarist Andrey Lebedev, violin & piano pairing Foyle-Stsura Duo, accordionist Bartosz Glowacki, and the Gildas Quartet who are joined by pianist Sholto Kynoch for Schumann's Piano Quintet.

Repertoire varies from MacMillan's Intercession and Bates' My First Scooter, to Arvo Pärt’s Pari Intervallo, Vaclav Trojan’s The Destroyed Cathedral and Astor Piazzolla’s Libertango, along with music by Grieg, Bach, Villa Lobos, and Haydn.

The City Music Foundation aims to equip outstanding musicians at the beginning of their careers with tools, skills, experience and networks they need to pursue music as a viable and rewarding livelihood. Those chosen to go onto the two year CMF Artists Programme receive mentoring through collaborations with city firms, professional development workshops, concerts and recitals in CMF seasons, access to promotional tools and artistic mentoring.

Full details from the Wallace Collection website

The objects combine scientific inquiry and fine craftsmanship with being works of art in their own right.

Mathematisch-Physikalischer Salon in the Zwinger © Ad Meskens/WikiCommons

One of the oldest museums in the world is contained within the Rococo delights of the Zwinger in Dresden. The collection displays the fascinating Electors of Saxony and exhibits mechanical and scientific instruments ranging from 16th-century automata to superbly crafted telescopes.

Despite its rather cumbersome name, the Mathematisch-Physikalischer Salon (officially The Royal Cabinet of Mathematical and Physical Instruments) is a remarkably small yet fascinating museum located in the Zwinger in Dresden. It is, in fact, one of the oldest museums in the world. We visited it whilst we were in Dresden for the music festival and you can read my article on the CultureTrip.com website.

Berlioz, Bliss and Brett Dean - the BBC Symphony Orchestra's 2016/17 season at the Barbican

Douglas Fairbanks as Robin Hood

The BBC Symphony Orchestra's 2016/17 season at the Barbican, under chief conductor Sakari Oramo, includes a fine crop of world and UK premieres from Brett Dean, Neil Brand, Kaija Saariaho, Peter Eotvos, Michael Zev Gordon, Nicola Lefanu, Philip Cashian, Wolfgang Rihm and Detlev Glannert. John Adams Doctor Atomic gets an outing and a Total Immersion event celebrates Philip Glass's 80th birthday. Rarities from a past age include Florent Schmitt's music for Anthony and Cleopatra, and Berlioz's Grande messe des morts gets a welcome outing as does Sir Arthur Bliss's The Beatitudes.

Sakari Oramo opens the season with music by Richard Strauss and Brett Dean, including the UK premiere of Dean's suite Knocking at the Hellgate from his opera Bliss. Brett Dean pops up again in a concert conducted by Joshua Weilerstein, when Allison Bell and Allan Clayton join the orchestra to perform Dean's From Melodious Lay (A Hamlet Diffraction for Soprano, Tenor and Orchestra), a work which will give us some pre-echoes of Dean's Hamlet opera being premiered at Glyndebourne in 2017.

Timothy Brock conducts the BBC SO in Neil Brand's new score for the silent film Robin Hood (starring Douglas Fairbanks) which is premiered as live accompaniment to a screening of the film. And Neil Brand's A Christmas Carol will also receive an outing, conducted by Marin Andre.

Kaija Saariaho's True Fire receives its UK premiere conducted by Santtu-Matias Rouvall with baritone Gerald Finley. Edward Gardner conducts the UK premiere of Peter Eotvos's The Gliding of the Eagle of the Skies in a concert which includes Janacek's Taras Bulba. Eotvos' opera Senza sangue receives its UK premiere with Simone Young conducting, plus mezzo-soprano Christine Rice and baritone Russell Braun.

Philip Cashian's Piano Concerto 'The Book of Ingenious Devices' is premiered by Huw Watkins, with Oliver Knussen conducting a programme which also includes music by Richard Strauss and Elgar. Sakari Oramo conducts the premiere of Michael Zev Gordon's Violin Concerto (with Carolin Widmann), plus music by Kabalevsky and Shostakovich. Nicola Lefanu's The Crimson Bird (a new commission from the RPS) is premiered in a concert conducted by Ilan Volkov with music by Shreker and Rachmaninov. 

