Innholdsfortegnelse for 1-Jan 2016 i BBC Music Magazine

ON AIR In with the new Radio 3 begins 2016 with ‘New Year New Music’, a week of programmes celebrating some of the best contemporary music from the last 60 years. This includes a rare complete broadcast of Stockhausen’s avant-garde masterpiece Hymnen, incorporating a recent live recording by the London Sinfonietta and archive taped material from Germany’s Stockhausen Foundation. See p90 ON DISC Rare Polish ‘A hidden jewel’ is how one critic described pianist Christian Blackshaw’s solo Mozart series in London from January 2012 to early 2013. If you weren’t there to hear it in person, Wigmore Hall Live has captured these superlative performances on disc. In this issue, we’ve reviewed the final recording in the series, including the composer’s famous A major Sonata No. 11. See p79 ONLINE Carol…

RADIO RECOLLECTIONS On a similar theme to TM Godwin’s ‘Night Thoughts’ (Letters, Christmas), I would add that they can happen early morning too – waking around 7am, I spend the next hour in a relaxed haze, enjoying Radio 3’s cocktail of old and new. This indulgence also has the bonus of encouraging musical reminiscences, such as that of when I myself worked as a programme engineer for the BBC during World War II. One evening, a charming old lady came in to give a piano recital to – in her own words – ‘help the war effort’. Adelina de Lara was her name, and I later found out she had an international reputation. She apologised for the simplicity of her programme, blaming her age, which was 72. While having a…

1895 The first ever Henry Proms concert takes place at Queen’s Hall, London 1927 The Proms season is run by the BBC for the first time 1941 The Royal Albert Hall hosts its first Prom (pictured above) 1953 The Hallé is the first non-London orchestra to appear at the Proms 1966 The Moscow Radio Symphony is the first Proms orchestra from abroad 1996 The first Proms in the Park concerts take place across the UK 2016 Melbourne to hold the first ever Proms event outside Britain…

Venetian discoveries Antonio Lotti’s fame today really rests on just one piece, his Crucifixus. But in a new signing for Delphian Records, The Syred Consort and its director Ben Palmer have turned the spotlight on other sacred pieces by the Italian composer, all recorded complete for the first time. The disc brings together the Missa Sancti Christophori, a G minor Dixit Dominus, a Miserere in C minor and a Credo in G minor. Lotti, born in Hanover to Italian parents, eventually became the primo maestro di cappella at St Mark’s in Venice. This disc of his music is the debut recording of the Syred Consort, formed in 2007, and is out in April 2016. Rare Dutilleux It’s the 100th anniversary of Dutilleux’s birth this January, and to mark the occasion…

Ingrid Fliter has headed to the Romantic era for her latest disc, pairing Schumann’s famous A minor Concerto with Mendelssohn’s First Piano Concerto. She performs with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, as recorded in Glasgow for Linn records. Arcangelo’s JS Bach Violin Concertos disc was our December 2015 Recording of the Month. And for a new recording, the period-instrument band and countertenor Iestyn Davies are bringing together JS’s Magnificat in D major with Magnificats by two of his sons, Johann Christian and Carl Philipp Emanuel, also for Hyperion records. Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 1 and Tempest Fantasy Overture have been occupying the New York-based Orchestra of St Luke’s and Spanish conductor Pablo Heras-Casado. They’ve been recording the pieces for a new Harmonia Mundi disc. David Wilde’s The Cellist of Sarajevo is…

I wrote 95 minutes of music last summer. Two pieces: a political oratorio called Turning Points for chorus, vocal soloists, children’s choir, orchestra, string orchestra, brass band, organ, piano duet and five electric guitars; and a piece for organ, saxophone quartet, film and poetry called HengeMusic, which marks the passage of the seasons at the extraordinary Neolithic henge at Knowlton in Dorset, with its ruined Norman church at its centre and its yew grove standing guard at the ceremonial entrance. Each piece had three performances, thanks respectively to the Agincourt Commemoration Fund and the Arts Council. It was a terribly hectic autumn, but some marvellous vignettes stay in my mind. Turning Points had a lot of political coverage on Radio 4’s Today programme and in the Guardian, and the premiere…

John Pike, Bristol I have been listening to DHM’s CPE Bach Edition box set. There are many gems here, but the recording that most caught my attention was Die Letzten Leiden Des Erlösers (WQ233) of 1769, performed by Collegium Vocale Gent and La Petite Bande under Sigiswald Kuijken. There are definite influences of his father here, but also similarities with Haydn. The lengthy duet ‘Muster der Geduld und Liebe’ is particularly beautiful. Gary Soucie, Massachusetts, US Lately, I’ve been listening to the Swedish composer-arranger-pianist Nils Lindberg. I’d been familiar for quite some time with his Seven Dalecarlian Paintings, which I thoroughly enjoy. Searching the Internet recently for audio and video examples of the great Swedish jazz baritone saxophonist Lars Gullin, I encountered Lindberg’s Symphony No. 1 (aka ‘Concerto 63’). Intriguing…

BAJI QUAN I practised tai chi when I was at school, so I already had some knowledge of martial arts, but at the beginning of last year I was inspired to take up baji quan by a family friend who’s been practising it for 30 years. Baji quan is originally from the northern part of China and contains eight forms – I’m working on my fourth form at the moment. It is simpler than tai chi but it still takes a long time to polish the underlying skills and the philosophy behind it, and each form takes a while to master. There is also important preparation before you do the forms that is called ‘zhuang gong’, which means ‘standing state’ – you stand there for a very long time and…

MUSIC’S MOST (IN)FAMOUS premiere has to be the first night of The Rite of Spring at Paris’s Theatre du Champs Elysées on 29 May 1913, the stuff of countless documentaries and even a novel or two. It seems to have been Nijinsky’s absolutely novel choreography, with the dancers’ feet turned inward, that triggered a riot, closely followed by the music which many found so exhilarating even then. What it really looked like, Nicholas Roerich’s designs apart, we will sadly never know; attempts at choreographic reconstruction fail to realise more enthusiastic descriptions of Nijinsky’s avant-gardism. Stravinsky, at least from the perspective of 1959 when he recorded a vivid testament of 1913, felt the dancing had little to do with the music, noting that Nijinsky said ‘I will count to 40 while…

