Proms: Bach B minor Mass

Review from The Arts Desk

Review from The Independent

Thursday 2 August 2012 at 19.30

Live from the Royal Albert Hall, London

Broadcast live on BBC radio 3 and at 20.00 on BBC4 TV

image from the Treasures of Saxon State Library

BBC 3 iPlayer time now expired
  Link to BBC4 TV iPlayer for two short video clips

J. S. Bach – Mass in B minor

Joélle Harvey – soprano
Malin Christensson – soprano
Iestyn Davies – counter-tenor
Ed Lyon – tenor
Matthew Rose – bass
Choir of the English Concert
The English Concert – Harry Bicket conductor

Having restored choral music to the forefront of his ensemble’s recent activities, Baroque specialist Harry Bicket returns to the Proms hotfoot from the 2012 Leipzig Bachfest with one of music’s great milestones.

Since its rediscovery by 19th-century Romantics, Bach’s Mass in B minor has been continually reimagined, most recently with an injection of period-style agility and buoyancy. Still the mysteries remain, as befits a testament through which the composer seemingly intended to carve out his unique place in cultural history.

* Note here the inclusion of tenor Ed Lyon who has recently wowed audiences world-wide with his performance in ROH Les Troyens

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Duration 2.5 hours with one interval

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Proms: A Child of Our Time with Sarah Connolly

Review from The Arts Desk

Review from Classical Iconoclast ( blog )

Wednesday 1 August 2012 at 19.30

Live from the Albert Hall, London on BBC radio 3

BBC iPlayer time now expired

BBC SO Principal Guest Conductor David Robertson begins with two iconic American pieces before turning to works in which the emotive force of the African American spiritual is harnessed by composers of the old world.

Ives - The Unanswered Question

Barber - Adagio for strings

Zimmermann - Nobody knows de trouble I see

INTERVAL – 20 minutes

Tippett - A Child of Our Time

In A Child of Our Time Tippett drew in five spirituals to reaffirm the indispensable human values of compassion and brotherhood.  Star trumpeter Håkan Hardenberger returns and an impressive array of international singing talent features alongside a newly formed youthful chorus.

Sally Matthews – soprano
Håkan Hardenberger – trumpet
Sarah Connolly – mezzo-soprano
Paul Groves – tenor
Jubilant Sykes – bass-baritone
BBC Proms Youth Choir
BBC Symphony Orchestra   David Robertson conductor

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Friday photo

People holding candles visit a memorial for the victims in the shooting

at the Century 16 cinema in Aurora, Colorado.

photocredit: Ed Andrieski/AP via The Telegraph

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Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
Seeing that death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come.

William Shakespeare – “Julius Caesar”

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The Wallace & Gromit Prom

Review from The Telegraph

Review from The Guardian

image from Wallace and Gromit website

Interactive Programme notes for this concert

Photo slide show from the concert

The world premiere of a new show, with classical favourites for all the family – including music by John Adams, Debussy and Shostakovich – plus specially filmed new Wallace & Gromit animations, featuring the dynamic duo’s backstage exploits as they prepare for the first performance of Wallace’s brand-new Proms commission, My Concerto in Ee, Lad. And A Matter of Loaf and Death, screened for the first time with a live orchestral soundtrack.

Watch the Adams piece on BBC iPlayer

Programme includes:

Copland - Fanfare for the Common Man

John Adams - Short Ride in a Fast Machine

Debussy (arr. A. Caplet) - Clair de lune

Shostakovich - Symphony No. 4 in C minor – 1st movement (excerpt)

Wallace - My Concerto in Ee, Lad

Tasmin Little violin

Aurora Orchestra  - Nicholas Collon conductor

Wallace and Gromit forum

Ivan Hewett of The Telegraph interviews Wallace and Gromit

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Friday photo

A baby gorilla born on 10 July in Frankfurt sleeps on the chest of its mother, Rebecca.

