Mozart
Alfred Brendel was peerless – but he wasn’t universally loved
In middle age Alfred Brendel looked disconcertingly like Eric Morecambe – but, unlike the comedian in his legendary encounter with…
Meet the man who says improvisation is the key to Mozart
In August 1993, the pianist Robert Levin sat down in Walthamstow Assembly Rooms with the conductor Christopher Hogwood and the…
Testament of cliché
‘Ring out your bells for me, ivory keys! Weave out your spell for me, orchestra please!’ It’s lush stuff, the…
False notes
Chevalier is a biopic of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, whom you’ve probably never heard of, as I hadn’t. He…
No laughing matter
As stage directions go, the The Magic Flute opens with a zinger. ‘Tamino enters from the right wearing a splendid…
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra
Grade: B It must have been an interesting day in the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra’s press office when Blair Tindall’s memoir…
Liquid silk
That strain again… it’s the morning after the concert and one tune is still there, playing in the head upon…
Small but perfectly formed
Haydn is looking well — in fact, he’s positively glowing. The dignified pose; the modest, intelligent smile: it’s only when…
Highs and lows
Rejoice: live music is back. Or at least, live music with a live audience, which, as Sir Simon Rattle admitted,…
Mozart’s footnotes
There are worse fates than posthumous obscurity. When Mozart visited Munich in October 1777, he was initially reluctant to visit…
The pleasures of four-play
One of the few social activities not yet prohibited under lockdown laws is four-handed piano playing. I don’t mean sitting…
Drama vs display
It is amazing what fine performances you can get beamed to your computer these days. Slightly less amazing is the…
Dumb and dumber
I think I am supposed to say that Bill & Ted Face the Music, the third in a franchise about…
Paradis regained
Selina Mills on Maria Theresia von Paradis, the gifted but forgotten 18th-century composer, whose story will finally be told in a new chamber opera
Meet the Mozarts
It’s 1771, you’re in Milan, and your 14-year-old genius son has just premièred his new opera. How do you reward…
A perfect antidote
Anyone familiar with Joe Hill-Gibbins’s work will brace instinctively when the curtain goes up on his new Figaro. He’s the…
This year, I’m performing all 32 of Beethoven’s sonatas. Here’s why
For the past several decades, little in my life as a professional pianist has been as constant as my relationship…
Why are Haydn’s operas so lousy? La fedelta premiata reviewed
There’s a book about musicals that every opera lover should read. Not Since Carrie by Ken Mandelbaum is a history…
An overcooked blowout: Glyndebourne’s Die Zauberflöte reviewed
Think back to when you were 12, and the sensation of re-opening your favourite book. (This is The Spectator; I’m…
Easily the best thing I’ve seen at the Grange Festival: Falstaff reviewed
‘Tutto nel mondo e burla’ sings the company at the end of Verdi’s Falstaff — ‘All the world’s a joke’…
Deft humour and daft imagery: WNO’s Magic Flute reviewed
Operas are like buses. Both are filled with pensioners and take ages to get anywhere, but more importantly they always…
Only adults struggle with The Magic Flute. Kids get it
Spoiler alert: it’s all a dream. At least, I think that’s what we’re meant to take away from the business…
