Light Divine: a final glimpse of treble Aksel Rykkvin

Handel, Albinoni, Ritter, Rameau; Mark Bennett, Aksel Rykkvin, The MIN Ensemble; Signum Classics
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 13 Mar 2018 Star rating: 3.5 (★★★½)
The Norwegian treble returns for a final disc of baroque arias for voice and trumpet

The Norwegian treble Aksel Rykkvin released a disc of baroque arias on Signum Classics in 2016 [see my review], now this latest disc (recorded in July 2017) captures Rykkvin's voice just before it changed (since Autumn 2017 he has sung as a baritone). The repertoire is music by Handel and Rameau, with an emphasis on both the voice and the trumpet, with Rykkvin performing with Mark Bennett (trumpet) and the MIN Ensemble (ensemble director Lazar Miletic).

The MIN Ensemble is a modern instrument chamber orchestra from Norway, and on this disc, it combines its modern instruments with baroque trumpet, flute, lute and harpsichord to give a very engaging account of this music, most of which fairly dances off the page.

The music is arranged effectively in two continuous sequences, first Handel and then Rameau, separated by an Albinoni aria and a Ciaccona by Czech composer Philipp Jakob Rittler. Some of the music has been arranged for the forces so that the disc opens with music originally in Handel's  Water Music, now adjusted to feature a pair of trumpets.

For the Handel sequence we move from the fanfares of the Water Music, through the opening voice and trumpet duet Eternal Source of Light Divine from the Birthday Ode to Queen Anne, the Passacaille from the Trio Sonata in G major, the aria What passion cannot music aise and quell from The Ode for St Cecilia's Day, and finally Alla caccia from the cantata Diana Cacciatrice.

David Hare's The Moderate Soprano at the Duke of York's Theatre

David Hare: The Moderate Soprano - Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Nancy Carroll, Roger Allam, Paul Jesson, Anthony Calf - Duke of Yorks Theatre (Photo Johan-Perrson)

Paul Jesson - (Photo Johan-Perrson)

David Hare The Moderate Soprano; Roger Allam, Nancy Carroll, Anthony Calf, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Paul Jesson, Jade Williams, dir: Jeremy Herrin
Reviewed by Anthony Evans on 12 April 2018 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
"I want to make the world a better place" – John Christie

Born in St. Leonards-on-Sea, David Hare returns to East Sussex to focus his theatrical chops on that most English of institutions the Glyndebourne Festival, with his play The Moderate Soprano which opened at the Duke of York's Theatre, directed by Jeremy Herrin, on 12 April 2018. Nancy Carroll plays the eponymous soprano with Roger Allam as the romantic late starter John Christie. Anthony Calf, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd and Paul Jesson are the three political exiles Ebert, Bing and "waving the baguette" Busch. Whilst Jade Williams holds the fort as the uncomplaining Jane Smith.

On the face of it, Glyndebourne should be easy pickings for David Hare a connoisseur of the minute dissections of our public institutions. There’s a public inclination to hate people who go to the opera and Glyndebourne with its rich patrons, manicured lawns and champagne fuels the suspicion that anyway opera is really just a side-show for dilettante toffs. Why should we care? Hare has an answer.

Into the musical melting pot again - Ensemble Tempus Fugit at Tara Arts

In 1690 the East India Company was granted a trading licence by the Nawab of Bengal for three villages on the East bank of the Hooghly river. By 1780, the company had transformed the villages into Calcutta, a small English city. Musicians travelled from London to India, bringing the music of Handel, Corelli and others, whilst others played their harpsichords with Indian classical musicians and transcribed Indian music into European notation.

It is this musical melting pot which Ensemble Tempus Fugit, director Katie de la Matter, explored in their programme Calcutta at the 2017 Brighton Early Music Festival in a sold-out St. Bartholomew’s Church — and will bring to London's Tara Arts Theatre on 21-22 April (just 10mins from Waterloo by train). The material is completely fascinating, including Western transcriptions of Hindu and Bengali music (done often at the behest of the wives of English residents), as well as local Indian versions songs. The video above is of Paradevate - a setting of Ap shenkin, a Welsh folksong, by Muthuswami Dikshitar c.1800 (performed by Ensemble Tempus Fugit, Debipriya Sircar (vocals), Jamie Akers (theorbo) & Katie De La Matter (harpsichord)).

Indian music and dancing groups were invited into some British-Indian homes, and mainly female colonials would transcribe the songs (or have the songs transcribed) using a harpsichord or pianoforte, this all being part of the greater European 18th-century trend to collect ‘national airs’ — in the same vein as collections of Scots tunes, for example. One of these women, Margaret Fowkes, described the process:

‘I have often made the Musicians tune their instruments to the harpsichord that I might join their little band. They always seemed delighted with the accompaniment of the harpsichord and sung with uncommon animation, and a pleasure to themselves, which was expressed in their faces.'

Another woman, Sophie Plowden hired the musician John Braganza to transcribe songs and had the results put into a beautifully illuminated manuscript with illustrations of Indian musicians by local artists (which contain some of the earliest depictions of some Indian instruments). This survives in the Fitzwilliam Museum as MS380 and forms the basis for Ensemble Tempus Fugit's project.