The newborn has not yet been named

photocredit:Fredrik Von Erichsen via The Guardian Eyewitness series

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Les Troyens at the Proms

Review from The Arts Desk

Review from Whats on Stage

Sunday 22 July 2012 at 16.30 – this is a LONG opera!

Live from the Albert Hall, London on BBC radio 3 and online

Berlioz: The Trojans 

Production photo from ROH

To aid your enjoyment – Programme notes from the Proms

From the Royal Opera’s acclaimed new production directed by David McVicar, Antonio Pappano conducts a concert performance of Berlioz’s The Trojans, with Bryan Hymel as Aeneas, Anna Caterina Antonacci as Cassandra and Eva Maria Westbroek as Dido. The Trojans is Berliozs’ most ambitious work, one that he himself considered greater than anything he had done previously. Based on Virgil’s epic poem The Aeneid, The Trojans tells the story of the destruction of Troy, and of the Trojan warrior Aeneas’s quest to found a new dynasty in Italy. On the way he meets Dido, Queen of Carthage, and falls in love. In the ultimate battle between duty and love, which will prove stronger?

iPlayer time expired but why not watch the video?

Bryan Hymel, tenor – Aeneas
Fabio Capitanucci, baritone – Coroebus
Ashley Holland baritone,- Panthus
Brindley Sherratt, bass – Narbal
Ji-Min Park, tenor, – Iopas
Barbara Senator, mezzo-soprano, – Ascanius
Anna Caterina Antonacci, soprano – Cassandra
Eva Maria Westbroek, soprano – Dido
Hanna Hipp, mezzo-soprano – Anna
Ed Lyon, tenor – Hylas
Robert Lloyd, bass – Priam
Lukas Jakobski, bass – Greek Chieftain
Jihoon Kim, bass – Ghost of Hector
Ji Hyun Kim, tenor – Helenus
Pamela Helen Stephen, mezzo-soprano – Hecuba
Royal Opera Chorus. Orchestra of the Royal Opera House.  Sir Antonio Pappano conductor

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For information links to the cast click here

Excellent photo gallery on flickr

There will be two intervals of 30 minutes each

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It is still possible to see the free video streaming of this opera at The Space.

It is available until October.

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Antonio Pappano

Photocredit:  Clive Barda

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Proms: Beethoven symphony cycle

Daniel Barenboim and the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra

Beethoven symphony cycle on radio and television

Live from the Royal Albert Hall, London.     20 – 27 July 2012

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Listen to each concert live on BBC radio 3 and watch on BBC TV

Daniel Barenboim directs his first Beethoven symphony cycle in London – and becomes the first conductor since Henry Wood in 1942 to survey all nine symphonies in a single Proms season. Each of the five concerts also offers the opportunity to hear the music of Pierre Boulez – like Beethoven, one of the great musical revolutionaries. The dynamic West–Eastern Divan Orchestra – famously bringing together Arab and Israeli players to form less ‘an orchestra for peace’ than ‘an orchestra against ignorance’ – goes far beyond the symbolic in its goal of building bridges through music

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Friday 20 July 2012 at 19.30, Royal Albert Hall

Prom 9: Beethoven Cycle – Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2

Beethoven: Symphony No. 1 in C major
Boulez: Dérive 2

Beethoven: Symphony No. 2 in D major

West-Eastern Divan Orchestra  Daniel Barenboim (conductor)

Review from The Telegraph

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 Saturday 21 July 2012 at 19.30, Royal Albert Hall

Prom 10: Beethoven Cycle – Symphonies Nos. 3 & 4

Beethoven: Symphony No. 4 in B flat major
Pierre Boulez: Dialogue de I’ombre double

Beethoven: Symphony No. 3 in E flat major, ‘Eroica’

Jussef Eisa (clarinet)  IRCAM (live electronics)
West-Eastern Divan Orchestra  Daniel Barenboim (conductor)

