Corinna Niemeyer

Press

• Benjamin: Picture a day like this

  Linbury Theatre, Royal Opera House, London

  Sep 2023

  • [The cast]...together with the conductor Corinna Niemeyer, bring the world that Benjamin has created movingly to life. ****

    • The Guardian
    • 24 September 2023

  • The 70-minute journey…is full of gentle wit and insights into human nature - and some compelling music for the singers and a chamber orchestra, virtuosically delivered under Corinna Niemeyer’s direction.

    • The Times
    • 25 September 2023

  • …conducted by Corinna Niemeyer with tenderness and care.

    • Opera Today
    • 23 September 2023

• Fauré | Poulenc | Saints-Saens

  Hallé

  Apr 2023

  • There was light and airy French music to begin with from the orchestra alone, conducted by Corinna Niemeyer in her debut with the Hallé. That was auspicious: she got a gentle but precise pizzicato underlay from the start for the beautiful tune of Fauré’s Pavane, controlled the ends of its phrases delightfully, and made the violas charmingly audible in the central section.

    • ArtsDesk
    • 28 April 2023

  • ... addressing the audience, Niemeyer spoke warmly saying “French programmes are all about colour... how to colour, how to blend instruments”. Niemeyer clearly knew how to balance an orchestra with this philosophy from the opening work to the last... Fauré’s Pavane began the concert. It had a perfect momentum in Niemeyer’s hands and there was a beautiful balance between the gentle pizzicato strings and the woodwinds in the opening. The phrasing was subtle and delicate, befitting of Fauré’s gently shaped phrases. Vibrato was kept light, just sufficiently to tint the sound in what was a simple, uncomplicated and highly effectively performance… Saint-Saëns’ famous “Organ” Symphony needs no introduction. In the Adagio to Part 1, Niemeyer ensured it was solemn and stately keeping the orchestral hues dark and sinister especially in the strings and brass. Each time the music modulated from minor to major in the quicker Allegro moderato, Niemeyer ensured the tonal range changed too, bringing brighter primary colours to contrast with more intense tenebrious episodes ... The Scherzo movement was vividly bright and the repeat of the Allegro moderato was more surefooted than its initial statement. The final section was brisk, but not rushed or hurried in any way. Niemeyer proved very skilled in using rubato to aid the excitement and expression in a conclusion that was majestically glorious, peaking just at the right moment.

    • Bachtrack
    • 30 April 2023

• Britten: The Rape of Lucretia

  Royal Opera House, London

  Nov 2022

  • Conductor Corinna Niemeyer coaxes some beautiful playing from Aurora Orchestra, drawing out some plangent colours in Britten’s tightly wound, intensely dramatic score, particularly from the woodwind.

    • The Observer
    • 19 November 2022

  • Musical standards are equally high. Corinna Niemeyer gets the pacing just right with a thrusting account of Britten’s virtuosic score that takes few prisoners.

    • Musical America
    • 17 November 2022

  • Corinna Niemeyer, meanwhile, conducts with detailed subtlety and beautifully understated intensity.

    • The Guardian
    • 16 November 2022

  • Corinna Niemeyer led a propulsive reading of the score from the pit that drove the music forward without rushing the more delicate passages, particularly at the start of Act 2.

    • Bachtrack
    • 15 November 2022

  • Corinna Niemeyer conducted a tense performance with some scorching playing from the Aurora Orchestra.

    • Financial Times
    • 15 November 2022

  • Conductor Corinna Niemeyer galvanises Britten's score with meticulous attention. She allows the thirteen-piece Aurora Orchestra to undulate smoothly before ramping up tension in line with the each emotional beat. Her timing and precision add a confrontational immediacy to the tragic on-stage action. She charges the cast, a selection of Britten Pears Young Artists and Jette Parker Artists, like a jolt of electricity.

    • Broadway World
    • 14 November 2022

• Stravinsky | Saint-Saens

  Danish National Symphony Orchestra

  May 2022

  • Niemeyer dirigerede det imposante værk med synlig fornøjelse, energi og omhu. Niemeyer conducted the imposing work with obvious pleasure, energy and care. Torsdagskoncerten var raffineret tænkt og herligt ambitiøs. Thursday's concert was refined thoughtful and wonderfully ambitious.

