Music, Classical

Scottish Opera: Falstaff

8 May 2008

OPERA Theatre Royal, Glasgow, Tue 13, Thu 15, Sat 17, Wed 21 & Sat 24 May; Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Wed 18, Sat 21, Thu 26 & Sat 28 Jun Long before any government directives on obesity, Shakespeare’s Sir John Falstaff knew all about the challenges…

Royal Scottish National Orchestra: Finale! Brilliant Benedetti

24 Apr 2008

Playing the Szymanowski concerto (and look out for his opera King Roger at this year’s Edinburgh International Festival) that shot her to fame as winner of the BBC’s Young Musician of the Year in 2004, violin prodigy Nicola Benedetti (pictured) is top…

London & Glasgow Improvisers Orchestras - Separately & Together

10 Apr 2008

JAZZ (Emanem Records) For reasons both practical and aesthetic large ensembles have been the exception rather than the rule in the world of free improvisation. Both the London and the rather younger Glasgow Improvisers Orchestras have happily flown in…

Opera Unwrapped returns

10 Apr 2008

Book now for Scottish Opera's behind-the-scenes scheme SCOTTISH OPERA’S Opera Unwrapped season kicks off again next month in Edinburgh and Glasgow. The strand offers fans and novices an hour-long behind-the-scenes look at the new season’s…

Scottish Ensemble: Essential Ensemble

10 Apr 2008

Welcoming back a great friend for the last of their concerts this season, the Scottish Ensemble is joined by Raphael Wallfisch (pictured), one of the UK’s most expressive cellists and one who consistently delights audiences wherever he performs.

The Teak Project

10 Apr 2008

JAZZ (First Hand Records) The Teak Project is a collaboration between sitar player Jonathan Mayer (son of Indo-jazz fusion pioneer John Mayer), guitarist Justin Quinn and tabla player Neil Craig. They describe the project as a collaboration of…

Edinburgh International Festival programme unveiled

2 Apr 2008

This year’s Edinburgh International Festival will take the changes and challenges facing contemporary Europe as its theme, it was announced today. Highlights of the programme include the world premiere of Matthew Bourne’s new dance work ‘Dorian…

Scottish Chamber Orchestra

27 Mar 2008

NEW COMMISSION Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, Thu 10 Apr; City Halls, Glasgow, Fri 11 Apr It’s not often that a new orchestral commission has its world premiere in Strathpeffer, but that is what happened in the case of Stuart MacRae’s Scottish Chamber…

Peter & The Wolf

13 Mar 2008

DANCE & CLASSICAL MUSIC Edinburgh Festival Theatre, Wed 26 & Thu 27 Mar To young ears, an orchestra can seem like a giant melting pot of sound. And picking out which instrument is playing when is a rather tricky affair. Which is why Sergei…

Mr McFall’s Chamber - Aye: An Affirmation of Martyn Bennett

13 Mar 2008

CLASSICAL Brunton Theatre, Musselburgh, Wed 19 Mar; Eastwood Park Theatre, Giffnock, Thu 27 Mar Whether playing to a packed hall or an empty one, musicians bond through the shared experience of being there and doing it together. When legendary piper…

Scottish Opera - Five:15

28 Feb 2008

Think opera, and it’s usually think big. At 15 hours in total, for instance, the four operas that make up Wagner’s Ring are very definitely tipping the overblown end of the scale. Proving that the genre doesn’t always have to be of such towering…

Messiaen Centenary

28 Feb 2008

One of the greatest figures of 20th century music, the French composer, organist and ornithologist, Olivier Messiaen was born in 1908. Celebrating his centenary, Edinburgh University, ECAT and the RSAMD collaborate with leading Messiaen scholar, Peter…

Scottish Chamber Orchestra - Mozart Symphonies 38–41

28 Feb 2008

CLASSCIAL (Linn Records) There are some partnerships that just work. The SCO’s collaboration with conductor Sir Charles Mackerras is one of them. Not that it doesn’t have to be worked at. Having done so over many years, their partnership has matured…

RNSO – Wagner’s The Ring, an Orchestral Adventure

14 Feb 2008

CLASSICAL Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Sat 23 Feb; Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Sun 24 Feb When, in the early 1980s, conductor Neeme Järvi left his Estonian homeland to work in the west, it didn’t go down too well with the powers that be. His name was…

