Yesterday I gave some coaching to the Minerva Piano Trio, who had brought the first version of Brahms’s B major Trio opus 8. He composed it around 1853-54, at the time when he first got to know the Schumanns, Clara and Robert. It’s well known that he became very close to the Schumann family, and […]

This week also sees my mini-residency at King’s College, Cambridge. On Friday 22 Feb I’m giving a pre-concert talk at 7pm and a solo recital at 9pm – music by Haydn, Schumann and Billy Mayerl. On the morning of Saturday 23 Feb I’m giving a three-hour masterclass for music students of the college – piano […]

I have had a delightful time working with the young musicians who took part in my London masterclasses over the last two days. Thank you, Trio Fournier, Gagliano Ensemble, Trio Minori, Veronika Kopjova and Vashti Hunter! Chamber music is in safe hands if the hands are such as yours. We were lucky to be able […]

It’s time once more for my own London masterclasses. This Thursday and Friday, Feb 14 and 15, I’ll be teaching four young professional chamber groups (see my Concerts and Events page for details). We’ll be working on Beethoven (a piano trio and a cello/piano sonata), a Brahms trio, a Mozart piano quartet, and some Shostakovich. […]

Melvyn Bragg’s excellent Radio 4 Series on ‘culture’ has been a thought-provoking companion every morning this week. Various guests on the programme, talking about ‘high art’, have commented that older forms of music have been overtaken and overshadowed by the vast popularity of pop. While some speakers have advised that the treasury of classical music […]