Revie Classical Music: Classical Opera Company | Haydn's Brave New World | King's Place

Publications by New Journal Enterprises

Home

Archive

Competition

The Review - CLASSICAL & JAZZ - with TONY KIELY
Published: 19 February 2009

Soprano Rebecca Bottone will perform in the third concert in the series, which features Arias from Die Feuersbrunst

Brave new take on Haydn’s world

PREVIEW - CLASSICAL OPERA COMPANY - HAYDN'S BRAVE NEW WORLD
King's Place

CLASSICAL Opera Company and director Ian Page return to Kings Place in mid-March with Haydn’s Brave New World – a week of concerts marking the 200th anniversary of Haydn’s death.
Haydn’s Brave New World – so titled because of the sense of originality which Prince Nikolaus Esterházy’s patronage encouraged in Haydn – focuses on the composer’s middle-period symphonies and his largely neglected operas.
Page, whose love of Haydn was nurtured with weekly tutorials on the early Haydn symphonies while at the Royal Academy of Music, has devised a series of five concerts which bring together a selection of Haydn’s most innovative symphonies and highlights from each of 14 operas that he composed while in Prince Esterházy’s employ.
“I personally find Haydn’s operas too dramaturgically weak for me to be tempted to revive them on stage,” explains Page, “but many of the individual numbers are as beautifully crafted as one would expect from a composer of Haydn’s greatness.
“By presenting a chronological sequence of 25 arias over four concerts, I hope that our audiences might be able to gain an appreciation of the rich formal variety and the extravagant beauty of Haydn’s best operatic compositions.”
The final concert of the series features fortepianist Gary Cooper, who is joined by the Icelandic mezzo-soprano Sigríður Ósk Kristjánsdóttir for a rare performance of the cantata Arianna a Naxos.
Haydn’s Brave New World follows on from Classical Opera Company’s hugely successful Mozart week at Kings Place in December. It is one of a number of series at Kings Place which explore the human voice in all its many forms: from Lieder recitals to choir concerts, poetry to cabaret, as well as opera collaborations between actors and musicians.
“The voice” is back in the limelight in the first two weeks of April when leading independent new music label NMC marks its 20th anniversary with a week of specially commissioned British songs followed by a week of choral music presented by The Sixteen.
• Haydn’s Brave New World is at Kings Place, York Way, N1 from March 11-15. www.kingsplace.co.uk

Comment on this article.
(You must supply your full name and email address for your comment to be published)

Name:

Email:

Comment:

Check Prices, Availability & Book Online
Receive Online Discounts and Instant Confirmation

» Rock & Pop
» Gig Listings
» Classical & Jazz
» C&J Listings
» Book concerts/gigs
» Buy CDs