I received an e-mail from conductor Eduardo Portal at the beginning of last July outlining the possibility of a commission of a piece for the Burgos Summer Festival (Spain), which would eventually be premiered during the Festival by the Antares Ensemble under his baton. I found out in the course of the ensuing correspondence with [...]
I went into the English National Opera without knowing what to expect of L’Amour de Loin. I didn’t know that much of Saariaho’s music, but had heard some positive comments on the lead-up to the performance. The subject, that of impossible love and based on Occitan courtesan love poetry of the Middle Ages –a literary [...]
It is always very strange to write long time afterwards about performances one experienced, even more if one –that is, me- seemed to rather carelessly not take down notes about it. Nevertheless, I reckon the distance and the forgetting provide an extra filter for the judging of the pieces, as indeed one only carries [...]
I come back to this blog after too long a break from it. The always manic end of the academic year was this time spiced up with the further addition of two commissions to be written over the summer, one with very short notice indeed. Hence, I was prevented from writing on these pages [...]
I was fortunate enough to get tickets for the last Royal Opera House production of Lulu. I went on Saturday evening, the 13th of June. London was in that strange in between when the combination of late sunsets, heat, sun, and sudden showers makes one think of the summer that is round the corner, but [...]