Upcoming live streams • Two live performances of Mahler’s music will be broadcast from an audience-free Concertgebouw, part of the Dutch orchestra’s Mahler festival this month. Baritone Thomas Oliemans performs songs from Hans und Grethe and Lieder Eines Fahrenden Gesellen on 13 May at 12.30pm CET (11.30 BST), and, on 15 May at 12.30 CET (11.30am BST) the Alma Quartet, comprised of members of the Concertgebouw’s orchestra, will perform an arrangement of the Adagietto from the 5th symphony and – with pianist Nino Gvetadze – part of the Piano Quartet in A minor. • Outstanding young artists are live-streaming concerts from their homes via recitalstream.org, that features two or three new events each week. Check the schedule for the next concert. Operas and concerts on demand • Watch one of the highlights of last year’s Proms season – the Aurora orchestra’s imaginative and thrilling staging of Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique. The performance is the first in the orchestra’s new “Aurora Play” series that will see new content each week alongside introductions by conductor Nicholas Collon and other special guests. • Established opera streaming platform operavision.eu has a rich archive of productions from across Europe all available free. New productions are coming every three or four days (check here). You can also watch via their YouTube channel. May sees a celebration of Russian opera, with Komische Oper Berlin’s Eugene Onegin, Moscow State Stanislavsky Music Theatre’s Queen of Spades and Dutch National Opera’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (from 12 May) among the offerings. • France TV, the French public national television broadcaster, has a classical music and opera channel with some great content including (at time of writing) Purcell’s Indian Queen, staged by Opera Lille with Concert d’Astrée and Emmanuelle Haïm, and a Robert Wilson staging of Turandot. • European cultural streaming platform Arte (which also hosts the fabulous Hope@Home – see below) has regularly changing content from opera houses across Europe. Current highlights include Gluck’s Orphée et Eurydice at the Opéra Comique in Paris, Turandot in a production for Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, and Piazolla’s tango opera Maria de Buenos Aires, a 2019 production from Opéra National du Rhin. • The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic is adding videos of past concerts to Facebook twice a week. Some have a specially-recorded introduction by chief conductor Vasily Petrenko. There’s also, in the Live From Liverpool Philharmonic Hall series, there are previously unreleased audio recordings of past concerts. • Scottish Opera’s world premiere production of Anthropocene by Stuart MacRae and Louise Welsh is available until 15 May via OperaVision. Read our four-star review here. • Ghent’s Opera Ballet Vlaanderen has productions including 2013’s Parsifal, winner of International Opera’s Best Wagner Anniversary Production (and which featured 250 litres of fake blood). And if you want to venture a little off opera’s beaten track, there’s Rimsky-Korsakov’s Sadko and Halévy’s La Juive. Their content is also available via OperaVision. • New York Philharmonic’s planned Mahler festival in honour of its former music director instead became a digital celebration, with all ten of his symphonies (some audio only), a 2011 performance (under Alan Gilbert) of Kindertotenlieder featuring Thomas Hampson, a walking tour, ‘Mahler Grooves’, and recipes. • The Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists are celebrating the 20th anniversary of their acclaimed Bach Cantata Pilgrimage with a new cantata every Sunday on their YouTube channel, selected to match the liturgical calendar. The series kicked off with BWV 67 Halt im Gedächtnis Jesum Christ, composed for the the first Sunday after Easter, and first performed on 16 April 1724. It’s audio only, but EBS leader Kati Debretzeni has recorded a lovely introduction, and there’s listening notes from John Eliot Gardiner. More information here. There’s plenty of other music to explore on the Monteverdi Choir and Orchestra’s YouTube channel, including Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo, recorded in 2017 in Venice’s historic Teatro La Fenice, and his Vespro della Beata Vergine recorded in the Palace of Versailles. • New music specialists the London Sinfonietta’s digital channel features interviews with many of its commissioned composers, performance guides and performances of short works by composers including Steve Reich and Harrison