Tag Archives: London Symphony Orchestra

In concert – Soloists, London Symphony Orchestra / Sir Antonio Pappano – Wagner: Tristan and Isolde @ Barbican Hall

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Barbican Hall, London, 1 July 2026

by John Earls. Photo credits of Clay Hilley (Tristan) with Gyula Oendt (Kurwenal) above and Sara Jakubiak below (c) Mark Allan

Wagner’s opera Tristan and Isolde is a piece of music like no other and this stunning concert performance by the London Symphony Orchestra under Sir Antonio Pappano (the first of two this month) showed why.

Such concert performances of opera must have been part of the thinking behind the appointment of Pappano as the LSO’s Chief Conductor in September 2024 (he had been Music Director of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, since 2002). The lack of onstage action in Tristan and Isolde makes it ideal for such performances, but that shouldn’t detract from this wonderful rendition which gripped for the whole of its near four hours.

American soprano Sara Jakubiak (above), making her Isolde debut, admirably negotiated the piece’s duration and range in delivery, including a powerful closing Liebestod, as well as looking the part of the Irish Queen in her green dress. American tenor Clay Hilley showed his experience of previously playing Tristan in a performance without score that was convincingly dramatic both in terms of his singing and theatrics which included leaning heavily on the conductor’s podium for support in the final act. Both singers were impressive together in the lovers’ tryst of Act Two.

Russian mezzo Marina Prudenskaya was glorious as Brangäne, including when singing off-stage (or behind-stage to be exact) where the sonic mix worked well where I was sat in the gallery. Franz-Josef Selig as King Marke was both clear and passionate.

The remaining soloists – Gyula Orendt (Kurwenal), Neal Cooper (Melot), Michael Gibson (Sailor/Shepherd) and James Emerson (Steersman) – all gave good performances and the male voices of the London Symphony Chorus were suitably robust in the first act.

But, for me, the real stars of the evening were the orchestra and their Chief Conductor (directing proceedings sans baton). The strings were expressive, even visually at one point as the synchronicity and swooping of the bowing put me in mind of a murmuration of starlings. Repeated alternating notes on clarinet early in Act Two hung in the air in a way that almost stopped time. And Drake Gritton’s cor anglais solos, both in the balcony and onstage, were captivating.

The whole performance was compelling throughout and thoroughly deserving of the rapturous standing ovation given by the audience at the end.

John Earls is Director of Research at Unite the Union and posts at @johnearls.bsky.social on Bluesky and @john_earls on X. You can subscribe (free) to his Hanging Out a Window Substack column here: https://johnearls.substack.com/

Published post no.2,936 – Friday 3 July 2026

Vinyl revival – Mendelssohn: Piano Concertos

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by Ben Hogwood

The second of an occasional series on Arcana…sharing vinyl purchases from charity shops!

This recent acquisition is a highly regarded Decca pairing of the two published Mendelssohn piano concertos, with soloist Peter Katin and the London Symphony Orchestra under Anthony Collins:

Saturday purchase – Musgrave: Clarinet Concerto

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by Ben Hogwood

Welcome to a very occasional series on Arcana…sharing vinyl purchases from charity shops! I have recently inherited a record player, which has opened up a new line of listening possibilities.

Here is one of the first! What I would imagine is a pretty rare recording, too – the Clarinet Concerto by Thea Musgrave, with soloist Gervase de Peyer and the London Symphony Orchestra under Norman del Mar:

In appreciation – Michael Tilson Thomas

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by Ben Hogwood Image (c) CBS Television, courtesy of Wikipedia

Last week we heard the very sad news of the loss of charismatic conductor Michael Tilson Thomas, after a long illness. You can read an obituary from Barry Millington at the Guardian website

Tilson Thomas was well-loved at all the orchestras where he held conducting positions – these included the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where he was assistant conductor in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, the New World Symphony, the London Symphony Orchestra, where he was principal conductor from 1988 until 1995, and the San Francisco Symphony, who he led until 2020. With the San Francisco Symphony, Tilson Thomas delivered a high quality survey of the works of Gustav Mahler, a journey you can take on this Tidal playlist

However the playlist I have compiled for Arcana is of shorter works, designed to show off the conductor’s affinity with music of his homeland – in works as varied as John Adams’ Lollapalooza, Ruggles’ Sun Treader, Copland’s Symphonic Ode and music by Charles Ives, with whom Tilson Thomas had a special affinity. Also included is a recent remastering of Tilson Thomas at the piano, partnering Jules Eskin in Debussy’s Cello Sonata, and a recording with the London Symphony Chorus and Orchestra of Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms, of which this writer is particularly fond.

