Lloyd-Evans' new production of Mozart's classic might be traditional, but there's no lack of astuteness in his direction of his characters. Problems in the pit hinder an otherwise strong musical performance.
A resounding success at its 1709 première, Handel’s Agrippina gripped the ear and dazzled the eye at the Grange Festival in a hugely entertaining and powerful performance.
A mixed programme of Corelli, Handel and Pergolesi brings beauty and spiritual intensity, as well as some empowered erotic playfulness, to an evening with the Academy of Ancient Music.
Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria tells one of the world’s great stories. This production is a treat for early opera fans and a great introduction for those new to the genre.
Music written by Bach for the Collegium Musicum, and also for the first Sunday after Easter, was played with skill and flourish by this exceptional orchestra; sadly, the singing was not consistently good enough to match.
A satisfying concoction of Italian concertos from the Academy of Ancient Music had Frank de Bruine leading the charge on oboe, with pristine performances also from violin and harpsichord.
The element of surprise in this seemingly standard Late Night Prom of Handel, Muffat, Bach and Purcell by the period-instrument orchestra Academy of Ancient Music was Leopold Stokowski.
The Academy of Ancient Music gave a finely honed account of Handel's unusual "little opera", written for the Earl of Carnavon's household musicians: a sweet pastoral offering never yet out of the repertoire.
Master improviser, Robert Levin, proved an informative and fun guide to a selection of Mozart's later masterpieces, performed with panache by the Academy of Ancient Music.
Gluck’s ballet Don Juan is a rarity but sadly, the tame performance by the Academy of Ancient Music, part of its ‘Grand Tour’ series, failed to seduce at Milton Court.
Andreas Scholl, Klara Ek and the Academy of Ancient music perform Vivldi, Pergolesi and Wassenaer at the Barbican. All the musicians worked exceptionally well as part of the collective, turning the programme into a real delicacy.
Billed as a “concert hall staging”, the Academy of Ancient Music’s season-opening performance of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo was brilliantly staged at the Barbican by the director Orpha Phelan and designer Caroline Hughes – as close as one could get to a full production in a concert hall without a pit.
Most striking about the Academy of Ancient Music’s playing is its neatness: every phrase is so precisely shaped, so clean. Presumably this is down to impeccable preparation as well as an intrinsic feeling in the group for how Baroque music should sound. But their playing also sounds fresh, new, surprising.
It has been a few years since the Academy of Ancient Music pioneered the programme The Four Seasons: Nature’s Voice and Verse. Its debut at Hong Kong City Hall on Sunday was the start of a China tour covering Shanghai, Beijing and Tianjin.
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.
With such a star-studded line-up at a concert that had been sold out for weeks, this was always going to be an evening to remember. Bach’s St Matthew Passion is one of those iconic pieces that never gets old, and every time I hear the throbbing bass of the opening chorus, I still get a tingle of excitement.
The Academy of Ancient Music has been critically acclaimed in pursuing Baroque composers’ original stylistic intent, and this gave tonight’s concert the prospect of a faithful look into the period of 1650-1750. Here are a few of my highlights from this varied Robeco Summer Concert in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.
How’s this for an original way of displaying one’s celebratory Union Flag? Strapped to the top of one’s contrabassoon! Apart from the absence of the National Anthem and horseracing, this concert gave us the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee weekend in a nutshell, encompassing the solemnity and sovereignty of all four of Handel’s Coronation Anthems, the exuberance of the Music for the Royal
There are some musical compositions that have always been a bit of a gamble, for composers, performers and even listeners. They might be exceptionally difficult, require extraordinary forces, or show such originality as to be perpetually startling.
We know what to expect from a virtuoso showpiece like Paganini's second Violin Concerto: a mighty contest between man and music, for us to be on the edge of our seats marvelling at how the violinist dazzles us with notes on the edge of possibility and grand gestures, with a mild frisson of "will he really manage it?"There is another way, demonstrated by the young Japanese-American violinist Shunsk
