El-Khoury and Spyres celebrate French stars

By Mark Pullinger, 15 July 2017

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“an astonishing voice which moves from an incredibly dark lower register to a gleaming top”

Reviewed at Cadogan Hall, London on 14 July 2017

Auber, Manon Lescaut: ouverture

Rossini, Otello: Venise, o ma patrie

Meyerbeer, Robert le Diable: Robert, toi que j'aime

Halévy, Guido et Ginevra: Dans ces leiux… Quand renaîtra

Verdi, Jérusalem: Air de Ballet

Halévy, Guido et Ginevra: Conduisez-moi… Ombre chérie

Donizetti, La Favorite: Overture

Hérold, Le Pré aux clercs: Jours de mon enfance

Auber, Le lac des fées: Ils s'éloignent

Donizetti, Lucia di Lammermoor: Regnava nel silenzio

Donizetti, La Favorite: Pas de Six

Donizetti, Lucia di Lammermoor: Lucia, perdona… Se ad ora inusitata

Donizetti, Les Martyrs: Miracle soudain... O sainte mélodie

Joyce El-Khoury, Soprano

Michael Spyres, Tenor

Carlo Rizzi, Conductor

The Hallé

Tarmo Peltokoski conducts the Hallé in Mahler and Vaughan Williams

Leighton Jones, 16th April

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

****1

Concertos – for violin and for orchestra – from the Hallé

Peter Connors, 22nd March

Viktoria Mullova is a superb soloist in Brahms' Violin Concerto, while an orchestra full of soloists play Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra with Kahchun Wong presiding.

*****

Nico Muhly’s vision of the end of the world comes to Sheffield

Phil Parker, 15th March

Doom – both personal and cosmic – and its aftermath are the focus of Alpesh Chauhan’s Hallé concert at Sheffield’s City Hall.

****1

Avant-garde echoes meet minimalist soundscapes in Hallé concert

Pwyll ap Sion, 26th February

Jonny Greenwood’s genre-defying music is given a powerful performance by violinist Daniel Pioro and members of The Hallé Orchestra under Hugh Tieppo-Brunt.

****1

Celestial journeys with Kahchun Wong and the Hallé

Rohan Shotton, 19th February

Kahchun Wong returns to The Hallé for Holst and Unsuk Chin, with a postscript from Colin Matthews

***11

The Hallé brings Salonen, Grieg and Sibelius to Sheffield

Phil Parker, 23rd January

Dazzling young German pianist Julius Asal and stand-in conductor Duncan Ward breathe new life into the familiar in repertoire by Grieg and Sibelius.

****1

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Mark Pullinger

Mark has been a Bachtrack editor since 2014. He is also an experienced critic, writing hundreds of reviews for the site, as well as a freelancer writing for other magazines and newspapers. He also writes programme notes and blogs on Substack. Mark has a particular passion for the operas of Verdi as well as Russian and French repertoire. Outside the concert hall and opera house, Mark enjoys cooking and travel and is probably at his happiest let loose in a French patisserie or a Viennese coffee house.

From Auber to Halévy: El-Khoury and Spyres celebrate a pair of French stars in style