| Date and venue | Title |
|---|---|
| 27-Apr-2013 Queen's Hall, Edinburgh | Scottish Chamber Orchestra and George Benjamin celebrate Britten |
 This second of two SCO Britten centenary concerts saw its subject juxtaposed with two living British composers and Mozart. Cynics might consider the closing Symphony no. 40 in G minor (1788) a reward for surviving the rest of the programme’s modernity. However, the audience of sophisticated, paying volunteers, such as I felt to be present, would be more likely to detect in it a parallel with our own, home-grown, prolific child prodigy, Benjamin Britten.Read full review... | |
| 27-Nov-2012 Southbank Centre: Royal Festival Hall | Strange meetings: Britten's War Requiem at the Southbank Centre |
 November continues to be a month of poppy art, despite Philip Larkin’s derisory account of “Wreath-rubbish in Whitehall”. As the only flower to survive the ravished soils of the trenches following the First World War, the poppy is replicated in the form of a paper badge to be worn yearly in commemoration of 11 November, the Armistice Day of 1918. It was deemed to be a symbol of hope and regeneration in the aftermath of devastating combat.Read full review... | |
| 19-Jul-2012 Royal Albert Hall | Prom 8: OAE forces thrill in Handel's Judas Maccabaeus |
 Written in the late 1740s, Judas Maccabaeus was a clever attempt by the ever-wily Handel to capitalize on recent successes, both his own – in the form of the now-established oratorio concert – and that of the nation, in the wake of the recent victories over Bonnie Prince Charlie’s Scottish rebels. Until this evening, only excerpts of the work had been heard at the Proms, and so tonight was an opportunity for the Orchestra of the Age of the Enlightenment and their director, Laurence Cummings, to make their case for a work much less popular now than it was in Handel’s own day.
Read full review... | |
| 28-Jan-2012 Holywell Music Room | John Mark Ainsley and Roger Vignoles: A night of dreams in Oxford |
 This was the first concert of Oxford Lieder's new season, and setting the bar pleasingly high for those who will come after was the partnership of tenor John Mark Ainsley, veteran of concert and opera stage alike, and Roger Vignoles, a name synonymous with the highest levels of professionalism in the accompaniment of song. Whilst the famous Dichterliebe was the main attraction, we were also treated to other Heine settings by Brahms and Mendelssohn, in a programme focused on themes of night and dreams.
Read full review... | |
