Um... a theremin?

Tonight I'll be at the QEH @southbankcentre.bsky.social for... well, it's a bit complicated. I'll let the OAE explain.

Reviewing for @bachtrack.com

That was nice...

Wordle 1,768 2/6

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22 operas next season at The Royal Opera inc. 10 new productions. Let's not forget how lucky we are to have them.

Time was we had 2 London houses producing that amount of work, but since the disgraced Arts Council England took its axe to ENO the latter can only offer tiny bites of competition.

Early start for the last night of the 2026 @festivalpaques.bsky.social . The final concert concludes the residency of Lahav Shani and the Munich PO.

Brahms 4 + the ubiquitous Renaud Capuçon playing Shostakovich VC1.

Reviews of all six concerts I've attended will appear soon on Musical America.

What a thoughtless and discriminatory presentation. Wearying for most people and near-blinding for anyone with early stage cataracts or floaters, issues that would concern a fair proportion of the audience I should think.

Absolutely, Christian. It was worse than it looks in the photo because you know phone cameras: they do their best to lighten darkness.

It did the artists no favours either. In the Schumann Piano Quintet it honestly took me a while to clock Capuçon as 1st vn with Argerich & Munich PO principals.

Do you have sensitive eyes? I only glimpsed the odd moment here & there at the @festivalpaques.bsky.social. Had to avert my eyes the rest of the time.

Here are Capuçon & Argerich with the front lights up. The 5 searchlights hammered us uninterrupted.

Rage, rage against the frying of the light.

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After last night's staggeringly wonderful concert, tonight Martha Argerich & Lahav Shani return for more, joined this time by Aix Easter Festival's artistic director Renaud Capuçon in chamber music by Mozart, Debussy and Schumann.

Wild horses wouldn't keep me away. @festivalpaques.bsky.social

Reading between lots of lines, I suspect that I'm not alone in finding Michael Frayn's fêted play Copenhagen about as gripping as watching porridge cool.

I haven't seen it since the 1st run but I vividly recall enduring it with a glum prayer of 'Excite me, why don't you'. All very mind-wandery.

It's really not all that great, and I speak as fan of Hammer schlock. But with a look.

Tonight's dinner in Aix will be pasta with cream and girolles. I adore girolles.

The weather here is extraordinary. A whisky and a novel on the balcony at 6.45 pm and it's still sunny at a balmy 20°. Best bit of the day.

Concert 3 of 6 at the @festivalpaques.bsky.social and it's chamber music tonight, a concert led by Mikhail Pletnev and Gidon Kremer. Mozart, Schubert, Tchaikovsky.

All part of my Musical America coverage.

Concert 2 of 6 for me at the Aix @festivalpaques.bsky.social will be given by Les Siècles this evening.

Bertrand Chamayou will play both Liszt concertos as the meaty filler in a Wagner sandwich - orchestral moments from Parsifal and Tristan.

I've been looking forward to this concert very much.

This morning I'm in professional mode.

Tonight: the first of 6 concerts at this year's Aix Easter Festival that I'm covering for Musical America.

A Brahms evening: Renaud and Gautier Capuçon play the double concerto with the Lausanne CO, followed by the early First Serenade.

Wall to wall Provence sunshine too. I took this yesterday.

Cancel state visit.

Couldn't have put it better myself. Tristan is the ultimate 'less is more' opera. Why? Because it's about the abstract, interior, inexpressible side of being human. For me it is the greatest work of art in any form.

Wherever possible I rush to semi-stagings. The fatuous things I've seen on a stage.

Evisceration of Trump on French TV in the early evening news magazine 5/5. Intelligent, damning, unanswerable, no holds barred.

Since I've given up on UK TV news, I don't know whether anything as vituperative as the analysis here makes it into our own news bulletins. But I doubt it.

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Just arrived in Provence for three glorious weeks in my favourite place on earth.

I'll be reviewing six concerts at the @festivalpaques.bsky.social (Easter Aix) for Musical America.

I'll also be living the life of Riley.

a white ghost with a surprised face and the words `` it 's just me '' . ALT: a white ghost with a surprised face and the words `` it 's just me '' .

It is a curious story. I have it written in faded ink...

Yes it's Turn of the Screw day at the Royal Opera. Down in the depths of the Linbury, ghosts are stirring. I'll be there to review them for Opera.

Malo, everyone.

Apologies for my geographical faux pas. I needed that line though. I know - how cheap.

World Premiere

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Tonight at the RFH Robin Ticciati and the @lporchestra.bsky.social join forces that are Scandinavian from start to Finnish in Sibelius (Kullervo) and Wennäkoski (a WP).

I'll be reviewing for Musical America.

My review of a delightful chamber concert by the Aurora Orchestra Principal Players at King's Place last Thursday.

Now published by @bachtrack.com

bachtrack.com/22/296/view/...

He also has a far cooler name than I have.

I do love @kingsplacelondon.bsky.social . Such an elegant venue for chamber music.

Why are we rewarding Donald Trump with a state visit from our King?

His illegal war is driving up costs for British families and he is belittling our country and insulting our troops.

Cancel the visit.

Tonight at @kingsplacelondon.bsky.social the Principal Players of Aurora Orchestra trespass delightfully on Nash Ensemble territory with an attractive mix of chamber works by Mozart, Poulenc, Janacek and Judith Weir.

I'll be reviewing for @bachtrack.com.