Indholdsfortegnelse for December 2025 i BBC Music Magazine

‘It absolutely reeks of cowpies, exaggerated Norwegian nationalism and trollish self-satisfaction! But I have a hunch that the irony will be discernible,’ wrote Edvard Grieg to his friend Frants Beyer in 1874. The music in question? His own ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ from Peer Gynt. Whether or not audiences appreciated that irony, there can be little doubt the composer was on to a winner – 150 years later, his incidental accompaniment to Henrik Ibsen’s nationalistic play remains some of the most recognisable music ever composed, heard everywhere from adverts to pop covers. And Grieg was a magnificent melodist – witness the bravura opening to his much-loved Piano Concerto, performed by the wonderful Paul Lewis on our Cover CD, or the lush nostalgia of the accompanying Holberg Suite.…

4th: The inaugural edition of the Observer, the UK’s first Sunday newspaper, is published. Promising ‘Truth, and the Dissemination of every Species of Knowledge that may conduce to the Happiness of Society’, the four-page first issue covers subjects such as sending convicts to Australia, crop farming and a West Country gentleman’s encounters with ‘chicken prostitutes’ near Somerset House. 6th: Following a brief stay in Paris after crossing the English Channel in late-November, William Wordsworth arrives in Orléans, France. The 21-year-old poet is there ostensibly to improve his command of French, though he is also drawn there by his fascination with the Revolution and a desire to get away from his guardians. In Orléans, he meets Marie Anne Vallon, who soon becomes pregnant with his child. 15th: The US Bill of…

When I was studying as a soprano at music college, I was pointed in the direction of Judith Weir’s King Harald’s Saga. I listened to a recording of it, loved it and would go on to sing it – and when I left the recording going, it then moved on to a choral work of hers called Missa del Cid. I was totally blown away – the singers sang in such an exciting way, with textures that wove in and out of each other to create this amazing soundworld that I’d never heard before. After I’d finished as a student, I took part in a staged performance of Missa del Cid in Manchester and we sent Judith an email out of the blue, just to let her know we’d be…

Given its huge popularity and wealth of characterful, instantly memorable tunes, it’s not entirely surprising that Grieg’s music for Peer Gynt has popped up in popular culture in all manner of ways, from pop songs to appearances in films, cartoons and TV ads. Leading the way in the music world was Duke Ellington (below), whose 1960 ‘Swinging Suite’ presented five movements from Peer Gynt in jazzed-up form. The Grieg Foundation failed to see the fun, getting it banned in Norway, ostensibly on copyright grounds. History does not appear to record what the Foundation later made of The Wombles’ ‘Hall of the Mountain Womble’ (1974), Erasure’s ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ (1987) or, most recently, US power metal band Kamelot’s 2001 track ‘Forever’, based on ‘Solveig’s Song’. Opposite ends…

How did your Yamaha connection arise? ‘In the Liszt Competition in Utrecht, which I won, I was offered ten minutes on the stage with eight different grand pianos to choose from. And I needed less than two minutes to make my choice, which was for the Yamaha CFX.’ Why was that? ‘With some instruments you feel you can’t move fast enough, and to make the articulation clear you have to really work. The keys of the Yamaha reacted very fast to my repetitions, and answered my other requirements instantly – and they are all essential for me. I need the sound to create a warm atmosphere, and I want it to be beautiful, with many different colours. And what’s supremely important is the legato: with some pianos you do your…

However highbrow we think we are, we’ve all been guilty of it – that is, sitting in a concert or opera and waiting impatiently for ‘the famous bit’. In some instances, that well-known moment may be just one of several in a work that is fairly familiar to us overall; in others, it can be the sole reference point in what is otherwise entirely unexplored territory. Some of those famous bits have become so big that they have taken on a life of their own, often played as standalone pieces and inevitably known by a name that makes no reference to the larger work they came from. Having such a star moment within it doesn’t necessarily condemn a work to obscurity; however, there are also plenty of examples where, while…

At a glance, the young pianist appears frozen in time, a still portrait quite at odds with the dancing carnival of sound that fills the KKL Luzern. The months pass by, and February’s ebullience bows to an August harvest: in Yunchan Lim’s hands, Tchaikovsky’s Seasons reveal a deeper cyclical wisdom. Lucerne’s Le Piano Symphonique – Switzerland’s musical Toblerone, with grandee Martha Argerich at its peak – welcomes the best pianists in the world, and Lim, just 21, is one of them. After the recital, fans flock to bestow cuddly toys upon the Korean wunderkind. The industry soon followed, with Lim’s debut album (Chopin Études on Decca) winning three BBC Music Magazine Awards in 2025 (Recording of the Year, Newcomer of the Year and the Instrumental Award – the first time…

