Carrying on the discussion from the Battle for Music strand at the Battle of Ideas 2007, Culture Wars reviews contemporary music and publishes comment pieces on the socio-political role of sound.

The comedy (and tragedy) of class

The Gambler, Royal Opera House, London

Alexei starts with unrequited love and a social situation that leaves him few options. Babulenka starts with gambling for (whisper it) sheer fun and then loses her fortune almost wilfully to spite her callous relatives. Are these stories not more interesting and more believable than broad-brush comparisons with zoo animals?

Unsettling, ambiguous, right

The Rake’s Progress, Royal Opera House, London

Between Mozartian recitative – complete with harpsichord – and lyrical duets and trios, passages that wouldn’t be out of place in a film noir score (or an atonal chamber concert) place the opera firmly in the 20th century. The folktale storyline is echoed by folksong-like tunes and lyrics, and at times the singers address the audience directly, somewhere between Brecht and music hall.

Why doesn’t listening to modern classical music matter any more?

A talk given at, 'A cultured ear: why does listening to music matter?', at the Battle of Ideas, London, Saturday 31 October 2009

Like every art form, music should continue to provoke and explore different ways of getting under our skin, but though I would hate to have a world without dissonance, I believe that rock music stole classical music’s thunder when it took over the role of providing society’s songs and dances, not least by absorbing the power of electricity to provide the level of energy that an increasingly sex and technology obsessed society needed.

Difference in sameness

Agon – Sphinx – Limen, Royal Opera House, London

When Eric Underwood lifts Sarah Lamb during a delicate duet, she gently accommodates her basket-shaped body in his curved arms, just like wine poured in a goblet would end up taking the shape of a tulip. An image bound to be memorable as the seal that only dance can put on beauty.

Live merrily in cheerfulness

Le Grand Macabre, ENO, London Coliseum

The performances are astonishingly physical, the singers making real contact with each other and performing both comedy and sensuality with confidence. Susanna Andersson, who sings both Venus and Gepopo, chief of the secret police, is outstanding in combining acrobatic movement, masterful comic timing and two coloratura soprano roles.

Common people

Jacko’s Hour, Bridewell Theatre, London

The pared-down simple scoring of Jacko’s Hour is not simply a matter of pastiche – a disjuncture of distinct styles – but a reminder that opera has always been a hybrid tradition brought alive in local contexts.

‘Adequate listening’ in Starbucks

The Eris Quartet, Starbucks, Edinburgh, 3 August 2009

While blender zuzzes unhappily punctuate a cerebral commission by Charlie Usher and some of the lighter textures are lost underneath the coffee chatter, Sarah Spence’s resonant cello solo opening the Borodin evolves seamlessly upwards into the first violin, and the quartet display a unique togetherness that captivates an unexpectant audience.

Music and chats in the wilds of Wales

Green Man Festival, Brecon Beacons, 21-23 August 2009

What made the weekend so fantastic was not just the quality of the music but the various other diversions on offer. These ranged from busking scientists, yoga and banjo workshops to nature walks and of course the cinema and comedy tents.

Musical youth

The National Youth Orchestra, BBC Prom 31, Royal Albert Hall, London, 8 August 2009

The violins played low volume, scratching noises. Imaginary mice were scurrying all over the place, picking up food, building their nests and bumping in to each other. The pipes went up a minor scale and then musically ran off. Silence. But not quite. The harpists plucked at base notes. The imaginary world of nature looked peaceful but lurking beneath was life. Huge applause.

Not a tidy tragedy

Kat’a Kabanova, Opera Holland Park, London

Getting on for a century old, this piece feels very modern. Partly because the music is neither dusty nor ostentatiously avant-garde, so it hasn’t dated. Partly, too, because it is a classically naturalistic work, in which the details of character and setting show a specific world which is not timeless, but of its time.

Further criticism is unnecessary

Too Close to the Sun, Comedy Theatre, London

Beyond the fact that he wrote some novels, was decorated for his part in the First World War and killed himself with a shotgun, Hemingway remains a mystery. Worse than that even, I now actively dislike him. God knows what the estate must think about this production.

In love with love

L’Amour de Loin, ENO, Coliseum, London

This is less the story of a relationship than an exploration of why two people choose it instead of a real relationship. When Rudel’s actual poems are sung in the medieval French, the music takes a turn that evokes the music of that period, full of harsh, primitive harmonies, archaic scales and a note of loss and sadness. These songs are what bind Jaufré and his Countess together.

Transient convenience

Madam Butterfly, English National Opera, Coliseum, London

Flocks of paper birds on long sticks rise and wheel over the garden, and the menacing entrance of Butterfly’s uncle, the Bonze, is accompanied by twirling black ribbons wielded by the black-veiled puppeteer chorus. At times, their ninja-like presence is distracting. Using Bunraku-style puppets can feel pointless. What does it add that a real child could not do?

Chilling discords

Peter Grimes, English National Opera, Coliseum, London

Paul Steinberg’s sets manage to capture the fishing-town feel, at once bleak and claustrophobic. But the visual style of the production is almost expressionist, with its high, slanting blocks of architecture and stylised movement.

Jazz and the myth of authenticity

Really the Blues, by Mezz Mezzrow

The counterculture never did have any time for aspiration. Jazz, for some, may have been a form of cultural slumming, but for many blacks, working at monotonous, low-paid jobs and paying high rents to live in overcrowded apartment buildings, the music and its performers offered a glimpse of a better life that was demonstrably within the grasp of black Americans. Music was one arena in which blacks could be seen to excel.