At Home He Feels Like A Tourist

Category: Contemporary Classical

• Classical Music Contemporary Classical London Opera Theatre

  Greek at the Arcola Theatre review *****

  Greek Grimeborn, Arcola Theatre, 13th August 2018 It is a shame Steven Berkoff’s plays don’t get performed more often. They do, like the stage, film and TV villains he has memorably played, (there he is above doing the menacing thing), sometimes lapse into “in yer face” cliche, but at their…

  August 27, 2018
• Classical Music Contemporary Classical Culture Ecology London Opera

  Cave at the Printworks review ****

  Cave The Printworks, Surrey Quays, 23rd June 2018 Cave is the second collaboration between composer Tansy Davies and librettist Nick Drake. Their last work, Between Worlds, which took as its subject the Twin Towers on 9/11, was superb. It was an immensely moving and sensitive elegy which focussed on the…

  July 13, 2018
• Classical Music Contemporary Classical Culture History Literature London Opera Theatre

  Lessons in Love and Violence at the Royal Opera House review ****

  Lessons in Love and Violence Royal Opera House, 26th May 2018 Here is an extract from an illuminated manuscript showing Eddy II getting a crown. Or more precisely a second crown. Not sure what that is all about but given he was by reputation a high maintenance sort of fella…

  June 6, 2018
• art Classical Music Concert Contemporary Classical Culture London Romanticism

  Beethoven symphony cycle from Britten Sinfonia and Thomas Ades at the Barbican review *****

  Britten Sinfonia, Thomas Ades (conductor), Nicholas Hodges (piano), Joshua Bloom (bass) Barbican Hall, 22nd and 24th May 2018 Beethoven – Symphony No 4 in B flat major Op 60 Gerard Barry – Piano Concerto Beethoven – Symphony No 5 in C minor Op 67 Gerard Barry – The Conquest of…

  June 3, 2018
• Amsterdam Classical Music Concert Contemporary Classical Culture

  Christoph Sietzen and the Wave Quartet at the Concertgebouw review ****

  Christoph Sietzen, Wave Quartet (Bogdan Bacanu, Vladi Petrov, Emiko Uchiyama, Christoph Sietzen) Het Concert-Gebouw, Recital Hall, 16th May 2018 Emmanuel Séjourné – Attraction for marimba, vibraphone and tape Iannis Xenakis – Part B (from ‘Rebonds’) for percussion J.S. Bach/Brahms – Chaconne (from Second Partita in D, BWV 1004) (arr. B.…

  May 28, 2018
• Classical Music Concert Contemporary Classical Culture London

  Ligeti in Wonderland at the South Bank review *****

  Ligeti in Wonderland Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room, 11th, 12th and 13th May 2018 Pierre–Laurent Aimard (piano), Tamara Stefanovich (piano), Patricia Kopatchinskaja (violin), Marie-Luise Neunecker (horn), Daniel Ciampollini (percussion) Ligeti – Poeme symphonique for 100 metronomes, Ligeti – 3 pieces for 2 pianos (Monument, Selbstportrat, Bewegubg), Ligeti – Trio…

  May 23, 2018
• Concert Contemporary Classical Culture London

  Icebreaker at Kings Place review ****

  Icebreaker: Velocity Kings Place, 5th May 2018 Anna Meredith – Nautilus Michael Gordon – Yo Shakespeare Paul Whitty – nature is a language – can’t you read? David Lang – Slow Movement Louis Andriessen – De snelheid (‘Velocity’) Boundaries. And their close, and troublesome cousins, borders. The bane of human…

  May 11, 2018
• Classical Music Concert Contemporary Classical Culture Gigs London Uncategorized

  Bryce Dessner and the London Contemporary Orchestra Soloists at Queen Elizabeth Hall review ***

  London Contemporary Orchestra Soloists, Galya Bisengalieva (violin), Rakhi Singh (violin), Robert Ames (viola), Oliver Coates (cello) – Bryce Dessner (electric guitar) Queen Elizabeth Hall. 10th April 2018 Bryce Dessner – Aheym for string quartet Mica Levi – You belong to me for string quartet Steve Reich – Electric Counterpoint for…

  April 19, 2018
• Contemporary Classical Culture Literature London Opera Theatre

  Coraline at the Barbican Theatre review ****

  Coraline Barbican Theatre, 7th April 2018 Was I the only person in the audience who knew nothing about Neil Gaiman’s 2003 cult children’s fantasy novella from whence came Mark-Anthony Turnage’s opera Coraline? It certainly felt like it. To be fair the provenance had dawned on me some time before the…

  April 16, 2018
• Classical Music Concert Contemporary Classical Culture London

  Carducci Quartet at St John’s Smith Square review ****

    The Carducci Quartet St John’s Smith Square, 23rd March 2018 This was the second time I had heard the Carduccis perform the first five Philip Glass string quartets, following their performance at Kings Place as part of the marvellous Minimalism Unwrapped year long festival in 2015. They are, along…

  April 4, 2018