The performers include James Hall (counter-tenor), Debipriya Sircar (Indian classical vocalist), Jonathan Mayer (sitar), Jamie Akers (lutes), Emily Baines (early wind), Lucia Capellaro (viola da gamba) George Clifford (violin) Katie De La Matter (harpsichord & creative direction), and Peyvand Sadeghian (puppets). And the ensemble will meld this unusual combination of instruments and traditions, with period music, Indian song, puppetry and drama to tell the story of music melting pot on the streets and at the soirées of Calcutta

The ensemble has just received Arts Council support to tour to SAMA Arts in London, Brighton’s Refugee Week, and the Left Bank Opera Festival in Leeds.

Further information from the Tara Arts website, or from the Ensemble Tempus Fugit website.
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Handel's Teseo at the London Handel Festival

Hippolyte Flandrin (1806-1864): Theseus Recognized by his Father (1832),
École Nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris. Wikimedia Commons.

Handel Teseo; Leila Zanetta, Meinir Wyn Roberts, Patrick Terry, La Nuova Musica, David Bates; London Handel Festival at St George's Church, Hanover Square
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 12 April 2018 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
Handel's third London opera, in a finely dramatic concert performance with students from the Royal Academy of Music

Handel's Teseo is a fascinating experiment, the only time the composer moved significantly away from the conventions of Italian opera (until he abandoned it entirely for English oratorio). Based on Quinault's French libretto for Lully, Teseo is in five acts (rather than the usual three) and the convention of the exit aria is entirely avoided, with characters remaining on stage for significant amounts of time. Handel would base other operas, such as Amadigi di Gaula, on French librettos, but never again would he depart so consistently from Italian operatic convention, and in fact, the joy of some of his later operas is the way he plays with the audience's expectations of the form.

Maria Callas as Medea in Pier Paolo Pasolini's film Medea

For the final Handel opera at this year's London Handel Festival at St George's Church, Hanover Square on Thursday 12 April 2018, David Bates conducted La Nuova Musica with a cast drawn from the Royal Academy of Music (there were, in fact, two casts, with a second performing on 13 April). We saw Patrick Terry as Teseo, Leila Zanette as Medea, Meinir Wyn Roberts as Agilea, Frances Gregory as Egeo, Alexander Simpson as Arcane, Emilie Cavallo as Clizia and Darwin Prakash as Sacerdote, many of whom had taken part on the recent performances of Jonathan Dove's Flight in the new theatre at the Royal Academy of Music [see my review].

When it was first performed in 1713, Teseo was presented with all sorts of scenic transformations and magical effects. Winton Dean in his book on Handel's Italian operas suggests that the opera may have originally been intended to be even closer to the French model with dancing as well, and it still has the descent of the goddess Minerva at the end for the lieito fine. In concert, we are left to imagine all these, though it was a shame that La Nuova Musica's excellent printed libretto omitted the stage directions.

Whilst the leading role is technically Teseo (who gets most arias) and the heroine is Agilea, it is very much Medea who dominates the action. She is a wonderfully complex creation, the second of Handel's quartet of fascinating sorceresses (Armida in Rinaldo, Medea in Teseo, Melissa in Amadigi di Gaula and Alcina), and it is into this character that Handel breathes life. Medea is unusual in that, unlike most Handel villains, she neither dies nor gets her comeuppance (Armida repents and converts to Christianity, both Melissa and Alcina die). Instead, unrepentant and a bad girl still, Medea has a final dramatic accompagnato, torches everything and then leaves gloriously in a chariot pulled by dragons.

Handel's Giulio Cesare from Early Opera Company at London Handel Festival

Handel: Giulio Cesare, first edition of July 1724
printed by Cluer and Creake

Handel Giulio Cesare; Tim Mead, Anna Devin, Hilary Summers, Rachel Kelley, Rupert Enticknap, Early Opera Company, Christian Curnyn; London Handel Festival at St John's Smith Square
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 12 April 2018
Star rating: 5.0 (★★★★)
Handel's great opera in a concert performance full of character and virtuosity

Whilst it is a truism that every performance of an opera is different, with an opera as long as George Frideric Handel's Giulio Cesare this is particularly the case as each production makes its own decisions about what to keep and what to omit. Christian Curnyn and Early Opera Company's performance of Giulio Cesare at St John's Smith Square on Wednesday 11 April 2018 as part of the London Handel Festival was the third outing of this opera in 12 months, each one very different. English Touring Opera included every aria and spread the performance over two nights [see my review], Bury Court Opera included as many arias as possible and trimmed the piece by removing B sections and Da Capo repeats [see my review], whereas Christian Curnyn followed the Charles Mackerras route [you can hear Mackerras's account on Chandos] and kept the integrity of the arias but removed 'lesser' ones to keep the running time to 3 hours 30 minutes (including one interval after the opening scene of Act Two).

Curnyn and Early Opera Company fielded a very strong cast, with Tim Mead as Giulio Cesare, Anna Devin as Cleopatra, Hilary Summers as Cornelia, Rachel Kelly as Sesto, Rupert Enticknap as Tolomeo, Callum Thorpe as Achilla and James Hall as Nireno. Interestingly, the last time I saw Curnyn and Early Opera Company performing Giulio Cesare (probably 20 years ago) was at St John's Smith Square, but that time Hilary Summers played the title role!

