Katy sings soprano, plays violin, cycles about and listens to music.
She's a graduate of both Bristol and City Universities and has been
known to write libretti.
This a was breathtaking but not breathless concert by Alina Ibragimova, a brilliantly accomplished individual interpretation of three of Bach's solo partitas and sonatas for violin.
Dancing, jokes, a pogrom and Bryn Terfel balancing on milk vats. It could only be Fiddler on the Roof. Grange Park Opera took an eclectic combination and planted if successfully on the Proms stage.
Rich gifts of from the distinctive OAE, with Vikoria Mullova adding austere authority to Brahms and Ádám Fischer bringing out all the colour in Dvořák's “New World” Symphony.
The BSO seamlessly jumped between all-out dramatic terror, soppy love and adventure in an eclectic mix of 21 pieces of "heroic" film and video game music from the past five decades.
Seven works by English composers created a journey from beauty to death as Remembrance day approaches. There wasn't much dwelling on the horrors of war itself, but plenty of human emotion and a sense of life sadly lost.
Infectious energy from musicians who breezed through a diverse and challenging programme without music stands or chairs, in which Benedict Mason displayed his originality.
This Winchester Chamber Music Festival programme made a stab at being eclectic, with two sets of early 20th century Webern miniatures to start. Yet the meat was in two substantial Romantic works by Schumann and Brahms.
The Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra's arrival at the Proms with their musical director Yannick Nézet-Séguin was popular, selling out seats and drawing a full arena crowd. There was an atmosphere of anticipation for a famously enigmatic conductor and a colourful programme. The concert didn’t disappoint with its marriage of Tchaikovsky and Wanger, and the cryptic Symphony No.
The BBC Proms 2013 began with some of the best of English composers. Tonight for Prom 28 it was the turn of some of Scotland’s finest, as Donald Runnicles conducted the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra in a performance of James MacMillan’s Violin Concerto. There were plenty of old favourites from Beethoven and Strauss Jr.
The inaugural Bristol Proms are nearly over. Indeed, if you’re reading this any later than Saturday evening, they’ve been and gone. The festival, run by the Bristol Old Vic, has deliberately been unlike its London namesake.
On a hot, humid summer’s evening, Sakari Oramo made his debut as Chief Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. That the occasion was the first night of the BBC Proms 2013 didn’t seem to bother him. The Finn’s combination of serenity and confidence – and just enough passion to assure us that he was enjoying it – set the tone for an intriguing, if oddly assembled programme.
35 years and many revivals after it was first seen, the late Joachim Herz’s version of Madam Butterfly (“Madama” spelt without the “a” here) is still going. For WNO’s themed series of “Free Spirits”, Caroline Chaney took on the revival director’s mantle. The result was a reliable production lacking in originality but not in warmth.
Verdi’s Rigoletto is possessed of a truly tragic plot. A physically disabled jester keeps his innocent daughter locked up except for weekly church visits, a situation which she only lightly resists. Rigoletto believes a curse is to blame for his daughter being killed, although she only dies as a substitute for the man Rigoletto himself has arranged to be assassinated.
Today it is thought that J.S. Bach’s chamber and ensemble music, including the four Orchestral Suites, date from his time in Leipzig from the 1720s onwards. When all the Orchestral Suites (BWV1066–1069) are put together, their inventive and varied nature is evident. The suites make great use of all ensemble instruments and incorporate a range of structures, as well as internal forms and dances.
The name of experimental opera and theatre company Opera in Space refers to its aim of interacting with the spaces in which it performs (no, nothing to do with astronauts or sci-fi interpretations). The Bussey Building was the chosen space for its most recent operatic subject.