Wolfgang Rihm's Piano Concerto No. 2 receives its UK premiere with pianist Nicolas Hodges and conductor Lothar Koenigs. Another UK premiere is Detlev Glanert's Megaris conducted by Sakari Oramo, with music by Nielsen and Sibelius.

Music for the stage in its various forms is a thread running through the season. The French composer Florent Schmitt gets star billing as Sakari Oramo conducts Schmitt's incidental music to Andre Gide's translation of Shakespeare's Anthony and Cleopatra, which will be performed with excerpts from Shakespeare's play performed by actors from the Globe Theatre, directed by Iqbal Khan.  Semyon Bychkov's Beloved Friend project explores the music of Tchaikovsky, combining performances of Francesca da Rimini, Manfred, Piano Concerto No. 2  (with Kirill Gerstein), Piano Concerto No. 3, and Symphony No. 6 with a performance of Ronald Harwood's play Beloved Friend which looks at the relationship between Tchaikovsky and his patron, Nadezhda von Meck. James Gaffigan is conducting Kurt Weill's ballet The Seven Deadly Sins (with Storm Large as Anna), and the programme also has songs by Weill, Jurmann and Tiomkin, plus Korngold's early symphony. And those interested in going further can participate in a Come & Sing Kurt Weill event (alas for tenors and basses only).

John Adams 2005 opera Doctor Atomic is being given a semi-staged performance with Gerald Finley reprising the role of Dr J Robert Oppenheimer. John Adams will be conducting, and Penny Woolcock directs.

Francois-Xavier Roth, a conductor best known for work with period performance groups, will be conducting Berlioz's mammoth Grande messe des morts with the BBC Symphony Chorus, the Crouch End Festival Chorus and the London Philharmonic Choir. Not surprisingly the performance is at the Royal Albert Hall rather than the Barbican. Jiri Belohlavek conducts Dvorak's large-scale but relatively rarely performed Requiem, a work written for Birmingham in 1891. Arthur Bliss's The Beatitudes was written for the opening of Coventry Cathedral in 1961, but ended up being premiered in the Coventry Theatre because of Britten's War Requiem. The work's reputation has never quite recovered and a performance conducted by Andrew Davis gives us a chance to re-evaluate it.

The first Total Immersion event of the season is devoted to the multi-talented Richard Rodney Bennett. This will include the film Murder on the Orient Express for which he wrote the music, plus a wide ranging selection of his concert music including Symphony No. 3, Spells and Anniversaries. The second Total Immersion is devoted to Philip Glass, who celebrates his 80th birthday and the event concludes with Marin Alsop conducting the UK premiere of Glass's Concerto for Two Pianos (with the Labeque sisters), plus Itaipu. The final Total Immersion of the season is devoted to the music of Edgar Varese, a chance to hear all his music performed in a single day.

The BBC Singers, Singers at Six concerts include Rachmaninov's Vespers conducted by Elena Sharkova, Graham Ross conducting Britten, Judith Weir, Tavener, Howells and RR Bennett.

Full details from the Barbican Centre's website.

Songs of the Somme

Songs of the Somme Gurney, Butterworth, Kelly, Sanderson, Novello, Von Tilzer, Wood; Simon Callow, Katie Bray, Nicky Spence, Nicholas Merryweather, William Vann; London English Song Festival at Wilton's Music Hall
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 12 2016
Star rating: 4.5
A powerful evocation in music, text and film of the tragedy of the Battle of the Somme

Having delighted us last year with the complete songs of RVW, pianist William Vann's London English Song Festival has returned with a rather different project. Songs of the Somme at Wilton's Music Hall (12 July 2016) commemorated the Battle of the Somme with a sequence of songs and readings performed by mezzo-soprano Katie Bray, tenor Nicky Spence, baritone Nicholas Merryweather and actor Simon Callow with William Vann at the piano. The sequence included songs by George Butterworth, Frederick Septimus Kelly, Wilfred Ernest Sanderson, Ivor Gurney, Ivor Novello, Albert Von Tilzer and Haydn Wood, along with readings from Ivor Gurney, Siegfried Sassoon, Aimee Byng Scott, Theresa Hooley, and May Wedderburn Cannan. The event started with footage from the film The Battle of the Somme presented in collaboration with the Imperial War Museum.

