I’m still roaring with laughter at the memory of thinking this was a Le Creuset saucepan stuck inside a tuba… 😂🤣🫕 But doesn’t it look exactly like one?! (Photo is of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra about to play the gut-wrenching Shostakovich’s Symphony no.11. at the #BBCProms.)

Me commenting to the man sitting next to me at the end of the performance: “Wellber must have lost at least 4 kilos from that workout…!”

Bachtrack@bachtrack.com · last wk.

Omer Meir Wellber enjoys an energetic workout with DKam at the BBC Proms ✍️ Mark Pullinger bachtrack.com/review-wellb...

I came to hear the talented Daniel Lozakovich play Bruch’s Violin Concerto, but ended up utterly mesmerised by Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen & Wellber’s stunning performance of Haydn’s Symphony No. 44. A tour de force! I don’t think my jaw left the floor. When can I hear them next?! #BBCProms

Anyone been blocked by the Royal Albert Hall site during the Proms season, on suspicion you are "a bot"?! How do I unblock myself? It won't allow me to buy any tickets from any device now... 😢

I'm gutted I couldn't attend tonight's Prom, but even listening on BBC Sounds, I was overcome with emotion by the LPO & Ed. Gardner's performance of An Alpine Symphony. That ending—the slow descent into silence—is simply magnificent. Beyond words...just tears. One of my favourite pieces of music.💕

What a way to begin my 2026 Proms season: a magnificent performance of Mahler Six with Sakari Oramo and the BBCSO. The hammer falls – three times! The cowbells answer. The world doesn’t stop for our grief… I’ll be thinking about that for a while. #BBCProms2026 #Mahler6 #BBCSO #SakariOramo

After waiting 2-3 years to get a ticket to any concert at the stunning Sala São Paulo, I finally made it there. And, as if that weren’t enough, OSESP happened to be performing one of my favourite Shostakovich works: his monumental Symphony No. 5 in D minor. My cup is filled! 🥰🎼 #SalaSãoPaulo #OSESP

Famous authors asking you out

"The effortlessness of Hough’s magical incantation..." -> This! 💕

Bachtrack@bachtrack.com · 3mo ago

Conviction, passion and clarity of vision: Sir Stephen Hough at @wigmore-hall.org.uk ✍️ Christopher Woodley bachtrack.com/review-steph...

Every time I hear this man play, I fall a little more in love with him. 💖 Two hours of sheer ecstasy. Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann, miniature Klavierstücke by Schoenberg and Stockhausen. “Mary Poppins” for dessert. Programme notes by Stephen himself! Spellbound and bewitched. *sigh*

For the first time since I became a "member", Ole & Steen did not send me a birthday treat voucher... Nothing on email, nothing on the app. Must be the end of the word. I feel bereft...😭💔#iwannacinnamonsocial

A lovely discovery today was Cécile Chaminade’s Callirhoë Suite. What a gorgeous piece: compact yet in four movements, and strikingly symphonic. She clearly had the talent for larger-scale writing. One can’t help wondering what more she might have done with the same opportunities as male composers.

I’m “Elgared out” after a double bill today: his beautiful Cello Concerto with Philharmonia/Benedetti/Măcelaru, followed by my first Dream of Gerontius with LSO/Pappano this evening. 😄 Enjoyed Gerontius but really wished surtitles had been provided–too dark to follow the text in the programme!

So glad I got a second round of Siegfried. Absolutely brilliant! Pappano in the pit, Kosky’s genius on stage–few things in life are more exhilarating. Btw, can we give the props manager a shoutout for the fabulous steampunk contraptions in Act 1 w/ which S forges Nothung? Roll on Götterdämmerung!

Take two! ‘Cause “once is never enough with a man like… Barrie Kosky…” 😉 #SiegfriedRound2

Oh my, I've just found a way to fill up six hours of my Easter Monday...with more Wagner-groupie activities. 🤫#SiegfriedRound2

It's been quite the Wagnerian week... some post-HD thoughts on the Met's new Tristan und Isolde: canzonetta.substack.com/p/review-tri...