Early years: Born 19 April 1965, Dessay trained as both a ballet dancer and actress before starting singing lessons aged 20. Starting Out: In 1991, she won the International Mozart Competition in Vienna. Soon after, in 1992, she sang Olympia in Offenbach’s Tales of Hoffmann, a part that became one of her signature roles. Major acclaim: During the 2000s, her interpretations of Donizetti roles Lucia di Lammermoor, and Marie in La fille du régiment won high praise. She was awarded a Laurence Oliver award for Outstanding Achievement in Opera in 2007. Vocal challenges: In 2001, she was diagnosed with vocal nodules, and underwent three years of treatment before returning to singing. In October 2013, she announced her retirement from opera.…

Accademia delle Crete Senesi Three historic churches provide atmospheric settings for intimate early music and lush Romantic works. Artists include the Ghent Collegium Vocale, deFilharmonie, famous soloists and upcoming young performers. (31 July – 5 August 2016) accademiadellecrete.com Incontri in Terra di Siena With majestic views and one of Italy’s loveliest gardens, Villa La Foce offers romantic outdoor settings for this first-class festival (29 July – 6 August 2016), with classical music, jazz, cross-over and more. Other dreamy venues include the castle Castelluccio, and churches in Città della Pieve, Montefollonico and Pienza. itslafoce.org Musical Landscapes in Tuscany The Renaissance town of San Quirico is the main centre for this refined festival (19-28 August 2016). Here and in nearby villages you can hear music in noble palaces,…

THE LIFE 1823 He is born 27 January in LILLE. His family name is Spanish, but the Lalos have been settled in France since the 16th century. 1839 Against his father’s wishes, he leaves home to pursue musical studies. Studying violin at Paris Conservatoire, he has composition lessons with JULIUS SCHULHOFF and JE Crevecoeur. 1848 Publishing his first compositions, he concentrates on chamber music, despite it being out of fashion in France at the time. 1865 He marries Breton contralto Julie de Maligny. A year later, she gives birth to a son, Pierre, who goes on to become a critic known for his disparaging reviews of the music of RAVEL. 1870 He receives support from the newly founded Societé Nationale and forms a working relationship with the Spanish violinist Pablo…

THOUGH THE VALVE HORN had been around for decades when he composed the Trio, Brahms specified the ‘waldhorn’ or natural horn, whose hand-stopped notes create such mysterious colours and infinitesimal shades of tuning. ‘I would be apprehensive about hearing it with the valve horn,’ he wrote. ‘All poetry is lost, and the timbre is crude…’. This is not the only recording using a natural horn, but it’s the most beautiful: Teunis van der Zwart’s (right) 1845 Lorenz horn has brindled, dusky sonorities, complemented by Alexander Melnikov’s delicate Bösendorfer piano; Isabelle Faust, on gut strings, completes the subtlest of textures. The key is a heart-stopping fragility. With no lack of fire and intensity, there is a nakedness here that does justice both to the Trio’s tragic depth and its bounding high…

Martin Cotton producer Martin Cotton studied at Cambridge, where Robin Holloway taught him the valuable lesson that he was not a composer. A Radio 3 producer for ten years, the last five with the BBC SO, since 1994 he has worked as a radio and CD producer, programme-note writer, reviewer and music examiner. John Allison editor, Opera; critic, Sunday Telegraph Nicholas Anderson Baroque specialist Terry Blain writer Kate Bolton-Porciatti lecturer, New York University, Florence Garry Booth jazz writer & critic Geoff Brown critic, The Times Michael Church writer, critic The Independent Christopher Cook broadcaster, critic Christopher Dingle Professor of Music, Birmingham Conservatoire Misha Donat producer, writer Jessica Duchen critic, novelist Hilary Finch critic, broadcaster Malcolm Hayes…

Right at the end of Nielsen’s 150th birthday year comes a set that’s a game-changer. Carl Nielsen on Record: Vintage and Other Historical Recordings on Danacord is a labour of love from Lyndon Jenkins, who began collecting Nielsen recordings in the 1950s, and whose knowledge and passion illuminate the booklet notes. I can only scratch the surface here, but any enthusiast will want to hear the first commercial recordings of the symphonies conducted by Launy Grøndahl, Thomas Jensen and Erik Tuxen(1946-52). They’ve added another set from 1950s broadcasts, and concert recordings made on wax by a Danish Radio engineer without his boss’s approval, including the earliest surviving performance of a Nielsen symphony, No. 5 in 1933, conducted by Georg Høeberg. He studied with the composer, and despite the gritty sound,…

ROSSINI DVD La donna del lago Joyce DiDonato, Juan Diego Flórez, Daniela Barcellona, Eduardo Valdes, John Osborn, Olga Makarina, Gregory Schmidt; Metropolitan Opera & Chorus/Michele Mariotti; dir. Paul Curran (New York, 2015) Erato DVD : 2564605098; Blu-ray : 2564605099 165 mins (2 discs) This serious opera is an adaptation of Walter Scott’s Lady of the Lake, and helped to inspire the continental craze for all things Scottish and Scott’s. In this production from the New York Met, the most conspicuous Scottish feature is the wearing of kilts by many of the performers, often to unfortunate effect. Of the three male characters in love with Elena (the Lady), the successful one is confusingly taken by a mezzo, the superb singer Daniela Barcellona, but in her (his) Scottish uniform she…

DALBAVIE Sonnets; The Keel Row; Nous n’irons plus au bois; Do, do, l’enfant do; Sextine-Cyclus Yuriy Mynenko (countertenor), Jean-Paul Fouchécourt (tenor); Gulbenkian Orchestra/ Marc-André Dalbavie Ame Son ASCP 1326 69:56 mins This is a beguiling triptych of beautiful works from Marc-André Dalbavie. All three are inspired responses to material from former times, yet are unmistakably of the present. The Sonnets set texts by Louise Labé. Dalbavie has loved her 16th-century poems since his teens, but it was hearing Philippe Jaroussky sing that prompted this setting for countertenor, composed in 2008. Ukrainian Yuriy Mynenko’s voice generally matches Dalbavie’s glistening textures with an intense clarity. A pity, then, that he has a slight rasp in a couple of mid-range notes, an especially noticeable trait in the enraptured stillness of ‘Lut, compagnon de…

