In Aristotle’s Poetics, catharsis was considered a desirable state brought about by arousing and magnifying the emotions in such a way that the spectator’s inner being would be purified. The best way to do this, Aristotle reckoned, was to evoke fear and pity by confronting an audience with a vision of souls in torment. The musical equivalent is what Catalan countertenor Xavier Sabata aims to induce on the enterprising Aparté label with a string of mostly unknown opera seria arias by the likes of Orlandini, Conti, Torri, Caldara, Ariosti and Sarro plus a handful of classics from Handel, Hasse and Vivaldi thrown in for good measure and a nod to marketing. Not that marketing needs much help. With the hirsute Sabata taking what I presume is a cathartic icy shower on the cover, this is a CD that is unlikely to go unnoticed on the shelves. With a good recital disc, the programme is half the battle, and in that respect Sabata has played an absolute blinder. He opens with a real find in the form of a classic ‘nemesis-aria’ from Orlandini’s Adelaide. Sabata has one of the richest, darkest countertenor voices on the circuit. Blessed with… Continue reading Get…

Shaham's forward and back Brahms odyssey appeals to head and heart.

The East Neuk Festival has done it again with its latest sand sculpture from the company that brought you a pumpkin carving of Trump. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Bangarra fires on all cylinders in seminal tale of first contact.

It’s fair to say that Dave Malloy’s dazzlingly eclectic musical-cum-opera on a chunk of Tolstoy’s War and Peace divides critics way beyond its losing out at the Tony Awards to the way more mainstream Dear Evan Hansen. The tendency for Malloy’s characters to comment on the action even while taking part in it seems to alienate some, while its resolute refusal to avoid repetition (more on that later) and hit the sweet spot of the big ballad means that listeners are unlikely to come across it on an album of show tunes. A pity, because by essentially setting prose – and most of it Tolstoy’s – Malloy is doing something rather unusual and clever. But don’t despair, this addictive cast album gives listeners the chance to sit back and enjoy a rare and imaginative piece of musical storytelling without the challenge of what is going on in front of their eyes. Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 starts at the point in War and Peace where the beautiful young Countess Natasha Rostova has fallen in love with, and gotten engaged to, the formal and somewhat starchy Prince Andrey Bolkonsky. While Andrey has departed for the war with… Continue reading Get unlimited…

Musical standards aid Kaufmann's debut, if production raises questions.

Back in 2015, this extended musical family told Clive Paget how the ‘food of love’ can also be the language of love. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

The South African-born, Gold Coast-educated fortepianist talks Mozart and the therapeutic effect of mixing a cocktail. Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Daniel Barenboim and Charles Dutoit help us discover the private pianist behind the public persona.

Ahead of his Pelléas with the SSO, the maestro talks French music and modern opera – just don’t mention the R-word! Continue reading Get unlimited digital access from $4 per month Subscribe Already a subscriber? Log in

Brett Dean wrangles the moody Dane into two-and-half hours of thrilling music theatre.

Poor old Ethel Smyth. A fine composer, she had the misfortune to be a) English and b) a woman, both of which have condemned her to musical purgatory for much of the 70 years since her death. Still, Der Wald (never recorded) was the only opera by a woman to be staged at the Met until Saariaho’s L’Amour de Loin in 2016. The Boatswain’s Mate (1914) is a small-scale but quintessential English comic opera. The widow and publican Mrs Waters is wooed relentlessly by a retired boatswain. When he recruits an unemployed soldier to frighten her into thinking she needs protecting, matters are turned upside down, with unexpected results for Mrs Waters’ head and heart. Act I employs spoken dialogue, a device awkwardly dropped in Act II, and some sections go on far too long, but it’s a winning libretto set to highly attractive music and incorporates elements of folk and popular song – it even quotes Smyth’s suffragette anthem, The March of the Women, though the work really doesn’t own the feminist credentials that are sometimes claimed for it. This world premiere is conducted by Odaline de la Martinez who directed the marvelous first recording of Smyth’s The Wreckers…