Bostridge and Pappano

Queens Hall, 13/8/2025

Ian Bostridge, tenor, Sir Antonio Pappano, piano, and members of the London Symphony Orchestra

I approached this concert with a degree of caution, because last year’s concert was underwhelming. Indeed our reviewer gave it a critical review, but this year’s collaboration with Sir Antonio Pappano and members of the LSO in a programme of two song cycles from Ian Bostridge, as well as a piano quintet from the LSO members looked promising.

The first song cycle was Britten’s (The Festival programme spelt it Brittan!), a cycle for tenor and piano written in 1953 for Peter Pears as were many of Britten’s song cycles. Last year our reviewer talked about Bostridge’s mannered performance, both vocally and physically. Indeed in the past he acquired the friendly nickname “Bendy Bostridge” for his physical contortions. I can report that his physical mannerisms are not so marked as before, but his vocal mannerisms persist. This wasn’t helped by his choice of Britten’s song cycle, which truth to tell is rather dreary, although it has been sung more melodically by others. Tony Pappano in what surprisingly is his Festival debut was a very accomplished accompanist but couldn’t save Bostridge’s interpretation.

The second song cycle was better. Firstly it was Vaughan Williams’ ‘On Wenlock Edge’, comprising six settings from A E Housman’s collection ‘A Shropshire Lad’. Importantly it was composed for accompaniment by piano and string quartet, here provided by Tony Pappano and four excellent musicians from the LSO. This song cycle is much more melodic than the Britten cycle and with the string accompaniment much fuller. However again Bostridge did give it his distinctive, somewhat alienating, mannerisms; listening to Mark Padmore’s recital on Apple Music it clearly doesn’t need to be this way. I regret my judgement of Ian Bostridge’s performance is little better than my colleague’s last year: the early beauty of his voice has been overtaken by his mannerisms and I’m afraid I don’t like it. Of course I may be in the minority. He did get his usual warm reception from the full house at the Queens Hall. You can make your own judgement when the BBC get round to broadcasting it. Keep your eye on the Radio 3 schedule.

The final work after the interval was a piano quintet by Elgar with Tony Pappano and four members of the LSO: Benjamin Gilmore (Violin 1), Julian Gil Rodriguez (Violin 2), Elvin Ringstad (Viola) and David Cohen (Cello). They were all excellent musicians and it was a particular pleasure to see Tony Pappano flourishing with his new musicians as he did the night before with the full LSO at the Usher Hall. I have been a long-time fan of Tony Pappano as a conductor from his days back in the 1990’s in Brussels at La Monnaie and of course over the past 25 years at Covent Garden. He is a fine conductor but what this morning’s concert shows is that he is a fine pianist and clearly enjoys working with his new musicians in the LSO. Let’s hope he and they become regular visitors to the Festival.