Rock meets classical as Perth explores music by Bryce Dessner, Nico Muhly, James Ledger and Andy Akiho. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

A cracking inaugural concert gives the Robertson era the look of a potential age of gold. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Deadpan Shakespeare, Russian-style, makes for an evening of divine mayhem and madness. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

From interactive iPads to magical encounters on the mean streets of Perth, it’s comfortable shoes time at the Festival. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

A personal examination of War by returned Australian soldiers.

Reconciliation seems a distant dream play as Strindberg’s relocated classic reopens old wounds. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Canberra and Willoughby Symphony chief spreads his wings and expands his interests abroad. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Handa Opera on the Harbour, the Melbourne Ring and Stuart Skelton all make this year’s nominations. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

High-octane storytelling and a Dancing with the Stars moment make for a memorable night of Israeli dance. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Former Guildhall School of Music and Drama teacher and Early Music expert charged with 15 sexual offences. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Hungarian composer Peter Eötvös has plenty of operatic experience having produced versions of Angels in America and Chekov’s Three Sisters. His 2008 setting of a short story by Gabriel Garcia Márquez, then, might seem to promise more, but despite this excellent Glyndebourne cast recording giving it every opportunity to land, it remains peculiarly elusive and, for all it’s South American colour, a slightly drab affair. The story concerns the increasingly obsessive love of a priest for a 12-year-old girl suspected of contracting rabies after being bitten by a dog. Oddly, her age appears not to be an issue here, and sung by the capable Allison Bell, she simply comes across as a young woman – albeit one given to a good old scream now and again. There’s a greater tension between the world of the local ‘natives’, accused by the Catholic hierarchy of superstition, and the harsh attempts by the Bishop and Abbess to exorcise Sierva’s ‘demon’. Perhaps the problem is that the short story is just that – short. The characters lack background and relationships are sketchy. The libretto is skillfully adapted, but too often the score seems to drift along when it should seize the dramatic possibilities. Many…

Dating from the 1730s, Bach’s four short Mass settings are the red-headed stepchildren of his choral output. Several Bach scholars have actively belittled them as “mindless” (Philipp Spitta in the 19th century) and “quite nonsensical” (Albert Schweitzer). Moreover, they contain abundant recycling of cantata movements not always perfectly suited to their new Latin words. Still, now that they have attracted such significant directors as Konrad Junghänel (Harmonia Mundi) and Philippe Herreweghe (Virgin Classics), competition in this repertoire is quite tough. Harry Christophers uses just two voices per part, a practice inherently neither good nor bad. In churches, even one-voice-per-part choirs can often convey unexpected vigour. Yet too frequently in a recording context, a tiny choir necessitates damping down the orchestral contribution, neutralising genuine drama, as opposed to mere indiscriminate briskness. So here. Junghänel, with forces comparable in size, obtains a spectrum of vocal and instrumental colours to which Christophers seems indifferent, allowing his musicians, in comparison with these impressive rival versions, to sound unduly genteel. The appropriately robust horn-players briefly heard in BWV233 appear to have wandered in from a different and more impassioned performance. Elsewhere, one might as well be listening to a robust Vivaldi opera as to anything…