On one level he seems so direct, so simple, so uncomplicatedly appealing. Schubert could turn on heart-lifting melody with the same ease that most of us would turn on a tap. Often he seems happy just to bask in his own lyrical ferility, rather than go in for the kind of ingenious, viscerally compelling development taken to such heights by Beethoven. And that’s the idea of Schubert that prevailed until well into the 20th century. He was an innocent, an exquisite charmer who composed in a kind of ecstatic trance – a sleepwalker, but not one of music’s challenging thinkers. George Bernard Shaw even called him ‘brainless’. In some of Schubert’s greatest works, seeming antitheses are starkly, unsettlingly juxtaposed It was Schubert himself who undid all this in the end,…

The best recording Sergei Rachmaninov (piano) Philadelphia Orchestra/Leopold Stokowski Biddulph BDF-ED-LHW036 Rachmaninov himself at the piano, recorded in 1929, is bound to remain a benchmark, even after nearly a century. Like many performers at the start of the recording era, Rachmaninov was microphone-shy and some say that he played much more freely and expressively when the red light was off. Also, the story goes that he and Leopold Stokowski started off at loggerheads about this interpretation, with the final compromise that Stokowski called the shots in the second movement and the composer in the finale. Yet there is nothing in the recording that audibly suggests either that Rachmaninov is freezing up or that he and his conductor were not in accord. The filigree central section resembles the dizzying whirl of…

Beethoven for Three Symphony No.1 (arr. Shai Wosner); Piano Trios, Op. 70, No. 1 ‘Ghost’ & Op. 11 ‘Gassenhauer’ Yo-Yo Ma (cello), Leonidas Kavakos (violin), Emanuel Ax (piano) Sony 19802908842 78:03 mins Smiles are powerful. Radio presenters are often advised to smile, as listeners can hear it in their voices. (Wisdom that has since been underpinned by academic study.) So too are public speakers, as it helps create a connection with their audiences. And, after listening to Emanuel Ax, Leonidas Kavakos and Yo-Yo Ma’s latest Beethoven album, I’m convinced that all three of them must be beaming, as their First Symphony in C major radiates infectious joy. Perhaps they are simply delighting in the chance as star soloists to get stuck into one of Beethoven’s symphonies, which has been brilliantly…

Kalevi Aho Moonlight Concerto*; Concerto for Alto Flute & Strings** *Hiyoli Togawa (viola); *Alexej Gerassimez (percussion); *Lahti Symphony Orchestra/Anja Bihlmaier; **Sharon Bezaly (flute); **St Michel Strings/Erkki Lasonpalo BIS BIS-2626 56:20 mins When, sometime in the last century, I joined an amateur flute choir, proximity to the extended instrument family was the main attraction. Alongside the standard ‘C’ model there exists the piccolo, of course, but also the lesser-spotted treble, an alto and various bass flutes. Initial excitement turned to dread as we took it in turns to play the larger iterations: requiring headache-inducing airflow and superhuman endurance, the lower flutes are very difficult to project. Such personal preamble is intended to enhance praise of Sharon Bezaly, the soloist in Kalevi Aho’s 2021 alto flute concerto (originally composed for Romanian flautist…

Golden Age Works by Donizetti, Rossini, Bizet et al Erin Morley; Lawrence Brownlee; Münchner Rundfunkorchester; Ivan Repušić  Pentatone PTC5187400 62:53 mins In operatic history, the term ‘Golden Age’ is used to refer to an almost legendary period of glamorous stars with exceptional voices and impregnable techniques, always placed some considerable distance from the present day. But in selecting the repertoire for this recording from works by Rossini, Donizetti, Verdi, Bizet and Delibes, the artists involved – soprano Erin Morley and tenor Lawrence Brownlee – show themselves at their respective peaks, and also remind listeners that singers of this mythical quality can be heard today. Each of them delivers two solo arias while also joining in five duets. Some of the repertoire is familiar: Morley delivers a peerless ‘Caro nome’ from…