This was very much a concert performance, the orchestra was centre stage and we were greeted by a forest of music stands. But the cast members, whilst using scores, were not welded to them and each gave a distinctive performance, creating a sense of real character. Whilst there was no space for physical interactions, there were plenty of small details in individual performances to bring out character so this account of the opera was not just about fine singing (of which there was plenty), but text and narrative too. The opera was sung in Italian and we were provided with a printed text, Brian Trowell's translation was used (which features on the Mackerras recording), a fine singing version but perhaps not ideal for a printed translation when a more accurate rendering of the Italian might be preferable.

Pirates ahoy: Moonfleet at Salisbury Playhouse

The composer Russell Hepplewhite has popped up on this blog quite a few times, he was responsible for the music for English Touring Opera's Laika the Spacedog [see my review], Borka the Goose with no feathers [see my review], Shackleton's Cat [see my review] and Silver Electra [see my review] and The Price for W11 Opera [see my review]. Now the Salisbury Playhouse is premiering his musical Moonfleet with book and lyrics by Gareth Machin, artistic director of the theatre, on 19 April 2018.

Moonfleet is based on the novel by J Meade Falkner first published in 1898; set in 18th century Dorset, the piece deals with a young man's search for adventure, set in the village of Moonfleet which is a village of intrigue and drama where shadowy smugglers lurk. Gareth Machin also directs with a cast which includes Simon Butteriss, Dom Hartley-Harris, Rhona McGregor, Dan Smith, Ruth Betteridge, Rebecca Lock, Susannah Van Den Berg and Ashley Mercer

Moonfleet runs at Salisbury Playhouse from Thursday 19 April to Saturday 5 May. The production is supported by Salisbury Playhouse’s Commissioning Circle. Full details from the Salisbury Playhouse website.

Concrete Dreams

Southbank Centre: Concrete Dreams

Concrete Dreams; Southbank Centre
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 10 Apr 2018 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
An immersive experience and unusual journey celebrating the history of the Queen Elizabeth Hall, Purcell Room and Heywood Gallery

Southbank Centre: Concrete Dreams

The Southbank Centre's Queen Elizabeth Hall (QEH), Purcell Room and Haywardd Gallery complex has been refurbished and renewed following a two year closure, very much devoted to rediscovering landmarks original Brutalist beauty. Both the Heywood and the QEH recently re-opened and as part of the festivities, there is an immersive exhibition, Concrete Dreams designed by the artists and performer collective KlangHaus and design practice LYN Atelier. This immersive journey explores the history of the hall, and it also allows the visitors a remarkably different view of the venues, taking them back-stage.

The tour starts in the gleaming QEH foyer, the marble floor glowing white and the light streaming in from the new windows, down the marble access staircase, one of the most striking parts of the old building and out past the concrete exterior - Brutalist perhaps but surprisingly subtle and detailed, 'a timber building cast in stone'.

Through the artists' entrance and up into the scenery dock life, the journey enlivened with stencilled quotations, copies of early documents and drawings, videos, projections and recordings, capturing the essence of the remarkable project. All this is the result of the mining of the extensive archives by KlangHaus. One corridor is papered with copies of the early architects' drawings and the sketches made by the builders (the architects' plans being too valuable to take on site).

Streetwise Opera's Tell me the truth about Love

Streetwise Opera is presenting its latest opera, Tell me the truth about love, at the Sage Gateshead on 14 & 15 April 2018. 

The opera takes its title from one of Benjamin Britten's cabaret songs, alongside new compositions by Will Todd and Anna Appleby, and arrangements by Iain Farrington of classical, pop and folk tunes mixed into the opera. The performance will bring together participants from Streetwise Opera workshops in Newcastle and Gateshead who have experienced homelessness, professional singers including mezzo soprano Anna Huntley, and musicians from Royal Northern Sinfonia conducted by Timothy Burke. The production is directed by Bijan Sheibani, designed by Samal Blak with choreography Polly Bennett.

Further details from the Sage Gateshead website.

Britten, Bernstein, Moore, Sutherland, Chagall, Piper - Walter Hussey & his commissions

Peter Webster Church and patronage in 20th century Britain: Walter Hussey and the Arts; Palgrave Macmillan
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 10 April 2018 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
A look at how Walter Hussey came to commission such a remarkable range of major 20th artists for the church

Walter Hussey, sometime Rector of St Matthew's Church Northampton and then Dean of Chichester, is an important figure in 20th-century art and music. Hussey was responsible for commissioning such figures as Benjamin Britten, Edmund Rubbra, Leonard Bernstein, Lennox Berkeley, Henry Moore, Graham Sutherland, John Piper, Marc Chagall and many more. Peter Webster's book Church and patronage in 20th century Britain: Walter Hussey and the Arts in Palgrave Macmillan's Histories of the Sacred and Secular series provides some remarkable illumination as to how this striking body of work came about.