ORFF Carmina Burana; Catulli Carmina; Trionfo di Afrodite Regina Werner (soprano), Eberhard Buchner (tenor); Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra/Herbert Kegel Brilliant 95116 (1973-78) 138:56 mins (2 discs) A punchy, serviceable Carmina, valuably coupled with at times electrifying accounts of the two other parts of Orff’s Trionfi trilogy. The sound is full of visceral impact. PERFORMANCE RECORDING A TRIBUTE TO RAFAEL KUBELÍK Music by Mahler, Brahms & Schoenberg Bavarian Radio Chorus; Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra/Rafael Kubelík Praga PRD/DSD 350118 (1962-79) 79:18 mins Kubelík was a great Mahlerian, and for specialists his two-part Das kagende Lied is a significant addition to the discography. For others, the off-air recording may be unappealing. PERFORMANCE RECORDING VERDI Messa da Requiem Leipzig Radio Choir & Symphony Orchestra/Giuseppe Patanè Brilliant 94948 (1975) 88:08 mins (2 discs) An unheralded…

BARSANTI Recorder Sonatas, Op. 1 Christoph Ehrsam (recorder), Eunice Brandão, (viol), Attilio Cremonesi (harpsichord) Glossa GCD C 80020 (1994) 63:45 mins As realised by Christoph Ehrsam’s suavely expressive recorder, Barsanti’s 1724 Op. 1 is a stylish sonata set, easy on the ear. Initially lumpen harpsichord support soon loosens its top collar. PERFORMANCE RECORDING VIVALDI Cello Sonatas in A minor, E minor, G minor, B flat and E flat Bruno Cocset (cello); Les Basses Réunies Alpha ALPHA 313 (2001) 71:46 mins A double bass adds depth to the continuo as well as avoiding any entanglement with Bruno Cocset’s gutsy ‘solo’ cello, which bestrides declamatory verve and a singing Vivaldian line. PERFORMANCE RECORDING LOVE IS STRANGE Works for lute consort by Bull, Gibbons, Cosyn, Coprario, Daniel, Dowland, Holborne, Parsons, Robinson, Johnson and…

MCCABE Variations, Op. 22; Aubade (Study No. 4); Gaudí (Study No. 3); Five Bagatelles; Mosaic; Haydn Variations John McCabe (piano) Naxos 8.571367 (1999) 76:11 mins This British composer-pianist was both admired and promoted by John Ogdon and here we see why: his music was intriguing, intricately-woven and, though largely atonal, easy on the ear. PERFORMANCE RECORDING SCRIABIN Piano sonatas (complete) Vladimir Sofronitsky plus Heinrich Neuhaus, Sviatoslav Richter (piano) Profil PH 15007 (1955-64) 152:54 mins (2 discs) Recorded on Scriabin’s own Bechstein by the man who married the composer’s daughter Elena, with the gaps filled in by Soviet pianism’s ruling deities, this is quintessentially authentic. PERFORMANCE RECORDING PIANO MUSIC FOR CHILDREN Works by Schumann, Mozart, Beethoven, Bartók, Debussy and Tchaikovsky Klára Würtz (piano); Prima La Musica/ Dirk Vermeulen Brilliant 95101 (1999)…

Perhaps surprisingly, given his superstar status and global renown, not every jazz-lover was a fan of Oscar Peterson. Their reservations centred around the very qualities that made him unique – his incredible technical command of the piano, the dazzling attack that turned any tune into a torrent of flying fingers, impelled by thunderous head-shaking swing. It was thrilling, the embodiment of jazz mastery. Or was it? To some, the Peterson phenomenon was just too unrelenting, a mechanical juggernaut sweeping all before it. A critic complained, ‘I heard a million notes and not a single idea’. The pianist seemed trapped on a wheel of his own virtuosity, perpetuated by his endless round of concerts and recordings. So even his detractors were surprised by the series of albums that appeared in the…

NOISE-CANCELLING EARPHONES B&O BeoPlay H3 ANC £200 Bang & Olufsen (B&O) is one of those brands for whom the word ‘affordable’ was most definitely not created, but behind the premium price tag lies engineering excellence, faultless build quality and more than a dash of style. While other brands hide behind breathtaking design which can’t be backed up with substance, B&O makes beautiful audio products that sound as good as they appear. The machined aluminium BeoPlay H3s (above) are B&O’s newest addition to its range of headphones and they certainly fit right in from a build perspective. Sonically they are also excellent – never too urgent or harsh, they present a relaxed, laid-back sound. The Active Noise-Cancelling technology (the ANC of the name) – using built-in microphones to produce frequencies that…

Five key facts about a work being performed this month (Choice 13) Vaughan Williams’s (VW) A Sea Symphony was premiered in 1910 at the Leeds Festival on the composer’s 38th birthday, when he conducted the Leeds Festival Chorus and Orchestra at the Town Hall. It had started out six years earlier as The Ocean, which in turn had developed from sketches for a project called ‘Songs of the Sea’. In A Sea Symphony , VW sets the texts of the US poet Walt Whitman. He was introduced to Whitman’s work while still an undergraduate at Cambridge, thanks to his friend, the philosopher Bertrand Russell. VW used Whitman’s texts in his 1907 choral work Toward the Unknown Region before again using settings – from the collection Leaves of Grass and poem…

David Nice Broadcaster and journalist ‘Listening long and hard to the music of Stravinsky in the round made me realise how constantly companionable a genius he is, and what a brilliantly refracted history of western music up to 1971 he gives.’ Page 22 Rick Jones Writer and costume journalist ‘Dressing up as Tudor actor Will Kemp and dancing to Norwich was my excuse for work this year. I crossed three counties at a rate of four leagues a day (12 miles). The Suffolk Constabulary accepted my story of “musical research”.’ Page 38 Tom Service Broadcaster and journalist ‘Making our film Leningrad and the Orchestra that Defied Hitler was spine-tingling. The musical substance and historical context of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7 came to vivid life, and I…

ELGAR AT CHRISTMAS While I enjoyed your article on neglected Christmas works, and appreciated the brief reference to Elgar’s A Christmas Greeting, one might also have mentioned The Snow, written for similar forces, and his musical Christmas card setting, Grete Malverne on a Rock (1897), later published as Lo, Christ the Lord is Born in 1909. Also, 29 December 2015 marks the centenary of the first performance of the incidental music written by Elgar for The Starlight Express. It concludes with Elgar’s wonderful treatment of the carol ‘The first Noel’, which still brings me to the verge of tears every time I hear it. It is worth tracking the recordings which the composer himself made featuring the baritone Charles Mott, who was to die of wounds in France in 1918…

