Emerging from a rare sabbatical, Evgeny Kissin – the world’s most acclaimed classical pianist – has just published his autobiography. He has also just married a childhood friend, and he’s ...Read More
Mitridate, re di Ponto, Royal Opera house, London Nobody ever talks about Graham Vick’s 26-year-old production of Mitridate, re di Ponto – it seemed to have sunk without trace – but Coven...Read More
‘If there’s no blood, there’s no entertainment,’ shouts Netia Jones, as her Puck catapults himself high into the air, and lands with a sickening thump on the rehearsal room floor. ‘Gosh – ...Read More
Don Carlo, Covent Garden, 12.5.17 With its God-given melodies, ravishing orchestration, and intricate but whizzing plot, Verdi’s Don Carlo ticks all the boxes, including that of topicality 150 years...Read More
Yuja Wang, Royal Festival Hall The elfin Yuja Wang has now reached thirty, so must be judged by grown-up standards. A shame that she ducked out of the ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata originally billed for ...Read More
IPM roundup 40 Wigmore Hall: Sunwook Kim Oct 25; Alexei Volodin Nov 2; Martha Argerich and Alberto Portugheis December 12; Beatrice Rana Jan 16; Luca Buratto 23 Jan; Barbican: Daniil Trifonov Jan 21; ...Read More
The World New Made: Figurative Painting in the Twentieth Century By Timothy Hyman Thames and Hudson 256 pp Ever since Tom Wolfe published his blistering polemic The Painted Word in 1975, it’s been a...Read More
“WE LEFT our native land thinking we carried no baggage, completely unaware of the biggest gift our country had bestowed on us: the gift of music.” So said Basel Rajoub, a Syrian composer and saxo...Read More
Japan’s Westernisation is only skin-deep. For musical proof of this, consider the eagerness with which the Japanese periodically forsake their hi-tech existence, and immerse themselves in their anci...Read More
Out, brief candle! As life nears its end, thoughts can acquire urgent clarity. This truth may not be particularly perceptible in literature, because novelists find endless ways of disguising it. But i...Read More