Category Archives: Song

In Concert – Carolin Widmann, CBSO / Tianyi Lu: Habibi, Korngold & Prokofiev

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Carolin Widmann (violin, below), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Tianyi Lu

Habibi Zhiân (2023)
Korngold Violin Concerto in D major Op.35 (1945)
Prokofiev Symphony no.5 in B flat major Op.100 (1944)

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Wednesday 25 February 2026, 2:15pm

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Picture of Tianyi Lu (c) Marco Borggreve

This afternoon’s concert saw the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in action with the Chinese-born New Zealand conductor Tianyi Lu, and a programme that prefaced established works from the mid-20th century with a recent piece by an Iranian-born Canadian composer.

Its title translating not only as ‘Life’ in Kurdish but as ‘indignant’ or ‘formidable’ in Persian, Iman Habibi’s Zhiân takes its cue from Iranian government repression in response to protests after the death of Mahsa Amini in police custody. Although not directly programmatic, there is a discernible trajectory from the initial explosion of violence, through a sequence of more ambivalent yet increasingly consoling episodes – during which solo instruments (notably the oboe) come into focus, towards a culmination of unalloyed fervour. Such a statement could easily have descended into overkill, but Habibi gauges its progress with audible sureness of intent; abetted here by the conviction of the CBSO’s response. Little heard as yet in the UK, Habibi is clearly a composer with something worth saying and the means by which to say it.

Those with longer memories may remember when Korngold’s Violin Concerto was far from being the concert staple it is today, its uninhibited romanticism held in check by orchestration as fastidious as it is sophisticated along with a formal concision that ensures this work never outstays its welcome. It was such a balance between effusiveness and discipline which came across most clearly in Carolin Widmann’s playing, by turns tensile and expressive so that the music retained its focus throughout. Even she could not quite prevent the finale from veering towards bathos, as Korngold’s otherwise judicious recourse to earlier film-scores rather gets the better of him, yet as its uproarious closing bars surged onwards, there was little doubting the sheer effectiveness of this work taken as a whole or of Widmann’s ease when realizing it.

The stage was set for a memorable performance of Prokofiev’s Fifth Symphony which, in the event, was no more than decent. Not that this was because of technical failings, yet the initial Andante never quite recovered from a sluggish opening such that the strenuous development was unduly hectoring then the climactic restatement of the main theme sounded turgid rather than implacable. The scherzo’s central phase had appealing insouciance, but its outer sections lacked impetus with little emphasis on the ‘marcato’ designation to ensure the necessary edge.

The ensuing Adagio was the sure highlight, Lu’s preference for leisurely tempos and gradual accumulation of tension coming into its own not least with a seismic climax which subsided towards a coda of melting pathos. The finale opened enticingly, but progress here was again undermined by a lack of momentum; without which, its ostensibly genial themes never took flight. This was most evident with a denouement, among the most hair-raising in symphonic literature, whose seeming matter-of-factness rather left the whole work hanging in abeyance.

A pity so relatively lacklustre an interpretation ended David Powell’s final concert as CBSO sub-principal cello. Your reviewer remembers his engaging presence from four decades ago, and is glad an overt dislike of Mahler did not end his 45-year tenure almost before it began.

To read more about the CBSO’s 2025/26 season, visit the CBSO website. Click on the names for more on conductor Tianyi Lu, violinist Carolin Widmann and composer Iman Habibi

Published post no.2,812 – Saturday 28 February 2026

In Concert – Sir Stephen Hough, Soloists, CBSO Chorus, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Omer Meir Wellber: Beethoven & Haydn

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Sir Stephen Hough (piano, below), Lauren Urquhart (soprano), Georgia Mae Ellis (mezzo-soprano), Luis Gomes (tenor), Alexander Grassauer (bass), CBSO Chorus (above), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Omer Meir Wellber (conductor & harpsichord/director)

Beethoven (/Hough) Piano Concerto no.3 in C minor Op.37 (1800, rev. 1803)
Haydn Missa in Angustiis, Hob.XXII/11 (‘Nelson Mass’) (1798)

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Thursday 19 February 2026

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

That tonight’s concert from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra featured music by Beethoven and Haydn might have been indicative of a straight-ahead or mainstream concert but, as things turned out, neither programme nor music-making could be deemed predictable.