DECEMBER’S RADIO 3 LISTINGS Schedules may be subject to alteration. For up-to-date listings see BBC Sounds and iPlayer Three to look out for Sam Jackson, the controller of BBC Radio 3, selects three programme highlights for the month of December Hannah Peel’s Electronic Women Composer, broadcaster and producer Hannah Peel and recording engineer Marta Salogni discuss pioneering women in electronic music from Daphne Oram to Laurie Anderson, plus the way their use of sound changed the world. The Essay, Monday 1 December to Friday 5 December, 9.45pm The Russia I Lost Leaving Russia for the last time, BBC journalist Tatyana Movshevich strives to define her Russianness for her children, by reaching back to an unwitnessed past through poetry, music and family narrative, in a rediscovery and a rewriting of her…

Terry Blain Music journalist ‘Grieg’s Peer Gynt contains some very familiar music. But how many know the Ibsen play for which it was written? The Grieg-Ibsen collaboration was not always smooth, but ultimately proved immensely fruitful.’ Page 24 Clifford Hall Writer, composer and performer ‘It all began with an offhand remark from a classical DJ about Haydn’s one-night fortune. That chance comment drew me into 18th-century diaries and reviews – and into the dazzling world of his London Symphonies.’  Page 36 Jessica Duchen Author and journalist ‘It would be easy to think of Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto as a guilty pleasure. But I love it to bits, even after dozens of listens for this month’s Building a Library feature. Whose do I choose?.’ Page 68…

In many instances, slavishly following every note on a musical score is contrary to what its composer would have wanted or expected, as Tom Service explains Classical music has a problem with perfection. You’d have thought the most important job of any professional musician was learning, playing and repeating the notes composers wrote down so often that they become second nature. Surely that’s how the tradition works: keep playing the same music – by Strozzi, Bach or Vivaldi – over and over again until the jewels that they left us are polished to a gleaming finish. That’s what the works of classical music are all about: they are bound in the pages of scores, fixed as absolute sequences of pitches in time, and turned into objects of contemplation in performance…

Has she gone too soon? Should she have gone at all? And won’t she miss it? For once, the main talking-point at this year’s Last Night of the Proms wasn’t the conductor’s speech or whether the EU flags outnumbered the Union Jacks. It was Alison Balsom’s announcement that the concert – in which she dazzled playing pieces by Hummel and Bernstein – would be her last as a trumpet soloist. She is, it seems, retiring at 46. When I asked her why, I received an honest answer: that the trumpet’s solo repertoire is too limited and she is frankly bored with playing it. Balsom was also candid enough to admit that we would be having ‘a very different conversation’ if she wasn’t married to a successful film director (Sir Sam…

There are well-known statues of Henrik Ibsen in the centres of both Oslo and Bergen. In the former, he looks stern; in the latter, plain terrifying (above). Is this why, when Mahler saw him in a Christiania hotel lobby in 1891, the composer didn’t dare approach him? Or maybe it was that, even for someone of Mahler’s own growing reputation, the great Norwegian playwright’s standing was so lofty as to demand respect from a distance? Born into an affluent family in the town of Skien in 1828, Ibsen spent his early adult years working in theatres in Bergen and then Christiania while writing plays, most of which received little attention. It was only when, disillusioned with his home country, he and his family moved to Italy that success started to…

Sometimes, the noise around a participant is louder than the music. Harvey Lavan ‘Van’ Cliburn’s win at the inaugural Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958 is remembered for the pianist’s glorious performances, and for the effect he had on listeners, with supporters affectionately calling him ‘Vanyusha’. Competition fever heightened as events moved to the television studio, with BBC Young Musician of the Year appearing on screens in 1978. Many winners – such as Nicholas Daniel (1980), Jennifer Pike (2002) and Peter Moore (2008) – have gone on to be stalwarts of the industry. And it’s not just classical competitions that launch careers: in 2004, a quartet of Guildhall graduates came second on The X Factor, going on to enjoy success as singing group G4. It laid the path for the Kanneh-Mason siblings,…

Hasse Piramo e Tisbe Anett Fritsch, Roberta Mameli, Jeremy Ovenden et al; Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin/Bernhard Forck  Harmonia Mundi HMM905393.94 102 mins (2CD) Johann Hasse (1699-1783) is a fascinating figure: one of the most successful opera composers of the 18th century, he links the worlds of Bach and Mozart (whose early Ascanio in Alba upstaged Hasse’s last opera in 1771), while also marrying the star soprano Faustina Bordoni. The story of Pyramus and Thisbe is most familiar to us from the hilarious parody created by Shakespeare for the ‘rude mechanicals’ in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but this late ‘intermezzo tragico’ by Hasse is a setting of the real tragedy, to a libretto by Marco Coltellini which draws out all the Romeo-and-Juliet passion and misunderstandings in the sad story. Hasse…