Chart for week ending 19 November 2015 1 Nessun Dorma – The Puccini Album Jonas Kaufmann (tenor); Orchestre e coro di Santa Cecilia/Antonio Pappano Sony Classical 88875092492 The suave tenor stays at the top with Puccini 2 Lang Lang In Paris: Chopin & Tchaikovsky Lang Lang (piano) Sony Classical 88875117582 The ever-popular Chinese pianist takes Romantic masterpieces to the French capital 3 JS Bach Mass in B minor Monteverdi Choir; English Baroque Soloists/John Eliot Gardiner Soli Deo Gloria SDG722 Thirty years on, Gardiner’s second B minor mass 4 JS Bach Violin Concertos Alina Ibragimova (violin), Arcangelo/Jonathan Cohen Hyperion CDA 68068 Ibragimova and co. approach musical perfection 5 Cantate Domino – La Cappella Sistina Sistine Chapel Choir/Palombella DG 479 5300 The world’s oldest choral ensemble,…

Martha Argerich has been awarded the Royal Philharmonic Society Gold Medal, joining a list of winners that includes Brahms, Elgar and Rachmaninov, as well as fellow pianists Anton Rubinstein, Myra Hess and Claudio Arrau. The Argentinian is the 101st person to receive the Gold Medal which, since 1871, has been presented to musicians who have made an outstanding contribution to music over many years. Argerich’s award recognises not just her standing as one of the most formidable pianists of her generation, but also her work in championing and performing with young musicians. ‘[Martha] is a consummate chamber music collaborator,’ said RPS chairman John Gilhooly as he praised Argerich’s ‘enduring generosity and personal commitment to emerging musicians.’ Other recent RPS Gold Medal winners include conductor Antonio Pappano and pianist Mitsuko Uchida.…

ANTJE WEITHAAS violinist I have been enjoying recordings of Schubert’s complete symphonies by the Kammerakademie Potsdam orchestra under Antonello Manacorda, and in particular the Great C Major Symphony. I find Manacorda’s interpretation very personal, and very convincing. He really illustrates Schubert’s obsession so well, and makes it very understandable why he uses the same theme so many times. It’s a very transparent interpretation with a lot of intensity, attention to detail and creativity. I just love this recording. In their recording of Schumann’s Sonatas, violinist Christian Tetzlaff and pianist Lars Vogt find just the right language – that very special Schumann language. They stick very close to the score, but still make their performances very personal and take a lot of risks. Again, these are very transparent performances and…

THAT SUN KING FEELING Lang Lang has been named as the first ever ambassador to the Palace of Versailles near Paris. In his new role, the pianist will be part of the campaign highlighting the need to preserve and repair the palace, built during the reign of Louis XIV in the 17th century. He is scheduled to give concerts there in both 2016 and 2017. VASILY THE VIKING The Oslo Philharmonic has announced that Vasily Petrenko is to be its chief conductor for at least another five years. The Russian maestro, 39, has extended his contract until 2020, a period that will cover the orchestra’s centenary in 2019 and, it is hoped, also a move to a new concert hall in the city centre the following year. INSTRUMENTAL INFO The…

STRAVINSKY TOLD A journalist that neo-Classicism was a ‘much-abused term meaning absolutely nothing’, suggesting by a pat on his backside where he could put it. The term as applied to his music was invented by the Scriabin acolyte Boris de Schloezer, with reference to, of all things, the very pure Symphonies of Wind Instruments, and developed by composer Arthur Lourie as a contrast to Schoenberg’s perceived ‘neo-Gothic’ intentions. If there was a starting-point, it would be Stravinsky’s treatment of Pergolesi and contemporaries in the 1920 ballet Pulcinella – ‘my discovery of the past’, as he put it, ‘the epiphany through the whole of my late work became possible’. But Prokofiev had been there already in his ‘Classical’ Symphony of 1917, and before him Tchaikovsky in the Mozartian pastiche of his…

BETWEEN THEM, Sony and Deutsche Grammophon – for which read Warner embracing DG, Decca and Philips with sundry additions from other labels – have assembled 86 CDs of Stravinsky’s music from a song and a piano piece of 1902 to two soul-piercing arrangements of Wolf songs about mortality, completed in 1968. There are countless gems scattered through both sets. The Sony box is a voyage around Stravinsky’s own recordings, amplifying the epoch-making ‘Stravinsky Edition’ first assembled on LPs in 1982 with recordings from the Columbia era of the mid 1940s – with a few RCA contributions for good measure and works by other composers where they appeared on the CBS originals. In order not to lose the LP sleeve designs, some CDs are of very short running-time, all of them…

I’m sitting in the Grand Hall of the St Petersburg Philharmonia. Unusually, there are only a handful of people in the audience in this glittering, chandelier-gilded auditorium – a place whose white marble pillars have resounded with premieres from Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique Symphony to Shostakovich’s First and 14th. But the sense of anticipation I feel is a physical sensation that isn’t just about the music I’m going to hear – although that in itself is a uniquely thrilling prospect: excerpts from Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony, dedicated to the city of Leningrad, and conducted by Shostakovich’s son, Maxim. It’s also because among the scattering of people in the auditorium are two people who have heard this music in this hall before, in one of the most astonishing concerts ever to have taken place.…

‘And now, my dear friend, beer prevents me from going on with this letter; I drink, I eat, I sleep, I don’t say a word, I listen with a serious expression to a mass of idiotic remarks, that’s my life’. For Lalo, on a short visit back home to Lille in 1852, not much had changed in the city since he had departed for Paris 13 years earlier. He was also escaping the intentions of his father, an ex-soldier in Napoleon’s army who wanted his son to follow in his footsteps. Whether with paternal blessings or not (accounts differ), in Paris he continued having violin lessons, first with Pierre Baillot, then with François Habeneck, and in 1843 added some in composition. We know almost nothing of his life and habits…

Symphonie espagnole Yehudi Menuhin (violin) ; Colonne Concerts Orchestra/ George Enescu Naxos 8.110967 Eighty years on, Menuhin’s recording of Lalo’s showpiece remains essential listening. Namouna (excerpts) Monte Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra/David Robertson Naïve V4907 (download only) Performed here with aplomb, Lalo’s 1882 ballet is a riot of orchestral colour. Piano Trios Leonore Piano Trio Hyperion CDA 68113 The Leonore Trio clearly revel in the rich lyricism of these three works for violin, cello and piano. Le roi d’Ys Giusepina Piunti, Guylaine Girard etc; Opéra Royal de Wallonie/Patrick Davin Dynamic CDS592 A committed, characterful performance of Lalo’s unjustly neglected opera.…

