ENB’s Signature Classic Debuts at the Royal Albert Hall ==== The Sleeping Beauty will be screened in cinemas nationwide 13 – 18 October. To find a participating cinema near you and buy tickets click here ==== Kenneth MacMillan’s The Sleeping Beauty, entrusted in the UK to English National Ballet (ENB), is a glorious spectacle full […]
Birmingham Royal Ballet, The Nutcracker
Once More with Feeling! Most versions of The Nutcracker ballet aim to create magic. It is, after all, a ballet about the transformative power of dreams and imagination, prompted by a mysterious magician figure and set to a Tchaikovsky score that is itself musical magic. So it was with all four Nutcrackers I saw in […]
Golda Schultz Sings Gershwin and Bernstein at the Proms
While Golda Schultz was the undisputed focus of last night’s BBC Prom, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, with Robin Ticciati on the podium (fresh from Glyndebourne), made its presence strongly felt. The evening opened with the Proms premiere of Franz Schreker’s Chamber Symphony and concluded with Stravinsky’s dazzling Firebird Suite, a showpiece that leaves no room for weakness in the orchestra.
The Marriage of Figaro – Glyndebourne at the BBC Proms
Glyndebourne comes to London with Mozart’s dazzling opera Glyndebourne’s Le Nozze di Figaro arrived at the BBC Proms with the opera’s title now firmly in English (The Marriage of Figaro), bringing with it the weight of tradition: a reminder that opera at the Proms has always been about making the grand feel accessible, and the […]
BBC Proms 2025: Anoushka Shankar – ‘Chapters’
A Rapturous Proms Return for Anoushka Shankar The Radio 3 digital promotional banner at the back of the Royal Albert Hall last night proclaimed ‘Music to Unwind Your Mind’. It was a fitting headline for the return to the BBC Proms of Anoushka Shankar, sitar virtuoso, composer, and multi-Grammy nominee, for her 5th Prom and […]
BBC Proms 2025 – Mahler and More
While I wouldn’t echo Maureen Lipman’s character in Educating Rita and claim I’d die without Mahler, the chance to immerse myself in his music is always a welcome one. This made a recent programme, Mahler’s Seventh Symphony, preceded by a BBC commission and world premiere from rising British composer Tom Coult, a particularly compelling prospect
The Ivy Kensington Brasserie
The perfect place for a Pre-Proms dinner We’ve all heard the saying ‘’If music be the food of love, play on’’, and as an evening at the Proms has become one of our annual summer ‘’must-dos’’ over the years, we booked Prom 42 which promised a three-course musical feast of Arvo Part, Grieg and Sibelius. […]