Music reviews

Sam Smith, Abbey Road Studios review: soaring vocals and soul-bearing lyrics

4/5

This live-streamed album launch had an intimacy that the pop star's usual arena shows could never offer

By Ali Shutler 31 Oct 2020, 5:29pm
Dizzee Rascal, E3 AF, review: the elder statesman of British rap returns

4/5

The rapper who reinvigorated British popular music has returned to his roots, with – when it isn’t being sentimental – an excellent album

By Thomas Hobbs 30 Oct 2020, 12:32pm
Ariana Grande, Positions, review: plenty of lust, but where are the hits?

3/5

Ariana Grande leaves her traumas behind with an RnB album dedicated solely to sex – but it doesn’t quite hit the spot

By Kate Solomon 30 Oct 2020, 7:40am
Malcolm Arnold, The Dancing Master, review: this risqué comic opera is a brilliant rediscovery

5/5

By Rupert Christiansen 29 Oct 2020, 11:30am
Elvis Costello, Hey Clockface, review: a hot, defiant mess to rouse us out of lockdown

3/5

By Neil McCormick 28 Oct 2020, 12:37pm
Britten Sinfonia, Saffron Hall, review: a scintillating 85th birthday celebration for a modern master

4/5

By John Allison 26 Oct 2020, 4:33pm
Piers Morgan's Life Stories: Cliff Richard review: nothing but soft soap and damp squibs

2/5

By Michael Hogan 25 Oct 2020, 10:00pm

I Wanna be Yours by John Cooper Clarke review: poetry, drugs and rock'n'roll

4/5

The 'poet laureate of punk' revisits his rise, fall and comeback in a funny and unflinching memoir

By Neil McCormick 25 Oct 2020, 4:00pm
Billie Eilish, Where Do We Go? The Livestream review: the boldest virtual gig since Covid

4/5

The 18-year-old superstar delivered a gloriously weird art pop experience, singing against ever-changing virtual reality backdrops

By Neil McCormick 25 Oct 2020, 1:12pm
Adele on Saturday Night Live review: not a grand comeback, more of a 'hello'

3/5

Joking about her weight loss, the singer made a charming host – but the absence of songs or solid news of her new album left her fans hungry

By Ed Power 25 Oct 2020, 10:03am

Bruce Springsteen, Letter to You, review: passionate, brilliant, and unashamedly old-fashioned

5/5

By Neil McCormick 23 Oct 2020, 9:19am
James Bay, Shakespeare’s Globe, review: songs of heartbreak in an evening of togetherness

4/5

22 Oct 2020, 2:36pm
Bruckner, Mass No 2 in E Minor & Te Deum review: Philippe Herreweghe conducts an exquisite album

4/5

By Ivan Hewett 21 Oct 2020, 11:30am
Chineke! Orchestra, Festival Hall, review: BLM-inspired premiere of which Beethoven would surely have approved

4/5

By John Allison 20 Oct 2020, 2:05pm

Aurora Orchestra, Kings Place, review: nourishing and radiantly optimistic

4/5

After eight months, the Aurora Orchestra finally returned to Kings Place for a joyous comeback

By Ivan Hewett 18 Oct 2020, 2:06pm
The Divine Comedy review, Barbican: a frontman having an infectiously good time

4/5

Neil Hannon and band were on the Barbican stage for one night only, in front of a tiny, distanced audience - but still, what fun it was

By Neil McCormick 15 Oct 2020, 4:10pm
Katie Melua, Album No. 8, review: an admirable divorce album free from recrimination

4/5

The songwriter's album about the end of her seven-year marriage is at once dreamy, spooky, precise and mature

By Neil McCormick 15 Oct 2020, 10:54am
Mariam Batsashvili, Wigmore Hall, review: it was as if she had three hands

4/5

Although falling slightly short here on the emotional side of things, this 26-year-old Georgian is a pianist of rare, thunderous brilliance

By Ivan Hewett 14 Oct 2020, 11:01am
Jonas Kaufmann and Helmut Deutsch, Selige Stunde, review: a delightful tasting menu of songs

4/5

Opera star tenor Kaufmann and his regular pianist Deutch play away the lockdown blues on a charming new album

By Rupert Christiansen 12 Oct 2020, 11:30am
Sweet Dreams by Dylan Jones review: name-dropping with the New Romantics

3/5

Dressed like Elizabethan dandies or sci-fi starlets, what were the New Romantics trying to express?