Brahms Clarinet Trio Brahms’s melancholy Clarinet Trio (1891) is another precision-cut diamond of the chamber repertoire. However, while in the Horn Trio he contrasts the commanding horn with the sweetness of the violin, here the open voice of the clarinet intertwines with the cello’s textured tenor with great contrapuntal ingenuity. Inspired by the playing of clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld, the trio is characterised by long-breathed melodies and wide, yearning intervals. After an opening Allegro which burns darkly with its minor tonality, there’s an Andante of limpid tenderness. The Andantino grazioso feels like a distillation of Viennese elegance, but any nostalgia is swept away in the tempestuous Finale. Recommended recording: Martin Fröst (clarinet), Torleif Thedéen (cello), Roland Pöntinen (piano) BIS BIS2063 Schumann Adagio and Allegro One of Schumann’s happiest creations, this…

BEETHOVEN The Late Piano Sonatas Igor Levit (piano) Sony 88883703872 129:03 mins (2 discs) ‘Those who are searching for perfection can stop here. I have praised many sets of the last five Beethoven piano sonatas, and I wouldn’t want to withdraw any of the plaudits, but this set, the first solo recording from pianist Igor Levit, sets a new standard that will be very difficult to surpass.’ January 2014 JS BACH Partitas Nos 1-6 Igor Levit (piano) Sony 88843036822 151 mins (2 discs) ‘The supreme Sixth Partita ranges over a vast variety of dances and moods and has a great Sarabande. This is Bach at his most commanding and the only recording of it I have heard that surpasses Levit’s is Dino Ciani’s.’ Christmas 2014 BEETHOVEN Piano Concertos Nos 1-5…

BERLIOZ Symphonie fantastique; Lélio Gérard Depardieu (narrator), Mario Zeffiri (tenor), Kyle Ketelsen (bass-baritone); Chicago Symphony Chorus & Orchestra/Riccardo Muti CSO Resound CSOR 901 1501 114:33 mins (2 discs) Berlioz would no doubt be deeply frustrated that while Symphonie fantastique is ubiquitous in concert schedules, its musical and dramatic partner, Lélio, is a rarity. The reasons are easy to surmise. Although the former requires an extensive orchestra, it still functions as a recognisable musical unity, albeit taking the symphony in a more extraordinary direction than anything envisaged by even Beethoven. Lélio, by contrast, is unclassifiable. It has lengthy passages of narration, the first music involves just voice and piano, yet it eventually requires large orchestra and chorus. Nonetheless, hearing the two works together significantly enriches both. If the Chicago Symphony Orchestra…

Toivo Kuula (1883-1918) Kuula showed musical talent from an early age, and enrolled in the Helsinki Music Institute in 1900, when he was 17. Due to scarce finances he had to withdraw for three years. On his return in 1906, he soon gained attention as a promising young composer. He became Sibelius’s first composition student, and subsequently studied in Bologna, Leipzig, Paris and, finally in 1911-12, in Berlin. Kuula became particularly known for his songs and choral works. His most ambitious work, a Stabat Mater for chorus and orchestra, was left incomplete with his sudden death when fatally shot by a soldier.…

VALENTINI Concerti grossi, Op. 7 Ensemble 415/Chiara Banchini Alpha ALPHA 310 (2001) 74:18 mins Valentini, nicknamed ‘Little Ragamuffin’, delighted in the unexpected. These six concertos, though fundamentally ‘Corellian’, tease and surprise at every turn, and Ensemble 415 respond enthusiastically. A delightfully distinctive rarity. PERFORMANCE RECORDING CPE BACH Flute concertos, Wq 13, 22, 166-69 Alexis Kossenko (flute); Arte dei Suonatori Alpha ALPHA 304 (2005) 70:19 mins Small-scale period-instrument forces create a sense of intimate chamber music. There’s crisp orchestral articulation and bold-toned flute in allegro passages if rather retiring in middle movements. Strings conjure up expressive detail in lyrical moments. PERFORMANCE RECORDING VIVALDI The Four Seasons; Concertos, RV 578, 372 & 390 Gli Incogniti/Amandine Beyer (violin) Alpha ALPHA 312 (2008) 70:54 mins A safe and characterful account of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons…

PROKOFIEV The Story of a Real Man Kibkalo, Deomidova, Shulpin; Bolshoi Theatre Chorus & Orchestra/Ermler Melodiya MEL CD 10 02353 (1961) 112:29 mins (2 discs) In Prokofiev’s last opera, extensively cut in this sole commercial recording, Yevgeny Kibkalo is superb as the WWII Soviet pilot who learns to fly again after his legs are amputated. PERFORMANCE RECORDING PUCCINI Tosca Milashkina, Atlantov, Mazurok; Bolshoi Theatre Chorus & Orchestra/Ermler Melodiya MEL CD 10 02359 (1974) 113:78 mins (2 discs) Milashkina’s Slavic vowels won’t suit everyone, but she and Atlantov make an ardent pair, with Mazurok a snarling Scarpia in this characterful production. PERFORMANCE RECORDING RIMSKY-KORSAKOV Mozart and Salieri; Boyarinya Vera Sheloga Milashkina, Teryushnova, Nesterenko, Fedin; Bolshoi Theatre/Ermler Melodiya MEL CD 10 02344 (1985) 74:01 mins Nesterenko is splendid as the brooding and…

SCHUMANN Das Paradies und die Peri Sally Matthews, Mark Padmore, Kate Royal, Bernarda Fink, Andrew Staples, Florian Boesch; London Symphony Orchestra & Chorus/Simon Rattle LSO Live LSO 0782 (hybrid CD/SACD) 88:03 mins (2 discs) Along with Scenes from Faust this is Schumann’s choral masterpiece, internationally successful in his lifetime but largely neglected throughout a 20th century embarrassed by the sentimental libretto, drawn from Thomas Moore’s Orientalist pastiche Lalla Rookh. Now we’re less inclined to sneer, Paradise and the Peri is becoming recognised again, with several excellent CD versions, especially Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s (Archiv). Now Simon Rattle’s new live performance easily equals this – and many will prefer it, not least for the superb recording, on two SACDs, with an included Blu-ray containing two- and five-channel streams and downloadable audio…