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Monday 23 July 2012 at 19.30, Royal Albert Hall

Prom 12: Beethoven Cycle – Symphonies Nos. 5 & 6

Beethoven: Symphony No. 6 in F major ‘Pastoral’

Pierre Boulez: Mémoriale (‘… explosante-fixe …’ Originel)

Pierre Boulez: Messagesquisse

Beethoven: Symphony No. 5 in C minor

Guy Eshed –  flute.  Hassan Moataz El Molla – cello,
West–Eastern Divan Orchestra.  Daniel Barenboim conductor

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Tuesday 24 July 2012 at 19.00, Royal Albert Hall

Prom 13: Beethoven Cycle – Symphonies Nos. 7 & 8

Beethoven: Symphony No. 8 in F major, Op. 93
Pierre Boulez: Anthèmes 2

Beethoven: Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92

Michael Barenboim (violin).   IRCAM (live electronics)
West-Eastern Divan Orchestra.   Daniel Barenboim (conductor)

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Friday 27 July 2012 at 18.30, Royal Albert Hall

Prom 18: Beethoven Cycle – Symphony No. 9, ‘Choral

Review from The Guardian

Programme notes from the Proms

Photo slide show

An impressive team of soloists joins the National Youth Choir of Great Britain and the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra to project the finale’s inclusive vision of hope, reconciliation and hard-won triumph.

What better to mark today’s opening of the London 2012 Olympics than Beethoven’s ultimate hymn to universal brotherhood?

Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 in D minor, ‘Choral’

National Youth Choir of Great Britain
West–Eastern Divan Orchestra.   Daniel Barenboim conductor

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And if you can’t get enough Beethoven – he is Composer of the Week on radio 3

Monday – Friday  23rd – 27th July

available on iPlayer for 7 days afterwards

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Elīna Garanča: Romantique

The album has a new web site with track list, liner notes, excerpts,

photos and an interview and purchasing details

http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/html/special/garanca-romantique/index.html

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A track from Elīna’s latest recording issued on 3 September by  Deutsche Grammophon

 Details

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video courtesy of Deutsche Grammophon

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For a comprehensive update on Elīna Garanča’s performance schedule,

and the latest reviews and videos, click here

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Lots of Handel on the radio this week!

 Lots of listening opportunities for Handel lovers coming up! – Week beginning Monday 16 July 2012

Handel is Composer of the Week in the BBC radio 3 series which broadcast at noon each weekday and repeated at 18.00. Expect lots of tasty excerpts from Handel works and the history of his life and times presented in a very accessible way.

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Meanwhile – from the Proms ….

Review from The Guardian

Watch clips from this Prom now on BBC 2 TV iPlayer

video from the BBC

 Hervé Niquet and Le Concert Spirituel make their Proms debut in this free Late Night Prom, giving Handel’s three Water Music suites and Fireworks Music the big-band, period-instrument treatment. Niquet directs an expanded group of up to 80 musicians to evoke resplendent royal occasions on the River Thames and in Green Park, offering a new slant on London’s favourite party pieces.

• Handel Water Music Suite No. 1 in F major
• Handel Water Music Suite No. 2 in D Major
• Handel Water Music Suite No. 3 in G major
• Handel Music for the Royal Fireworks

Le Concert Spirituel, Hervé Niquet conductor,

Performance photo gallery featuring Hervé Niquet in a very fetching jacket

This concert will be repeated on radio 3 Wednesday 25th July at 2pm.

and is to be shown on BBC2 television on Saturday 4 August

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Thursday 19 July 2012 at 19.30

Review from The Guardian

Handel - Judas Maccabaeus (1750 version) 

original playbill – they got their money’s worth!

Composed in the wake of the last pitched battle fought on British soil – the putting-down at Culloden of the 1745 Jacobite rebellion – Handel’s oratorio recounts a tale of military prowess on the part of the Israelites of biblical times, with whom Protestant England was keen to identify.