The selection of songs by those who fought in the battle not only included those of Ivor Gurney and George Butterworth, but also the lesser known Frederick Septimus Kelly, and there were also the popular songs of the day, ending of course with Haydn Wood's Roses of Picardy. Similarly the readings varied from Siegfried Sassoon's poems and diary entries, some very harrowing, to Ivor Gurney's poems and poems by female poets whose work is now not so well known.

The songs and readings were presented as a dramatised sequence rather than a simple concert, giving them something of a context. It started with the singers in simple concert format, with Nicholas Merryweather giving an intense account of Butterworth's Loveliest of Trees, Nicky Spence singin Frederick Septumus Kelly's rather more conventional Shall I caompare thee and Katie Bray in the popular song God be with our boys tonight by Wilfred Ernest Sanderson, along with Simon Callow reading Gurney's Maisemore.

Testament to a change in taste - Les Mystères d'Isis

Mozart arr. Lachnith Les Mystères d'Isis; Chantal Santon-Jeffery, Marie Lenormand, Renata Pokupic, Sebastien Droy, Tassis Christoyannis, Jean Teitgen, Le Concert Spirituel, Diego Fasolis; Glossa
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jun 29 2016
Star rating: 3.5
An early 19th century pasticcio which introduced Parisian audiences to the music of Mozart's The Magic Flute

No, Mozart did not write an opera called Les Mystères d'Isis, and no, this isn't a straightforward French version of The Magic Flute. Instead we have a pasticcio created in 1801 by Ludwig Wenzel Lachnith with a plot which owes something to The Magic Flute and music from that and other Mozart operas. The work is performed by Diego Fasolis, Le Concert Spirituel, the Flemish Radio Choir with Chantal Santon-Jeffery, Marie Lenormand, Renata Pokupic, Sebastien Droy, Tassis Christoyannis and Jean Teitgen. The recording is issued on the Glossa label and supported by the Palazzetto Bru Zane, who prepared the score.

If we have little more than a pasticcio, then why record the piece? Perhaps because it represents and interesting and in some ways important landmark.

By 1801 Paris had heard very little Mozart opera. Le nozze di Figaro (in French with Beaumarchais' dialogue) disappeared after six performances in 1793, and Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail was performed just three times in 1798. Apart from an odd aria, The Magic Flute had not been heard at all. Though the Académie Royale de la Music was in it incarnation as the Theatre de la République et des Arts, it still adhered to the old guidelines and as a work without ballet and with spoken dialogue, The Magic Flute was unsuitable. But the fad for all things Egyptian following Napoleon's Egyptian campaign (1797-1801) made the idea of the opera attractive.

Free adaptation of foreign works in Paris and in London was common in the early 19th century. Carl Maria von Weber's London commission for Oberon was due to his popularity through free adaptations of Der Freischütz, a work which reached Paris in the form of Robin de Bois. And Berlioz famously took on the task of adapting Der Freischütz for the Paris Opera because he feared someone else making a bad job of it. But Lachnith took a very free attitude to The Magic Flute, not so much adapting it as using the score as a quarry to create a new work suitable for French theatrical tastes. Lachnith as a Bohemian composer and horn player who had moved to Paris in 1773 to study horn, and composition (the latter with Philidor).

After the overture we launch into music from the second act of the original opera. There are excerpts from La clemenza di Tito, Le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni. Myrrene (the Queen of the Night figure) is now a mezzo-soprano and makes her entrance to Donna Anna's first aria from Don Giovanni and later in Act Three sings Vitellia's Non piu di fiori from La clemenza di Tito. She does not sing the Queen of the Night's famous second aria. Don Giovanni's Champagne aria becomes a trio. Music from The Magic Flute pops up in strange places and unrecognisable contexts, Pamina even gets some of the Queen of the Night's music. All is linked together with new recitative. All the characters are present, but renamed, apart from Pamina, and the relative balance changed (the Papagena character is expanded).

So why record it?

Young American pianist in UK debut with David Matthew's Piano Concerto

Thomas Nickell - photo Stephen Sullivan

David Matthews' Piano Concerto receives its first London performance on 16 July 2016 when the 17-year-old American pianist Thomas Nickell (read my interview with Thomas) makes his UK debut performing the concerto with the Orchestra of the Swan, conductor David Curtis. Nickell will also be the piano soloist in Bach's Keyboard Concerto in D minor, BWV1052. 