The playlist ends with MTT conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic from the piano in Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. You can listen on Tidal here

Published post no.2,870 – Monday 27 April 2026

In concert – Peter Moore, London Symphony Orchestra / Ryan Bancroft @ BBC Proms: Folk Songs & Dances

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Peter Moore (trombone), London Symphony Orchestra / Ryan Bancroft

Vaughan Williams English Folk Song Suite (1923)
Schuller Eine kleine Posaunenmusik (1980) [Proms premiere]
Tippett Triumph (1992) [Proms premiere]
Arnold arr. Johnstone English Dances Set 1 Op.27 (1950, arr. 1965)
Grainger The Lads of Wamphray (1904), Country Gardens (1918, arr. 1953), Lincolnshire Posy (1937)

Royal Albert Hall, London
Saturday 30 August 2025 11am

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Photos (c) BBC / Chris Christodoulou

His pained countenance may have adorned its programme cover but Sir Simon Rattle’s ‘routine surgery’ meant this morning’s Prom was directed by Ryan Bancroft, though the works played by woodwind and brass (and basses) of the London Symphony Orchestra remained the same.

The concert duly breezed into life with Vaughan Williams’ English Folksong Suite, heard in its original scoring for concert (i.e. – military) band such as imparts a forthright impetus to its outer marches – the former alternating brusqueness with insouciance, and the latter similarly balancing energy with geniality. In between these, the intermezzo provided welcome respite with its soulful medley. Expert as are the arrangements for orchestra by Gordon Jabob or for brass band by Frank Wright, this remains the ideal medium for an unassuming masterpiece.

It would have been remiss of the Proms not to include a piece by Gunther Schuller in the year of his centenary, with Eine Kleine Posaunenmusik being a fine choice in context. Fastidiously scored for trombone and ensemble, whose wind and brass melded into tuned percussion with notable solos from piano and harpsichord, its five succinct movements outline a succession of vignettes in which Peter Moore sounded as attuned expressively as technically. With music as distinctive as this, Schuller’s fourth appearance at these concerts will hopefully not be his last.

Surprising that Michael Tippett’s Triumph should have remained so obscure within his output. Seemingly made during work on The Rose Lake, this ‘Paraphrase on Music from The Mask of Time’ is for the greater part his arrangement of the oratorio’s sixth movement, though it could be heard as encapsulating his music over the decade from the mid-’70s. The main portion pits fractured lyricism against dissonant outbursts as befits its genesis in a setting of Shelley’s The Triumph of Life and, if the closing affirmation sounds added-on, its finality is hardly in doubt.

There could hardly have been a more pointed contrast than with Malcolm Arnold’s initial set of English Dances – its sequence of winsome, bracing, elegiac then energetic numbers ideally conveyed in Maurice Johnstone’s arrangement. Their concision was thrown into relief by the relative garrulousness of The Lads of Wamphray, an early example of Percy Grainger’s love for folksong which, in this instance, rather outstays its welcome. Rattle presumably enjoys it and Bancroft gave it its head, but its inclusion here was not warranted by its musical quality.

From the other end of Grainger’s career, his concert-band arrangement of Country Gardens exudes all the wit and irony of his later creativity. It made a canny upbeat into Lincolnshire Posy, one of a select handful of concert band masterpieces and where the LSO gave its all. Thus, the incisive Lisbon (Dublin Bay) was followed by the pathos-drenched Horkstow Grange then intricately imaginative Rufford Park Poachers; the jaunty The Brisk Young Sailor by the darkly rhetorical Lord Melbourne (very different from Britten’s elegiac take).

The surging impetus of The Lost Lady Found brought to a suitably rousing close this suite and what was a fine showcase for the LSO woodwind and brass, an unexpected if welcome appearance by Bancroft and, above all, a demonstration of the potential of the concert band.

Click on the artist names to read more about Peter Moore, the London Symphony Orchestra and conductor Ryan Bancroft. Click also for more on composer Gunter Schuller and the BBC Proms

Published post no.2,644 – Monday 1 September 2025