Under the direction of Laurence Cummings – Music Director of the Handel festivals in London and Göttingen – the distinguished line-up of soloists is headed by John Mark Ainsley, a stylish and much-admired Handelian, here tackling a role long considered the pinnacle of the tenor repertoire.

John Mark Ainsley – tenor (Judas Maccabaeus)
Christopher Purves – baritone (Simon/Eupolemus)
Rosemary Joshua – soprano (Israelitish Woman)
Christine Rice – mezzo-soprano,(Israelitish Man)
Tim Mead – counter-tenor (Israelitish Messenger/Israelitish Priest)
Choir of the Enlightenment
Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment,  Laurence Cummings director

• Part 1 at 19.30
• 20.25 Interval
• 20.45  Parts II & III

This Prom will be repeated on Monday 23rd July at 14.00 on BBC radio 3

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White Shirt Weekend ….. Romeo

Juliet:  And when I shall die, take him and cut him up in little stars,

and he will make the face of heaven so fine that all the world will fall in love with night

and pay no worship to the garish sun.

Romeo and Juliet: William Shakespeare

Screen capture: I Capuleti e I Montecchi. Bayerische Staatsoper 2012

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HAVE A WONDERFUL WHITE SHIRT WEEKEND!

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Pelléas et Mélisande at the Proms

 

Sunday 15 July 2012 on BBC radio 3

Review from MusicOMH     Review from What's on Stage

Live from the Albert Hall, London

Debussy - Pelléas et Mélisande.    Concert performance sung in French

image via Le Point. fr

 A scene from the Paris staging by  Stéphane BraunschweigBBC iPlayer time expired

Premiered at the Opéra-Comique on 30 April 1902

For the 150th anniversary of Debussy’s birth, John Eliot Gardiner conducts the operatic masterpiece, Pelléas et Mélisande. Debussy’s score is full of atmospheric suggestion and insinuating eroticism, and it follows the story of the mysterious Mélisande, rescued from the forest by Golaud, who marries her then discovers his half-brother Pelléas has also fallen in love with her.

This doomed love is the central focus of the opera, but there is much that is opaque, obtuse, elusive. John Eliot Gardiner says that “to conduct Pelléas et Mélisande is to enter another world.” He has recently performed this landmark piece in Paris at the Opera Comique with his period instrument ensemble, and this is the first time it will be heard at the Proms on the instruments of Debussy’s time. Phillip Addis and Karen Vourc’h reprise their much-praised, fresh-voiced partnership in the title-roles.

• 19.00 Acts 1-3
• 20.40 Interval
• 21.00 Acts 4-5

Pelléas – Phillip Addis, Baritone

Mélisande – Karen Vourc’h, Soprano

Golaud – Laurent Naouri, Baritone

Arkel – John Tomlinson, Bass

Geneviève – Elodie Méchain, Contralto

Yniold – Dima Bawab, Soprano

A Doctor – Nahuel di Pierro, Bass

The Monteverdi Choir

Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique.  Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Conductor

Synopsis from l’Opéra Comique

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It will be very interesting to see how this works in the vastness of the Albert Hall

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First night of The Proms 2012

For information on The Last Night of the Proms 2012 click here

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Friday 13 July 2012

This was live from the Royal Albert Hall, London

Review from The Telegraph

Review from The Guardian

image from wiki commons

Yes folks, it’s time for that wonderful celebration of music and great British institution The Proms and the season kicks off on Friday 13th ( superstitious? ) I will be recommending my own choices of concert from time to time but do check out the whole season to see if there’s anything which particularly appeals to you. There seems to be something for everyone and every Prom is broadcast live on wonderful radio 3.

