Richard Rodney Bennett (1936-2012)
Just a word or two about an extraordinary musician and a genuinely lovely man. From his precocious early years at the cutting edge of the musical avant garde to those many and memorable nights where just the man and…
Into the madhouse… “The Changeling” at the Young Vic
The Young Vic’s slogan is “It’s a big world in here”. It’s a changing world, too. This most adaptable of venues wrong foots you with every visit. It’s quite simply a different environment for every show, a…
Wagner “Der fliegende Holländer”, Zurich Opera, Royal Festival Hall
Why anyone these days would want to perform Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer with an interval when even the three act version was so plainly fashioned to be performed without one is beyond me. There is that tell-tale…
Renée Fleming, Barbican Hall (Review)
Building a memorable solo recital is an art in itself – that we know – but personalising it so precisely to your vocal character that it’s hard to imagine other voices even contemplating such a programme, now…
Meyerbeer “Robert Le Diable”, Royal Opera House (Review)
In the fictional museum of operatic history the Meyerbeer exhibit invites curiosity more than it commands respect. One sees his place in the grand – very grand – scheme of things, one can appreciate his influence, acknowledge…
The Bodyguard, Adelphi Theatre (Review)
It starts with the gunshot. It had to. Legions of Bodyguard aficionados who know the movie frame by frame will have cried blue murder if it hadn’t. So there it is – the opening scene of the…
Lehar “The Merry Widow”, Philharmonia Orchestra, Wilson, Royal Festival Hall (Review)
Lehar’s Merry Widow has been been spreading enchantment across the globe for well over a century. She’s the vintage champagne of operettas and the prospect of John Wilson popping her cork was more than a little enticing.…
Sondheim/Furth “Merrily We Roll Along”, Menier Chocolate Factory (Review)
It seems inexplicable now that Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Merrily We Roll Along should have bombed so ignominiously on its first Broadway outing in 1981. But then again what is clearer than ever from Maria Friedman’s…
London Symphony Orchestra, Gardiner, Barbican Hall (Review)
Any young composer who finds himself at the opposite end of a programme from Walton’s First Symphony had better be good. Edward Nesbit – whose piece Parallels was commissioned by the LSO Panufnik Young Composer’s Scheme –…
A Conversation With RICHARD SUART & MARY BEVAN: Backstage at ENO’s ‘The Mikado’
It’s an amazing statistic in itself that Jonathan Miller’s now iconic production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado is one-fifth as old as the piece itself – that is 26 years. For 25 of those Richard Suart has groveled…