Richard Tognetti: an anarchist with a chamber orchestra
The violinist, conductor and composer reflects on 25 years with Australia’s leading chamber orchestra – and why the best music leaves us speechlessThe most trouble Richard Tognetti ever got into was...
View ArticleMozart: Il Re Pastore CD review – a glimpse of the composer's mature brilliance
Fox/Tynan/Devin/Ainsley/Hulett/Classical Opera/Page(Signum Classics)Now on its fourth instalment, Classical Opera’s ongoing project to record all Mozart’s stage works is saving the undisputed...
View ArticleMozart: Les Mystères d’Isis review – purists may hate it but this Magic Flute...
Santon-Jeffery/Lenormand/Pokupić/Droy/Christoyannis/Teitgen/Le Concert Spirituel/Fasolis (Glossa)Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte was not performed complete in Paris until 1829, 38 years after its first...
View ArticleBath MozartFest: Nash Ensemble review – five-star poignancy
Assembly Rooms, BathAs the players created a rich and luscious body of sound, the opening concert of this annual celebration proved totally satisfyingBath’s annual celebration of Wolfgang Amadeus...
View ArticleDuncan Druce obituary
Violinist and composer who completed Mozart’s RequiemDuncan Druce, who has died aged 76, was an exceptional musician whose gifts as composer, string player, musicologist, teacher and writer fed into...
View ArticleSabine Devieilhe: Mozart & the Weber Sisters CD review – irresistibly good
Devieilhe/Pichon/Pygmalion(Erato)On being rejected by Aloysia Weber – oldest sister of Constanze, whom he would later marry – Mozart is said to have sat at the Webers’ keyboard and played a song...
View ArticleHave you lost the plot with opera? Help is at hand
If you’ve ever wondered why the heroines in tragic opera stories don’t just roll their eyes and mouth ‘Yeah, whatever’, we’ve got the summaries for youOperas aren’t meant to make sense. That’s why they...
View ArticleHeath Quartet/Baillieu review – fluid and elegant quintet playing
Wigmore Hall, LondonJames Baillieu’s playing needed a touch more personality in the Mozart but the Elgar was convincingly shapedPianist James Baillieu is a featured artist at the Wigmore Hall this...
View ArticleMozart at 250: how to explain a 10-year-old talent for all time
Conductor Ian Page has embarked on a 27-year project to play Mozart’s music, in order, 250 years after it was written. He has reached 1766, when Mozart was 10 and his music was already breaking new...
View ArticleDates of key Mozart symphonies are wrong, claims music scholar
Days of looking at crossed-out dates on original manuscripts with magnifying glass reveals different dates on five works from composer’s early periodMozart symphonies from one of the most important...
View ArticleThe chamber orchestra: why small is beautiful
Mozart, Brahms and Schumann all worked with, and wrote for, chamber orchestras, whose compact size is a huge advantage to composers and audiences alike. Why do we neglect them today? A wise man once...
View ArticleMozart: Piano Concertos Nos 20 & 21 CD review – strangely disappointing
Rudolf Buchbinder (piano), Staatskapelle Dresden(Sony)Two of Mozart’s great mature piano concertos, a veteran pianist of the classical repertory, and a skilled German orchestra– what could go wrong?...
View ArticleENO in crisis: who can keep the magic alive?
Despite a glorious Magic Flute revival, a new artistic director of the stricken opera company will face some hard decisionsLast week English National Opera advertised for an artistic director....
View ArticleDon Giovanni review – Mozart's dark vision delivers subterranean thrills
Hackney Empire, LondonUnder Lloyd Wood’s guiding hand, English Touring Opera go underground to create the work’s best UK staging for some timeLloyd Wood’s English Touring Opera production of Don...
View ArticleBeethoven beats Mozart for first time in most popular composer poll
Beethoven takes 19 places in top 300 chart of works to best Mozart’s 16 in Classic FM’s Hall of Fame poll – world’s biggest public vote on classical music tastesBeethoven has beaten Mozart for the...
View ArticleMozart: Piano Trios KV 502, 542 & 564 CD review – agility and intimacy
Rautio Piano Trio(Resonus)The Rautio Piano Trio, which specialises in period performance, was established at the Royal Academy of Music and at the International Musicians Seminar, Prussia Cove in...
View ArticleA musical tour of Europe’s great cities: Paris
In the second of a new series, Stephen Moss traverses Paris through the musicians who lived and loved there; give us your suggestions for next week’s city, Venice, belowOur post-referendum celebration...
View ArticleDie Entführung aus dem Serail CD review – full of bounce and clatter
Le Cercle de l’Harmonie/Rhorer(Alpha)This production of Mozart’s dubiously orientalist Singspiel (part song, part speech, generally comic, racial politics firmly of its time) was created for the 2015...
View ArticleQuatuor Van Kuijk: Mozart's String Quartets CD review - well-judged debut...
Quatuor Van Kuijk(Alpha Classics)Winners of the Wigmore Hall’s prestigious string quartet competition last year, the young French ensemble Quatuor Van Kuijk are currently BBC New Generation Artists, so...
View ArticleMozart: Zaide CD review – unfinished harem opera reveals its deeply serious side
Bevan/Clayton/Imbrailo/Orchestra of Classical Opera/Page(Signum)Mozart’s work list is littered with incomplete projects, from pieces that are regularly performed in their unfinished state, such as the...
View Article