No post yesterday; we were busy attending a concert, with dinner afterwards.
Yesterday we attended Oscar, a ballet at Zellerbach Hall on the UC Berkeley campus, staged by The Australian Ballet, on tour, with the local Berkeley Symphony playing the score, with conductor Jonathan Lo. Choreography by Christopher Weldon; score by Joby Talbot, whom I’d never heard of before.
Here’s the page on the Cal Performances site, though it will likely disappear soon:
Sep 25–27, 2026
The Australian Ballet
Oscar© by Christopher Wheeldon
North American Premiere
It’s about Oscar Wilde, and is told in a semi-chronological, non-narrative fashion. Much of it depicts memories and fantasies of Wilde as he lies in prison, after conviction for indecency (i.e. homosexuality, which was illegal then). There are allusions to his works, especially The Picture of Dorian Gray.
I was most curious about the composer, whom I’d never heard of. Joby Talbot. He’s a British composer, of stage works and film scores (he did The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy back in 2005), and apparently quite prolific. It’s difficult to generalize about his style after hearing this one score just once, but the word I’ve settled on for this music is “colorful.” Eclectic. Bright and busy, with Philip Glass arpeggios there, John Williams bombast there, ominous horror movie thump-thumps there, harp and soprano glissandos there.
There are lots of Talbot samples on YouTube, and a few about this ballet, Oscar.
Here’s 10 minutes of the composer talking with the conductor, Jonathan Lo.
Here are some samples of the music, in rehearsal.
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I had made a reservation for dinner after the concert, but at intermission I saw an email from the restaurant saying they had cancelled my reservation. The restaurant was, in fact, Zino, the restaurant in the hotel where Locus staged their Locus Awards ceremony about four months ago. I phoned them; they said the restaurant was not opening that evening. No explanation. I’ve never experienced this before.