Partch The Wayward Partch Ensemble Bridge BRIDGE9611 55:10 mins Harry Partch was that rare thing of a true original. Born in California in 1901, Partch went on to create his own musical scale, construct his own (highly idiosyncratic) musical instruments and compose some of the strangest and most delightful music of the 20th century. This glorious disc from the Partch Ensemble brings to life one of Partch’s most intriguing and affecting series of works, The Wayward, in a world premiere recording. Partch describes The Wayward as ‘a collection of musical compositions based on the spoken and written words of hobos and other characters – the result of my wanderings in the Western part of the United States from 1935 to 1941’. This recording brings together, for the first time, all…

The Piano in Beethoven’s Chamber Music Misha Donat Boydell 978-1-837-65219-8 480pp (pb) £39.95 As the late Alfred Brendel noted in his appreciative foreword, this comprehensive new monograph ‘ploughs a neglected field’. Misha Donat’s scholarly yet engaging survey of an oft-unheeded facet of Beethoven’s output amply fills a void in the literature. While Beethoven’s symphonies, concertos, string quartets and piano sonatas have all received wideranging musicological and historical analysis in print, tantalisingly little has appeared previously which could effectively redress the balances where Beethoven’s chamber works with piano are concerned, and that’s where this offering scores decisively. Graced by 254 musical examples, all lucidly described and judiciously chosen, this book will accompany the curious listener through what might at first seem a rather specialised group of works. Donat’s authoritative, elegantly written text…

Ute Lemper has performed on stage and screen over a 40-year career – in musicals and plays on Broadway, in Paris and Berlin, and in London’s West End. She has recorded more than 30 albums, and is particularly known for her interpretations of Berlin cabaret songs, the works of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, and the songs of Marlene Dietrich, Édith Piaf, Nino Rota and Astor Piazzolla, as well as her own compositions. In December she presents her ‘Rendezvous With Marlene’ show in Paris, before touring Europe and America in 2026. I grew up in a small town called Münster in West Germany during the Cold War. There was a lot of music in our house, which helped me to find freedom in quite restrained, bourgeoisie surroundings. My father had…

Write to: The editor, BBC Music Magazine, Eagle House, Bristol, BS1 4ST Email: music@classical-music.com Social media: contact us on Facebook and X (Twitter) LETTER of the MONTH The elusive charms of Brahms Claire Jackson’s opinions on Brahms (Hero or Hype?; August) resonated with me. I studied his First Symphony for O-Level, and his Fourth for A-Level. Then at college, my piano teacher insisted I learn some Brahms pieces. On saying that I didn’t like Brahms, he replied, ‘When you grow up, you will like him’. I am delighted that, at the age of 77, I have not yet ‘grown up’! However, reading your October tribute to the late Roger Norrington, of whom I was a great admirer, made me think. He conducted a series of the complete Beethoven symphonies on…

‘Dear Mr Grieg: I am writing to you in connection with a plan that I propose to implement, and in which I wish to invite your participation.’ The tone is impeccably formal and business-like, but the letter sent in January 1874 by the Norwegian writer Henrik Ibsen to his compatriot Edvard Grieg planted the seed for one of the most consequential artistic collaborations of the 19th century. The first ever staging of Ibsen’s play Peer Gynt was being mooted, and Ibsen wanted Grieg to write the incidental music which he envisaged accompanying the action. ‘Please let me know if you are willing to undertake this task,’ Ibsen’s letter ended. Grieg hesitated, not least because his first impressions of Ibsen had not been entirely positive. The pair initially met in Rome…

The London symphonies During his trips to London in the 1790s, Haydn composed his final 12 symphonies, Nos. 93-104. Though each stands on its own, together they represent Haydn’s distinctive late style and reveal a remarkable consistency in invention and character. The first movements often begin with a stately introduction before launching into a lively allegro. Haydn expanded the orchestra’s palette, introducing clarinets in Symphony No. 99, and made more prominent use of trumpets and timpani. The finales brim with folk-like vitality and his trademark wit. Several symphonies are remembered by their colourful nicknames – almost always bestowed by audiences or publishers rather than by Haydn himself. The ‘Surprise’ (No. 94) quickly became a crowd favourite after the jarring fortissimo chord in its slow movement jolted listeners at the 1792…

