Beethoven and Brahms from the Allegri String Quartet in Oxford

Richard Strauss' music has earworm qualities – this applies to his chamber music as much as his operas, as this evening with the Allegri Quartet proved.

Durham University’s concert series Musicon has been moving around different venues in the city over the last few years, and this year has been putting on concerts in the College chapel of St Hild and St Bede.

Hearing a work when the composer is in the audience always adds something to the occasion and the performance, and we’re fortunate in Durham that this seems to happen quite frequently. This evening’s concert by the Allegri String Quartet, held in the music department as part of the University’s Musicon series included the première of Anthony Payne’s String Quartet No.

Leonard Slatkin returns to the Prague Symphony Orchestra with one of his own pieces, a Schubert tribute that steals the show.

Mahler’s Rückert-Lieder provide an apt, if somewhat unexpected, partner to Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony in Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall. 

The Academy of Ancient Music poses the question what might have been in Leipzig with stunning performances of Bach and his competitors to be the new Thomaskantor.