Opera
Grateful for large mercies
Glyndebourne is nothing if not honest. ‘In response to the ongoing Covid-19 restrictions our 2021 performances of Tristan und Isolde…
Springtime for Putin
Alexander Litvinenko lies in a London hospital, dying of polonium poisoning. That photograph from 2006 haunts the memory: the medical…
Money, money – and music
Art is supposed to emerge from poverty but extreme wealth does not preclude talent, as the history of composers proves. By Richard Bratby
Too bawdy for the Beeb
Malcolm Arnold composed his opera The Dancing Master in 1952 for BBC television. It never appeared, the problem being the…
Carry on Bel Canto
Melons. An absolutely cracking pair of melons, right there on a platter: the centrepiece of the banquet that the chaste,…
Bring me sunshine
Comedy’s a funny thing. No, seriously, the business of making people laugh is as fragile, as mercurial as cryptocurrency —…
Spelling disaster
When you think of Handel’s Amadigi (in so far as anyone thinks about the composer’s rarely staged, also-ran London score…
Tsar quality
There are worse inconveniences than having to wear a face mask to the opera. But there’s one consequence that hadn’t…
Coming up roses
At the turning point of Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s Der Rosenkavalier, all the clocks stop. Octavian has arrived…
The caged bird sings
At the first night of Glyndebourne Festival 2021 there was relief and joyful expectation as Gus Christie made his speech…
Where to start with Ethel Smyth
I’m reminded of an old Irish joke. A tourist approaches a local for directions to Dublin. The local, after much…
From screen to stage
It’s my new lockdown ritual. Switch on the telly, cue up the menu and scroll down to where the vintage…
The rise of opera film
I’m still waiting for the Royal Opera to step up. Nearly a year into the Covid crisis and what do…
Britain’s got talent
Brexit and Covid have pushed us out of the common musical market and thrown us back on homegrown sprouts. Good, says Norman Lebrecht
The trying game
Rosie Millard dispels the myth that persistence is always rewarded
A pan-European cheese dream
The best moment in the Vienna Philharmonic’s annual New Year’s Day Concert comes after the end of the advertised programme.…
Ambassador, you are really spoiling us
In classical music circles, Christmas arrives with the overture to Handel’s Messiah. Or so they’ll tell you. In truth, festivities…
Drama vs display
It is amazing what fine performances you can get beamed to your computer these days. Slightly less amazing is the…
Kitchen-table opera
Covid has been many things to the arts — most of them unprintable. A plague, a scourge, a disaster from…
Trick or treat
The timing couldn’t be better. Just as the gates clang shut on another national lockdown, trapping us all indefinitely with…
Born of the moment
It’s quite a title sequence. Puccini swells on the soundtrack and words flash before your eyes. ‘Ecstatic!’ ‘Spellbound!’ ‘Passionate!’ ‘Dazzled!’…
Panto at Glyndebourne
Offenbach at Glyndebourne! Short of Die Soldaten with a picnic break or a period-instrument revival of Jerry Springer: The Opera,…
The turf
Wetumpka Racing? When your yard is running at a handsome strike rate of 40 per cent wins to runs you…
One for the road
The email from English National Opera was blunt: ‘Your arrival time is 18.25. If you arrive outside your allocated time…
The joy of going to a real concert…
I went to a concert! Not a livestream or download: a real concert, with real musicians, a real conductor, a…
