Christopher Morley's essential guide - with contributions from his team of specialist reviewers
CBSO Prom
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Apologies to all
In my excitement over the piece my fingers ran away with me, and I forgot to credit Ethyl Smyth as composer of the Concerto for Violin, Horn and Orchestra.
CHRISTOPHER MORLEY ENJOYED THREE ENCHANTED EVENINGS AT EASTBOURNE'S GRAND HOTEL
SOME ENCHANTED EVENINGS
Appassionata at the Grand Hotel, Eastbourne *****
Eastbourne's breathtakingly magnificent Grand Hotel, so imposing yet also so welcoming, has an impressive roster of visiting musicians since its opening in 1875. Among the many luminaries who have crossed its portals are Debussy (who completed La Mer here), Kreisler, Caruso, Nellie Melba, Ysaye, Paul Robeson, Myra Hess… the list goes on.
Latest to join them is the young vocal quartet Appassionata, who, together with pianist Will Sharma, presented a three-night entertainment "Some Enchanted Evenings" at the end of March. It began with baritone Matthew Siveter, already a much-loved veteran of Gilbert and Sullivan productions, presenting his one-man show "A Source of Innocent Merriment", drawing material from the likes of G&S themselves, Noel Coward, Flanders and Swann, Tom Lehrer, as well as d...
STIRRING ELGAR CONCERTO FROM THE CBSO LEADER CBSO at Symphony Hall ★★★★ Elgar’s Violin Concerto has provided almost as many opportunities for pointless speculation as his ‘Enigma’ Variations. Who is referred to in the work’s inscription, “Herein is enshrined the soul of...”? Is it someone codenamed “Windflower” after whom several of the work’s themes are named? Is it Alice Stuart-Wortley, daughter of the painter John Everett Millais? Is it Helen Weaver, or Elgar’s mother or possibly his wife? Who cares? Elgar himself told us all we need to know about the work when he said of it: “It's good! Awfully emotional! Too emotional, but I love it.” So would any unprejudiced listener after hearing this performance played with such tenderness, fierce concentration and passion by the CBSO’s leader Eugene Tzikindelean and backed to the hilt by the orchestra conducted by Kazuki Yamada. In the opening bars soloist and orchestra captured the mysterious haunting quality of the initial theme that ...
CBSO’s new season – fresh start CBSO at Symphony Hall ★★★★ Normal service has been resumed – after the most traumatic season for the CBSO since the orchestra almost went bankrupt just over twenty years ago. Birmingham City Council funding will be axed after a century of civic support. Then new CEO Emma Stenning’s infamous “Vision Statement” – a gospel for the trendy Holy Trinity of Accessibility, Relevance and Inclusiveness – urged audiences to get out the mobile phone, film the musicians, take selfies and bring in some drinks. In December Strauss and Beethoven were swamped by a vastly expensive, noisy, distracting and utterly irrelevant, light show. In April, tenor Ian Bostridge halted his performance of Britten’s ‘Les Illuminations’ until dimwits in the audience stopped distracting him with their mobile phones. My reviews of both concerts went viral and sparked many think pieces and diatribes in the national media. Perhaps in some small way they helped start the backtracking of...