Birtwistle, as well as Tansy Davies and Nick Drake’s recent chamber opera Cave. • There’s a new concert each night – the “concert du jour” (available for 24 hours only) – plus a great selection of on-demand content from the Philharmonie de Paris, including Samstag, from Stockhausen’s Licht opera cycle, and Hans Krása’s children’s opera, Brundibar – plus jazz, chamber music and masterclasses. A well-designed search facility helps you navigate the wide variety of music. • The Philharmonia Orchestra had been due to mark its 75th anniversary with concerts at London’s Royal Festival Hall on the Easter weekend. Instead, they’re offering a concert from 50 years ago at the same venue. In June 1970 the orchestra’s first principal conductor, Otto Klemperer, led the orchestra in a cycle of Beethoven symphonies, and you can watch the orchestra perform the ninth, the choral symphony, featuring soloists including mezzo Janet Baker. • The New York Philharmonic is broadcasting a past concert every Thursday at 7.30pm EST (12.30am BST) on Facebook and YouTube. This week’s offering is a 1994 Live from Lincoln Center episode featuring then music director Kurt Masur leading an all-Beethoven program. There are also audio streams and videos of past concerts. • Each evening at 7.30pm EST, New York’s Metropolitan Opera is also streaming a past production from its award-winning Live in HD series. Each opera is available to stream, free, for 23 hours. More details on @MetOpera. • Violinist Isabelle Faust live-streamed a solo Bach recital on 5 April from Leipzig’s Thomaskirche, the church where JS Bach was Kapellmeister from 1723 until his death in 1750. The spine-tingling 60-minute concert is on Arte.tv, free to view until 4 July. • Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw Orchestra has a huge array of past concerts to watch, organised by composer (including a Beethoven and a Mahler symphony cycle), by conductor (well represented are former chief conductors Bernard Haitink, Mariss Jansonsand, Daniele Gatti; plus Andris Nelsons and Ivan Fischer – (although women on the Concertgebouw podium are conspicuous by their absence), and soloists. There are also conducting masterclasses, portraits of the orchestra’s members, and documentaries – enough to keep you engaged for weeks to come. • The Dutch National Opera has on its YouTube channel the world premiere production of William Jeth’s Ritratto, which was never actually publicly performed. There’s also, currently, Richard Jones’s production of Janácek’s Cunning Little Vixen (with costumes by Anthony McDonald). Content changes regularly. • The Melbourne Recital Centre has a range of performances from the past few years of predominantly Australian performers and repertoire in an admirably easy-to-navigate site. • Garsington Opera has made available its 2019 production of Smetana’s Bartered Bride in a staging our critic declared “full of charm and wit”, as well as its Nozze di Figarocaptured in 2017. • Brussels’s famous opera house La Monnaie has curated a “virtual season” with seven recent productions (including Tristan und Isolde, Aida, Dusapin’s specially-commissioned Macbeth Underworld, and a hallucinogenic La Gioconda). Not all the surtitles are in English – try this database of librettos to gen up). You can also access the same content on its YouTube channel. • The Bavarian State Opera (Bayerische Staatsoper) is livestreaming a chamber music concert each Monday evening, which is then available on demand for a fortnight. The first, featuring Christian Gerhaher, the Schumann Quartet, and pianist Igor Levit was watched by almost 50,000 live. Check the schedule here. • The EU-wide Early Music Day was, of course, online-only this year but featured live streamed concerts that can all be watched on demand alongside plenty of previous concerts and shorter performances. Don’t miss Steven Devine’s performance of Bach’s 48 Preludes and Fugues on the harpsichord at the York Early Music Centre, or if you need a lift, Bach’s Toccata and Fugue (other Baroque composers are available) arranged for four very nimble-fingered recorder players. • The Gstaad Menuhin Festival and Academy (currently still scheduled to run from 17 July to 6 September 2020) has an online space where you can watch performances, backstage interviews and masterclasses from previous festivals. Registration is required, but this will also enable the non-German speakers among us to access the English-language version of the written content. • Berlin’s Pierre Boulez Saal’s Intermission series features a regularly updated selection of past concerts each