Faust, Royal Opera House, London Some operas have to be taken in the spirit of the times out of which they sprang, and this applies particularly to Gounod’s Faust. Nobody today could accept its ca...Read More
Orchestra and Choir of the Age of Enlightenment/Rattle, Royal Festival Hall Should Bach’s Passions be staged? They increasingly are, and there are good supporting arguments, particularly in the ca...Read More
Berenice, Linbury Theatre First a welcome to the hall. The old Linbury Theatre was a Spartan concrete cavity, well suited to the hair-shirted avant-garde performances which were often staged there. N...Read More
La forza del destino, Royal Opera House It’s always news when Anna Netrebko or Jonas Kaufmann grace the stage, and doubly so when they appear together: breath is bated not only over whether these s...Read More
There are two words – ‘weinte bitterlich’- in a recitative in Bach’s darkly dramatic Johannespassion when the Evangelist must negotiate his path alone through a frenzy of melodic and emotional...Read More
The Magic Flute, Coliseum Idomeneo, Hackney Empire Like Ko-Ko’s ‘little list’ in The Mikado, there’s a moment in The Magic Flute which seems designed for topical allusion. As the Freemasons ...Read More
Recital round-up No 53 for International Piano Magazine – April 2019 Wigmore Hall: Kirill Gerstein, Feb 24; Garrick Ohlsson, Feb 27 Royal Festival Hall: Angela Hewitt, Feb 26 Barbican: Arcadi Volodo...Read More
Elisabetta, regina d’Inghilterra, ETO at the Hackney Empire In a week when English National Opera presents a hyperactive Merry Widow, and the Royal Opera a deranged Cosi fan tutte, it’s sweet reli...Read More
The Merry Widow, ENO Nobody ever complains when Ko-Ko’s ‘little list’ in The Mikado is updated to suit the temper of the times, and nobody complains that April de Angelis’s book for ENO’s Me...Read More