Transatlantic is violinist Callum Smart’s tribute to British and American composers. Recorded during the first lockdown, his intention was to focus on the music he was “deeply in love with”, and this passion certainly translates to Edward Elgar’s lyrical Violin Sonata in E minor which Elgar wrote in 1918. Smart plays the opening movement with great…
Exquisitely tasteful and original: Pavel Kolesnikov’s Goldberg Variations
The famous opening Aria barely announces itself, gently insinuating its simple, elegant melody into the ear and the conscious. In Kolesnikov’s hands it’s a miniature study in elegance and other-worldly serenity.
Spired and emotional: the Oxford Lieder Festival 2020
On paper, the Oxford Lieder festival (wholly online this year, for contagious reasons) ended about a month ago. But not for me. Right up to the last minute, I’ve been extracting the maximum value I possibly can from my catch-up pass, viewing as many concerts as possible before the on-demand video archive finally vanishes from…
Interview with baritone Roderick Williams
Karine Hetherington, from our ArtMuseLondon desk, caught up with busy baritone, Roderick William. He has been directing the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and singing with soprano Rowan Pierce, in a series of concerts featuring music by Bach, Handel and Teleman. The concerts are now available to watch via the OAE Player. (Photo by…
Poulenc: The Story of Babar – a delightful new recording from Miriam Margolyes & Simon Callaghan
In this delightful new recording on the Nimbus label, one of our best-loved actresses and raconteurs, Miriam Magolyes, narrates this favourite children’s story. Her voice is familiar to many and she is an instinctive and characterful narrative who brings both warmth and drama to the words.
West Side Story Revisited and Revived
West Side Story Revisited and Revived I admit I never intended to review what I believed to be a straight orchestral revival of Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story, released by Orchid Classics on November 6th. I loved the musical and the film starring Natalie Wood, and having sung all the songs throughout my teenage years, I thought I…
Turner’s Modern World at War
Tate Britain is home to the majority of J.M.Turner’s total output due to his bequest to the institution in 1851 . Three hundred oil paintings and many thousands of watercolours and sketches, have, over the years, either travelled to other galleries, been archived, or have featured in the Clore Gallery’s ever-changing displays. Turner’s Modern World is Tate Britain’s…
Mystery lays: Stef Conner, ‘Riddle Songs’
This startling, life-affirming record somehow manages a feat that has otherwise eluded science so far: time travel. Stef Conner has composed a suite of songs that demonstrate how, through the arts, the past is all there, all at once, running parallel to our present. What are its secrets? A bit of background (although Conner’s liner…
“a wonderful view of a revised history of British art”
The guide, reflecting the displays in the Tate Britain, gives us a wonderful view of a revised history of British art which includes the contribution of artists of the diaspora and women artists and presents plural perspectives of Britain and its diverse cultures.
Yes, surprises: Rick Simpson, ‘Everything All of the Time: Kid A Revisited’
This album is an extraordinary achievement – certainly no ordinary ‘covers project’. Rick Simpson and his ensemble wilfully tackle head-on perhaps the original writers’ most elusive set of tracks and, fittingly, bring the same sense of adventure to the material as Radiohead might recognise from recording much of their music first time around. It’s impossible…