Trilok Gurtu

31 Jan 2008

CELTIC CONNECTIONS Trilok Gurtu may have begun his musical life in a family thoroughly steeped in the strict disciplines and formal cohesion of Indian classical music, but his own career has taken him into some of the most diverse world-jazz fusions…

Scottish Chamber Orchestra

17 Jan 2008

CLASSICAL City Halls, Glasgow Fri 18 Jan; Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, Sat 19 Jan From the familiar tunes of Vivaldi’s pre-Christmas Four Seasons to four saxophones performing a brand new piece of music is quite a leap. Four is also the number of…

Brodsky Quartet

4 Jan 2008

The internationally renowned Brodsky Quartet, who unfortunately had to postpone their performance as part of Edinburgh’s New Town Concerts series in November, are now happily rescheduled at the Queen’s Hall. In a wide-ranging programme that is typical…

Met Opera at the Cameo

13 Dec 2007

Usually, a visit to a cinema is for film and a trip to an opera house is for, well, opera. Ripping apart the straitjacket of all of that is a relatively new venture that brings live opera direct from stage to the big screen. The stage is the New York…

Children’s Classic Concerts

29 Nov 2007

CLASSICAL CONCERT Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, Sat 1 Dec; Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, Sun 16 Dec He’s more at home behind the shop counter in Still Game, but this Christmas Sanjeev Kohli is branching out. Instead of hanging out with old boys Jack and…

Dunedin Consort – Buxtehude Anniversary Concert

15 Nov 2007

ANNIVERSARY Queens Hall, Edinburgh, Sun 18 Nov Composers’ anniversaries can be neat pegs upon which to hang concert programmes, with the added bonus that audiences hear music that otherwise might not get much of an airing. In the case of Dietrich…

Hitlist - The best classical & opera

18 Oct 2007

• BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra: Thursday Night Series Not long back in Glasgow from a tour to Prague, the orchestra stays in Czech mood for Dvorak’s richly melodic Symphony No 7. Nationalist sounds from closer to home are heard in Eddie McGuire’s…

Sarah Chang

18 Oct 2007

GUEST PERFORMER Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Wed 24 Oct Glasgow’s International Classical series has some impressive names attached to it this season. Alfred Brendel, Kurt Masur, Ian Bostridge and Antonio Pappano are just a few of those who are in…

Classical hitlist - the best classical music

4 Oct 2007

The Scottish Ensemble: Passionate Romantics Starting their winter season with the fire of passion and romance, the SE play the luscious, but infrequently aired Chausson Concert for violin, piano and strings. A great success when first performed, its…

Scottish Chamber Orchestra: Cl@six

4 Oct 2007

Something different is on offer from the Scottish Chamber Orchestra this season as they embark upon a new series that makes concert-going incredibly easy. With a venue that could hardly be more central, a start time to coincide with the end of the…

Benedetti adds new string to her bow

25 Sep 2007

Classical violinist Nicola Benedetti is promoting her third album, which the 20-year-old from Ayrshire describes as “emotional, tuneful and atmospheric”. The Ayrshire musician has released her interpretation of pieces by Ralph Vaughan Williams and…

Hitlist - The best classical & opera

20 Sep 2007

• BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra: Thursday Night Series The opening concert of the BBC SSO’s new series is inspired by heavenly bodies, centred on Holst’s everlastingly vivid portraits of The Planets, one of the most popular pieces of classical music…

Royal Scottish National Orchestra

20 Sep 2007

NEW SEASON Classic Bites, Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Fri 21 Sep; Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Sat 22 Sep; Opening Concert, Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, Fri 28 Sep; Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Sat 29 Sep The leaves on the trees are starting to…

Conductor stepping down from Scottish Symphony Orchestra

19 Sep 2007

The chief conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra will step down from the post in September 2009. Ilan Volkov, who was chosen to head the company aged just 26, will pursue a freelance career with the likes of the Washington Symphony and…

Public to vote for RSNO performance

7 Sep 2007

The Royal Scottish National Orchestra will allow the public to vote for a concert programme for the first time, as the company looks to broaden its appeal. One of the five concerts for Scotland’s national orchestra upcoming Classic Bites season will…

Benedetti: Cult of reality TV ‘disturbing’

3 Sep 2007

Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti has lashed out at the ‘reality’ culture responsible for spawning pointless celebrities, such as footballers’ wives and socialite Paris Hilton. The 20-year-old from Ayrshire also directed her criticisms at fellow…