The book is not a biography, it is, in fact, an academic study of both Hussey and the role of the arts in the mid-20th-century church of England. But anyone who is interested in learning more about the creation of Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb and Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms will find this a fascinating and illuminating read. Webster writes easily and engagingly so that the book has a far from academic tone about it.

Webster explains early on on the book that Hussey's surviving papers, whilst extensive, do not always provide the ability to look into Hussey's motives, partly because he rarely kept copies of his own letters. Importantly for a book which endeavours to put Hussey's artistic endeavours within the context of the 20th-century church, Hussey has effectively left little information about his devotional beliefs, or given a detailed theological basis for his commissioning activity.

Webster does a great job in following the history of Hussey's activity and putting it in the right context. Hussey's commissioning was not simply as a patron, but as church patron and the art was intended to sit within the liturgical atmosphere of the church. Apart from Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, all the music that Hussey commissioned was intended for performance during a church service, it had to fit in. Similarly, works of art, like the two Graham Sutherland pictures, the Henry Moore sculpture, the John Piper tapestry and the Marc Chagall window, had to fit into a church environment elicit the right response from the churchgoers.

Europe and the world: a symphony of cultures

The British Museum is holding a music festival, Europe and the world: a symphony of cultures which will open up the museum's galleries to a whole range of concerts between 16 and 29 April 2018. Whilst some of the events are evening ones when the museum is closed, many are daytime events intended to interact with the museum visitors. The festival is the brainchild of Hartwig Fischer, director of the British Museum, and Daniel Kühnel, artistic director of the festival and intendant of the Hamburg Symphony.

The festival is not intended to turn the museum's rooms into concert halls, but to encourage the public to ask questions about their interactions with the museum's exhibits, between the different areas of the collection in the museum. The festival's theme is Europe's connection with the world and vice versa. Various venues around the museum will be used including the reading room, the Parthenon galleries and the Egyptian galleries.

The programmes are intended to create encounters between cultures and between moments in history. The opening night, which takes place on 16 April in the Parthenon Gallery, will combine Richard Strauss's Metamorphosen, his lament for the destruction of European culture, with Berio's Recital for Cathy which Kühnel sees as asking questions about what art can be and what does culture mean, and Scelsi's Xnoybis with its meditation on Buddhist thought and culture. The final concert which takes place in the Reading Room, combines Bartok, Nono and Hosokawa, again works which reflect and refract ideas about European and other cultures.

A more intriguing encounter takes place in the Egyptian galleries on Wed 18 April 2018, when there will be performances of gagaku, Japanese classical music. Not an obvious combination, but Kühnel sees the Japanese music as formal, rigid and spiritual and feels that the encounter with the similarly rigid Egyptian culture (both ancient and both foreign to us), will prove enlightening. There is more Oriental music when Zhang Jun brings Chinese kungqu opera to the museum on Friday 20 April, but the performance will be an interesting encounter as Zhang Jun will be performing a 75 minute, one-man version of Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Other events include classical and traditional Arab music, an encounter between Perian, Ottoman and French Baroque music, Ligeti's Poeme Symphonique (in the Reading Room), music by Golijov and by John Cage and Stockhausen's Telemusik and Nachtmusik

There is something refreshingly conceptual about the idea behind the festival, it is intended to make the listeners ask questions rather than providing answers and it is certainly a long way from the sort of festival which makes a museum simply a nice backdrop for the music. It is the third such festival that Kühnel has organised, the first in 2015 was with Fischer in Dresden (where Fischer was based before he came to the British Museum) and the second in Jerusalem. In each case, the festival explores new ways of interacting with what Ficher calls encyclopedic museums.One interesting aspect to the experience is that both Kühnel and Fischer feel that having immersive, interactive music will make listeners think more about the experience with the objects in the museum which are behind glass and no longer interactive.

Of course, quite what the average museum-goer will make of wandering into a gallery to find Scelsi piano music or Byzantine chant playing is anyone's guess, but that is part of the festival's charm.

Full details from the British Museum website.

International Opera Awards 2018

Teresa Berganza, winner of the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2018 International Opera Awards
(photo Chris Christodoulou)

The 2018 International Opera Awards were held at the London Coliseum on Monday 9 April 2018, celebrating significant achievements in the world of opera. Hosted by Petroc Trelawney and directed by Ella Marchment (herself a recipient of in International Opera Awards Bursary). 

Anne-Sophie Duprels performing at the 2018 International Opera Awards
(photo Chris Christodoulou)

The evening featured live performance from the Orpheus Sinfonia, conductor Oliver Gooch, with a chorus made up of past and current International Opera Awards Bursary recipients. The chorus and orchestra opened proceedings with ‘Wach’ auf, es nahet gen den Tag’ from Wagner’s Die Meistersinger and during the evening soprano Anush Hovhannisyan sang music from Rossini’s Semiramide, soprano Anne-Sophie Duprels sang music from Mascagni’s Iris, mezzo-soprano Wallis Giunta sang music from Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus, baritone Gordon Bintner sang music from Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, bass-baritone Brindley Sherratt sang music from Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra, and soprano Camilla Tilling sang music from Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice. 