available for two or three days. • Deutsche Oper Berlin has a regularly changing programme of past productions available on demand. Check for details. • The audio stream of Missy Mizzoli’s Breaking the Waves (which was at the Edinburgh international festival last year) captured in Opera Philadelphia’s premiere production in September 2016 is available via a Soundcloud embed. • The Royal Opera House is making available weekly ballets or operas streamed live (and then available on demand) on their Facebook and YouTube channels. The 2010 outing of Jonathan Miller’s Così fan tutte, Wayne McGregor’s 2009 staging of Handel’s Acis and Galatea and the 2o13 production of Britten’s Gloriana is currently on offer. . More ROH content is available on Marquee TV (see below). • Arts and culture streaming platform Marquee TV has extended its trial period to 30 days, giving free access to a huge range of theatre and ballet productions and a large and varied collection of operas that includes most of Glyndebourne festival’s recent productions (from Brett Dean’s Hamlet to Jonathan Kent’s glorious staging of Purcell’s Fairy Queen, bonking bunnies and all). Other must-sees include Arvo Pärt’s Adam’s Passion, and Opera North’s award-winning production of Jonathan Dove’s children’s opera, Pinocchio, and one of the greatest opera events of the last decade: Aldeburgh festival’s outdoor production of Peter Grimes, staged on the beach where Britten’s opera is set. Registration (and thus credit card details) are required to activate the free trial period, but you can cancel anytime. • The Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra has a wide array of past concerts on demand and will be adding more regularly. Of many wonderful concerts, try Daniel Barenboim’s joyful performance of Beethoven’s 5th Piano Concerto under the baton of Mariss Jansons (from November 2017), or watch its celebrated and much missed chief conductor Jansons conducting Bruckner’s Mass No 3 F minor. • Opera North’s acclaimed semi-staged Ring cycle from 2016 is available on its website. The 2017 production of Trouble in Tahiti is available via Now TV and Sky on-demand services, and, on operavision (more of which below) you can watch its production of Britten’s Turn of the Screw, recorded live on 21 February 2020. • The Teatro Massimo in Palermo has several concerts and recent opera productions recorded live available to watch on demand. At the time of writing the operas include Madame Butterfly, La Traviata, a Barber of Seville (check out the witty animated opening) and a Cav and a Pag. And there’s more to come, we are promised. • The Teatro Regio’s YouTube channel, Opera on the Sofa, is making available past productions from the historic Turin theatre. The opening offering is Nabucco, staged last February, and there’s also Madama Butterfly, La Sonnambula and a Carmen. • Vienna State Opera is making a different opera available to watch each day via its streaming platform. There’s also a large archive of previous ballet and opera productions that can be watched with a subscription. • Many UK organisations live stream concerts and make them available via YouTube or other channels. Check out Wigmore Hall, which has a huge selection of its past chamber music concerts free to watch, or try the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s YouTube channel or Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. • Part of its new portal, Lincoln Center at Home, the New York arts venue is posting on Facebook past concerts from its Live from the Lincoln series. Highlights include Jaap van Zweden conducting the New York Philharmonic in Act 1 of Die Walküre, Mahler 5, or Joshua Bell’s Seasons of Cuba. Check for regular additions. • The Academy of Ancient Music’s Streaming Sunday sees a new concert uploaded each week that you can watch on their YouTube channel. Scotland’s Dunedin Consort has on Facebook a recent all-Bach programme recorded at Washington DC’s Library of Congress. • The London Philharmonic Orchestra launched LPonline with a remarkable performance of a movement of Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 10 led by Anne-Sophie Mutter from Munich, with her fellow musicians in Tonbridge, Pimlico and Barnes. More content includes listening guides, Spotify playlists and even a chance for the violas to shine. • The London Mozart Players’ “At Home” series features a daily changing selection of imaginatively-curated streams, workshops, family-friendly broadcasts and even live recitals. Check its YouTube channel or its website. • The London Symphony Orchestra is