Barry Creasy

2 weeks ago | musicomh.com | Barry Creasy

Barrie Kosky’s glittering conversion of Handel’s oratorio into opera sees its second revival at Glyndebourne Festival. It’s back again! First staged at Glyndebourne in 2015, Barrie Kosky’s adaptation of Handel’s first successful oratorio, Saul, delighted audiences then, and has continued to do so in Glyndebourne touring productions, in its first revival in 2018, and now once more in the 2025 Glyndebourne Festival.

3 weeks ago | musicomh.com | Barry Creasy

Seven players from Chineke! orchestra are joined by Josie d’Arby for a barnstorming performance of Wynton Marsalis’ jazz-influenced paraphrase of Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale. Stravinsky’s 1918 L’Histoire du soldat (The Soldier’s Tale) is a full-on Russian-period work. It’s based on the folk tale of a Faustian encounter by a soldier with the Devil, who offers the soldier fame and riches in exchange for his soul (symbolised by his violin).

4 weeks ago | musicomh.com | Barry Creasy

The Early Music vocal ensemble is joined by lutenist Jonas Nordberg for performances of works by Carlo Gesualdo, Alessandro Piccinini and Giovanni Kapsberger. The history of music is full of quirky composers, but the Prince of Weird was surely Carlo Gesualdo.

1 month ago | musicomh.com | Barry Creasy

Jamie Barton joins James Baillieu for the conclusion of his one-day marathon at Wigmore Hall. “Quite frankly, if someone asked me to give three recitals in a day, I’d laugh and run away.”So joked mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton as she introduced the second half of Saturday evening’s concert. This, though, is exactly what the ever-popular and always-brilliant pianist James Baillieu did on Saturday on his ‘focus day’ at Wigmore Hall.

1 month ago | musicomh.com | Barry Creasy

Music old and new for guitar from the multi-Grammy nominee and colleagues. As Sean Shibe remarked in his introduction to the second half of Wednesday evening’s concert, guitarists often have to beg, steal and borrow repertoire, and in this he’s not wrong: it’s rare to attend a ‘classical’ guitar recital that doesn’t include arrangements of pieces originally written for other instruments.