Music and Opera

I have just finished a book (writing one, not reading one, you fool) and, as ever, I am hoping that it’s good enough and people will like it. Can you ever know? In this respect, and in quite a few others, it’s a little like a band putting out a new album, which they may have been working on for years, which they feel they have put their whole life into, and which goes out there to be judged by others who (let’s be entirely frank here) may not have their best interests at heart. This must apply particularly to someone like Bryan Ferry, who works obsessively for years and

The Bamberg Symphony Orchestra will be giving the concluding two concerts of this year’s Edinburgh International Festival under its chief conductor Jonathan Nott. The Bamberg Symphony Orchestra will be giving the concluding two concerts of this year’s Edinburgh International Festival under its chief conductor Jonathan Nott. The programmes aren’t what you might expect from one of Germany’s leading orchestras, but then very little is typical about the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra. It will be performing Messiaen, Bartók and Ravel.   A few weeks ago I went to watch the orchestra rehearsing in its home concert hall, and moved on with it to Baden-Baden where it gave a performance in the Festspielhaus

This year is the 500th anniversary of the death of Tomás Luis de Victoria, whose work, as I have written before, I consider to be the most moving High Renaissance music there is. This year is the 500th anniversary of the death of Tomás Luis de Victoria, whose work, as I have written before, I consider to be the most moving High Renaissance music there is. But we could have had little idea how the world’s tragedies would follow the Tallis Scholars around, making performances of his ineffable six-voice Requiem as useful as they have been appropriate. From the earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand, through the disaster at Fukushima to

You’ll notice that the great man has some good friends helping out on this version of Riding That Midnight Train. Among them: Tony Rice and Ricky Skaggs. All good, rollicking stuff.

Sure, you don’t necessarily think of Elvis as a country singer. But then you remember his gospel roots and the rockabilly and it all makes sense. How could such a great American ever escape the greatest American musical genre of them all? He never did. Or, if you prefer, he just often returned to it. Here he is with that great Hank Williams tune I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry:

In honour of the debt-ceiling fiasco currently crippling Washington George Jones’s Things Have Gone To Pieces seems rather appropriate. Happily, it’s also a great song.

Everyone needs to return to the Carter Family from time to time. It’s a country pilgrimage. Here the ladies perform My Clinch Mountain Home and Foggy Mountain Top. Class all the way and forever.

Nashville is a fun town and there’s a heck of a lot of good stuff that’s come from Tennessee but Texas is the other great home of country music and the Texas singer-songwriter tradition is maintained by Robert Earl Keen (among many others). Here he is with The Road Goes on Forever (And the Party Never Ends). True that. Remember: we’re in the country of country…

Sorry for the lack of posts here lately. That’s what a trip to London, an 11 hour journey home and a weekend of cricket will do. Anyway, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings have a new album out and it is as good as you might expect. Here’s a bootlegged clip from a recent gig that a) is swell, b) is vivid and c) reminds one of Rawlings’ contribution to the partnership. Yeah, I’ll Fly Away….

Been a while since the standard-bearer of the modern Bakersfield sound was featured here. Time to make amends for that prolonged absence. So here’s the man himself with a fine rendition of his lovely, mournful song I Sang Dixie. Pure class.

It has to be Glen Campbell this week what with the announcement that, on account of Alzheimer’s, his forthcoming tour will be his last. So here he is with a lovely stripped-down (no bloody strings!) version of Wichita Lineman. Jimmy Webb’s song is still a mighty one and Campbell does it justice here: [This post is dedicated to NR, an old college pal and Glen Campbell obsessive]

It’s so rare I want to shout about anything from the rooftops but I do want to shout from the rooftops about The Ruby Dolls and their latest show, Rubies in the Attic, which takes cabaret and shapes it into something so original that if you can catch it you must. It’s so rare I want to shout about anything from the rooftops but I do want to shout from the rooftops about The Ruby Dolls and their latest show, Rubies in the Attic, which takes cabaret and shapes it into something so original that if you can catch it you must. The Dolls, whom I caught at the Riverside