Henry Wood News
English conductor (1869–1944)
Commemorations 2024 (Death: Henry Wood)
- organ
- classical music
- United Kingdom, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
- conductor, composer, university teacher
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2024-03-25
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2024-03-16 09:57:00
From Early Music to contemporary: the Royal Festival Hall organ is 70 and organist James McVinnie is celebrating with a Southbank Centre residency
James McVinnie performing at the Royal Festival Hall organ with Bedroom Community - Sept 2015The Royal Festival Hall organ is 70. Built from 1950–1954 to the specification of the London County Council's consultant, Ralph Downes, it was restored and re-configured by Harrison & Harrison as part of the hall's reconstruction during 2005-2007 and it was re-inaugurated on its 60th anniversary in March 2014. Now, to celebrate the instrument's 70th birthday, organist James McVinnie has a residency at the Southbank Centre featuring organ recitals including a wide range of repertoire as well as an appearance by the James McVinnie Ensemble.Though James had played the organ once before the rebuild, he was not familiar with it until he came to play it as part of the 2014 celebrations. But he spent two years as an organ scholar at St Albans Cathedral where the organ was also designed by Ralph Downes and built […]
2024-03-13 09:06:00
Contemporary music for St Patrick's Day: Belfast-based choir Cappella Caeciliana, musical director Matthew Quinn, makes its London debut
Cappella Caeciliana, musical director Matthew QuinnThe Belfast-based choir Cappella Caeciliana, musical director Matthew Quinn, makes its London debut on Saturday 16 March 2024 presenting a concert of Celtic music at St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden on the eve of St Patrick’s Day. Celtic Celebration includes music by Sir James MacMillan and Charles Wood, along with rising stars Seàn Doherty, Eoghan Desmond. Áine Mallon and Anselm McDonnell [read my review of McDonnell's recent disc, Kraina]. The works by Doherty and McDonnell are London premieres, and Quicksilver by choir member Anita Mawhinney is also a London premiere. The programme also includes Philip Stopford's Ave Verum Corpus, composed when he was Director of Music at St Anne’s (Anglican) Cathedral in Belfast as a gift to St Peter’s, the city’s other Cathedral (Catholic), whilst the performance of Dublin-born Charles Villiers Stanford's The Blue Bird commemorates the centenary month of his death.Full details from St Paul's Church's website.
2024-03-11 07:32:00
Something astonishing: Olivia Fuchs' new production of Britten's Death in Venice for Welsh National Opera involved a collaboration with circus arts, NoFit State
[…] on strong form, on only in terms of the sophisticated malleable choral sound, but in the way they suggested character, whether as hotel guests, beach denizens or threatening inhabitants of Venice.The city itself was a merest suggestion, perhaps yet another manifestation of Aschenbach's imagination. Yet in the pit, Leo Hussain and the orchestra conjured magical sounds that complemented these wisps and fragments, creating a very real sound world, with a special mention to pianist Stephen Wood for all the expressive recitative.Britten: Death in Venice - Mark Le Brocq, Roderick Williams - Welsh National Opera (Photo Johann Persson)Dare we say it, for all its genius status, Britten's Death in Venice can have longeurs. The most successful production I have seen had an added ingredient into the mix. All those years back, the presence of Peter Pears in the title role made the whole mesmerising. At Garsington in 2015, Paul Curran's production added […]
2024-02-26 15:10:33
Luigi Dallapiccola, Part I, 2024
[…] from Hitler, adopted racial (for all practical purposes, antisemitic) policies: Dallapiccola’s wife, Laura Luzzatto, was Jewish. They married on May 1, 1938; the racial laws were adopted in November of that year. Here, from 1938, is the first of the three Canti di Prigionia (Songs of Imprisonment), Preghiera di Maria Stuarda (A Prayer of Mary Stuart) written, in part, as a protest against Mussolini’s racial laws. The New London Chamber Choir is conducted by James Wood, and the Ensemble Intercontemporain, by Hans Zender. We’ll continue with the life and music of Luigi Dallapiccola next week.
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