Music
The Music Section of the Critics’ Circle meets regularly to share news and views about journalism and the music industry, and their ever-changing landscapes and challenges. It presents annual Music Awards to celebrate outstanding performance skills, composition, conducting and vision–largely from new or emerging figures–and to honour one individual’s lifetime achievement.
The Music Section aims to promote the art of informed criticism. While not a trade union, it fosters and safeguards the professional interests of its members and organises social events. Above all, its members’ combined voices support the arts in Britain, occasionally inviting music practitioners to meetings and learning from them. The 100 or so members largely write about classical music and opera, but the section embraces critics from across music journalism.
News & Reviews
Wonderfully performed but this Ariadne is not quite the sum of its parts
Alina Wunderlin, David Butt Philip, Rachel Wills-Sørensen in Laurent Pelly’s new production, (c) Tristam Kenton Glyndebourne Festival Opera / Robin Ticciati Glyndebourne Theatre, July 19, 2026 Change—even when thwarted—is the bedrock upon which Ariadne auf Naxos, one…
Singing to die for rescues drab Royal Opera ‘I Puritani’
Lisette Oropesa as Elvira in Bellini’s ‘I puritani’. Photo: Tristram Kenton Verdi’s Il trovatore is said to need only the four best singers in the world, but pretty much the same goes for the earlier composer Vincenzo Bellini’s I…
Glyndebourne’s Billy Budd is a first-rater
The crew of the Indomitable, at Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Photo: Tristram Kenton Nelson’s flagship,Victory, and the stage at Glyndebourne measure about the same, port to starboard – roughly 15 metres. So the three decks of the 18th- century man-of-war Indomitable…
Monteverdi’s “L’Orfeo” at Glyndebourne
It is truly astonishing to think that this is Glyndebourne’s first Monteverdi L’Orfeo . It is not the first Monteverdi there, though: both Poppea (first seen 1962), and Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in patria (1972) have previously featured. One of the earliest operas…