ARENSKY Piano Quintet in D; String Quartet No. 2; Piano Trio No. 1 Spectrum Concerts Berlin Naxos 8.573317 80 mins For those who wish Borodin had written more music like his string quartets, these three works by Arensky, a pupil of Rimsky-Korsakov’s, offer similarly expressive harmonies and beguiling melodies. String Quartet No. 2, written in Tchaikovsky’s memory – its central movement a masterful set of variations on that composer’s Crown of Roses – is scored for two cellos rather than the usual two violins. The Quartet’s rich resonance recalls that of a Russian Orthodox choir: indeed, its finale quotes the Orthodox Requiem Mass. I was also struck at the work’s opening by the viol-like sound conjured by the Spectrum Concerts Berlin players, enhancing Arensky’s already inventive scoring in which the…

JS BACH Goldberg Variations Alexandre Tharaud (piano) Erato 2564605177 75:13 mins (CD) plus 62 mins (DVD) Many of the greatest pianists have recorded the Goldbergs. Glenn Gould’s iconic performances remain benchmarks (Alexandre Tharaud is undoubtedly inspired by them) but recordings range from Rudolf Serkin’s 1928 piano roll and other vintage accounts to more recent classics (including Igor Levit’s, Recording of the Month, p60), jazz-inspired versions and countless historically-informed performances on the harpsichord, not to mention many stylistically anachronistic ones. No stranger to Baroque music, Tharaud has made eloquent recordings of Couperin, Rameau and Scarlatti, many of the strengths of which are present here, too. He is at his best in the more intimate, contemplative variations, where the tone is transparent and the phrasing lyrical and delicately ornamented. The more virtuosic…

MOONLIGHT SAVING TIME Meeting At Night Emily Wright (vocals), Nick Malcolm (trumpet), Dale Hambridge (piano) etc MST CD 002 48:53mins This Bristol-based group takes its name from a Tin Pan Alley tune made into a hit by Guy Lombardo’s orchestra in the 1930s. But actually there’s nothing standard nor repertory about Moonlight Saving Time’s sound. Led by singer Emily Wright, MST’s curiously English blend of psychedelic jazz and folk has caught the imagination of a (predominantly) younger audience. Wright herself has a light, natural voice but not so delicate you don’t catch every word. The words are important: the title track for example is a setting of Browning’s poem. John Masefield and Emily Bronte also crop up in Wright’s sensitive, atmospheric interpretations. At other times, her wordless singing harmonises diaphanously…

30 SECOND OPERA: The 50 crucial concepts, roles and performers, each explained in half a minute Ed. Hugo Shirley Ivy Press ISBN 978-1-78240-272-5 160pp (hb) Making opera digestible for the soundbite generation is a fairly tall order, and as editor of this enjoyable coffee-table volume Hugo Shirley has bitten the bullet with considerable aplomb. But the results are compromised by the ubiquitous tyranny of Design – resulting in some frustration for anybody who would have liked more of the excellent words instead. Here, some of the best-respected opera critics in the UK sum matters up stylishly, and are not above including the occasional insider side-swipe – eg ‘Arias are the high-points of opera, often literally, where star singers get to show why they are paid so much’. With everything…

When Karl Eliasberg assembled the surviving musicians of his Radiokom Orchestra in 1942 to perform Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7 in Leningrad, the city was in the grip of its devastating two-year siege (see p44). In the midst of human suffering, music shone as a bright light, and as the symphony moved from darkness towards its final triumphant bars, the city showed the world that it would never be cowed. Thousands of miles to the west, meanwhile, pianist Myra Hess and many other great musicians of the day were performing recitals at London’s National Gallery throughout the worst nights of London’s wartime bombing (see p34) – concerts were never cancelled as music became an important part of the ‘Blitz spirit’. It’s difficult to overestimate the transformative effect on pain and distress…

In a career that has graced some of the most prestigious stages across the UK, Kathryn Rudge considers her performance in Michael Nyman’s Hillsborough Memorial Symphony at Liverpool Cathedral as a highlight. ‘I’m a big football fan,’ explains the 29-year-old mezzo, ‘so to be able to do something to help support the families of the victims, who have campaigned for years to find answers, was a huge honour. It’s a performance I’ll never forget.’ Liverpool born and bred, Rudge’s early career was defined by the city. It was at Liverpool College that she was first introduced to opera by her music teacher, Polly Beck – ‘She put me on the right path; if it wasn’t for her, I don’t think I would have ended up where I am today’ –…

THIS MONTH PAUL HILLIER Co-founder of the Hilliard Ensemble, Paul Hillier set up Theatre of Voices in 1990 and has recorded repertoire from Byrd to Stockhausen. His latest disc explores Dieterich Buxtehude and his musical world and is out this January on the Dacapo label. My finest moment Paul Hillier conducts Arvo Pärt De Profundis; Da pacem; Creator Spiritus Harmonia Mundi HMX2908730/32 This recent reissue of three of my Arvo Pärt recordings is a symbol of something I’m glad about. I don’t believe there’s such a thing as the finest recording, but one of these discs won a Grammy, and let’s be honest, as a musician it’s nice to be able to say that. Da Pacem, which won the Grammy, is the middle of the three discs. We…

Joyce DiDonato is doing her bit for opera-loving schoolchildren by launching a new online opera community. Aimed at teenagers who might otherwise not have anyone with whom to share their passion for opera, the US mezzo’s new ‘Opera Rocks’ newsletter will provide subscribers with news, photos and videos of life on stage, introduced by DiDonato herself. ‘I’ve noticed a fabulous trend from social media about young opera lovers: often in high school, they will feel as if they are the only person on the planet who likes opera. I am simply giving back to them, providing a platform for them to share this wonderful world of opera.’…

@fatboyclayton The two worst words in the Italian language are undoubtedly ‘da capo’ Tenor Allan Clayton (left) resents being made to repeat himself. @matthewmbarley Why do so many hotels put a knife and fork on the breakfast table, but spoons at the buffet? On tour, cellist Matthew Barley takes issue with a blatant case of anti-cerealism. @AWeilerstein Listening to an Italian patiently explaining the rules of baseball to a Frenchman, in English. Trying very hard not to giggle. Amusement for cellist Alisa Weilerstein. At least the poor chap wasn’t trying to explain cricket. @ben_hulett I’m done with anodyne, bland acoustic covers of good songs. Let’s have an Xmas ad by Motörhead. As the annual advertising schmalzfest hits our TV screens, tenor Benjamin Hulett suggests an alternative. @fatboyclayton The two worst…

