Rightyho, prospectus duly plundered. What follows is just a taste of the interesting (or just really attractive) dates that didn't make the national press yesterday.
15 July: Buskaid and the Soweto String Ensemble meet John Eliot Gardiner and the English Baroque Soloists. Intriguing.
18 July: Kurt Masur celebrates turning 80 by joining together his two orchestras, the Orchestre National de France and our own London Philharmonic.
21 July: A short but lovely French Prom featuring Steven Isserlis in Saint-Saens's Cello Concerto No.2, and also Faure's Cantique de Jean Racine. Thierry Fischer conducts.
23 July lunchtime: recital by seriously hot fiddler James Ehnes and pianist Eduard Laurel.
29 July: Les Musiciens du Louvre-Grenoble/Mark Minkowski with Anne Sofie von Otter; programme includes Berlioz Les nuits de'ete.
30 July: Yefim Bronfman plays Esa-Pekka Salonen's Piano Concerto, with composer conducting.
3 August: Semyon Bychkov conducts Rachmaninov Symphony No.2 with BBCSO.
6 August: Renee Fleming evening, with Korngold arias from Die Kathrin and Das Wunder der Heliane among the goodies.
12 August: Gotterdammerung conducted by Donald Runnicles, Christine Brewer as Brunnhilde.
25 August: Bernard Haitink and the Concertgebouw in Wagner and Debussy.
4 September: Barenboim and the Vienna Phil go Austro-Hungaromanian.
8 September: Last Night stars Anna Netrebko, Andrew Kennedy and Josh Bell. OMG, please tell me Netrebko isn't going to sing 'Rule, Britannia'?!
PS - huge thanks to Alex Ross for picking up on the Tasmin busking story and noticing what the crux of the matter really was...
Friday, April 27, 2007
Thursday, April 26, 2007
A very different kind of festival...
I regret not having discovered, until today, violinist-blogger Simon Hewitt Jones's reports from the Mozart in Palestine festival through the first half of April. It's a moving travelogue full of insight and incident, lavishly illustrated with photos and videos - well worth reading in its entirety if you haven't already. Don't miss the 'Queen of the 1001 Nights' aria...
Prommms
I had a lot of s*)% to deal with yesterday and everything happened at the time I should have been heading for the Proms launch. By the time the sighs of relief had been breathed, 'Old Nick' would have finished his speech. So for the moment here's the report from today's Independent giving some of the highlights...which include an evening with the mind-boggling Nitin Sawhney, a Brass Day (billed as 'loud'), and a new composition by Rachel Portman about Hurricane Katrina (Portman is best known as an excellent film composer, and a refreshing change from the Anglo-German youngsters trying to be Berg a century too late).
There's also an evening with Michael Ball, of which Nick Kenyon apparently said "We are responding to what audiences want to hear". Cue yells about dumbing down. It's Nick's last season. Maybe he just doesn't care any more?
On the other hand, anyone who saw Michael Ball as Purcell in the Tony Palmer/John Osborne film England, My England, may stop and reflect that it's not such a bad idea. Maybe we ought to listen first and judge afterwards.
I'll pick out some suitably idiosyncratic JDCMB Proms (assuming there are some) once I've plundered the prospectus. Meanwhile, you can see the full listings of what's on.
There's also an evening with Michael Ball, of which Nick Kenyon apparently said "We are responding to what audiences want to hear". Cue yells about dumbing down. It's Nick's last season. Maybe he just doesn't care any more?
On the other hand, anyone who saw Michael Ball as Purcell in the Tony Palmer/John Osborne film England, My England, may stop and reflect that it's not such a bad idea. Maybe we ought to listen first and judge afterwards.
I'll pick out some suitably idiosyncratic JDCMB Proms (assuming there are some) once I've plundered the prospectus. Meanwhile, you can see the full listings of what's on.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
The trouble with an iPod...
...at least, a very small one...is that if you forget to take it out of your pocket, you can later discover that it's been through the laundry.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Crying for Argentina
The other day a strange girl stopped me at my local station and said "I love your shoes." I was on the way to the South Bank in the most live-in-able of my tango-style heels from Buenos Aires. The young woman turned out to be a dance teacher.
Any of you who remember our pathetic attempts at learning the tango a couple of years ago will probably have surmised that after the big trip to South America in January 06, we admitted defeat (de feet were not OK). Wow, do I miss it. The CD Canciones Argentinas had me hankering after the place, the atmosphere, the music, that peculiar brand of bone-twisting nostalgia.
Buenos Aires is not the most beautiful city I've ever visited, the food was not the finest in the world, I can't speak the language and I can't dance the dance. The people were extremely charming (especially a certain leather jacket salesman, who was Cuban), yet there was a slight undercurrent of unspecified threat, and as for the driving, you take your life in your hands when you step into a taxi. But what can I do? It's got under my skin. I miss it. I want to go back.
Problem - my editor tells me that South America is 'the kiss of death' in fiction. I don't know why. Perhaps Isabelle Allende has a monopoly, or perhaps it's just that people can't jump on Easyjet and check out the locations for themselves in a cheap weekend. I doubt that my next book is going to be tango-centric, much as I would love it to be. So there's only one thing for it...
...hunting down Astor Piazzolla on Youtube from the safety of my London study, where coincidentally I've spent the morning chewing over concepts concerning solitude, loneliness and the peculiar sonic qualities of the violin that make it so perfect as a vehicle for such emotions. So here is Piazzolla, with fiddler friend, in 'Soledad'.
Any of you who remember our pathetic attempts at learning the tango a couple of years ago will probably have surmised that after the big trip to South America in January 06, we admitted defeat (de feet were not OK). Wow, do I miss it. The CD Canciones Argentinas had me hankering after the place, the atmosphere, the music, that peculiar brand of bone-twisting nostalgia.
Buenos Aires is not the most beautiful city I've ever visited, the food was not the finest in the world, I can't speak the language and I can't dance the dance. The people were extremely charming (especially a certain leather jacket salesman, who was Cuban), yet there was a slight undercurrent of unspecified threat, and as for the driving, you take your life in your hands when you step into a taxi. But what can I do? It's got under my skin. I miss it. I want to go back.
Problem - my editor tells me that South America is 'the kiss of death' in fiction. I don't know why. Perhaps Isabelle Allende has a monopoly, or perhaps it's just that people can't jump on Easyjet and check out the locations for themselves in a cheap weekend. I doubt that my next book is going to be tango-centric, much as I would love it to be. So there's only one thing for it...
...hunting down Astor Piazzolla on Youtube from the safety of my London study, where coincidentally I've spent the morning chewing over concepts concerning solitude, loneliness and the peculiar sonic qualities of the violin that make it so perfect as a vehicle for such emotions. So here is Piazzolla, with fiddler friend, in 'Soledad'.
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