1 Das Rheingold
Mark Elder and the Hallé are certainly taking their time over their Ring cycle. After Götterdämmerung in 2009 and Die Walküre two years later, they now go back to the beginning with Rheingold. Iain Paterson is Wotan this time, with Samuel Youn as Alberich.
Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, Sun
2 Richard Rodney Bennett
The latest of the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s Total Immersion days focuses on the music of the wonderfully versatile composer and pianist. There are programmes of chamber music and lighter works, before Rumon Gamba conducts the BBCSO in a suite from Bennett’s score for the movie Lady Caroline Lamb, as well as the Third Symphony and Spells, his settings of Kathleen Raine poems.
Barbican Hall, EC2, Sun
3 Andersen-Liederkreis
The final day of this year’s Huddersfield contemporary music festival brings yet more premieres. Particularly notable is the first British performance for Michael Finnissy’s reimagining of the song cycle using words by Hans Christian Andersen brought to life by Mark Knoop and Juliet Fraser. The texts are drawn from Andersen’s tales, poems and travel writings; they seem, the composer says, “disturbingly cruel and emotionally evasive”.
St Paul’s Hall, Huddersfield, Sun
4 Alice’s Adventures Under Ground
Lewis Carroll promises to be the perfect match for Gerald Barry’s surreal imagination, and just six days after the world premiere in Los Angeles, Barry’s opera gets its first performance in Europe. Thomas Adès conducts the Britten Sinfonia for the concert performance, with the irrepressible Barbara Hannigan as Alice.
Barbican Hall, EC2, Mon