Oliver Condy Editor Reading about Myra Hess’s wartime concerts on p34 sent me looking for my copy of Tenebrae’s stunning recording of Poulenc’s 1943 choral masterpiece, Figure Humaine, the composer’s paean to the liberation of France. His most challenging piece for choir, each of Figure Humaine’s eight movements are built from rich, complex jazz-inflected harmonies and angular, chromatic melodies. All of which are no match, of course, for Tenebrae… Jeremy Pound Deputy editor This winter I intend to embrace the concept of ‘hygge’, the Danish idea of cosying down at home to get through the chilly months. While I shan’t attempt to emulate the Danish String Quartet’s luxuriant facial hair, I will, however, repeatedly enjoy the pleasures of their Wood Works, a charmingly programmed and charismatically played disc of deftly…

Was it President Kennedy who said that victory has a thousand fathers while defeat is an orphan? That wry observation popped into my head after George Osborne made his startling autumn statement, acknowledging that inflicting deep cuts in the culture budget was a ‘false economy’, and even giving Arts Council England a slight budget increase. What was it that inspired this Pauline conversion in a Chancellor of the Exchequer who had spent his first five years imposing exactly those ‘false economies’ on the arts budget that he now professes to abhor? Well, victory has a thousand fathers… So I got press releases from ‘creative industries’ lobby groups saying how pleased they were that he had listened to their arguments, and much the same from the Incorporated Society of Musicians, and…

STRAVINSKY’S EARLY YEARS at home were spent in predominantly masculine company. He was a sickly child conscious of his mother’s preference for the eldest of the four boys she bore to Fyodor Stravinsky, a distinguished bass-baritone at St Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre. It was hardly surprising if he succumbed to the feminine blandishments of relatives at Ustilug, where he met his nine-year-old first cousin Katerina Nossenko, one year his senior. ‘From our first hour together we both seemed to realise that we would one day marry,’ he wrote in retrospect – they did so in 1906 – adding that they were ‘more like brother and sister’. Certainly Katerina became the stay-at-home mother of his children, while the composer’s string of lovers, perhaps inevitable given his sophisticated cosmopolitan existence in the 1910s…

Many opera singers in the twilight of their careers must wish they had done what Natalie Dessay did two years ago. Still on the right side of 50, she said goodbye to the operatic stage at a moment when everyone was still astonished at the decision and lamenting the loss of a voice that was still giving in full measure. Many artists, in contrast, limp into a decline that is cut off too late, leaving everyone with memories that are sullied by their last performances. When I meet Dessay at the Barbican before a recital, she is happier than ever about a change that she says she had embedded in her mind from the moment she came to professional opera. ‘When I was 20 I said I would stop by…

IN LATER LIFE, Hess professed not to like her own recordings (like many other artists she detested the process). ‘They bore me to death,’ she said, admitting that if she heard one being played on the radio she ‘quite liked bits of Carnaval and Beethoven’s Op. 109’. These are, indeed, special highlights of her discography. Others include Beethoven’s Op. 110 Sonata, Franck’s Variations symphoniques (with Basil Cameron) and Schumann’s Études symphoniques. The latter was a favourite of Myra’s teacher Tobias Matthay, who noted that the work had been dedicated to William Sterndale Bennett, his first composition teacher. Among the shorter works are some delicious Scarlatti sonatas and late Brahms, Rudolph Ganz’s transcription of Schubert’s Rosamunde ballet music, Jesu, joy of course and – among the works she recorded at her…

NBC Symphony Orchestra/ Arturo Toscanini Opus Kura OPK7050 A performance that Shostakovich is said to have felt was unsatisfactory, but an essential document in the work’s history: this was the performance that was broadcast across the US on 19 July 1942. Chicago Symphony Orchestra/ Leonard Bernstein DG 477 7587 Bernstein conducts a riveting, utterly cinematic, no-holds-barred performance that captures in vivid details the extremities of violence and tenderness in Shostakovich’s most epic symphony. St Petersburg Philharmonic/ Yuri Temirkanov Signum SIGCD194 Temirkanov’s orchestra is the one that Shostakovich knew and loved. And there’s a searing imagination as well as an indelible sense of connection and commitment here. Russian National Orchestra/Paavo Järvi Pentatone PTC5186511 Järvi’s recent recording is one of the most powerful of recent performances, combining a meticulous ear for detail…

Philippe Herreweghe Annual Val d’Orcia visitor Philippe Herreweghe studied both music and medicine before embarking on his prestigious career as a conductor when he founded the Ghent Collegium Vocale in his Belgian hometown in 1970. He became one of the great pioneers of period performance, radically changing approaches to early music, influencing many of today’s musicians. Since then, he has formed three other ensembles, La Chapelle Royale, the Ensemble Vocal Européen and the Orchestre des Champs-Elysées, with whom he explores an eclectic range of repertoire.…

Schumann One of Lalo’s gods was Schumann, ‘the great poet, powerful, inspired, whose every note is personal’, and there are many Schumannesque moments in his music, both poetic and energetic. He concluded one of his diatribes against Brahms by saying, ‘He will never be a Schumann’. Exoticism Like many of his contemporaries, Lalo was attracted by Spanish colours and rhythms, notable in his Symphonie espagnole . He also took folk material from Russia and Norway, but nothing from the Near or Far East. The furthest he went in that direction was Corfu in his ballet Namouna . Noise Although there are many delicate moments in Lalo’s music, he also admitted to a liking for noise, something which not all contemporary critics were willing to…

Recording of the Month BBC Music Magazine Award-winning pianist Igor Levit tackles three Mount Everests of the piano repertoire: variations by JS Bach, Beethoven and Frederic Rzewski, p60 Cello masterpieces explored Here’s a good chance to celebrate the cello: Alisa Weilerstein and Emmanuelle Bertrand have made first-rate new recordings, which you’ll find among this month’s choices. These two cellists from opposite sides of the Atlantic have more in common than just their instrument, as both have worked with great composers of recent years. Henri Dutilleux described Bertrand’s playing as a ‘revelation’, and she’s now recorded his Tout un monde lointain… (p66). And a few years back, Weilerstein recorded Elliott Carter’s Cello Concerto, playing the piece to the then 103-year-old composer. But for her latest recording, she’s swapped Carter for…