Expect proceedings to get off to a bang with Mark-Anthony Turnage’s punchy brass and percussion fanfare. After that London itself is celebrated with Elgar’s pen portrait of the city at the turn of the 20th century and described by the composer as ‘cheerful and Londony’. Yorkshireman Frederick Delius was born 150 years ago and will be celebrated throughout the season with some of his major works, tonight it’s his setting of Walt Whitman’s poem Sea Drift, an exploration of the experience of bereavement through a seabird’s loss of his mate. With this year also being Her Majesty the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, it’s music with a royal connections that makes up the second half: Michael Tippett’s joyous and lyrical Suite for the Birthday of Prince Charles and Elgar’s Coronation Ode, which brings the concert to a rousing climax.

Mark-Anthony Turnage - Canon Fever  - World Premiere
Elgar – Overture ‘Cockaigne (In London Town)’
Delius – Sea Drift
INTERVAL - Stephen Johnson explores Elgar’s Coronation Ode
Tippett – Suite for the Birthday of Prince Charles
Elgar – Coronation Ode

Susan Gritton – soprano
Sarah Connolly – mezzo-soprano
Robert Murray – tenor
Gerald Finley – bass-baritone
Bryn Terfel – bass-baritone
BBC Symphony Chorus.  BBC Symphony Orchestra

Edward Gardner conductor (Canon Fever, Coronation Ode)
Sir Roger Norrington conductor (Cockaigne)
Sir Mark Elder conductor (Sea Drift)
Martyn Brabbins conductor (Suite for the Birthday of Prince Charles)

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Last year we had the “inovation” of Maestro Cam whereby we had the option of a musician’s view of the conductor and some daft commentary which really interfered with the enjoyment of the music. Maestro Cam without the commentary would have been good. This year, if we press the red button, we are treated to the imagined thoughts of one of the composers whose music is featured in the concert, interspersed with “up-to-the-minute tweets from viewers”.  Oh for goodness sake!

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This concert was live on radio 3 at 19.30

It was on BBC 2 television and BBC HD starting at 20.30.

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All Prom concerts are broadcast live on BBC Radio 3, 90 – 93FM, on Digital Radio and Online
All Proms broadcasts are available on demand for 7 days.

Many Proms are repeated on weekday afternoons in Afternoon on 3.

Selected Proms are shown on BBC television

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Several prominent musicians select their must-see Prom in The Telegraph

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Need a laugh today?

I’ve just come across this group on YouTube. Love it!

Bobby McFerrin with MozART GROUP

There are many examples of this unique musical humour. Enjoy!

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Friday photo

Unidentified orchestra pit

Does anyone recognise this pit?

Whilst researching various orchestra pits for a piece  I am working on I came across this photo but the venue is not mentioned. The house itself looks renovated but the pit, although large seems old fashioned and the stage set relatively small. - Anyone any ideas?

PS. - Surely that must be a Rosenkavalier Act 1 set?

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ENO’s Caligula

Detlev Glanert’s opera Caligula - UK premier production

Recorded recently at English National Opera, the Coliseum, London

Saturday 7 July 2012 at 18.00 UK time

Based upon Albert Camus’s existentialist response to the rise of Hitler and Stalin, Detlev Glanert’s 2006 opera – ‘perhaps the finest German opera of the 21st century’ (Tempo) – offers a disturbing insight into the self-destructive logic driving a decadent and dangerous dictatorship.  Young Australian director Benedict Andrews highlights the timeliness of the opera’s themes by setting his UK premiere production in a football stadium, the kind of vast public arena within which dictators habitually play out their political games.

