Samantha Clarke (Photo: Benjamin Ealovega) Mozart in 1774 - Mozart: Symphonies Nos. 28 & 30, Bassoon Concerto, music from La finta giardiniera, music from Paisiello's Andromeda; Samantha Clarke, Jane Gower, The Mozartists, Ian Page; Wigmore Hall Reviewed 2 May 2024 Ian Page and his ensemble explore the symphonic music Mozart wrote in 1774, along with a superb contribution from bassoonist Jane Gower and soprano Samantha Clarke in outstanding form In 1773, Mozart returned from his long journey to Italy and for the next four years was based in Salzburg. The new Archbishop took t ..read more

Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Maxim Emelyanychev in Aberdeen (Photo: Christopher Bowen) The 2024/25 season sees Maxim Emelyanychev returning for his sixth season as principal conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra (SCO) with nine concerts, both as conductor and as soloist. Andrew Manze takes up a new role as SCO's principal guest conductor, directing three concerts during the season from Scandinavian contemporary music to Mozart to Faure's Requiem. The SCO will be giving seven premieres during the season including Bruckner’s Skull by Jay Capperauld, the SCO's asso ..read more

European Union Chamber Orchestra King's Lynn Festival's annual celebration of all things Early Music, its Early Music Day will be returning to St Nicholas' Chapel on Saturday 20 July featuring a lunchtime organ recital with Harvey Stansfield, a concert with the European Union Chamber Orchestra and a late-night recital with harpsichordist Masumi Yamamoto. The day begins with a recital by the organ scholar at Peterborough Cathedral, Harvey Stansfield. He will play the Henry Willis organ at St Nicholas' Chapel, the last instrument on which Father Willis worked on before his death i ..read more

Melodrama as a dramatic musical genre has a somewhat patchy history. Whilst Mozart would say of Georg Benda's melodramas 'I love these two works so much that I carry them with me', and indeed works like Benda's Medea [recorded in 2021 by Cappella Aquileia on Coviello Classics, see my review] influenced Mozart's use of speech with music. Melodrama as a tool in the opera composers armoury does pop up, but the exploration of simple speech with music is still relatively rare. The development of post-War music-theatre works has meant that contemporary composers shy away from it rath ..read more

Willem Wissing (1656-87) - Mary II (1662-94) when Princess of Orange c.1686-87 (Photo: Royal Collection Trust RCIN 405643) A Choral Celebration of Queen Mary II: Clarke, Blow, Purcell, Handel;  chapel choir of the Royal Hospital Chelsea, the Old Royal Naval College Trinity Laban Chapel Choir, Brandenburg Baroque Soloists, Ralph Allwood, William Vann; Chapel of St Peter and St Paul, Old Royal Naval College Reviewed 30 April 2024 A celebration of Queen Mary II's birthday brings together the choirs of two institution she was instrumental in founding, mixing professionals with s ..read more

BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra's 2024/25 season is its third with chief conductor Ryan Wigglesworth. Wigglesworth will be directing Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius and a new work by Helen Grime, along with playing the solo part in Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 17. There will be a further premiere from Ricardo Ferro, plus works by Donghoon Shin, Errollyn Wallen, Gabriela Montero and the orchestra’s Composer-in-Association Hans Abrahamsen. Ilan Volkov conducts percussion concertos with Scottish virtuoso Colin Currie, including a UK premiere by Olga Neuwirth and a concerto by Andy Aiko. Othe ..read more

Spitalfields Music Festival returns with events in iconic spaces across East London from 27 June to 10 July 2024. The festival opens with soprano Nardus Williams and lutenist Elizabeth Kenny in In the Shadow of the Tower, exploring East London's cosmopolitan history in a recital at St Peter ad Vincula in the Tower of London. The concert features a new work by Roderick Williams, one of 14 premieres being presented at this year's festival. And we return to St Peter ad Vincula for Sing Joyfully: Tudor and Jacobean Music for the Chapel Royal performed by Choir of the Chapels Royal ..read more

An urban myth tells of how, one evening, Stalin made a surprise phone call to Radio Moscow demanding the urgent delivery of a record: a Mozart piano concerto played by Maria Yudina. Unfortunately, radio companies at this time did not always preserve their broadcasts for a future release or even for their own archive. But rather than say 'no' to Stalin, Radio Moscow gathered together Yudina and their orchestra in the middle of the night and made the recording from scratch, ready to be delivered to the Kremlin the following morning. In the version of the myth as told by Shostakovich, it was th ..read more

Lampe: The Dragon of Wantley - Charlotte Badham - New Sussex Opera Lampe & Carey: The Dragon of Wantley; Ana Beard Fernandez, Charlotte Badham, Magnus Walker, Robert Gildon, director: Paul Higgins, conductor: Toby Purser, Bellot Ensemble; New Sussex Opera at the Theatre Royal, Winchester Reviewed 28 April 2024 Updated to the 1980s miners' strike, New Sussex Opera's production mixes political satire and period style along with a sense of enjoyment in the work's send-up of opera seria British theatre always seems to have been fond of music, Purcell's semi-operas were the musical spe ..read more

Portrait of Mendelssohn by Wilhelm Hensel, 1847 Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto, Symphony No. 2 'Lobesgesang'; Lucy Crowe, Hilary Cronin, Nick Pritchard, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Choir of the Enlightenment, Sir Andras Schiff; Queen Elizabeth Hall Reviewed 26 April 2024 A near ideal performance of the violin concerto followed by an account of Mendelssohn's great symphony-cantata that never compromised the work's idiosyncrasy yet brought out its rich detail and emotionalism Sir Andras Schiff and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (OAE) have been celebrating Mendel ..read more