Amstel Quartet in Utrecht Music Week Festival

By Cynthia Wilson, 13 September 2014

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Reviewed at TivoliVredenburg: Grote Zaal, Utrecht on 11 September 2014

Bulsink, Barricade! (World premiere)

Kiyama, Sax quartet

Knigge, OhEngelOh (World premiere)

Sysoev, Consistent Contradictions

Germanus, Moonwalk

Amstel Quartet

Andris Nelsons and the BSO arrive in New York, with baggage in tow

Cameron Kelsall, 9th April

In his first New York appearance since the termination of his contract as BSO Music Director, Nelsons courts public sympathy and makes some thrilling music.

***11

Nelson Goerner shines with the CBSO and Rachmaninov's Rhapsody

Robert Gainer, 9th April

The CBSO present the work of three European émigré composers of the 1930s and 40s, who reimagined their musical influences with contrasting approaches and results.

****1

Karabits and Szeps-Znaider carouse with the LPO

Christopher Woodley, 8th April

The sparkle of Max Bruch's Fecond Violin Concerto and the drama of Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony overcome the gloom of Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s dark forebodings.

****1

Savall conducts Beethoven and Haydn at the Elbphilharmonie

Mengguang Huang, 3rd April

Beethoven's Christus am Ölberge is paired with Haydn's Die sieben letzten Worte, a journey from agony to transcendence in which the agony proves the more honest companion.

***11

Portraits and pictures from Ibragimova, Gardner and the LPO

Roy Westbrook, 1st April

From Three Screaming Popes to Pictures at an Exhibition, a pair of works inspired by paintings frame a violin concerto by Béla Bartók at London's Southbank Centre.

****1

Energy, precision and drama from the Philadelphia Orchestra

Susan Stempleski, 31st March

Marin Alsop is joined by pianist Hayato Sumino as she conducts the Philadelphians in an exhilarating program of works by John Adams, Gershwin and Prokofiev.

****1

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Cynthia Wilson

Boston-born, educated at Concord Academy and Sarah Lawrence College, Cynthia Wilson studied harpsichord in Amsterdam. She has performed, taught and held significant management positions: public radio, Philips Hall, Rotterdam Philharmonic. Wilson subsequently founded wwclassics: (arts) policy and (events) production. She recently published the biography of Menahem Pressler (Beaux Arts Trio).