Mark Pullinger

London

Music Critic and Editor at Bachtrack

Critic, Bachtrack editor, programme note writer. Best when caffeinated. https://t.co/8GjfrlTpNS Also found where the Sky is Blue... 😉

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Articles

Tchaikovsky: Queen of Spades at Wiener Staatsoper | Live Review

5 days ago | gramophone.co.uk | Mark Pullinger

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Netrebko and Eyvazov in Queen of Spades at Wiener Staatsoper (Photo Michael Poehn)Anna Netrebko’s role debut as Lisa in Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame (The Queen of Spades) has been a long time coming. 'It's a slightly heavy role, on the spinto side,' she told me in a 2018 Bachtrack interview, doubting she’d ever sing it. Then came a duet, with (then) husband Yusif Eyvazov, at the 2020 Salzburg Festival and two solo scenes on her 2021 album Amata della tenebrae.
Srnka: Voice Killer at Theater an der Wien | Live Review

5 days ago | gramophone.co.uk | Mark Pullinger

⭐⭐⭐⭐Voice Killer at Theater an der Wien (Photo: Karl Forster)'Who breathes cannot sing, who sings cannot breathe.' The inscription in the score to Miroslav Srnka’s new opera places the human voice at its very centre. Voice Killer, commissioned and premiered by MusikTheater an der Wien, is based on the true story of Private Edward J. Leonski, an American soldier stationed in Melbourne, who killed three women in May 1942. Caught after the third murder, Leonski was hanged under American military law.
Mozart: Marriage of Figaro at Volksoper Wien | Live Review

1 week ago | gramophone.co.uk | Mark Pullinger

⭐⭐ Marriage of Figaro Act 2 at Volksoper Wien (Photo: Marco Sommer)Centre-stage in this new Le nozze di Figaro at the Volksoper is a washing machine on which a notice is taped: Out of Order. It’s an apt description of Lotte de Beer’s turkey. About 20% of the audience didn’t bother returning after the interval. I envied them.
Rossini: Barber of Seville at Wiener Staatsoper | Live review

1 week ago | gramophone.co.uk | Mark Pullinger

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Patricia Nolz as Rosina in Barber of Seville at Wiener Staatsoper (Photo: Michael Pöhn)Herbert Fritsch’s 2021 staging of Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Wiener Staatsoper caused a stink. Literally. Its abstract set consists solely of brightly coloured plastic sheeting and is reportedly a lot of fun.
Tchaikovsky: Mazeppa at Grange Park Opera | Live Review

1 week ago | gramophone.co.uk | Mark Pullinger

⭐⭐⭐⭐David Stout as Mazeppa and Rachel Nicholls as Mariya in Mazeppa at Grange Park Opera (Photo: Marc Brenner)When he was Director of Productions at English National Opera, David Pountney was part of the triumvirate – with Peter Jonas and Mark Elder – that helped instigate a revolution in modern opera production in Britain.
Review - The Bizet Edition

2 weeks ago | gramophone.co.uk | Mark Pullinger

Mark Pullinger With its rich HMV/EMI back catalogue to draw upon, Erato tends to curate its single-composer boxes well. This 16-disc Erato edition, devoted to Georges Bizet 150 years after his death, is a mixed bag, full of interesting things, but some choices will inevitably raise eyebrows. Take Carmen, one of the world’s most-performed – and most-recorded – operas. Erato has a wealth to choose from, offering us two. Which Carmens does it plump for?
Pountney's vivid Simon Boccanegra at Grange Park Opera

3 weeks ago | bachtrack.com | Mark Pullinger

Wasfi Kani is a shrewd hustler. Want an opera house built? She’ll raise the millions required. Want some seats? She’ll acquire some knock-offs from Covent Garden. For Grange Park Opera, she’s also bought in productions wisely: Katie Mitchell’s Jenůfa from Welsh National Opera; David Alden’s Kátya Kabanová from English National Opera; and now Sir David Pountney’s long-forgotten staging of Simon Boccanegra (WNO, 1997). Revived by Robin Tebbutt, it makes a handsome opening to GPO’s festival.
Dinis Sousa and the OAE present Elgar on period instruments

3 weeks ago | bachtrack.com | Mark Pullinger

Elgar on period instruments? Why, one may well ask, given we have actual recordings of Sir Edward conducting much of his music, including all three works that featured on this programme from the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Dinis Sousa? In matters of tempo and portamento, we can hear exactly what “period Elgar” sounded like just by firing up Spotify.
Hot ice: Osipova and Brændsrød sizzle in Cranko’s Onegin

3 weeks ago | bachtrack.com | Mark Pullinger

When it comes to Eugene Onegin, how operagoers must envy balletomanes. With yet another disappointing production of Tchaikovsky’s masterpiece launched by The Royal Opera last autumn, it's a consolation to turn to John Cranko’s 1960s creation Onegin, in The Royal Ballet’s repertoire since 2001. Set to a patchwork score of music by Tchaikovsky, notably not drawn from the opera, it is one of the most sumptuously set jewels in the ballet crown.
Bachtrack top ten: Richard Strauss

3 weeks ago | bachtrack.com | Mark Pullinger

“I may not be a first-rate composer,” declared Richard Strauss with characteristic self-deprecation, “but I am a first-class second-rate composer.” He was speaking in 1947, aged 83, during a golden Indian summer which yielded such works as Metamorphosen and the Four Last Songs. Strauss was most definitely a first-rate composer, particularly in the realm of opera, from the succès de scandale of Salome (1905) to the wistful “conversation piece”, Capriccio (1942).