Noah Mosley conducted his own A History of Opera in 4 minutes, an enjoyable and imaginative whisk through 400 years of opera, my favourite section being Tristan spliced with the Can-Can from Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld then slipping directly into Carmen. The evening was brought to a close with the ‘Make our Garden Grow’ from Leonard Bernstein’s Candide with Toby Spence as Candide and Sky Ingram as Cunegonde.

The awards were highly international, with finalists from all over the globe and a jury of near 30 people, chaired by John Allison (editor of Opera magazine). Quite how they made their decisions I don't know, when faced with so many companies and artists deserving recognition. As an example of the sort of problems faced by the judges, the Opera Company Award included Bavarian State Opera, La Fenice, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Opera Graz, Opera North and Teatro Real (Madrid) in the finalists, companies who vary in size enormously, how on earth do you begin to compare Bavarian State Opera (the winner) to Opera North!

Sky Ingram and Toby Spence performing at the
2018 International Opera Awards (photo Chris Christodoulou)

The Education and Outreach Award, presented by Nadine Benjamin, went to Opera Holland Park for their Inspire programme. The Young Singer Award, presented by Gerald Finley, went to the Canadian mezzo-soprano Wallis Giunta (see my review of her performance in Opera North's production of Ravel's L'enfant et les sortileges). The Newcomer Award went to Czech director Barbora Horáková Joly [see my review of her production of Verdi's Un giorno di regno at the Heidenheim Opera Festival]. The Philanthropist Award, presented by Stuart Skelton, went to Annette Campbell-White who is on the advisory board of Garsington Opera

The Lifetime Achievement Award, presented by Sir Jeremy Isaacs (former director of the Royal Opera), went to the Spanish mezzo-soprano Teresa Berganza. The award for Female Singer went to Swedish soprano Malin Byström (recently seen in Richard Strauss's Salome at Covent Garden, see my review), and Polish tenor Piotr Beczała was awarded the Male Singer award, whilst the Readers’ Award went to soprano Pretty Yende, who received more than 10,000 votes online.

The Conductor Award went to Vladimir Jurowski, who conducted the Brett Dean's Hamlet at Glyndebourne, which received the World Premiere Award [see my review of the touring production of the opera]. The Director Award went to Mariusz Treliński, the Designer Award to Paul Steinberg (who designed the Rossini Semiramide at Covent Garden, see my review).

The CD (Complete Opera) Award went to Erato's recording of Berlioz'  Les troyens, conducted by John Nelson, with Joyce DiDonato, Michael Spyres and Marianne Lemieux [see my review].

I will also be writing about the event for the Russian Art & Culture website.

2018 WINNERS

CHORUS: MusicAeterna
CONDUCTOR: Vladimir Jurowski
DESIGNER: Paul Steinberg
DIRECTOR: Mariusz Treliński
EDUCATION AND OUTREACH: Opera Holland Park
FEMALE SINGER: Malin Byström
FESTIVAL: Festival Verdi Parma
LEADERSHIP IN OPERA: Bernd Loebe
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT: Teresa Berganza
MALE SINGER: Piotr Beczała
NEW PRODUCTION: Britten: Billy Budd, d. Deborah Warner (Teatro Real, Madrid)
NEWCOMER: Barbora Horáková Joly (Director)
OPERA COMPANY: Bayerische Staatsoper
OPERA ORCHESTRA: Teatro alla Scala, Milan
PHILANTHROPY: Annette Campbell-White
READERS’ AWARD: Pretty Yende
RECORDING (COMPLETE OPERA): Berlioz: Les Troyens (Erato)
RECORDING (SOLO RECITAL): Veronique Gens: Visions (Alpha)
REDISCOVERED WORK: Krenek: Drei Opern (Oper Frankfurt)
WORLD PREMIERE: Brett Dean: Hamlet (Glyndebourne)
YOUNG SINGER: Wallis Giunta

Shedding light on Claude Le Jeune's psalm settings

Claude Le Jeune psalms from Dodecacorde; choir fo St Catharine's College, Cambridge, Edward Wickham; Resonus Classics
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 3 Apr 2018 Star rating: 3.5 (★★★½)
Shedding a light on little-known repertoire, surprisingly complex polyphonic psalm settings based on the Genevan psalter

At first sight a disc of psalm tunes based on the Genevan Psalter does not seem like a particularly musically enticing prospect, but in the psalms of Claude Le Jeune, Edward Wickham and the choir of St Catharine's College, Cambridge have found a little gem. On this disc from Resonus Classics we have four of Claude Le Jeune's psalm settings from his Dodecacorde.

Claude Le Jeune was a French Protestant composer who lived during the complex Wars of Religion in 16th century France. His Dodécacorde is a set of 12 psalm settings (one in each mode), which was published in 1598. The piece was reprinted once, in 1618 with different texts, and then seems to have disappeared. Though each psalm is based on a tune from the Genevan Psalter (which included such still performed tunes as the Old Hundredth), Le Jeune's settings are far from simple, certainly not the plain and direct psalm tunes that we might expect to come out of the Calvinist psalter.

