19th century
theartsdesk in Dresden: Wagner and Vivaldi at the 2013 Dresden Music FestivalSunday, 02 June 2013
Sitting in the concert hall in Dresden’s Albertinum – the city’s modern art gallery – is a paradoxical experience. You are indoors, but faced on all sides by external walls, framed by Dresden’s typical bourgeois 19th-century architecture but looking... Read more... |
I Puritani, Grange Park OperaSaturday, 01 June 2013
Apparently Bellini’s I Puritani was Queen Victoria’s favourite opera. That wasn’t quite reason enough for director Stephen Langridge to condemn the cast of his new Grange Park production to this extraordinarily ugly sartorial era, but unfortunately... Read more... |
London Symphony Orchestra, Gergiev, Trafalgar SquareTuesday, 28 May 2013
Down Whitehall, the English Defence League had been making ripples, and at 7.40pm some of its packs were still roaring round Trafalgar Square. At that moment, Berlioz’s March to the Scaffold from the Symphonie fantastique drowned them out in one big... Read more... |
DVD: Django UnchainedTuesday, 28 May 2013
There’s something profoundly infantile about Quentin Tarantino’s quest to right the wrongs of history. Last time round he was retroactively bitchslapping the Nazis for the Holocaust. Here he’s punishing Americans who accrued obscene wealth out of... Read more... |
La donna del lago, Royal OperaSaturday, 18 May 2013
I mean, really, what is the point of Rossini? That’s actually not as stupid as it sounds. No-one has ever mistaken any of his operas for taut music-drama, and even the best of them are peculiarly difficult to pull off because without first-rate... Read more... |
The Pirates of Penzance, Scottish Opera, Theatre Royal, GlasgowThursday, 16 May 2013
Of all the Savoy operas, this merry clash of pirates, policemen and a Major-General flanked by an entire chorus of loving daughters finds Sullivan most in tune with the mid-19th century Italian opera he so lovingly spoofs. So why can’t Martin Lloyd-... Read more... |
The Leopard: 50 years on from CannesWednesday, 15 May 2013
It took Sicilian aristocrat Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, melancholy last scion of a never very reproductive family, a lifetime to get round to writing one of the 20th century’s greatest novels. Publication of The Leopard (Il Gattopardo), based on... Read more... |
DVD: Les MisérablesTuesday, 14 May 2013
Fans of this bewilderingly popular musical, and they are legion, will not be disappointed. Director Tom Hooper knows how to tell a fast-moving tale that makes light of the final running time (originally 158 minutes, slightly shorter in this DVD... Read more... |
The Suspicions of Mr Whicher: The Murder in Angel Lane, ITVMonday, 13 May 2013
The disgraced ex-cop turned private investigator has become such a trope of contemporary noir that the fate of the first great modern detective, following the events of his first televised outing, is not particularly surprising. The Murder in Angel... Read more... |
Don Carlo, Royal OperaSunday, 05 May 2013
An operatic truism still doing the rounds declares that for Verdi's Il trovatore you need four of the greatest singers in the world. For Don Carlo, his biggest opus in every way, you need six. Nicholas Hytner's Covent Garden staging hits the mark... Read more... |
La bohème, English National OperaTuesday, 30 April 2013
I’m not one to get misty-eyed over La bohème (unless it be a red mist of rage), but this second revival of Jonathan Miller’s production at English National Opera brought me closer than any yet to understanding the snuffling, lip-quivering reactions... Read more... |
Juan Diego Flórez and friends, Barbican HallMonday, 22 April 2013
It takes a certain kind of artist to book American mezzo-extraordinaire Joyce DiDonato as a supporting act. It’s a risk. Even if you happen to be Juan Diego Flórez. But it’s one that actually paid off on the first night of Flórez’s three-concert... Read more... |