    • Politiken.dk
    • 06 May 2022

• Ravel: L'Enfant et les Sortilèges

  Lille Opera

  Feb 2022

  • We must associate with this success the ensemble Les Siècles, with its period instrument – the Typical French winds, including bassoons and double basses so tasty, the hushed and quick-silver strings, the velvety horns – led with elegance refinement and dramatism by Corinna Niemeyer, undoubtedly at the dawn of a beautiful international career. With the conductor, we find here a fluidity of the contours, a natural sense of the sentence in its conduct, an evocative power, a sound poetry of all moments, so typically Ravelian. But Corinna Niemeyer does not hesitate, with good reason, to pull the score towards the pastiche (the jazzy swing of the teapot-cup duo) or the parody of fashionable contemporaries (the clock scene thus recalling the aesthetics of the ephemeral group of the Six) implied by an unpredictable Ravel pince-sans-rire and a bit mocking.

    • Les Clefs ResMusica
    • 23 February 2022

• Rossini: Le Comte Ory

  Opéra-Théâtre de Metz

  Oct 2021

  • The Choir of the Eurometropolis of Metz, particularly at ease in this lively and playful score, contributes to the atmosphere of general jubilation. Conducted with precision and rigor by the conductor Corinna Niemeyer, the National Orchestra of Metz, divided between the pit and the first rows of the parterre, plays with its usual professionalism.

    • ResMusica
    • 03 October 2021

  • Corinna Niemeyer offers a reading of the work perfectly in line with the Rossinian aesthetic: light but dynamic, fun and poetic.

    • Bachtrack
    • 03 October 2021

  • The musicians, led by the firmness and flexibility of Corinna Niemeyer, unfold the variety of this stunning score of virtuosity, finely managing the Rossinian crescendi (in tempi and dynamic).

    • Olyrix
    • 03 October 2021

  • Corinna Niemeyer has managed to appropriate the quintessence of the Rossinian style; she manages to whip the Orchestre national de Metz and infuse it with the part of madness that the execution of such a perilous score requires. The work pays off and this is understood: in the pit, all the desks are of a metronomic precision, starting with the brass and the winds so characteristic of Rossini's writing (the scene of the storm in Act II), and on the set the distribution is in unison with the energy that circulates between the musicians...

    • Premiere Loge
    • 03 October 2021

• Monteverdi: L'incoronazione di Poppea

  Theater St. Gallen

  May 2019 - Jun 2019

  • Corinna Niemeyer and the St. Gallen Symphony Orchestra bring this neo-baroque music fresh and straightforward with quite late-romantic and expressionist insinuations. Close contact with the stage contributes much to the overall impression of a concentrated compactness of this operatic rarity. The good two hours of Krenek's pleasantly cut-to-the-point stuff about love and betrayal at the court of Nero are among the most entertaining and exciting things one has recently experienced in St. Gallen.

    • Tagblatt
    • 12 May 2019

  • The St. Gallen Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Corinna Niemeyer transports this instrumental colour palette in the most wonderful way, showing the motivic ramifications with the required transparency. The orchestral sound is never too thick or too intrusive, even in the two preludes and the intermezzo there is a clever dynamic subtlety that directs the ear to attentive listening.

    • Oper Aktuell
    • 12 May 2019

  • In the committed, sensitive interpretation of Corinna Niemeyer and the St. Gallen Symphony Orchestra, the transparent orchestral movement reveals astonishing, imaginative details of the score... Already because of the pleasing vocal and musical performance, it is worth visiting the production, which is extremely interesting as an alternative to historically informed performances... The transparent orchestral movement in the dedicated, sensitive interpretation of Corinna Niemeyer and the Sinfonieorchester St. Gallen hears amazing, imaginative details of the score... For the gratifying vocal and musical performance, it is worth visiting the production as an alternative to historically informed performances extremely interesting.

    • Deutschlandfunk
    • 13 May 2019