Many pianists would be happy just to record one of these huge variation sets. Why did you take on all three? There are many different reasons so let me give you just a few. Since my childhood the variation has always been the most important and joyful musical form for me. I love looking at one thing from many different perspectives. When I was about 15, my teacher told me he thought the Diabellis would absolutely be my piece. It was a total lifechanger and it has become central to my repertoire. At 16 I didn’t want to play Bach because I felt uneducated, but the Hungarian harpsichordist Lajós Rovátkay introduced me to Renaissance vocal music and we came back to Bach. For a long time I felt it was…

BRUCH Serenade in A minor; Romance in A minor; Violin Concerto No. 1 Jack Liebeck (violin); BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/Martyn Brabbins Hyperion CDA 68060 72:14 mins It’s a brave violinist who takes on Bruch’s First Concerto, with so much distinguished competition in the catalogue. Jack Liebeck certainly has the technique and temperament, and the recording is of Hyperion’s usual clear and wide-ranging quality. Martyn Brabbins doesn’t let the music sit down in the first movement, which has energy and direction from all concerned. I would like to hear more variety of tone and rubato in the opening passages, and in the cadenza which paves the way for the transition to the famous Adagio, where there’s affection in Liebeck’s performance. He doesn’t wear his heart on his sleeve, letting the music…

HANDEL Partenope Karina Gauvin, Philippe Jaroussky, Teresa Iervolino, Emöke Baráth, John Mark Ainsley; Il Pomo d’Oro/Riccardo Minasi Erato 2564609007 203:26 mins (3 discs) As librettos go, Silvio Stampiglia’s Partenope was one of the most widely travelled. First set to music in Naples by Luigi Mancia in 1699, it was set by the Mexican Manuel de Zumaya 20 years before Handel’s 1730 premiere in London. With fame came notoriety for what is, essentially, a sex farce. The Royal Academy of Music’s Owen Swiny described it in 1726 as ‘the very worst book (excepting one) that I ever read in my whole life.’ Dramaturgically speaking, Swiny had a point; but Handel’s setting is a moreish confection of limpid sicilianos, ebullient coloratura, startling martial music and a plangent Act III sommeil for the…

Wagner’s Ring Cycle In 1848, Wagner began planning his epic Ring cycle without the prospect of a theatre able to stage it according to his vision. Wagner required that all singers were to be selected for their ability to fulfil their role both vocally and as actors; scenery was to be specially created rather than adapted from other opera productions; the auditorium should be an amphitheatre; and the orchestra should be invisible. It was Wagner’s good fortune that the wealthy King Ludwig II subsidised the purpose-built theatre at Bayreuth which fulfilled all these requirements.…

Julia Wolfe (b1958) Born in Philadelphia, Julia Wolfe studied at University of Michigan, the Yale School of Music and at Princeton University. She was one of three American composers who in 1987 co-founded the New York music collective Bang on a Can. Her music draws inspiration from folk, classical and rock genres. Though habitually drawn to the city rather than the coal fields of her native Pennsylvania, Wolfe counter-intuitively turned to the latter for inspiration when commissioned by the Mendelssohn Club to write a work. The result was her oratorio Anthracite Fields , which won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize.…

RACHMANINOV Cello Sonata CHOPIN Cello Sonata; Etude, Op. 25 No. 7 (arr. Franchomme); Polonaise brillante, Op. 3 Alisa Weilerstein (cello), Inon Barnatan (piano) Decca 478 8416 80:54 mins The glorious ebb and flow of melodic material that courses through the veins of the Rachmaninov and Chopin Sonatas seems absolutely tailor-made for a cellist with the flamboyance and intensity of Alisa Weilerstein. In this superbly recorded recital, she delivers one of the most compelling performances of the Rachmaninov I’ve ever heard. Her negotiation of the fluctuating tempos and contrasting moods in the first movement is totally compelling, as is the menacing tone she achieves in the lower reaches of her instrument at the opening of the ensuing Scherzo. Later in the same movement, she offers some wonderfully magical mezza voce playing…

MUSIC, SENSE AND NONSENSE : Collected Essays and Lectures Alfred Brendel The Robson Press ISBN 978-1849549059 442pp (hb) Alfred Brendel’s perspective on the classical canon is a rare one: not only does he represent a vital link with the middle European tradition from which it emerged, but his dialectic is filtered through a subtle prism of German and English, yielding up an illuminating range of semantic nuance. Moreover we know he has felt in his fingers what his intellect has formulated, which gives his writing vivid authority. This collection combines Musical thoughts and afterthoughts (1977) and Music Sounded Out (1998), with essays from Alfred Brendel on Music (2007) and reflections written since his retirement in 2007. His forensic analysis of humour in Haydn and Beethoven (‘The sublime in reverse’)…

Each week Michael Berkeley talks to a guest about their favourite music, one of whose choices are below KIM BRANDSTRUP Opera & ballet choreographer PROKOFIEV ‘Shuisky and the Huntsmen’ from the film Ivan The Terrible Russian State SO/Valery Kuzmich Polyanksy ‘My way into dance and classical music was through film. This is from Sergei Eisenstein’s film Ivan the Terrible (1944) which is incredibly stylised, both in gesture and through close-ups and make-up; everything is like an opera. It’s incredible what Prokofiev does with the music. When they were writing the score for this and when Eisenstein had done the rough edit, Prokofiev would come in and sit with a box of matches. He would decipher the rhythm of each sequence by banging out the pulse with the box on…

BORN IN SOLIHULL in 1965 and a member of Solihull Parish Church choir as a boy, Nigel Short studied voice and piano at the Royal College of Music. He went on to sing as a countertenor in the Tallis Scholars and as a freelance soloist before joining the King’s Singers for seven years. After leaving the group, he set up his own choir, Tenebrae, who today tour internationally and have won numerous awards. Tenebrae’s latest disc, of Brahms and Bruckner motets, was last month’s Recording of the Month. My parents weren’t particularly musical but they did have some Classics for Pleasure LPs, on one of which was an old King’s College, Cambridge recording of ALLEGRI’s Miserere with Roy Goodman singing the treble solo. I was mesmerised. When I was about…