Sir Stephen Hough has no doubt played Beethoven’s Third Concerto many times with, moreover, his take on the outer movements not far removed from his much-praised Hyperion recording. The initial Allegro was lithe and impetuous if at times a touch hectoring (and Matthew Hardy was uncharacteristically reticent in that spellbinding passage after the cadenza), with the final Rondo treading a fine line between humour and irony at its most distinctive in the modulatory transition to the main theme, or that improvisatory solo flourish prior to the nonchalant coda.

Interest naturally centred on the slow movement – a Largo designated Con gran espressione in its ‘re-imagining’ by Hough (above). Itself part of a project instigated by this evening’s conductor, Omer Meir Wellber, to re-examine works in the core repertoire, this duly retains Beethoven’s instrumentation but renders the main theme, introduced by the soloist, as a hushed chorale for strings which pervades what follows. All well and good had that chorale become more than a static backdrop, against which Hough’s welter of skittish figuration sounded overly confined to the upper register. Neither was the climactic return of the first movement’s principal theme other than an affectation, nor the upsurge leading directly into the finale without contrivance. One respected Hough’s following of his muse, even if the outcome felt less than convincing.

Having not unreasonably given Hough the benefit of any doubt, the audience was nonplussed with his encore – the last of Schoenberg’s Six Little Pieces that, written after Mahler’s funeral on 17th June 1911, yields a rapt eloquence even at less than the ‘very slow’ tempo prescribed.

As searching products of his late maturity, the six ‘name day’ Masses that Haydn wrote around the turn of the 19th century remain too little heard at orchestral concerts; save for the ‘Nelson Mass’ whose actual title, Mass in Troubled Times, makes explicit the cultural turmoil from of which it arose. This must also have occasioned its unyielding orchestration with trumpets and timpani but no woodwind, plus a dextrous continuo part allotted here to harpsichord and from which Wellber directed with a sure sense of where this most combative of masses was headed.

Vocally the solo writing favours soprano and bass, with Alexander Grassauer making the most of his mellifluous contributions and those of Lauren Urquhart impassioned yet tonally uneven in more animated passages. Georgia Mae Ellis and Luis Gomes handled their secondary roles with real finesse, while chorus-master David Young drew a laudable response from the CBSO Chorus (arrayed on stage with what might be felt the choral equivalent of ‘free bowing’). Taut and incisive, the epithet ‘symphonic’ as applied to this work can rarely have been so apposite.

The performance certainly set the seal on a concert which rightly encouraged a reassessment of both works and, by so doing, underlined Wellber’s own interpretative convictions. Having last appeared with the CBSO almost six years before, his return should be so long in coming.

To read more about the CBSO’s 2025/26 season, visit the CBSO website. Click on the names for more on conductor Omar Meir Wellber, pianist Sir Stephen Hough and soloists Lauren Urquhart, Georgia Mae Ellis, Luis Gomes and Alexander Grassauer.

Published post no.2,804 – Friday 20 February 2026

In Concert – Natalya Romaniw, CBSO / Eduardo Strausser: Shekhar, Richard Strauss & Brahms

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Natalya Romaniw (soprano, below), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Eduardo Strausser (above)

Shekhar Lumina (2020) [UK Premiere]
Richard Strauss Vier letzte Lieder (1948)
Brahms Symphony no.4 in E minor Op.98 (1884-5)

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Wednesday 4 February 2026

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Pictures (c) Rodrigo Levy (Eduardo Strausser), Frances Marshall (Natalya Romaniw)

Eduardo Strausser has been welcome visitor to the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra on several earlier occasions (see elsewhere on this website), with this afternoon’s programme demonstrating a keen ear for his juxtaposing of contemporary music and established classics.

Equally well-established as an instrumentalist and multi-media artist, Nina Shekhar (b.1995) is an Indian-American with a substantial output to her credit – not least Lumina. Premiered in Los Angeles and subsequently heard across the United States, its eventful 12 minutes explore what she has described as ‘‘… the spectrum of light and dark and the murkiness in between’’. The incremental emergence of sound and texture brings Ligeti’s 1960s pieces to mind, while the build-up of its central phase towards a culmination of palpable emotional fervour is both adeptly managed and powerfully sustained, before the gradual return to its inward origin. The present performance left little doubt as to Strausser’s belief in this music, even if that opening stage would have benefitted from a more attentive response by some of those in the audience.

