At the Edinburgh Festival this week we went to the Usher Hall to hear the French orchestra Les Siècles performing Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring on instruments of the period. (The difference in those instruments was not immediately apparent, though there was a soft grain to the famous bassoon solo which opens the piece, and other […]

Hearing of the death of renowned theatre director Peter Brook, I went back to my book Beyond the Notes in which I described going to Paris in 1982 to ask his advice about how to keep our chamber music group Domus alive and in good heart despite the many difficulties we were grappling with. His […]

I have been following – online – the Van Cliburn piano competition which takes place every four years in Fort Worth, Texas. As well as being one of the world’s most prestigious it must be the most generous, with an array of prizes and offers of management, concert bookings, recording opportunities, media training, financial training, […]

Very sad news today that the great pianist Radu Lupu has died. He was probably the first ‘favourite pianist’ I chose for myself rather than taking my teachers’ choices on trust. I tweeted something about having once had a couple of lessons with Radu Lupu when he was living in London. In response, American pianist […]

A fortnight ago I performed Mozart’s wonderful Piano Concerto in B flat K595 with the Meadows Chamber Orchestra, a long-standing amateur orchestra which has become an institution in Edinburgh’s musical life. The orchestra celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. The concert was brilliantly conducted by Gordon Bragg and took place in Stockbridge Church, Edinburgh (see […]