Beethoven’s doctor ‘accidentally killed’ composer

30 Aug 2007

After months of forensic-style examinations, a Viennese pathologist claims the doctor treating Beethoven up to his death in 1827 inadvertently killed the composer. Christian Reiter has completed painstaking research examining strands of Beethoven’s…

Christine Brewer

23 Aug 2007

As comfortable chatting about American Idol as she is arias, Christine Brewer is swift to dispel any notion of the opera diva. Indeed, from the moment she burst onto the stage as a teenager with the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Brewer knew she had…

Gürzenich Orchestra

Carol Main

23 Aug 2007

Of all the orchestras appearing at the Festival, there is none with a more impressive pedigree than the Gürzenich from Germany. Mahler, Berlioz, Wagner, Verdi, Brahms and Stravinsky all wrote for and conducted this orchestra, whose Cologne roots stretch…

Royal Scottish National Orchestra

23 Aug 2007

On stage at the start of this year’s Edinburgh Festival and back at the Usher Hall for its penultimate night, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra have three Glasgow dates that are equally unmissable before returning to Edinburgh with their winter…

Tschaikowsky (And Other Russians)

23 Aug 2007

Armed with a truckload of sheet music, some forgotten musical gems and a biting Jewish wit, Mark Nadler is like a male Barbra Streisand on speed. Opening with the Kurt Weill/Ira Gershwin song ‘Tschaikowsky’, featuring the unpronounceable names of 49…

Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610

16 Aug 2007

While Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo occupies Festival pole position, there is plenty more on the programme from the great Renaissance-Baroque transitionalist Italian. Five concerts of madrigals make up what EIF director Jonathan Mills calls ‘the sketch book’. As…

Second Life to host first online symphonic concert

14 Aug 2007

The virtual world Second Life has added another string to its bow of real-life pursuits, with plans to stage a full scale symphonic concert on the site. The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic has created a virtual version of its concert hall in which it will…

Candide

9 Aug 2007

In setting up this year’s Opening Concert of the Edinburgh International Festival, Jonathan Mills has quickly ditched the tradition of a Sunday evening kick-off (although the St Giles’ Festival Service remains in place for the morning) and has brought…

L’Orfeo

9 Aug 2007

‘Festivals are a sort of personal odyssey,’ says EIF director Jonathan Mills, ‘like a pilgrimage or rite of passage, where you can learn about yourself.’ In programming his first Festival, Mills also threw down a personal gauntlet, meeting the challenge…

Music of Thomas Adès

9 Aug 2007

For some inexplicable reason, the music of the young English composer Thomas Adès doesn’t get much of an airing north of the border. Putting that to rights is the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, with Adès himself conducting his violin concerto and the…

La Didone

19 Jul 2007

For over 30 years, the most unlikely elements have been combined in the Wooster Group’s work. Everything from creaky old B-movies to cutting edge technology have been spliced together to create arresting pieces of theatre.

*Hitlist - Classical

3 Jul 2007

• Mendelssohn on Mull Festival Whether heard in the beautiful setting of Iona Abbey, or the Aros Hall in Tobermory, music at this nearly 20-year-old festival takes on an almost magical quality. String players of international renown come together on…

National Youth Choir of Scotland

3 Jul 2007

CHORAL CONCERTS While the professional outfits take a summer break, it’s the turn of Scotland’s musical youth to take to the stage. First off on the round of summer courses, concerts and tours is the National Youth Choir of Scotland. In preparation…

* Hitlist (Classical)

Hitlist

26 Apr 2007

The Sixteen: Music from the Sistine Chapel The seventh choral pilgrimage of this outstanding group of 16 singers takes the Renaissance music of the Papal chapels as its inspiration. The sumptuous sounds of Allegri’s famous Miserere forms the centrepiece…

Scottish Ensemble with Gwilym Simcock

City Halls, Glasgow, Thu 26 Apr; Queen’s Hall, Edi

26 Apr 2007

SEASON FINALE Well known for its innovative programming, the Scottish Ensemble bring their 2006/07 season to a close with a collaboration that straddles the worlds of classical and jazz. Leading young jazz pianist and composer, Gwilym Simcock, joins…

* Hitlist (Classical)

