The 10 best classical and jazz shows to book tickets for this spring

The Telegraph’​s Classical Music Critic, Ivan Hewett, chooses ten classical and jazz shows to book tickets for this Spring.

Eric Lu (Classical)

The wonderfully subtle, poetic young Chinese-American pianist, who carried off the top prize at the Leeds International Piano Competition last year, makes his London recital with a programme that stretches from Mozart to Chopin.

LSO St Lukes, London EC2 (020 7638 8891), April 4

Total Immersion (Classical)

A day-long celebration in the music of Parisian sisters Lili and Nadia Boulanger, one an extraordinarily gifted composer who died in 1918 at the age of 24, the other the grand dame of French music for over half a century.

Barbican, London EC2 (020 7638 8891), April 6

Javier Perianes (Classical)

This young Spanish pianist combines staggering virtuosity, superb calm lyricism, and a refusal to play to the gallery. This recital of Chopin, Debussy and Falla in the Southbank’s International Piano Series plays to all his strengths.

Queen Elizabeth Hall, London SE1 (020 3879 9555), April 16

Pekka Kuusisto (Classical)

Not many violin recitals involve a visual designer and a neuropsychologist, but Finnish virtuoso Pekka Kuusisto is no ordinary violinist. The last concert in his Wigmore Hall residency has music by Bach, Kreutzer, Thomas Adès, Jörg Widmann, and Paganini.

Wigmore Hall, London W1 (020 7935 2141), May 1

Tectonics (Classical)

Glasgow’s festival of cutting-edge new music is always full of surprises. This year it includes four performances from virtuoso harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani, and a world premiere from the 85-year-old modernist pioneer Christian Wolff.

Various venues, Glasgow (0141 353 8000), May 4 & 5

Fred Hersch (Jazz)

Fred Hersch is the jazz pianist that other top-rank jazz pianists revere, famed for his unbelievably subtle voicings and harmonic turns. Catch his only UK date in 2019 at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival, curated this year by star singer Gregory Porter.

Various venues, Cheltenham (01242 850270), May 5

Chineke! (Jazz)

Europe’s first BAME orchestra goes from strength to strength. In this Brighton Festival concert they celebrate the Roaring 20s with honey-toned soprano Nadine Benjamin, with music by Copland, Gershwin, Ibert and Weill. Also at the Bath and Bury St-Edmunds festivals.

Brighton Dome (01273 709709), May 23

Keith Tippett & Matthew Bourne (Jazz)

Two wonderful jazz pianists from different generations, utterly different in style, unveil their new joint creation at the enterprising Manchester Jazz Festival, which this year defiantly takes “Celebrating Europe” as its theme.

Royal Northern College of Music Manchester (0843 208 1848), May 23

Thomas Larcher (Classical)

Austrian composer Thomas Larcher, one of three resident composer-creators at this year’s Aldeburgh festival, performs his own evocative Poems for Piano, and a song-cycle composed especially for tenor Mark Padmore.

Britten Studio, Snape (01728 687110), June 9

Metropolis (Classical)

The Philharmonia’s Weimar Germany season reaches a spectacular climax with a screening of Fritz Lang’s classic dystopian vision Metropolis, with Gottfried Huppert’s sometimes luxuriantly Wagnerian, sometimes creepily modernist score performed live by the orchestra.

Royal Festival Hall London SE1 (020 3879 9555), June 13

BBC Cardiff Singer of the World (Classical)

Twenty outstanding young singers from fifteen countries compete in one of the world’s most prestigious singing competitions, which has launched the careers of Bryn Terfel, Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Nina Stemme, among others.

Various venues, Cardiff (029 2087 8444), June 15-22