A lovely moment from our Bob Chilcott Christmas Oratorio recording with Dame Sarah Connolly Merton College Choir and Benjamin Nicholas at the helm 🥰

Head over to YouTube to see the whole Magnificat! 🔔

Deborah Annetts Richard Morrison The Times and The Sunday Times Arts Council England Try being a small chamber ensemble with this current ACE regime & cancel culture in place . Poor feedback, no development just stick & paste half a sentence responses. No point in wasting time with crass Grantium portal. We have better things to do, re- delivering excellence 🎶🎷

Thanks to everyone who followed Record Review to its new afternoon berth today, and welcome to newcomers! Stick with us live BBC Radio 3 or catch-up BBC Sounds
So many messages, tweets and emails…it’s been genuinely moving hearing how much RR matters to you all. 💕

Anyone else thinking the new weekend schedule on BBC Radio 3 is an improvement? No, thought not. In fairness, Tom’s programme is ok. Ideal afternoon listening between, say 2 and 4pm to dip in and out of. No replacement for #recordreview though. Please reconsider Sam Jackson

The first grand opera in Arabic opens in Saudi Arabia this month, starring Dame Sarah Connolly. Australian composer Lee Bradshaw tells us how he came to write the score.
limelight-arts.com.au/features/an-ar…

Back in my favourite cafe in Broadstairs. Simple pleasures !

Insightful piece by Richard Morrison in The Times and The Sunday Times today on Arts Council England. The burdensome conditions ACE imposes on arts bodies even when their funding is just a small part of the revenue is shocking. No wonder CEOs are thinking of going it alone. In my view ACE needs urgent reform.

Two musical Dames at the very tops of their respective professions once again join together in recital at Wigmore Hall on Saturday 16 November ✨

Join Dame Sarah Connolly (Dame Sarah Connolly) and Dame Imogen Cooper for Duparc, Loewe, Mozart and more 🎼

What glorious singing from St John's Voices on BBC Radio 3 this am. Please, there must be a way to preserve this choir. I’m of the opinion that communal singing is our biggest weapon against the mental health crisis facing our younger generations. We need more choirs, not fewer.

Axing of Cambridge mixed choir ‘regressive move for women’, say supporters | Choral music | The Guardian ⁦St John's Voices⁩ should co-exist with ⁦St John's College Choir⁩ since they both offer different opportunities. SJV should have been consulted. theguardian.com/music/2024/mar…

Stephen Maddock While, interestingly, the government's announcement of Mary Archer's review of Arts Council England references its remit in supporting high-quality/excellent arts no fewer than five times but does not mention the words 'relevance'/'relevant' once. Curious... 🤔

A quick search of the new ACE opera report reveals just 7 uses of “excellence” or “excellent”.

This compares with 48 uses of “relevance” or “relevant”. theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

Truly staggering singing & playing from the entire cast, huge chorus & band in English National Opera Jenufa. I hope the authors of Arts Council England opera analysis + Darren Henley CBE + Nick Serota go to see how a 120-year old opera handles male violence, honour killing and other, er, “relevant” ideas.

And too many Americans want to vote for the criminal who caused this? It’s unbelievable to me how knuckle-headed Trump supporters are. I don’t believe he’ll win the presidency but let’s hope he’s in gaol running his campaign before then.

Oh this is such a cute house!!inside and out…see link

Anyone in Chiswick looking for a house that's small but perfectly formed...

A friend is selling this bijou house in Chiswick. Please share x rightmove.co.uk/properties/145…

Absolutely!

Toi toi toi to Dame Sarah Connolly who makes a role debut tonight singing Jocasta in Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex at De Nationale Opera.

Performances until 24 March.

Full details here: buff.ly/48QEjsQ

It’s worth spreading this . Trump can not be allowed to regain power