The concert also includes music from Walton's Henry V, Britten's Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge, and Steve Martland's orchestration of Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor, originally written for organ. Rather intriguingly, the concert will be complete by Nickell's performance of his own Piano Sonata No. 3 in C.

David Matthews' Piano Concerto was written in 2010 using just piano and strings. The work was commissioned by the Dartington International Summer School and premiered there by Helen Reid with Trinity College of Music String Ensemble, conducted by Nick Pendlebury.

Full details from the Kings Place website.

A young Marschallin in the making: Gemma Lois Summerfield in recital

Gemma Lois Summerfield

Felix Mendelssohn, Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, Claude Debussy, Richard Strauss;
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 9 2016
Star rating: 4.0
An attractive programme with some moments of great beauty from this young artist

2015 Kathleen Ferrier Award winner Gemma Lois Summerfield has popped up a couple of times on this blog. Ruth caught her January 2016 recital with Simon Lepper at St John's Smith Square (see Ruth's review), and I heard her as Ginevra in the Royal College of Music's production of Handel's Ariodante (see my review).

At the Buxton Festival on 9 July 2016 I caught up with Gemma Lois Summerfield in a revised version of her January 2016 recital, accompanied by Sebastian Wybrew in songs by Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn plus Debussy's Ariettes oubliées and Richard Strauss's Four Lieder Op.27.

The Pavilion Arts Centre is not an ideal recital venue, the acoustics are perhaps a little dry and the location meant that Gemma Lois Summerfield and Sebastian Wybrew's recital had competition from a band playing in the Pavilion Gardens as part of the Buxton Carnival. Though we were given free leaflets containing the translations of the song texts, the lights in the auditorium were turned down so low that reading was impossible.

Looking delightfully summery despite the weather, Gemma Lois Summerfield displayed an attractive stage persona and in some of the songs really communicated with her audience. However, in others she had a tendency to hide behind her music. In the more strophic Mendelssohn songs, though her diction was excellent, we wanted a greater variety of colours in her vibrant lyric line. That said, a persistent catch in her voice seemed to indicate that things were not quite 100%. She overcame this brilliantly but you felt it could not help but create a certain tension.

We opened with a substantial group of songs (too many?) by Felix Mendelssohn and by Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel.

Looking forward to the 2016 Edington Festival

Choirs at the 2015 Edington Festival with Jeremy Summerly,
Matthew Martin, Peter Stevens and Benjamin Nicholas

The Edington Festival is an annual celebration of music within the liturgy, a week in August (this year 21-28 August) when four services per day at Edington Priory Church in Wiltshire provide fine music sung within the context of the liturgy. 

Throughout the week the Offices of Matins and Compline are sung by a Schola Cantorum (directed by Peter Stevens, assistant master of music at Westminster Cathedral), whilst the main services are sung by a choir of men and boys (conducted by Matthew Martin, director of music at Keble College, Oxford) and a mixed voice consort (directed by Jeremy Summerly, director of music at St. Peter's College, Oxford). The festival director is Benjamin Nicholas (director of music at Merton College, Oxford).

The festival runs from 21 August 2016 when there is an opening service of Compline, to 28 August 2016 when the festival closes with Solemn Eucharist which includes Louis Vierne's Messe solennelle. The theme of this year's festival is suitably Shakespearean, The Seven Ages of Man and along the way there will be music by Victoria, Clemens non Papa, Orlando Gibbons, William Byrd, Anton Bruckner, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Sir George Dyson, Benjamin Britten, Sir William Walton, Kenneth Leighton, and Morten Lauridsen to name but a few, and Francis Pott whose festival commission Mihi autem nimis is being premiered at the Choral Evensong on 24 August 2016, which is being broadcast live on BBC Radio 3.

The event is free and unticketed, you just turn up. And now that the church has a wonderful new organ (a Harrison & Harrison installed in 2014), there is the chance to listen to an organ recital for 30 minutes before the main evening service each day.

Full details from the festival website.

