Grant Llewellyn Reviews
November 4, 2013, Symphony Hall Boston. Beethoven Symphony Number 2 with Handel and Haydn Society, Boston.
“Llewellyn led the H&H period-instrument orchestra with steady tempos and a clear idea of the music’s architecture. The musicians responded with crisp playing from the start of the opening Adagio, trading phrases between solo winds with ease. The conductor’s deliberate approach to the tempos in the ensuing Allegro and third-movement Scherzo allowed plenty of room for the musicians to put across the energetic and sometimes tempestuous music with flair. Winds and strings coalesced for a warm blend in the sensuous Larghetto. Llewellyn opened the throttle for the manic finale, which the orchestra played with supple flow.”
Aaron Keebaugh in Boston Classical Review
October 30th 2014 BBCNOW in a series of concerts called “My Friend Dylan Thomas.”
“Conductor Grant Llewellyn sustained the long span of the work from the opening Maestoso, where a slow lamenting tread periodically breaks into anguished outbursts, through the exuberant and capricious scherzo to the final return to the inescapable fact of death…”
“Yet Thomas’s words were realised with even greater immediacy in Mark-Anthony Turnage’s song cycle “When I Woke,” where the exceptional Roderick Williams brought insight and richness of tone to every line. His gentle incantation of the final Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed was particularly beautiful, and Llewellyn handled the melancholic instrumental colours with great care.”
Rian Evans The Guardian
March 19th 2009: American Spectrum with Branford Marsalis
"The North Carolina Symphony plays with great spirit and dash under Grant Llewellyn"
David Hurwitz in Classics Today
Hall November 30th, 2025: Verdi's Macbeth at Cadogan Hall Chelsea Opera Group’s 75th anniversary
"Utterly astonishing and hugely inspirational"
" ...conductor Grant Llewellyn held together his vast forces and presented a true account of Verdi’s score. Artistic integrity, emotions and brilliance were all provided. One would have not known that, owing to an accident (stroke) some five years ago, Maestro Llewellyn was conducting as well as turning the pages in his score only with his left arm…
Utterly astonishing and hugely inspirational; I was privileged to be in the audience"
Agnes Kory- Seen and Heard International
Reviews from Grant’s first ten years at North Carolina Symphony Orchestra
Raleigh News and Observer Reviews
“Grant Llewellyn was hired to take the N.C. Symphony to another level….But his greatest successes so far pale in comparison to his utter triumph…conducting Mahler’s Symphony No. 5.”
Memorial Hall, Chapel Hill – May 3, 2007:
“[The] concert was one of those nights you dream about, with performances that grab you up, shake you around, and leave you in a daze afterwards. Music director Grant Llewellyn and the orchestra were white-hot, aided by a world-class soloist, in an evening unquestionably demonstrating the cathartic power of music.”
Meymandi Concert Hall – February 19, 2010 (Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 1 and Brahms Symphony No. 4)
“…Llewellyn demonstrated his deep connection throughout… supplying an electricity to the rhythms and dynamics that kept the work moving but never rushed it. He had confident control of every wafting, ethereal phrase and every sudden, dramatic outburst.”
Meymandi Concert Hall – September 8, 2011 (Mozart Requiem):
From Classical Voice North Carolina (online review site):
Meymandi Concert Hall, Raleigh – April 8, 2011: “Llewellyn has crafted a string section that can whisper with the best, bringing a fine sense of delicacy without any thinness….” – Steve Row
Memorial Hall, Chapel Hill – February 7, 2013: “The North Carolina Symphony with Llewellyn at the helm is the equal of any orchestra I know in interpreting the music of Sibelius. This performance was rhapsodic, intense and superbly guided….” – Ken Hoover