Prokofiev
Evgeny Kissin’s stand-in brings the house down
It was such an enticing programme, too. The Philharmonia had booked Evgeny Kissin, the last great piano prodigy of the…
Rejoice at the Royal Ballet’s superb feast of Balanchine
Any evening devoted to the multifaceted genius of George Balanchine is something to be grateful for, manna in the wilderness…
The awful calamity of Stalin being a music lover
The dictator obsessed over new recordings and was a frequent visitor to the Bolshoi; but he treated even the greatest musicians arbitrarily, consigning many to the Gulag for no reason
Ravishing and poignant: ENO’s Orphée reviewed
Billy Wilder, asked for his opinion of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical version of his movie Sunset Boulevard, famously replied: ‘Those…
Gutted!
There was blood on the walls and floor at the birth of Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet in 1965. The…
All you need is love
What could induce a grown-up, rational, childless person to go to see the ballet of Cinderella? You’ll expect to cringe…
Russian revelation
Anyone who thinks opera singers and orchestral players are overworked should spare a thought for the Mariinsky Opera on its…
An irrepressible spirit
Matthew Stadlen talks to the Chinese pianist Lang Lang