‘Caligula is not a madman,’ says composer Detlev Glanert, ‘but rather an intelligent, rational creature who skilfully experiments with human beings, just like Stalin or Hitler.’ (see him explain on Youtube) The Roman emperor Caligula’s descent into madness is sparked by the death of his sister and lover, Drusilla and the opera depicts the ways in which Caligula’s challenges to those around him test the boundaries of their loyalty to the office of emperor, to him personally, and to each other. Demanding that his former slave Helicon brings him the moon, he enacts absurd and brutal laws. He rapes the wife of one of the senators and forces another to drink poison; appearing at some festivities as Venus, he decides to marry the moon, commanding his guests to worship him. Summoning four poets to entertain the assembly, he arbitrarily sentences them to death; the guests are provoked into conspiring to kill him, but Caligula tricks them with false news of his own demise. His wife Caesonia proposes her own death, at his own hands, as the ultimate proof of her love; the conspirators finally put Caligula to death.

 iPlayer time now expired

Caligula…..Peter Coleman-Wright (baritone)
Caesonia…..Yvonne Howard (mezzo-soprano)
Helicon…..Christopher Ainslie (countertenor)
Cherea…..Pavlo Hunka (bass-baritone)
Scipio…..Carolyn Dobbin (mezzo-soprano)
Mucius…..Brian Galliford (tenor)
Mereia/Lepidus…..Eddie Wade (baritone)
Livia…..Julia Sporsen (soprano)

English National Opera Chorus
English National Opera Orchestra, Conductor…..Ryan Wigglesworth

DURATION: 2 HOURS, 40 MINUTES

video from ENO

Review from The Guardian

Review from The Telegraph

Review from The Arts Desk with interesting reader comments

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Joyce DiDonato live from the Wigmore

Friday 6 July at 19.30 UK time

Joyce DiDonato live from the Wigmore Hall, London.

Review from The Arts Desk.      Review from The Independent

Joyce Didonato - mezzo-soprano with David Zobel - piano

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Joyce is donating 5  personal photos of Venice for auction.

The proceeds go to “Wigmore Hall Learning“

Programme - 19.30

Vivaldi - From Ercole sul Termodonte:  Onde chiare che sussrrate.  Amato ben

Fauré - Cinq mélodies ‘de Venise’

Rossini - La regata veneziana

Schubert - Gondelfahrer

Interval – “Requiem for a Garden of Eden” – information

Schumann - From Myrthen: Zwei Venetianische Lieder

Head - Three songs of Venice

Hahn - Venezia – Chansons en dialecte vénetien

BBC iPlayer time now expired

image from Wiki commons

About this concert

Named as Gramophone’s Artist of the Year in 2010, DiDonato, a committed recitalist, here celebrates her love of the baroque and 19th-century bel canto, but extends it outwards in a programme themed around another of her passions, Venice.

ROH Les Troyens – video on demand no longer available

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DON’T MISS THIS!

 On demand viewing available NOW – at least in the UK, the Netherlands,

Germany, France, Australia, west & east coast USA and JAPAN!

このリンクをクリックし   それは見ていて自由である

Click this  Link to The Space – now finished

Click here for interesting talks about the opera by Antonio Pappano

and other information about the production

photocredit: Bill Cooper/ROH

  This performance is available on demand on The Space until the end of October and shown internationally on the big screen in November as part of the 2012/13 Cinema season.…

 The five individual acts of the opera are available on-demand on

The Space for worldwide audiences.

        Reactions to the production

Cassandre	Anna Antonacci
Chorèbe	Fabio Capitanucci
Enée	Bryan Hymel
Didon	Eva-Maria Westbroek
Narbal	Brindley Sherratt
Anna	Hanna Hipp
Ascagne	Barbara Senator
Priam	Robert Lloyd
Hécube	Pamela Helen Stephen
Ghost of Hector	Jihoon Kim
Panthée	Ashley Holland
Hélénus	Ji Hyun Kim
Greek Captain	Lukas Jakobski
Trojan Soldier	Daniel Grice
Iopas	Ji-Min Park
Hylas	Ed Lyon
Chorus	Royal Opera Chorus
	Orchestra of the Royal Opera House- conductor Antonio Pappano

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About 5 hours 30 minutes, including two intervals

Review from Intermezzo with fabulous production and curtain call photos

Review from the NY Times

Review from The Stage

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