Claude Le Jeune had strong experience of the Wars of Religion, he was caught up in the siege of Paris (and in fact only the intervention of a fellow composer and a music loving sergeant saved his manuscript of  Dodécacorde). Le Jeune's response to the troubles seems to have been to set a sequence of psalms which treat on peace and on strong Kingship. Each psalm is based on the Genevan psalm tune, but this forms just the cantus firmus, around it Le Jeune creates elaborate polyphony. But it is polyphony which seems neither to partake of Italian or French sacred music of the period.

Pro Youth Philharmonia makes its debut

In April a new orchestra for young professionals aged 22 to 32 gives its debut concerts. The Pro Youth Philharmonia will be performing at Cadogan Hall, London (13 April), the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford (14 April) and Victoria Hall, Stoke-on-Trent (15 April). The orchestra is the idea of the flautist Wissam Boustany, who conducts the ensemble and will be joined by a team of prominent musicians who will mentor this first tour. 

Stephanie Gonley, leader of the English Chamber Orchestra, will combine her role as soloist with coaching the strings, horn player Jonathan Williams will work with the brass, and the flautist and pedagogue Anna Noakes will be the orchestra’s woodwind mentor. The programme will consist of James MacMillan's Confession of Isobel Gowdie, Sergei Prokofiev's Violin Concerto No.2 and Béla Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra.

The orchestra will use Boustany's Method Called Love, his own rather different approach to instrumental training, as well as inspiring audiences and an extensive educational outreach programme, teaching children how to integrate love on their journey through life. The orchestra's educational and outreach projects will include Art/Poetry Competitions, with the winning art work used for concert posters and the winning poem being read in concerts. There will also be an Emerging Musician Programme for a very promising A-level instrumentalist to join PYP for rehearsals and a concert.

Full details from the Pro Youth Philharmonia website.

Journey to Nidaros

Alexander Chapman Campbell Journey to Nidaros; Alexander Chapman Campbell
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Mar 07 2018 Star rating: 3.0
Lyrical new classical music, inspired by a walk through Norway

Journey to Nidaros presents a sequence of nine piano pieces by the young Scottish composer/pianist Alexander Chapman Campbell, issued on his own label. The music describes a journey through Norway which Chapman Campbell undertook in 2015, walking from Oslo to historic Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim. Rather than being a reflection on the journey undertaken in quietude after the event, the pieces were written during the journey and Chapmen Campbell's notes in the CD booklet describe how coming upon pianos by accident led to the merging of musical ideas with the walk through Norwegian forests.

Each piece describes a particular moment, from the start at home through to the latter part of the journey. The cathedral itself is missing, this is a description of the wilds and the solitary aspects of such a walk. There are nine pieces in all, each around four or five minutes, making a total of 40 minutes.

This is very much in the new classical style, existing in the limnal zone between jazz, contemporary, pop and classical, its influences broad and combining classical ideas with structures from other musics, seamlessly blending styles.

Fantasies can be dangerous: Mark-Anthony Turnage's 'Coraline'

Mark-Anthony Turnage: Coraline - Mary Bevan (Coraline), Kitty Whatley (Other Mother)
and Ghost Children (Dominic Sedgwick, Harry Nicoll, Gillian Keith)
Royal Opera (Photo ROH | Stephen Cummiskey)

Mark-Anthony Turnage Coraline; Mary Bevan, Kitty Whately, Alexander Robin Baker, Britten Sinfonia, Sian Edwards: Royal Opera House at the Barbican Theatre
Reviewed by Anthony Evans on 7 Apr 2018 Star rating: 3.0 (★★★)
Strong performances of Mark-Anthony Turnage's new opera

Neil Gaiman’s 2002 novella Coraline is a coming of age tale that has won more plaudits than you can shake a stick at and Coraline’s deliciously dark journey into another world has been adapted for film, tv, a comic book, musical and even a video game. Now in 2018 The Royal Opera in a co-production with Folkoperan, Opera de Lille, Theater Freiburg and Victorian Opera bring us Mark-Anthony Turnage’s Coraline the opera. This world premiere at the Barbican Theatre was directed by Aletta Collins with the Britten Sinfonia under the musical direction of Sian Edwards. At this performance (7 April 2018), our plucky heroine was Mary Bevan with Kitty Whately and Alexander Robin Baker as her parents.

Coraline’s discovery of a bricked-up door which becomes a doorway to another world propels her on an adventure away from the rain and crazy infuriating grown-ups into a world where all her desires can come true.

The Chichester connection - celebrating Bernstein

Walter Hussey

The Chichester Psalms is a most unlikely piece, a setting of texts from the Psalms in Hebrew for soloist, choir and instrumental ensemble/orchestra written for the Southern Cathedrals Festival in 1965 by America's leading composer, Leonard Bernstein. Who knew that it would go on to be one of Bernstein's most popular non-theatre works and, unusually for Bernstein, the work crosses the boundaries between classical and Broadway as Chichester Psalms incorporates unused material from a pair of musicals, The Skin of our Teeth (which never saw the light of day), and West Side Story.

The work owes its existence to Walter Hussey, then Dean of Chichester Cathedral and a character whose involvement in the arts included commissioning an altarpiece painted by Graham Sutherland, stained glass windows by Marc Chagall, a sculpture by Henry Moore, a litany and anthem by W.H. Auden, and the cantata Rejoice in the Lamb by Benjamin Britten. Hussey did not just commission Bernstein, he developed a warm relationship with the composer as their correspondance testifies, and the Bernstein family would come to Chichester for the UK premiere of the work (the world premiere was given in New York under Bernstein's baton).

