Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Thomas Walker

Romeo Castellucci’s inspiring and spiritual production lands in Berlin, with a superb cast of Baroque specialists and the B’Rock Orchestra under the baton of René Jacobs.

Handel's oratorio Susanna is often considered to be less than consistently dramatic and this performance in the Halle Handel Festival did little to dispel that view.

John Butt and the Dunedin Consort closed the Oslo Church Music Festival with fine performances of CPE Bach and Mozart, even though the concert didn't prove quite as innovative as advertised.

Under the baton of René Jacobs, B’rock Orchestra gave an inspired performance  that ought to contribute in giving Il ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria the place it deserves in the standard repertoire.

An excellent performance of Sir Harrison Birtwistle’s The Last Supper receiving its Scottish première, with Roderick Williams and Susan Bickley heading a luxury cast.

At the Holland Festival, the performance of Haydn’s Die Schöpfung with film images by Julian Rosefeldt does not quite unfold as the spectacle it promises on paper.

Ottavio Dantone, the Accademia Bizantina and the Norwegian Soloists' Choir gave a strong performance of Handel's oratorio Belshazzar.

An opera that pokes fun at opera seria? An opera that features backstage preparations for a show, followed by an opera within an opera? No, it’s not Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos. 

Five star reviews are flowing Arcangelo’s way. It’s easy to see why. Five years after it was founded by Jonathan Cohen, the quality of this zestful ensemble just keeps soaring. 

Saint-Saens' “Dance of Death” and Orff's gaudy, medieval satire framed a stunningly-realised new commission from Guy Barker, with Alison Balsom playing against type. 

Bieito and Oper Stuttgart's Platée is a true riot, with outstanding vocal performances from Thomas Walker in the cross-dressing title role, and Lenneke Ruiten as a rock star, guitar-toting La Folie.

In Peter Sellars' reconstruction of Purcell's unfinished semi-opera The Indian Queen, fine vocal performances are spoilt by indifferent staging and choreography and an embarrassing retelling of the Conquistador story.

With only twelve singers, including the soloists, the Dunedin Consort gives an insight into what the first Messiah might have sounded like in Dublin's Musick Hall in 1742.

Channelling Conchita Wurst in its starring role, the Early Opera Company's production of this rare Rameau opera is bursting with laughs and memorable performances from a strong young cast. 

Laurence Cummings and Royal Northern Sinfonia round off their week of Bach concerts at Sage Gateshead with joyful orchestral music, and Bach's miniature comic opera.

John Butt and Dunedin Consort delight Dunbar Parish Church with Acis and Galatea

The decision to appoint the Early Opera Company and Scanner as this year’s associate artists says much about Spitalfields Music Summer Festival, an eclectic cornucopia of classical and non-classical music concerts by professional and amateur artists, bespoke tours, and family activities.

Passion is not for the faint-hearted. This performance of Bach’s St Matthew Passion weighed in at three hours (excluding interval). However, my attention did not waver, and this seemed true of the rest of enraptured audience.

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 Scottish Ensemble has been resident in Dundee for four days, really getting under the skin of the city. Amongst a whole raft of activities, including pop-up concerts, performing a film score live at a screening at Dundee Contemporary Arts, the Ensemble has been working with string players from Dundee Schools Orchestra and Dundee Symphony Orchestra.

A year after the first performance of his St John Passion, Bach made several significant alterations that divert the emphasis of the work away from Christ’s final triumph over death, focusing instead on human sinfulness.

A piece of music written by a dying composer, left unfinished and completed by a dedicated friend from the chaotic fragments left behind. This is not just the story of Mozart’s Requiem, so familiar to many from Peter Schaeffer’s colourful retelling in Amadeus, but also of Bartók’s Viola concerto, which was imaginatively paired with the more well-known Requiem by Northern Sinfonia this evening.

ENO's latest première matches a young theatre director with a reputation for cutting-edge drama to one of the earliest operas in the repertoire, in the less-than-conventionally-operatic surroundings of London's Young Vic. It's an improbable combination, and I wasn't at all sure what to expect.

On a dark and snowy night, a packed Wigmore Hall was captivated by the Early Opera Company's offering of Handel's Messiah - compared to some, an intimate performance with a dozen instrumentalists and a choir of 8, but which suited the surroundings to perfection.

Début de saison inégal aux Violons du Roy dans trois magnificats de la famille Bach livrés avec fougue, mais appelant plusieurs réserves en matière interprétative.

Gemeinsam mit dem Kammerorchester Basel und einer durchwachsenen Besetzung leitete René Jacobs Joseph Haydns letzte Oper am Theater an der Wien.

Allzu lange kaute Rameau für den Geschmack des damaligen Publikums auf der Gegenüberstellung von Gut und Böse, Schwarz und Weiß herum. Wäre die Neuproduktion der Komischen Oper Berlin die Uraufführung gewesen, hätte es Rameaus Bühnenmusik wohl auch nicht leichter gehabt. 

Mit dieser neuerlichen Belgien-Produktion unterstrichen Ensemble und Dirigent ihren Ruf als vorzügliche und lebendige Opernausleuchter.

Händels opernoratorisches Speziellentum begeistert mit Dantones stimmlichem Allstarteam