Handel’s last oratorio presents, amongst the composer’s catalogue of undeniable masterpieces, a masterwork of stunning stature. Not a note is misplaced in Jephtha: long though it is (more of that later), everything is perfectly […]
Christophe Rousset’s performance of Bach’s Osterortorium, BWV 249, in Aix en Provence recently led me to his disc from 2011: Frans Brüggen’s Amsterdam account with the Orchestra of the 18th Century and Cappella Amsterdam with […]
Weinberg, Shostakovich Quatuor Danel Wigmore Hall, 6.5.2025 Weinberg String Quartets: No. 14, Op. 122 (1978); No. 15, Op. 124 (1980) Shostakovich String Quartet No. 14 in F sharp, op. 142 (1973) This was a […]
Janáček The Excursions of Mr Brouček (‘Výlety páně Broučkovy’; concert performance). Cast; Tenebrae; London Symphony Orchestra / Sir Simon Rattle (conductor). Barbican Hall, 04.05.2025 Cast: Broućek – Peter Hoare Mazal/Blankytný/Petřík – Aleš Briscein Malinka/Etherea/Kunka – Lucy […]
Israeli pianist Alon Kariv will play Chopin’s First Piano Concetto on Sunday, May 11 at London’s Cadogan Hall with the English Chamber Orchestra. Ahead of that performance, I met Alon to discuss all things piano, […]
Julia Wolfe appointed the Orchestra’s first Composer in Residence, with four works featured in the season, including a newly commissioned symphonic arrangement of her Pulitzer-winning Anthracite Fields Focus on opera, with Principal Guest Conductor Anja Bihlmaier […]
This might be Classical Explorer‘s first encounter with Arturo Toscanini, the great enigma. For years, I railed against him, both of my feet firmly in the Furtwängler camp. Cue a sheaf of reviews for the […]
I was very, very take by Omer Meir Wellber’s appearance with the London Philharmonic Orchestra in March. So much so that I sought out this, the 2019 release of Wellber’s Butterfly from Glyndebourne. And while […]
Debussy (orch. Büsser), Mozart, Stravinsky Jan Lisiecki (piano); Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg / Aziz Shokhakimov (conductor). Salle Érasme, Palais de la musique et des Congrès, Strasbourg, France, 25.02.2025 Debussy Printemps, L 68 (1887, orch. Büsser 1912) […]
Grand Concert pour les Aixois: Haydn, Tchaikovsky , Mozart The Strings of Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra / Gábor Takács-Nagy. Cathédale Saint-Saveur, Aix en Provence, France, 20.04.2025 Haydn Die sieben letzten Worte underes Erlöser am Kreutz, […]
