Don Giovanni is bi. So what?
Kirill Serebrennikov’s new production of Mozart’s #Metoo hero at Berlin’s Komische Oper suggests that the Don makes a play for both sexes. It also follows him into hell with a section of Mozart’s unfinished Requiem. […]
classical music
Who needs pictures and flashing lights in a symphony?
The latest gimmickry at London’s South Bank Centre is arousing audience discontent. The symphonies affected were by Shostakovich and Mahler. Here’s a letter sent by one unhappy patron to those complicit and responsible. Let us […]
Michael Tilson Thomas: The very last concert
The conductor, who is suffering from the recurrence of a brain tumour, took his final bow on Sunday with the San Francisco Symphony that he led for half of his 51-year podium career. From the […]
New song cycles inspired by 10th-century Persian poetry, the Magdalene Laundries & Baba Yaga as storytelling in song takes centre stage at this year’s Oxford International Song Festival
Konstantin Krimmel (Photo: Guido Werner) This year’s Oxford International Song Festival takes as its theme Stories in Song and from 10 to 25 October 2025, artistic director Sholto Kynoch and his team are presenting 67 […]
A genre finding its way: Maurice Greene’s Jephtha reveals different English oratorio before Handel consolidate the form
Maurice Greene: Jephtha; Andrew Staples, Mary Bevan, Michael Mofidian, Jeremy Budd, Early Opera Company, Christian Curnyn; CHANDOSReviewed 28 April 2025 Written well before Handel really welded oratorio in his own form of music drama, Maurice […]
Ruth Leon recommends…. Duke Ellington – In Concert
Duke Ellington We talked last week about the great Duke Ellington and his work with the equally great Ella Fitzgerald, whose birthday it was, without my noticing that this week is the 186th birthday of […]
Just in: Bologna has untested new boss
The board of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Italy’s second most importnat opera house, has named Elisabetta Riva as the new Sovrintendente, starting immediately. Riva, 52, has been director for the past ten years of […]
In DC, the National Symphony Orchestra embraces Dolly Parton
Message received (and see the bottom line): Press Release (WASHINGTON)—The National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) is excited to announce a new concert titled Dolly Parton’s Threads: My Songs in Symphony. This remarkable program, scheduled for June 26 and […]
Bach is what everyone’s streaming this week
Here, exclusively, is this week’s Apple Classical’s global streaming chart. The #1 and two other entries are by JS Bach: 1 J. S. Bach: Mass in B Minor, Raphaël Pichon, Pygmalion, […]
Sir Nicholas Kenyon to give the inaugural Purcell Lecture at Stationers Hall presented by the Musicians’ Company, and the Stationers and Newspapermakers’ Company
Stationers Hall In 1683, a group of musicians and music lovers got together as the Musical Society of London and organised a St Cecilia’s Day concert (22 November) for which Henry Purcell wrote Welcome to all the […]
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