Love, death, rebirth: Davidsen and Spyres fire up the Met’s new Tristan und Isolde

What better way to spend a beautiful spring Sunday in London than being cooped up in a darkened room with Richard Wagner for five hours?

canzonetta.substack.com

Me reading about the Met Opera's new Yurval Sharon production of the Ring Cycle starting in the 2027-2028 season, with Lise Davidsen as Brünnhilde and Ryan Speedo Green as Wotan: 🤩😍🥹 Am already dying of love and ecstasy (like Isolde).

A stupendous Met Opera production of Tristan und Isolde, with Lise Davidsen sounding as magnificent as ever on her return from mat leave. Michael Spyres impressed with his vocal and physical stamina, reminding me of Andreas Schager’s Siegfried at the ROH earlier this week. 🧵1/3

As if nearly six hours of Siegfried wasn’t enough opera for this week, here I am for another six – with Tristan und Isolde. Hankies at the ready. I didn’t even bother wearing mascara today, knowing I’ll probably be a weepy mess by the end of Act III! 😭

Full fan-girl mode for Jennifer Johnston at the WH 💖 My cheeks hurt from grinning like an idiot all evening! That rich, velvety, chesty voice of hers, with such clear diction and emotional depth, makes her my favourite Mahler singer. Of course, anything she sings sounds utterly sumptuous!

Gosh, it’s a nerdy week for me… From a Wagnerian coming-of age (Siegfried) to Mahler’s Resurrection with the Philharmonia & Kent Nagano. Me, confidently humming what I thought was Mahler on the way home – only to realise it’s still that leitmotif from Siegfried, gah! 😄

Loving all the rave reviews of Barrie Kosky's Siegfried! What a musical/artistic/vocal feast the opening night was! (although Act III felt a li'lle visually overwhelming for me) Still debating whether to go see it a 2nd time at the RBO or catch the screen version so I can enjoy the close-ups!

Bachtrack@bachtrack.com · 5mo ago

Siegfried at The Royal Opera: Kosky and Pappano continue to surprise and delight ✍️ David Karlin bachtrack.com/review-wagne...

Back at @wigmore-hall.org.uk for a fabulous treat of a concert with one of my absolute favourite violinists in the world: James Ehnes, with Andrew Armstrong. Adored the Elgar, the bluesy Ravel left me breathless, and the fun encores James jokingly called the “dessert menu” were the cherry on top!🍒

Joshua Bell was on 🔥 at Wigmore Hall tonight w/ a fabulous programme! I only knew Grieg for his Piano Concerto; I had no idea he’d written violin sonatas. I LOVED the stormy yet tender Violin Sonata No. 3 – now inspired to explore more of his music!Gorgeous Schubert and Prokofiev too. Heart full! 💕

About Saturday’s magnificent LPO/Jurowski's Mahler 10. Mahler’s unfinished Tenth resonated somewhere very deep. My heart thumped with every drumbeat of the finale; I forgot to breathe! A single tear at the flute solo. Mahler’s whispered “Almschi” speaking to anyone who has ever known love and loss.

LPO/Jurowski review – Mahler’s 10th is full of colour, and the composer’s pain, in Barshai’s completion

Rudolf Barshai’s audacious completion of Marhler’s final unfinished symphony slathers on the colour, and its diverse timbral details came over loud and clear thanks to the LPO’s playing and Vladimir J...

theguardian.com

Kidnapping the leader of a foreign state without any declaration of war and announcing it via social media is full-on rogue state stuff. From the world’s number one superpower.

Whatever you might think of Maduro, the seizure and kidnapping of a head of state takes us to a very dark place. Vast, arbitrary, extra-legal power, which could be exercised almost anywhere, regardless of the character of the target government.

I've always hated karaoke. But a Prosecco-fuelled Christmas do with colleagues bellowing out nostalgic love songs turned out to be unexpectedly therapeutic. “I died a hundred times…you go back to her… and I go back to...blaaack, blaaack, blaaack, blaack.” youtu.be/d7z5YjouK44?...

So good to see Simon Rattle on top form after his cancelled Proms appearance last summer. The BRSO really is the “Rolls Royce” of orchestras! 👏 Bruckner’s 7th was sublime, with that gorgeous Wagnerian Adagio — rings of Valhalla! And I loved the searing orchestral drama of Janáček’s Taras Bulba!