I’ve just been in Venice for a few days. The city was on the cusp of autumn – warm and sunny but with thunderstorms looming, and mist in the morning on the day we left. We visited about 547 churches. As ever in Italy, I’m disappointed by how rarely one hears any music being made [...]

In November, my trio is giving the premiere of a new work which has been written for us – is being written for us, I should say – by Huw Watkins. Earlier in the summer I pestered Huw to let me have what he’d written so far, and though the parts aren’t fully finished yet, he [...]

There’s been a lot in the press this summer about middle-aged women and the way they’re unceremoniously dropped from positions such as BBC newsreader or presenter. Newsreader Selina Scott brought the topic to everyone’s attention with her age discrimination claim against Channel Five, and lots of middle-aged women added their own experiences of being expected [...]

I was in the audience this week at a concert of ‘early music’. At one point, a harpsichordist played a piece. Between two of its variations he pulled out a harpsichord stop which produced a different tone colour, and then he played a fast variation. When it was over, a woman leaned over to me, [...]

I recently made up a couple of cadenzas for a Haydn piano concerto. I kind of improvised them at the piano, and played them in the concert without ever writing them out. Afterwards, I thought I’d try and note them down before I forgot them entirely. Cadenzas are supposed to be, or at least sound, [...]