It is this Chichester connection which is celebrated in the festival Bernstein in Chichester which takes place from now until December 2018 in an around Chichester. The centrepiece of the festival is a performance of Bernstein's Chichester Psalms in Chichester Cathedral with Marin Alsop conducting the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and the choirs of Chichester, Salisbury and Winchester Cathedrals (the three choirs which premiered the work). Also in the concert will be Bernstein's Symphony No. 1 'Jeremiah' a work he completed just before Chichester Psalms, but though the two have Hebrew psalm texts in common they are very different works.

Around this event, the festival has put together an imaginative series of events. The relationship between Bernstein and Walter Hussey is the subject of Peter McEnery's play Walter & Lenny which he will be performing at the festival, there will also be an exhibition at West Sussex Record Office curated by Peter Webster who has recently written a book on Walter Hussey's patronage of the arts. In connection with this, Nigel Simoene, who edited Bernstein's letters, will be giving a talk, and there is a symposium at Pallant House on Walter Hussey

Other performances at the festival include Bernstein's opera Trouble in Tahiti from Stage Left Project, a celebrartion of Bernstein's life devised by Carl Davis and Pamela Howard,  the Dave Brubeck Quartet (with Dave Brubeck's son Darius), a Bernstein cabaret and much more.

Dame Patricia Routledge, who worked with Bernstein on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and Edward Seckerson, who was one of the last people to interview Bernstein, will be remembering Bernstein, and so will Humphrey Burton who was a friend and colleague of Bernstein's as well as writing his biography.

Full details of the festival from the Bernstein in Chichester website

Philip Venables: The Gender Agenda & 4:48 Psychosis

The composer Philip Venables has two challenging works being performed in London during April. His 2016 opera 4:48 Psychosis returns to the Lyric Hammersmith in the Royal Opera's production, whilst The Gender Agenda is performed by the London Sinfonietta at the Southbank Centre on 12 April.

Venables' 4:48 Psychosis is inspired by Sarah Kane's final play, directed by Ted Huffman with Gweneth-Ann Rand, Lucy Schaufer, Samantha Price, Susanna Hurrell, Lucy Hall and Rachael Lloyd. Kane’s play, first performed posthumously in 2000, draws on her own struggles with depression. It does not specify cast or stage directions, presenting 24 fragmented episodes; dark and at times harrowing, but leavened with poetry, humour and a humane warmth. Venables sets the play for six female singers and chamber ensemble.

Further information from the Royal Opera House website.

A challenge of a different sort is presented in The Gender Agenda. Performance artist David Hoyle will be the gameshow host and compère for the world premiere of Venables’ The Gender Agenda. The newly re-opened Queen Elizabeth Hall will be turned into a gameshow and its audience into contestants. Complete with challenges and commercials, The Gender Agenda includes all the gameshow features you’d expect, but turned on its head – think The Generation Game meets South Park to create an irreverent and funny exploration of gender (in)equality, with various rounds that reflect gender issues such as manspreading, genderising children and female hair removal. The London Sinfonietta is conducted by Jessica Cottis, and Ted Huffman directs.

Further information from the Southbank Centre website.

Competitive edge: Thomas Arne's 'The Judgement of Paris' and arias from Handel's 'Semele'

Angelica Kauffman, The Judgement of Paris c. 1770-1797

Arne The Judgement of Paris, Handel Semele (excerpts); Soraya Mafi, Gillian Ramm, Susanna Fairburn, Ed Lyon, Anthony Gregory, The Brook Street Band, John Andrews; the London Handel Festival at St George's Church, Hanover Square
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on 6 Apr 2018 Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
Two settings of Congreve from 1740s London, Arne's little known The Judgement of Paris and Handel's well known Semele

The restoration playwright  William Congreve's opera librettos, The Judgement of Paris and Semele, failed to spark an English opera tradition but they would have an intriguing after life. The Judgement of Paris was written for the famous competition in 1701-1703 when John Weldon, Daniel Purcell, Gottfried Finger and John Eccles each set the libretto and eventually John Weldon's setting won (though Eccles' was expected to). Eccles went on to write Semele to Congreve's words, but this fine work failed to be performed and English opera died a death, with Italian opera being taken up by the English nobility.

Both Congreve librettos would be set by subsequent generations, whilst Handel's Semele (using Congreve) is the best known, his younger contemporary Thomas Arne set The Judgement of Paris. Those with long memories may remember Anthony Rooley and the Consorte of Musicke performing the three surviving operas from 1701-1703 (Finger's setting has been lost) at the BBC Proms with the audience voting (this time Eccles won), and in 1710 Bampton Classical Opera performed Thomas Arne's setting [read a review on Bachtrack]. And in 2004 Anthony Rooley recorded Eccles Semele with Florida State University and the disc is well worth seeking out for those interested in the history of English Opera.