Richard Strauss’s Four Last Songs is too frequently encountered in concert these days, so that it takes something special to make one reflect anew on its achievement as among the greatest of musical swansongs. This account got off to rather an inauspicious start – Natalya Romaniw overwrought in the vernal deftness of Frühling, not aided by overly opaque textures – though it subsequently came into its own. Arguably the most perfectly realized of all orchestral songs, September found an enticing balance between joy and resignation, while if leader Jonathan Martindale’s solo in Beim Schlafengehen was not quite flawless, it eschewed sentimentality to a (surprisingly?) rare degree. Im Abendrot rounded off the performance with Romaniw’s eloquent retreat into an orchestral backdrop which itself faded into serene and rapt fulfilment.

If by no means his final work, Brahms’s Fourth Symphony surely marks the onset of his final creative period. In its overtly austere sound-world and an abundance of hymn-like or chorale-inflected themes, it is also the most Bachian of his orchestral works but Strausser was right to offset this aspect against that surging emotion as underlies even the most speculative passages of its opening movement. The coda built methodically yet not a little impulsively towards an apotheosis as dramatic as anything by this most Classically inclined of Romantic composers.

After this, the Andante emerged in all its autumnal warmth and expressive poignancy – if not the most perfectly realized Brahms slow movement then surely the most profound. Bracingly energetic if never headlong, the scherzo prepared unerringly for the finale – the effectiveness of its passacaglia format having on occasion been questioned, while conveniently overlooking that parallel sonata-form dynamism such as galvanizes this movement on its intended course. Suffice to add that the closing pages felt as inevitable as any performance in recent memory.

Overall, a fine showing for the CBSO – notably its woodwind and brass – and Strausser, who will hopefully return soon. The orchestra is heard later this month with Omar Meir Wellber in a no less stimulating programme of Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto with Haydn’s ‘Nelson’ Mass.

To read more about the CBSO’s 2025/26 season, visit the CBSO website. Click on the names for more on conductor Eduardo Strausser soprano Natalya Romaniw and composer Nina Shekhar

Published post no.2,791 – Saturday 7 February 2026

In concert – St. John’s College Choir Cambridge / Christopher Gray – Christmas Carols @ Wigmore Hall

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Choir of St. John’s College Cambridge / Christopher Gray

Beamish In the stillness (2007)
Rutter There is a flower (1986)
Parsons Ave Maria (c1560)
Hassler Verbum caro factum est (1591)
Britten A Hymn to the Virgin (1930, rev. 1934)
Walton All this time (1970)
Trad/German arr. Pearsall In dulci jubilo
Hieronymus Praetorius Magnificat quinti toni (pub. 1622)
Daley Love came down at Christmas (2004)
Poston Jesus Christ the Apple Tree (1967)
Kirbye Vox in Rama (c.1620)
Anon Coventry Carol
Dove The Three Kings (2000)

Wigmore Hall, London
Monday 15 December 2025

Reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What a lovely idea to bring a concert of Christmas Carols to the last of the BBC Radio 3 Lunchtime Concerts held in the Wigmore Hall in 2025. The Choir of St. John’s College Cambridge, suitably attired, were led in a stirring yet thought-provoking programme by their conductor Christopher Gray, who have just released O Holy Night, an album of Christmas carols, on Signum Classics.

Yet much of the selection here went beyond the album’s component parts, exploring responses old and new to specific parts of the Christmas story. In a curious twist, the oldest music heard proved to be the most adventurous and emotive.

The concert began with an account of Sally Beamish’s In the stillness which was notable for its crystal clear intonation and enunciation, features the choir would display throughout the concert. John Rutter’s There is a flower fared equally well, the anthem he wrote for the choir leading with a touching treble solo, before the complexities of Robert Parsons’ masterful Ave maria were aligned in commendable phrasing. Similar qualities befell the lively exchanges of counterpoint in Hans Leo Hassler’s Verbum caro factum est, before the remarkable invention of the teenage Britten was found in A Hymn to the Virgin, music that looks simultaneously forward and backward.

The choir performed these carols in carefully arranged sequences, ideally programmed for tonality and emotive impact. Walton’s exuberant All this time began the second sequence, the choir enjoying the push-pull rhythms, after which In dulci jubilo switched on its ever-beautiful light in the darkness, casting a spell in spite of a slightly ragged second verse. The clever text setting of Hieronymus Praetorius – not the normally performed Michael! – was especially enjoyable in his Magnificat setting, before the clarity of carols from Canadian composer Eleanor Daley and Brit Elizabeth Poston was beautifully achieved. The latter’s Jesus Christ The Apple Tree was particularly moving in the simplicity with which its paragraphs end.

