1 Hear and Now
Matthias Pintscher conducts the latest of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s free contemporary programmes. The main event is the Scottish premiere of the Seventh Symphony by Pintscher’s one-time teacher Hans Werner Henze; there’s also the UK premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s Masaot/Clocks Without Hands, and one of Ligeti’s orchestral classics, San Francisco Polyphony.
City Halls, Glasgow, 8 April
2 National Youth Orchestra: A Spring Awakening
Carlo Miguel Prieto takes charge of the National Youth Orchestra and their always-astonishing array of young talent. Works by Shostakovich make up the bulk of his programme, but Prieto begins with The Night of the Mayas, a rarely heard work by his fellow Mexican Silvestre Revueltas.
Town Hall, Leeds, 8 April; Barbican Hall, EC2, 9 April
3 Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria
John Eliot Gardiner and his choir and orchestra are celebrating the 450th anniversary of the birth of Monteverdi with concert stagings of all three of his surviving operas. The Europe-wide tour will visit the Edinburgh festival in August, but first there’s a chance to catch all three operas in Bristol; Orfeo and L’Incoronazione di Poppea follow next month.
Colston Hall, Bristol, 12 April
4 St John Passion
There’s never a shortage of Bach Passions at this time of year, and even the most discerning concert-goer is likely to be spoilt for choice. The pick of the bunch comes from Britten Sinfonia and Mark Padmore, with poetry by TS Eliot and sacred texts read by Simon Russell Beale.
St Andrew’s Hall, Norwich, 13 April; Barbican, EC1, 14 April; King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, 15 April