As part of the London Handel Festival at St George's Church, Hanover Square, The Brook Street Band, conductor John Andrews, presented a performance of Thomas Arne's 1742 setting of The Judgement of Paris with Ed Lyon as Paris, Soraya Mafi as Venus, Anthony Gregory as Mercury, Gillian Ramm as Juno and Susanna Fairbairn as Pallas. The evening was completed by a selection of arias from Handel's Semele, with the audience members voting at the beginning of the evening for their favourite arias and the top six being performed by the soloists. An intriguing link to the original competition and a novel way of selection excerpts.

Arne's and Handel's settings of Congreve have a number of tantalising links. In the late 1730s and early 1740s Handel was coming to the end of his engagement with Italian opera. His own performances of Italian opera in London had been challenged by the success of such English ballad operas as Lampe's The Dragon of Wantley (1737), and he had also had a stroke that year. His opera Deidamia (1741) would be his last Italian opera in London. In 1742 he and his company were invited to Dublin where Messiah was premiered and the great success rather buoyed the composer.

Whilst Handel was away, Thomas Arne and his company mounted a double bill of Handel's Alexander's Feast and Arne's new setting of The Judgement of Paris, amongst the cast was the tenor John Beard who was renowned for his Handel roles but who did not accompany Handel to Dublin. It is inconceivable that Handel did not know about these performances, and in fact, Arne was in Dublin too for benefit performances towards the end of Handel's period there. In his article in the programme book John Andrews suggests that Handel my have hit upon Congreve as a possible, literate solution to the English opera problem. The result was Semele, which with its risque nature and hints of satire on the relationship between King George II and his mistress, the Countess of Yarmouth, did not go down well. The result was that English opera remained on the sidelines, and Handel developed the oratorio.

A labour of love: new musical directions at Finchcocks House

Finchcocks Manor House

Buying a significant country house is not for everyone, it takes a particular type of bravery and clear-sightedness, particularly when the house comes with a significant history. Finchcocks is an early Georgian manor house near Goudhurst in Kent which from 1970 to 2016 housed the much loved Finchcocks Musical Museum, Richard Burnett's collection of historic keyboard instruments. But that is what Neil and Harriet Nichols have done

Neil Nichols visited Finchcocks Musical Museum as a small boy and had a memorable trip, but then never really thought about the house again. In 2016, Richard Burnett decided to downsize, part of the collection of historic keyboard instruments was auctioned off and the house put up for sale.

Neil was taking piano lessons, something he had returned to as an adult, and happened to notice a brochure for the auction at his piano teacher's. He had missed the auction, but the house intrigued him and when they saw it, he and his wife, Harriet, fell in love with it. Having two pairs of twins, the eldest pair about to go to school for the first time, they conceived the idea of buying Finchcocks and using it as a family home.  It was a lovely setting and an ideal time to relocate before the children started school.

The piano cellar at Finchcocks

Though the main house was to be used as a family home again, Neil and his wife wanted to keep something of the musical atmosphere of Finchcocks, and so the idea of running courses for adult learners was conceived of. Neil explains, from his own experience, that adult learners do not always progress and they can find it difficult to fit lessons into ordinary life. So Finchcocks would provide short immersive courses aimed at adults.

In addition to the main house, Finchcocks also has a coach house, a huge and rather unloved place which they converted into accommodation with eight bedrooms and bathrooms for the visiting pianists.


During the 1960s Finchcocks was a ballet school and the basement of the main house used as a canteen, this was transformed into the cafe when it became the musical museum. Neil and his team determined to restore the space for use by the piano courses. Having stripped off the layers of paint (using half a tonne of alkali), they revealed the fine brick arcading providing the main basement area (under the main hall) as a recital area which seats 80, and smaller practice areas each of which holds a grand piano comfortably.

Spellbinding: Anna Netrebko and Željko Lučić in Verdi's Macbeth - Royal Opera House Live Cinema

Verdi: Macbeth - Anna Netrebko - Royal Opera (Photo Bill Cooper)

Željko Lučić, Anna Netrebko
Royal Opera (Photo Bill Cooper)

Verdi Macbeth; 
Željko Lučić, Ildebrando D'Arcangelo, Anna Netrebko, 
dir: Phyllida Lloyd/ Daniel Dooner, cond: Antonio Pappano; 
Royal Opera House Live Cinema cast
Reviewed by Anthony Evans on 4 Apr 2018 
Star rating: 4.0 (★★★★)
Anna Netrebko's Lady Macbeth carries a vocal weapon of such authority and menace that it would take a better man than Macbeth to resist

I’m still firmly nailed to the fence when it comes to the debate surrounding cinema relays. The advantages of seeing the New York, Met in London for example are pretty self explanatory, seeing the Royal Opera in Islington less so. But being a mutton-headed sort I managed to miss the booking for one of the most anticipated operas of the season. So, gift horse and mouth – I wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity to see the Royal Opera House Live Cinema Cast of Verdi's Macbeth at the Vue, Islington on 4 April 2018.

The revival of Phyllida Lloyd’s 2002 production of this opera ‘senza amore’ brought together the considerable musical heft of Željko Lučić and Anna Netrebko as Mr. and Mrs. M, plus Ildebrando D'Arcangelo as Banquo, under the baton of Antonio Pappano with spellbinding results.