The mood darkened appreciably for George Kirbye’s lament Vox in Rama, the inconsolable Rachel weeping for the loss of her children in the massacre ordered by King Herod, while the Coventry Carol too sounded sombre in this company. All the more reason to end with a characterful account of Jonathan Dove’s The Three Kings, brilliantly characterised by the trebles especially.

Two encores followed – a breathless and exciting arrangement of Adam lay ybounden by Laura Sheils, then a close-harmony version of We Wish You A Merry Christmas, channelling Cole Porter to show-stopping effect. It was the musical equivalent of a mince pie with extra brandy, the ideal way to send the Wigmore Hall audience humming into the afternoon!

You can listen to the concert on BBC Sounds here, and explore the choir’s recent discography at the Signum Classics website.

Published post no.2,750 – Tuesday 16 December 2025

In concert – Jonathan Kelly, CBSO / Kazuki Yamada: Richard Strauss – Tod und Verklärung, Oboe Concerto, Also sprach Zarathustra

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Jonathan Kelly (oboe), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Kazuki Yamada

Richard Strauss
Tod und Verklärung Op.24 (1888-9)
Oboe Concerto in D major AV144 (1945)
Also sprach Zarathustra, Op.30 (1896)

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Wednesday 10 December 2025

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Picture of Jonathan Kelly (c) Stefan Hoederath

Richard Strauss is among a relatively select number of composers, the range and breadth of whose output makes it suitable for a whole programme – as was evident from this evening’s concert by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and music director Kazuki Yamada.

Never one to miss such an opportunity, Strauss had evidently conceived his tone poem Death and Transfiguration in the wake of illness only to extend its remit accordingly. Yamada duly had its measure: whether in the not so stark fatalism of its opening pages, the tussle with his approaching demise audibly relished by the protagonist then emergence of that transfiguring state which, after the brief and rather jarring interjection of earlier angst (no more convincing here than almost any other performance) sees this work through to a fervent culmination then on to its beatific close. Not consistently more than the sum of its best parts, and with internal detail sometimes obscured in the onslaught of its vehement tuttis, this was still an involving account – lessened not a jot by its underlining Strauss’s enjoyment of his emotional strivings.

Onward 46 years to the Oboe Concerto the ageing composer wrote at the promptings of US army corporal and professional oboist John de Lancie. Much the finest of those concertante pieces from Strauss’s ‘Indian summer’, its three movements merge into the finely balanced continuity that Jonathan Kelly (above) – making a welcome return to the orchestra of which he was solo oboist during 1993-2003 – relished throughout. The elegance of its initial Allegro here abetted by a degree of nonchalance, as was the poise of its Andante with deftest pathos, his reading came into its own in a Vivace whose cadenza passages were as eloquent as the coda that Strauss duly extended to make this movement an unerring fusion of scherzo and finale. Kelly understandably offered no encore, but he returned to join the CBSO after the interval.

That second half consisted of Thus spake Zarathustra – if not the most ambitious of Strauss’ tone poems in size then surely in scope, whether or not the depths of Nietzsche’s existential musings are really plumbed. The indelible ‘Sunrise’ treading a fine line between profundity and portentousness, Yamada charted its idiosyncratic journey toward spiritual enlightenment with a sure sense of where this music was headed – no matter that the outcome felt as much   a glorification of orchestral power and opulence as of anything more intrinsically humane.

Highlights during its course included the sustained emotional force in ‘Of Joys and Passions’, the textural unanimity of the strings across their fugal writing in ‘Of Science and Learning’, and suavity then mounting animation of ‘The Dance Song’ with leader Eugene Tzikindelean in his element – before ‘Song of the Night Wanderer’ brought proceedings down from their orgiastic heights into that sombre repose whose tonal inconclusiveness may be an indicator  of Strauss’s own perspective; the certainly of those opening bars left pointedly unresolved.

Its pizzicato chords on lower strings made a telling farewell for Eduardo Vassallo, principal cellist throughout much of the past 36 seasons. His broad sympathies including Argentinian tango, and a characterful Don Quixote to boot, leaves players and listeners alike in his debt.

Published post no.2,747 – Saturday 13 December 2025

For more on the CBSO’s season for 2025/26, head to the CBSO website – and for more on the artists in this programme, click on the names to visit the websites of conductor Kazuki Yamada, oboist Jonathan Kelly and principal cellist Eduardo Vassallo