Best concerts and opera in July
The greatest music festival in the world, the BBC Proms, opens this month, with 72 concerts. Here is our pick of the July Proms, with the best of London events at other venues and on the city's opera stages
The greatest music festival in the world, the BBC Proms, opens this month, with 72 concerts. Here is our pick of the July Proms, with the best of London events at other venues and on the city's opera stages
An exciting and imaginative series of live concerts across this vibrant east London area has something for every taste, with new music and much-loved pieces revisited. Artists include violinist Aisha Orazbayeva (pictured), who plays Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber's Mystery Sonatas (8 July) , a real rarity. Also on the programme Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring for solo piano (3 July).
Read more ...A run of gorgeously sung Handel operas at Glyndebourne seems likely to continue with this magical piece. The plot is obscure, the characters confusing, and it doesn't matter a bit. Just listen to those arias! In this new production, the cast includes Canadian coloratura soprano Jane Archibald in the title role and a host of fine British singers. Jonathan Cohen conducts the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.
Read more ...If you love the full-bodied choruses of Handel's great choral work Messiah, here's your chance to give voice and join in. The outstanding baritone interpreter of this repertoire, Roderick Williams (pictured), leads a workshop that looks in the first half at ensemble numbers and in the second at individual arias. A fascinating way to get inside this masterpiece, in great company.
Read more ...A spectacular launch for the long-awaited fully-fledge BBC Proms, after two more limited years, in the form of Verdi's mighty and operatic Requiem. Soloists include rising star tenor Freddie De Tomasso (pictured) and soprano Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha. Saraki Oramo conducts the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
Read more ...This brilliant young conductor (pictured) and his dynamic orchestra breathe new life into some of the best loved works in the English repertoire, including Elgar's highly personal Enigma Variations and Vaughan Williams's Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. Adam Walker is the soloist in Huw Watkins's Flute Concerto. This is a great Prom for family audiences.
Read more ...The double bill that closed the Opera Holland Park season 2019 was a resounding highlight of the company's highly successful summer. So a second double bill is something to look forward to. Here, Delius's Margot La Rouge, in which a woman's reputation is at stake, is staged with Puccini's one-act opera Le Villi. Two great casts feature soprano Anne Sophie Duprels in the leading role of both operas, plus Nadine Benjamin (pictured), Peter Auty, Stephen Gadd and many more.
Read more ...Mark Adamo's opera based on Louisa May Alcott's classic American novel, is given its UK premiere. Already considered a masterpiece in the composer's native United States, in Ella Marchment's production sisters Jo, Meg, Beth and Amy are sung by Charlotte Badham, Kitty Whateley, Harriet Eyley and Elizabeth Karani, with Lucy Schaufer (pictured) as Aunt Cecilia. A must-see.
Read more ...All aboard for an underwater musical adventure with CBeebies stars and the Southbank Sinfonia conducted by Kwame Ryan (pictured). The two relaxed performances last one hour, and include musical extracts that conjure up marine life, with precious creatures and a unique sound world. Broadcast live on Radio 3 and recorded for later transmission on CBeebies.
Read more ...The swirling opera that opened Glyndebourne Festival Opera 2022 comes to the Proms in a semi-staged performance with, among the original cast, soprano Lauren Fagan (pictured) outstanding as a suspicious girlfriend and Marta Fontanals-Simmons as her loyal friend Jack. The scene is a small Cornish community that wrecks and loots passing ships and which turns on a couple who light beacons to help the hapless sailors. Robin Ticciati conducts the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Glyndebourne Festival Chorus.
Read more ...Blurr is the Colour of My True Love's Eyes is the teasing title of a new concerto for percussion and orchestra by the Canadian composer Nicole Lizée, given its European premiere by the virtuoso Colin Currie (pictured) with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Alpesh Chauhan. Also in the first half of this promising Prom, an arrangement for orchestra of the Adagio from Bruckner's late string quartet. To finish Shostakovich's politically driven and bristling Symphony No 5.
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