CLASSICAL HITLIST

28 Feb 2007

The International Classical Season: Viktoria Mullova and Ottavio Dantone To experience Moscow-trained Mullova’s (pictured) Bach is something that no one should miss, especially with harpsichordist Dantone who shares her expertise and reverence for…

Rory MacDonald

RORY MACDONALD AND THE ORCHESTRA OF SCOTTISH OPERA

28 Feb 2007

DEBUTANTE Although it is inevitable - and indeed right - that young Scottish musicians don’t always continue their education and develop their careers on home ground, it is nonetheless satisfying when the raw talent that left returns with a highly…

* Classical Hitlist

Hitlist

15 Jan 2007

The best classical & opera BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra: Afternoon Performance Definitely worth blagging an afternoon off to recharge the batteries in the company of favourite Russian maestro Alexander Titov, who tells Stravinsky’s colourful…

Gianni Schicchi/L’heure espagnole

RSAMD Opera, Theatre Royal, Glasgow, Fri 19 &Sat 2

15 Jan 2007

OPERA DOUBLE BILL USA and Canada, England and Wales, Sweden, Iceland, Singapore and Brazil are all countries that are fielding singers in the RSAMD’s comedy double bill of operas from Italy and France. Although a one-off blip means that Scotland is…

* Classical Hitlist

Hitlist

3 Jan 2007

National Youth Orchestra of Scotland: New Year Concert What a way to start the year. Almost 100 of the cream of the country’s young musical talent show what can be done after their winter residential course. Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Thu 4 Jan.

Sally Matthews and Toby Spence

3 Jan 2007

VISITING VOCALISTS As Scotland’s various concert promoters revive themselves in the wake of the festive season, two organisations - totally coincidentally - choose to start the new year with stars from the younger generation of British singers. Tenor…

Classical music books for Christmas

27 Nov 2006

Mozart in the Jungle Blair Tindall Given the passion that runs through classical music, maybe it’s not surprising that American oboist Tindall should be able to write Mozart in the Jungle, a story of what might happen when young musicians find…

* Classical music hitlist

Classical music hitlist

22 Nov 2006

Reed Between the Lines As part of a drive to promote and celebrate the oboe and bassoon, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra gives a series of Glasgow concerts with these two instruments taking pride of place. Complementing the starry players, such as…

Eye of Fire

Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, Wed 6 Dec

21 Nov 2006

NEW MUSIC A bit of chat, maybe some music or the odd amusing anecdote from a celebrated soloist are all staple fare these days for pre-concert talks. Generally free, relaxed and informal, they are useful vehicles for preparing the audience for what…

Children's Classical Concerts

Children's Classical Concerts</h3>

17 Oct 2006

CLASSICAL MUSIC Whether it’s the latest picture book by Julia Donaldson or a juicy storyline in EastEnders, we all love a good yarn. Young or old, a well-told narrative always hits the spot, but there are as many ways of delivering a story as there…

Classical hitlist

Hitlist

12 Oct 2006

Mr McFall’s Chamber Tribute to piper and fiddle player Martyn Bennett, who was a great friend of the group up until his death a year and a half ago. His hallmark combinations of electronic bass lines and beats with folk tunes, whether original or…

Royal Scottish National Orchestra: Naked Classics

Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow, Thu 26 Oct

11 Oct 2006

STANDARDS REVISTED AND REWORKED Naked and orchestras are two words which (probably thankfully) don’t usually appear in the same sentence. The RSNO’s new Naked Classics series is set to change that, albeit the collective body of the orchestra that is…

Felicja Blumental - album review

Polish Fantasy (Brana Records)

2 Oct 2006

If your idea of a Polish fantasy stretches as far as smoked sausage washed down by a glass of vodka, then it’s time to listen to Brana Records’ latest release. Despite the recent influx of Poles to these parts, the classical music of their homeland…

Classical hitlist

The best opera and classical music

28 Sep 2006

Paragon Ensemble: Loony Tunes (pictured) Another first for Paragon as they give the UK premiere of Lyell Cresswell’s Of Whirlwind Underground which depicts Prometheus’ efforts to steal fire from the gods and his resulting punishment at the hands of the…

Orchestra of Scottish Opera

Orchestra of Scottish Opera

28 Sep 2006

CLASSICAL They may not be very visible when Scottish Opera is on the main stage, but the Orchestra of Scottish Opera is not one to shy away from appearing in public on their own so that audiences can get a chance to hear and see them a bit more…