Performer: Tora Augestad

Despite some very creditable orchestral playing, conductor Joshua Weilerstein never quite got anywhere with his programme of Bach, Weill and Brahms.

Christoph Marthaler's eagerly-anticipated UK debut at the Royal Opera House makes for a confusing first date – but we still leave wanting a second. 

Arnold Schoenberg’s 1912 melodrama Pierrot lunaire is a work of many paradoxes. The main character, Pierrot, is a man usually sung by a woman; the instrumentalists serve both as soloists and as an accompanying orchestra; it is performed using a style of singing more akin to stylised speech than actual singing; and it straddles the divide between high art and cabaret.

Musik sagt mehr als tausend Worte, aber kann sie Menschen auch zu Einsichten verhelfen? Christoph Marthalers Inszenierung ist an Urängste appellierender Hässlichkeit kaum zu überbieten.