The composer Born into an aristocratic family in 1873, Rachmaninov hit the ground running as a musician. By his late teens, he had already left the Moscow Conservatory with the Great Gold Medal and with praise ringing in his ears for his abilities both as a pianist and as the composer of works such as his opera Aleko. A financial boost then followed with the publication of his Prelude in C sharp minor, but life would take a turn for the worse when Tchaikovsky, a staunch supporter, died in 1893. The subsequent slump in Rachmaninov’s spirits deepened further with the calamitous premiere of his First Symphony four years later. The work Let’s get the inevitable out of the way: Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2 is one of the most popular…

The idea of reimagining Beethoven’s grand symphonies for three instruments might sound challenging. But listen to our Recording of the Month and you’ll hear something extraordinary – Emanuel Ax, Leonidas Kavakos and Yo-Yo Ma (each masters of their art) bring fresh brilliance to the composer’s work. The Chamber section is full of other gems, too: the Partch Ensemble’s premiere recording of The Wayward, a funny and touching cycle of speech-songs from Harry Partch’s wanderings across America stands out, as do Maya Magub and Matthew Schellhorn’s waltz transcriptions for violin and piano. Elsewhere, look out for Tippett’s powerful A Child Of Our Time, Kalevi Aho’s ‘Moonlight Concerto’ and a definitive recording of Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe. This month’s critics John Allison, Nicholas Anderson, Miranda Bardsley, Terry Blain, Kate Bolton-Porciatti, Geoff Brown,…

R Strauss Ein Heldenleben Philharmonia Orchestra/Santtu-Matias Rouvali Signum Classics SIGCD922 50:12 mins Santtu-Matias Rouvali’s interpretation of Strauss’ Ein Heldenleben (A Hero’s Life) may be on the long side at 50 minutes, but it is rarely lagging. The extra time in the Philharmonic chief conductor’s vision comes partly in the wildly cataclysmic battle scene between the ‘hero’ (assumed to be, at least in part, Strauss himself) and his ‘adversaries’ (oh those critics!) in ‘Des Helden Walstatt’. That stretched tempo gives room for the thrilling high dramatics Rouvali encourages to depict this epic set-to. The orchestral sound is superb and gloriously expansive The Philharmonia etch all the colours of Strauss’s swirling and unashamedly heroic opening theme – in key as well as in thrust – with joyously defined energy. The ‘adversaries’, introduced…

Tippett A Child of Our Time Nadine Benjamin, Sarah Connolly, Kenneth Tarver, Roderick Williams; London Philharmonic Choir; London Adventist Chorale; London Philharmonic Orchestra/Edward Gardner LPO LPO0136 65:27 mins ‘The world turns on its dark side’. Tippett would have been entirely happy if his text for A Child of Our Time was now irrelevant. Prompted by the November 1938 anti-Jewish violence in Nazi Germany that came to be known as Kristallnacht, this secular oratorio is a more universal examination of inhumanity. Historic individuals, notably the Jewish refugee Herschel Grynszpan and Ernst vom Rath, the German diplomat whose shooting sparked the horrendous Nazi retributions, become ‘the boy’ and ‘the official’ respectively. The London Philharmonic Orchestra gave the oratorio’s premiere in 1944, and it is clear from this 2022 performance that current principal…

Shades Of Mourning Original cello works Tamar Sagiv Sono Luminus SLE-70041 33:39 mins Given that all compositions are arguably revised improvisations and that improvisations can be thought of as unrevised compositions, performed at the moment of their creation, there’s some particularly interesting territory existing between these two concepts. Tamar Sagiv has made this her own with the improvisation-derived solo works on this recording, the theme of which is signalled by its title. In discussing this release, her debut as a composer/performer, she refers both to personal grief at the loss of a close family member and to conflict in the wider world, both of which she addresses. Stylistically, her solo music is melodic and oddly timeless, and indeed placeless, somehow evoking both Bach and Dave Holland. An allusion to the…

Lorraine Hunt Lieberson Handel Arias (Remaster 2025) Lorraine Hunt Lieberson (mezzo-soprano); Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment/Harry Bicket et al Avie AV2792 67:01 mins If you knew nothing about the background to this 2003 recording it would still be one of the most poignant albums of Handel arias, for the intensity of engagement and communicative power of American mezzo Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. Handel’s oratorio Theodora was one of her calling cards, and here she sings the arias of Theodora’s friend Irene. ‘As with rosy steps the morn’ encompasses the beauty of a sunrise, the resilience of their faith and an underlying sense of vulnerability. Her final aria ‘New scenes of joy’ is almost unbearably undercut by the plangent voice and Handel’s melancholy C minor. In the cantata La Lucrezia, Hunt…