There's not much happening in London right now except the white stuff, but the city springs into musical life later in the month. The final week of January in particular offers a pile up of competing attractions.
The first event in my January calendar is Elektra, in concert at the Barbican on 12 and 14 January. Valery Gergiev and the LSO are joined by a fabulous cast - Jeanne-Michèle Charbonnet, Angela Denoke, Felicity Palmer, Matthias Goerne and Ian Storey.
Music and movies are on the menu for the Barbican's 16 January Hans Werner Henze day, followed on 17 January by the UK premiere of Phaedra.
At the Royal Festival Hall, the Anna Netrebko and Dmitri Hvorostovsky recital on 18 January is sold out, but there may be returns on the date.
The Rake's Progress opens on 22 January at the Royal Opera House, the second run for Robert Lepage's disappointingly half-baked production. The casting is superb though - after a few dropouts the final line-up centres around Toby Spence, Rosemary Joshua, Kyle Ketelsen and Patricia Bardon, with Ingo Metzmacher conducting.
The second Covent Garden opening of the month is Jonathan Miller's Cosi Fan Tutte, conducted by Julia Jones. Yes, a lady in the pit. Sally Matthews's Fiordiligi looks like the pick of the casting.
29 January sees the first of Daniel Barenboim's Beethoven piano concerto series at the Royal Festival Hall, with the rest following over the week. Sold out, of course, but all concerts will be relayed live (and free) to the Ballroom's big screen, and recorded for later broadcast on Radio 3.
Wigmore Hall offers Simon Keenlyside on his own on 22 and 25 and with Angelika Kirchschlager on 31 January for the Wigmore's annual celebration of Schubert's birthday. Joyce DiDonato appears on 26 and 28, and the Early Opera Company tackle Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno on 29 January with a cast including Lucy Crowe, Anna Stephany and Hilary Summers.
I missed the Birmingham premiere of Luke Bedford's Good Dream She Has thanks to Virgin Rail's incompetence, so I'm looking forward to hearing it in BCMG's interesting 24 January Wigmore Hall programme.
The mini-St Paul's acoustic of King's Place makes it one of my least favourite venues for vocal music, but their Vienna to Weimar Festival in the last week of January is worth checking out. The pick is a song recital on 27 January from Christian Immler and Helmut Deutsch, featuring rarely-performed works by Eisler, Gàl, Goldschmidt, Korngold, Krenek, Schreker and Zemlinsky.
And the final last week scheduling conflict comes from the Roundhouse. Their cross-platform Reverb minifest includes Joanna McGregor, the Britten Sinfonia and the OAE sharing their performing space with the less classically-inclined. A piano day on 31 January includes recitals from the Labeque sisters and Rolf Hinds. Finally - approach with caution - Charles Hazlewood rethinks the Beggar's Opera on 25 January "from songs recreated exactly as they would have sounded to groove-laden walls of psychedelia."