By Neil McCormick 11 Oct 2020, 1:00pm
Lewis Capaldi, Sneaky Pete's, review: heartbreak and haemorrhoids in this intimate live-streamed show

4/5

Even without a crowd, Ali Shutler found Lewis Capaldi a captivating presence in this special gig to raise money for grassroots venues

10 Oct 2020, 1:02pm
What's Next, Vivaldi? review: Patricia Kopatchinskaja drags Vivaldi into the 21st century

4/5

The Moldovan virtuoso joins Giovanni Antonini for a radical album that shows Vivaldi in a new light

By Ivan Hewett 10 Oct 2020, 11:30am

Jason Rebello Trio, Ronnie Scott’s, review: the best tonic for lockdown I’ve had in months

4/5

The brilliant pianist and his louche, perfectly honed, lounge-lizardish trio made it feel more like 5.30am than pm

By Ivan Hewett 9 Oct 2020, 3:09pm
Lockdown Town, Warden's Grove, review: whole lotta shakin’ goin’ on at London Bridge

4/5

This immersive, socially distanced musical experience is set in a maze of railway arches and tunnels - it's also great, bizarre fun

By Neil McCormick 9 Oct 2020, 2:57pm

Ella Fitzgerald: The Lost Berlin Tapes review: a rediscovered masterpiece

5/5

On this live album, recorded just months after the Berlin wall went up, the great jazz star sings as if her life depended on it

By Ivan Hewett 9 Oct 2020, 12:12pm
Bournemouth SO / Brabbins, Lighthouse, Poole, review: floating tremulously between ecstasy and orientalism

3/5

Stand-in conductor Martyn Brabbins led a concert that included a ravishing, little-known piece by Ukrainian composer Théodore Akimenko

By Ivan Hewett 8 Oct 2020, 3:54pm
Peter Grimes review: Stuart Skelton is electrifying in a superb recording of Britten's masterpiece

5/5

This new CD is a marvellous achievement – and a forceful reminder of Britten's genius

By Rupert Christiansen 8 Oct 2020, 11:30am
Headie One, Edna review: the king of drill shows his sensitive side

4/5

Dedicated to his late mother, the controversial rapper's new album is laced with melancholy and regret

By Neil McCormick 7 Oct 2020, 11:30am
Monteverdi, Il Terzo Libro di Madrigali (Madrigals Book Three), Concerto Italiano, review: bewitching beauty

5/5

This miraculous new CD captures the flowing Renaissance style – and the emerging unruly passions of the Baroque

By Ivan Hewett 5 Oct 2020, 10:37am
Tom Grennan, O2 Academy, review: authentic magic from the soulful singer-songwriter

4/5

The Brixton venue's first gig since Covid struck was streamed using pioneering VR technology to create an intimate feel

By Alex Diggins 3 Oct 2020, 4:35pm
RLPO / Thomas Jung, Philharmonic Hall, review: a marvellous relaunch of Liverpool's concert life

5/5

This was a superb evening of live music-making, with conductor Thomas Jung moulding the works with exceptional sensitivity

By David Fanning 2 Oct 2020, 1:36pm
Blackpink, The Album, review: lab-made pop that gloriously basks in its own utter banality

4/5

The Korean girlband's second album sounds like it has been cooked up by pop scientists. It's unnerving and stupefying, finds Neil McCormick

By Neil McCormick 2 Oct 2020, 12:00am

LPO / Edward Gardner, Royal Festival Hall, review: a post-lockdown corner is invigoratingly turned

4/5

The lack of an audience was frustrating, but this first concert at the Festival Hall in more than six months was still cause for celebration

By Ivan Hewett 1 Oct 2020, 2:17pm
Angela Hewitt, Wigmore Hall, review: Hewitt and Bach provide the kind of shared moment we’ve all been waiting for

5/5

The great pianist finished her majestic traversal of Bach’s harpsichord music by climbing the lofty, lonely peak that is The Art of Fugue

By Ivan Hewett 29 Sep 2020, 2:45pm

Bernard Haitink: The Enigmatic Maestro, review: a tribute to the quiet Dutchman who made a big noise

4/5

By Anita Singh 26 Sep 2020, 9:00pm
Elizabeth Llewellyn, Wigmore Hall, review: gloriously full-blooded and warm-hearted singing

4/5

By Rupert Christiansen 24 Sep 2020, 1:18pm
Julian Joseph, Snape Maltings, review: effusive maximalism – and a tribute to Mum

3/5

By Ivan Hewett 21 Sep 2020, 1:58pm
Abel Selaocoe, Kings Place, review: Bach meets Bobby McFerrin

4/5

By Ivan Hewett 20 Sep 2020, 1:52pm

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