New Zealand Youth Choir in London

New Zealand Youth Choir - photo Brooke Baker

St John's Smith Square will be welcoming the New Zealand Youth Choir on 12 July 2016 for a concert which marks the conclusion of the choir's 11th overseas tour. After London, the choir will give a lunch-time performance in the Lady Chapel at Ely Cathedral, and appear in the Cambridge Summer Music Festival with an evening concert in St John’s College Chapel. On this tour, the choir has already taken in Singapore, the Czech Republic, the New Zealand memorial at Le Quesnoy on Northern France, Paris and Oxford.

The choir was formed 37 years ago and features young singers aged 18 to 25 from all over New Zealand. Conductor David Squire has led the ensemble since 2011.

Full details of the tour from the choir's website, concert & ticket information from the St John's Smith Square website.

Visual and aural feast - Handel's Tamerlano in Buxton

Paul Nilon, Simeon John-Wake - Handel Tamerlano - Buxton Festival - photo Robert Workman

Handel Tamerlano; Rupert Enticknap, Paul Nilon, Owen Willetts, Marie Lys, Catherine Hopper, dir: Frances Matthews, English Concert, cond: Laurence Cummings; Buxton Festival
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 11 2016
Star rating: 5.0
Serious psychological drama and seriously good singing

Rupert Enticknap, Catherine Hopper - Handel Tamerlano
Buxton Festival - photo Robert Workman

The third in a remarkable trio of productions at this year's Buxton Festival was Handel's Tamerlano, a co-production between the festival and the English Concert, with Laurence Cummings conducting the English Concert in the pit. Directed by Francis Matthews, designed by Adrian Linford, with lighting by Simon Corder, the production featured Rupert Enticknap as Tamerlano, Paul Nilon as Bajazet, Owen Willetts as Andronico, Marie Lys as Asteria, Catherine Hopper as Irene and Robert Davies as Leone.

One of a trio of great opera's which Handel wrote in a single year, 1724/25, Tamerlano is perhaps less immediately loved than Giulio Cesare and Rodelinda. In contrast to these, Tamerlano has little outward action, little plot, and instead concentrates on the psychological contest between Tamerlano, the Emperor of the Tartars, and his captive Bajazet, Sultan of the Turks. The opera places the five main characters (Tamerlano, Bajazet, his daughter Asteria, her lover Andronico and Tamerlano's betrothed Irene) in a single place and concentrates on their interaction under Tamerlano's imperious interference.

Marie Lys, Paul Nilon - Handel Tamerlano
Buxton Festival - photo Robert Workman

It was Francis Matthews' first Handel opera, yet he clearly 'gets' Handelian opera seria and though the action was busy at times there was a clear sense of him dramatising the music (not just the libretto), nor was there any hint of a suggestion that the action was necessary to keep the audience entertained. This was serious psychological drama, proving yet again that opera seria and da capo arias really can work as thrilling drama in the right hands. It helped that Matthews got some stunning performances from his cast. It says something for the standard of Handel performance at the moment that we can often take for granted the technical abilities of young singers and look for that bit extra. The cast here was all on top form and provided musical delights with that bit extra too.

Adrian Linford created a single dazzling set which housed and concentrated the entire action, encapsulating Francis Matthews idea that Tamerlano is someone for whom anything and anyone can be bought. The set was an Aladdin's cave of great objects, a wall with great objets trouvées embedded, Trajan's column as the centre of a staircase, rich pots, gilt chairs. This Tamerlano was someone powerful enough to collect anything he wanted, and viewed people similarly. The end of the overture opened the action with a visual coup, Simeon John-Wake (Tamerlano's follower) triumphing over Paul Nilon's Bajazet in a pose captured in a painting.

Rupert Enticknap, Marie Lys, Simeon John-Wake - Handel Tamerlano - Buxton Festival - photo Robert Workman

Linford's costumes were equally dazzling and whilst modern dress, Tamerlano and his two followers (Simeon John-Wake and Jennifer Parker) had a touch of the exotic East about them in the style of dress, richness of Tamerlano's fabric and even dressing of hair. That Paul Nilon's Bajazet was just another acquisition was emphasised by his prison being in fact a glass cabinet, Bajazet on display with the other objets. Yet the world created was one of nervousness and suspicion as Tamerlano's two followers constantly eavesdropped, with everyone being just part of Tamerlano's games.