John Amis online

If that great expert on Handel’s operas, Winton Dean, took three large pages to explain the plot of the Master’s 1726 Alessandro , your scri...

It seems that anything composed by Richard Wagner will draw applauding crowds these days. The Ring is always sold out and just now all perfo...

Busy Russian at the helm Asked whether she preferred drama on radio or television, the lady opted for radio. Why? “Because the scenery is be...

The capital of Victoria has a new music room, a large recital room seating a thousand, no proscenium, just a stage abutting the first row of...

Sonya Orchard, Harper-Collins The Virtuoso is a remarkable book by a young Australian musician turned novelist – rave reviews before and si...

A quarter of a century ago the Sultan of Oman decreed a visit to his capital Muscat of the London Symphony Orchestra; I went as a scribe and...

Wednesday 18 March 2009 Prokofiev: A life of Music John Amis and Tait Memorial Trust Awardees John Amis together with Mary Jean O’Doherty, J...

Interest in Korngold grows apace. His superb film scores (2 Oscars) have made people keen about Erich Wolfgang, 1897 – 1957. His middle name...

Rossini’s Runt? The background to this opera is readworthy: Rossini composed most of Matilde di Shabran (where dat ? probably Iraq) in 1822...

Glory be! Wexford has a fine new opera house, sprung Phoenix-like on the site of the old Georgian house, standing tucked away in a little st...

October 11, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Puccini’s Bohème is revived for the 22nd time in the production by John Copley. That surely i...

Which opera tugs most persistently at your heart-strings? Surely is must be Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana . He hits your emotions roughly ...

Verdi’s Falstaff on the cheap must be the verdict on Pimlico Opera’s production 21 September at the Grange Opera House (near Alton, Hampshi...

Submarines in the pit of the Royal Opera House? No, what at first glance looked like periscopes were in fact theorbos in triplicate, the lon...

You may have seen advertisements in this journal for a summer course for singers August 1 to 9 and I went to see what goes on. To start with...

New Glyndebourne Opera August 10 The premiere at Glyndebourne of a new, commissioned opera by Peter Eötvöșa, a Hungarian composer previously...

No.61, June 13 – 29 began with a stinker and ended with a bang. Things here are changing; some of the almost derelict buildings adjacent to ...

Neither Stravinsky, Hogarth nor W.H Auden were best served by the new production at Covent Garden of The Rake’s Progress , first night of fi...

Leonard Bernstein was the all-American Mr. Music. He adored applause, he courted it, he got it and he deserved it. On form he was the top co...

Grange Park Opera Triumphs Grange Park Opera in Hampshire near Basingstoke has come of age in the current season with its production of Pu...