Page 143 - FINAL_Theatre of Sound Coverage Book

only when the set changes from pool table, Pepsi signs and podiums to backstage mirrors and

dressing tables that we see the true Carmen. She is a mother, trying to survive, looking for

happiness where she can. Chrystal E Williams reconciles these two Carmens in compelling

fashion. To Oct 28, then touring to April 2022; opera north.co.uk
Rebecca Franks

Read the full review

Handel’s Amadigi: English Touring Opera bounces back

★★★★☆

Even when the thin plot idled, nothing distracted in any form from Handel’s consistently perky

and imaginative music, or the colourful panache of the ETO regulars the Old Street Band,

conducted by Jonathan Peter Kenny. Touring to November 17; englishtouringopera.org.uk

Geoff Brown
Read the full review

A sensational new work from Thomas Adès with clarinettist Mark

Simpson

★★★★★

Alchymia was outstanding. Armed with a basset clarinet, a longer version of the soprano clarinet

with extra low notes added, Simpson eloquently led us through calmly descending, clear-
textured phrases into the first of four spellbinding movements designed by Adès to further the

alchemical processes regularly used by Elizabethan composers to turn simple musical material

into gold. On BBC Sounds

Geoff Brown

Read the full review

A blockbuster programme starts a new era with Santtu-Matias Rouvali
and the Philharmonia

★★★★★
With a blockbuster Strauss programme and a supersize orchestra, this was orchestral music at its

biggest and boldest. More than 100 players were crammed on stage — social distancing

dispensed with — making the loudest sound a Royal Festival Hall audience has heard, surely,

since before the pandemic. Exhilarating doesn’t begin to cover it. On BBC Sounds and on