streaming full-length concerts on Sunday and Thursday evenings on its YouTube channel. Each performance will be available up to midnight (UK time) on the day of broadcast, and thereafter on streaming site Stingray Classica (currently offering a free 30-day trial). • [NEW] Chineke! Orchestra’s concert (Coleridge-Taylor, Bruch and Beethoven) from Sunday 23 February 2020 has just been made available on YouTube. It was filmed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, was conducted by Fawzi Haimor and featured Tai Murray as soloist. Easter music • English Touring Opera has uploaded its staging of Bach’s St John Passion which premiered in London on 5 March 2020 and had been due to tour across the UK featuring local choirs. The broadcast weaves together footage of the live performance at the Hackney Empire, with 90 individual video contributions made by choir members in isolation from Cumbria to Cornwall who were due to participate in performances across the country. • An abridged version of Bach’s oratorio St Matthew Passion, with Streetwise Opera (who work with people affected by homelessness) and The Sixteen, is available to watch on YouTube. It was filmed live at Campfield Market, Manchester, in March 2016. • You can also watch The Sixteen’s performance of James MacMillan’s Stabat Mater in the Sistine Chapel from April 2018. Newly created content on social media • Gramophone magazine’s charity gala on Sunday 10 May featured musicians including Lise Davidsen, Stephen Hough, Víkingur Ólafsson, Rachel Podger and Ian Bostridge performing from their homes. You can catch up with it on demand until 11.59pm on 17 May. • Outstanding young artists are live-streaming concerts from their homes on this impressive new platform, recitalstream.org/ Concerts are then available on demand for a fortnight. It’s free, but donations – that go direct to the performers - are welcome. • [NEW] What’s lockdown life like in Nottingham with Britain’s most musical family (or at least surely a prime contender for the title)? Have a peek inside the Kanneh-Mason household with regular Facebook live streams featuring short performances from cellist Sheku and his siblings. Don’t miss their scratch chamber orchestra arrangement of the first movement of Beethoven’s third concerto – a work that Isata had been due to perform at the Royal Albert Hall on 18 April. • Violinist Elena Urioste and her pianist husband Tom Poster are posting short clips each day of their performances of anything from Mozart to Messiaen, Nat King Cole to nursery rhymes. Don’t miss the Come on Eileen/Toxic/Baby Shark mashup, or their themed costumes to match the music. Send in your requests, and drop in to #UriPosteJukeBox to brighten your day. Wonderful stuff. • Violinist Daniel Hope’s hugely successful Hope at Home series has come to an end but you can catch them all 30+ episodes on demand via the ARTE Concert website. • Every evening at 6.30pm BST there’s a live organ recital from Worcester Cathedral on Facebook Live. • Pianist Igor Levit has now finished his two month run of nightly house concerts on Twitter (52 concerts), but you can still catch up with his wonderful series of mini recitals. • Cellist Yo-Yo Ma is playing short pieces that give him comfort and is posting them regularly on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Search hashtag #SongsofComfort. • Fellow cellist Gautier Capuçon, on lockdown in Paris, is posting daily doses of Bach on Twitter. • And Alisa Weilerstein has embarked on a #36daysofBach project – each day a different movement of Bach’s six Cello Suites will be streamed on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. • Bass Matthew Rose and cellist Steven Isserlis are introducing each other to new music each day on Twitter. Follow their dialogue and listen to their choices (here’s the first one). • Ivan Fischer and musicians from his Budapest Festival Orchestra are live streaming chamber concerts in a series they have called Quarantine Soirées. Check the website for details. Critics’ daily picks • Week eight: lushness from Renée Fleming and a torrid thriller from Korngold • Week seven slo-mo Pärt, a glorious Figaro and Beethoven’s tenth (yes really) • Week six: Dancing horses and bonking bunnies • Week five: Stockhausen’s devilish Saturday and a Beethoven marathon • Week four: Klemperer’s Choral symphony, a world premiere and splendidly sinister Britten • Week three: A charismatic Don Giovanni and ear-bending new sounds from Australia • Week two: Argerich, Aida and Hans Abrahamsen • Week one: Igor Levit, Il Trovatore and the Berlin Phil