Classical Features

First Person: conductor Harry Bicket on filming the complete Handel for The English Concert's big new project

Harry Bicket Tuesday, 28 February 2023

Of the many questions we asked ourselves during lockdown, I suspect that many of us looked at our lives and professions and asked, “Why?”.

Extract: The Northern Silence - Journeys in Nordic Music and Culture by Andrew Mellor

Andrew Mellor Wednesday, 15 February 2023

“Silence,” Andrew Mellor contends, “is more prominent in the northernmost reaches of Europe.” Yet it is more like a texture or an apprehension of vacancy than a state of true soundlessness: sometimes “real and pure”, sometimes it “lingers despite the noise”.

First Person: Kings Place Artistic and Executive Director Helen Wallace on a year of 'Sound Unwrapped'

Helen Wallace Saturday, 21 January 2023

2023 is surely the year the performing arts reach peak "immersive", a word endangered by its own ubiquity. From Punchdrunk’s Burnt City to Danny Boyle’s The Matrix we are promised a swallowing-up by art. Kings Cross is the location for two visual and aural initiatives: David Hockney’s 3D Bigger & Closer at the Lightroom, and Sound Unwrapped at Kings Place, a year-long series of intimate, immersive events kindled by live performance.

First Person: Royal Academy of Music Principal Jonathan Freeman-Attwood on why a conservatoire should make recordings

Jonathan Freema Wednesday, 11 January 2023

Why is it important for a music conservatoire to make recordings? What is the educational context? These are questions we have continued to reflect upon at the Royal Academy of Music – celebrating its bicentenary this year – since we took our first steps towards what has become an established and invigorating part of Academy life.

'We wanted to emphasise the “ordinariness” of people affected by torture': Sally Beamish on her new work for Ex Cathedra

Sally Beamish Saturday, 12 November 2022

I was first approached by Quaker Concern for the Abolition of Torture (Q-CAT) in 2016 with the idea of a creating a piece of music to raise awareness of torture – its use worldwide, and the terrible damage it does both to victim and to perpetrator.

First Person: composer and co-founder of The Multi-Story Orchestra Kate Whitley on car-park creativity

Kate Whitley Monday, 07 November 2022

We started The Multi-Story Orchestra back in 2011 with a group of friends when we’d left university. Conductor Christopher Stark and I basically wanted to find new ways to play orchestral music that would escape formal concert halls and be more exciting and more accessible.

'Serving the community means representing the narratives of our time': Elena Dubinets on her responsibilities as the LPO's Artistic Director

Elena Dubinets Thursday, 29 September 2022

Just as I was moving from the US to the UK to begin working as the Artistic Director of the London Philharmonic Orchestra last summer, the orchestra was emerging from the COVID-19 period and our audiences began coming back.

theartsdesk at Musikfest Berlin - orchestral and choral rainbows around the clock

David Nice Saturday, 24 September 2022

In its three weeks of world-class events, Muskfest Berlin has managed to be all things to all people – like a mini-Proms distilling the aspects of top international visitors alongside home-grown excellence, and of a focus on at least one relatively unfamiliar 20th century/contemporary work per concert.

First Person: violinist and music director Bjarte Eike on bringing the Playhouse to his 'Alehouse Sessions'

Bjarte Eike Thursday, 22 September 2022

History first. The 17th century London of Oliver Cromwell and its puritanical quest to curb all creativity – banning music, closing down theatres, restricting alcohol and all the rest – provided an incredible backdrop for Barokksolistene’s project The Alehouse Sessions. How music survived with its tunes and tales, in song and dance, has for me been a true revelation.

BBC Proms 2022 - silence after Mass

David Nice Monday, 12 September 2022

So John Eliot Gardiner’s fire- and-air way with Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis turned out to be the last night of the Proms. Just as I was about to cycle to the Royal Albert Hall for the first of the Philadelphia Orchestra’s two Proms the following evening, a notice came through: following the news of the Queen’s death at 6pm, the evening’s event had been cancelled.

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