In our student days, those of us studying music (and in fact anyone who wanted to continue their piano studies) were allowed to hire upright pianos and put them in our rooms. Not infrequently there were two or more people on the staircase with pianos in their rooms -...
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I often tweet about music and related matters. Usually the response is small - I'm thrilled if my tweets reach a couple of hundred people. So my experience yesterday was exceptional. I was watching The Queen's funeral which, as you'll know, had a variety of music in...
There's news today of an important new women's health strategy in England. 'Ministers have vowed to tackle decades of “systemic” and “entrenched” gender health inequality in England with plans to introduce compulsory women’s health training for doctors, more cancer...
'If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?' It's funny how the first flowers of the year - crocuses, daffodils, aconites -seem especially vivid in colour. Are they really brighter than other flowers, or do they just strike us that way because our eyes have gradually...
If you would like to read the excerpts from 'Out of Silence' in today's Guardian, click here.
The Guardian is publishing excerpts from Out of Silence in the Review section on Saturday 20 March. I’ll post the link on Saturday when I know it. In the meantime, many thanks to everyone who silently toasted my book from several different countries and three...
Thursday's the day when Out of Silence is officially published. As I haven't managed to organise a book launch party, how about a virtual book launch that day? At 18:00 hours (UK time) on Thursday 18 March, I’m going to raise a glass to toast my readers, wherever they...
My new book, Out of Silence, comes out on March 18. I haven't even seen a copy yet, though I'm hoping to see one early next week. In the meantime, the publisher, Boydell Press, has posted another excerpt from the book on its website. You can read the new excerpt by...
Coming back from a concert in Holland I thought, not for the first time, how strange it is that there’s only one little spot on the earth that is ‘my house’, and to which I have to make my way back from wherever I’ve been. In this case, first with a taxi ride, then a...
I was recently sent the score of Mendelssohn’s D minor piano trio, in a forthcoming edition of his first draft of the piece. I’d read about this first draft, but had never had the chance to see it until the editor of the new Leipzig edition, Dr Salome Reiser, kindly...
My second frustrating expedition this week. We decided to give ourselves the morning off and see the Van Gogh Exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts. Even on a weekday morning it was packed. Standing on tiptoe, we had managed to see about a dozen early sketches over...
A disappointing evening. We had been invited to a lovely 'housewarming concert' on the other side of the city (I took this photo of the full moon as we set off in cheerful mood). After waiting for ages at our local tube station, we were told that because of a signal...
At this time of year in Richmond Park, I shudder when I see official notices warning visitors about the deer cull. The park is closed at certain times while its resident population of deer is ‘reduced’. It’s always a treat to see the park's different herds of deer,...
Someone asked me today whether my new book, Out of Silence, is a collection of my blog posts. It isn’t; the book was written a year before I had the idea of starting a website or a blog. I suppose the experience of writing ‘a pianist’s yearbook’ may have given me an...
I’m practising Schumann’s wonderful set of piano pieces, Davidsbündlertänze, for a concert later this year. As usual, progress is unpredictable. Sometimes things move on, sometimes not. Feeling short of inspiration one day this week, I sat down to listen to a historic...