United Kingdom William Shakespeare’s Macbeth: Filmed live (directed by Tim Van Someren) at London’s Donmar Warehouse in 2023 and released in cinemas across the UK, US, Australia and selected international territories from 5th February 2025. (JPr)
Articles & Interviews
The master list of news, features and interviews
Len Mullenger looks back at 30 years of MusicWeb International (founded in 1995)
30 years of MusicWeb International by Len Mullenger
2025 is the year in which MusicWeb achieves a significant milestone; it is thirty years ago that I founded the site, way back in 1995.
I hope I will be forgiven for blowing my own – and MusicWeb’s – trumpet. Over these thirty years we have diligently presented reviews of extremely high quality, unmatched in quantity by any other site. We are the number one leading site, with 61,000 CD reviews to date and multitudes of articles, and we are immensely proud of all that. I am immensely grateful to all the contributors to MusicWeb, both past and current, whose efforts have enabled us to achieve all this. My particular thanks go to my management team of David Barker, Ralph Moore, John Quinn and Jonathan Woolf whose strong support I rely so much on.
Lost Dog, NEBT, Ballet Nights and Let’s Dance International Frontiers at the start of 2025
SHARIF AFIFI (2023 Olivier nominee: The Band’s Visit (Donmar Warehouse) stars in LOST DOG’s award-winning, spectacularly popular, critically acclaimed one-man take on Milton’s epic poem: ‘Paradise Lost (lies unopened beside me)’. February 6 and 7 – Chichester Minerva Theatre March 15 to April 5 – London, Battersea Arts Centre (Tues-Sat each week) ‘PARADISE LOST…’ is … Read more
Geoffrey Newman in conversation with conductor Andrew Litton
Conductor Andrew Litton talks to Geoffrey Newman
Born in New York City in 1959, Andrew Litton is currently Music Director of the New York City Ballet Orchestra. Litton shot to international attention in his mid-twenties after winning the BBC/Rupert Foundation International Conducting Competition in 1982 and quickly became Assistant Conductor at the National Symphony of Washington under Rostropovich. He then took on successive Principal Conductor appointments with the Bournemouth Symphony (1988-1994), Dallas Symphony (1994-2006), and the Bergen Philharmonic (2003-2015). He also directed the Minnesota Orchestra’s summer festival from 2003-2017. Litton has now recorded over 140 CDs, primarily on the Virgin, Delos and BIS labels. He is also known for his virtuosity on the piano and his love of jazz and Gershwin. This interview tracks the conductor’s development and his achievements in detail. It took place coincident with his appearance with violinist Anne Akiko Meyers and the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in October 2024 (review here).
The 2025 Salzburg Festival – 18 July to 31 August
174 Performances on 45 Tagen at 16 Venues as well as 37 Performances as part of the Youth Programme jung & jede*r
‘I am being given birth into death,’ remarks Samuel Beckett’s character Malone in a monologue that dissolves time and space, leaving only the nothingness of the end. The endgame of human existence is where we find the protagonists of this summer’s Salzburg Festival: siblings languishing in the Russian provinces in Peter Eötvös’s Three Sisters, a woman lost in the forest in Schoenberg’s Erwartung and a mournful, lonely wanderer in Mahler’s ‘Der Abschied’. The doctor in Vladimir Sorokin’s deadly blizzard is likewise caught up in extreme circumstances, as is the despondent prophetess Cassandra in Michael Jarrell’s adaptation of Christa Wolf’s novella.
For more information and how to book tickets CLICK HERE
Some musical highlights of Musicus Fest 2024 in Hong Kong
Hong Kong’s Musicus Fest 2024 in Hong Kong
In 2010, a group of music enthusiasts in Hong Kong founded the Musicus Society. Under the artistic direction of Trey Lee, the organization has become an integral part of the cultural life of this Asian metropolis over the last 15 years.
Royal Ballet and Opera and The Metropolitan Opera to widen its cinema audience in the UK and US
Royal Ballet and Opera and The Metropolitan Opera join forces with new cinema collaboration
First of its kind collaboration to widen access to world-class ballet and opera across the UK and US
Broadcasts of the Met’s production of Il barbiere di Siviglia and Royal Ballet’s classic, The Nutcracker
Click here for RBO and here for the Met and find your local cinema screening