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I’ve been writing this blog since 2009, but there still seem to be plenty of interesting topics to mull over. You can subscribe (it’s free) to follow the blog by email – each new post will pop into your inbox.
Keyboards for smaller hands
Last night I appeared at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, discussing my latest book with broadcaster Kate Molleson (see picture of me turning away from the piano after playing one of the pieces we were talking about). Conversation turned to the idea of...
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Elite athletes and what we musicians can learn from watching them
I'm enjoying the lull between major sports events - the Euros Football Tournament and the Wimbledon Tennis Championships just passed, and the Olympics which start in Paris at the end of the coming week. I got quite engrossed in both the tennis and the football,...
Bushes and briars
The critics of Gramophone magazine have been choosing their favourite discs of the year for the December issue, and Peter Quantrill has chosen the Florestan Trio's latest disc, of Haydn Trios (volume 2), as his personal favourite of 2009. He writes: 'I can't remember...
Territorial display
We were rehearsing this week in the home of a friend who keeps a pet canary in a cage in the kitchen. The canary was silent as we arrived and sat round the table, chatting and drinking coffee. But as soon as we went next door, picked up our instruments and started to...
Beethoven’s questions
For the past few days the trio has been rehearsing intensively. Over the next ten days we have two concerts at the Bath Mozartfest, a fundraising concert and dinner for the Florestan Trust, a concert at the University of Cambridge, a concert in the Wigmore Hall (with...
A joyful ‘Annie’
What a joy it is to see something being performed with superb commitment as well as style, talent and humour. That’s how we felt about Jane Horrocks and Julian Ovenden, the two stars of ‘Annie Get Your Gun’ at the Young Vic. I was slightly apprehensive about it...
Cambridge Companion to Recorded Music
My copy of the newly-published Cambridge Companion to Recorded Music arrived today along with about 35 other items of post suddenly released from the backlog of the current postal strike. My contribution to the book is just a short article on 'Learning to Live with...
Coughing in concerts
The other night, at the theatre, I was amazed by how freely people in the audience were coughing. At one point, the coughs became so frequent that it was like hearing bull-frogs calling to one another at night from different parts of the swamp. I actually started to...
Huw Watkins premiere
At last the printed score has arrived for the trio by Huw Watkins. We’re giving the world premiere in the Wigmore Hall on November 25. When the newly published score arrived, I already knew the notes of the piano part, because I’ve been working from an electronic PDF...
Step in Time
The choice of music on this series of Strictly Come Dancing is a great disappointment. What an opportunity they have to range over the world’s fantastic dance music, and what a shame they don’t take it! I find it particularly annoying when the on-stage band is so...
‘The Sacred Made Real’
An intriguing hour at ‘The Sacred Made Real’, a National Gallery exhibition of Spanish religious art from 1600-1700. Although it had some wonderful paintings, its main focus was a series of statues – of Christ, of Mary, and of various saints - carved from wood and...
No Connection
Richmond Park this morning offered many examples of a discouraging sight which is fast becoming familiar in the parks round here: of dog-walkers absorbed in conversations on their mobile phones, while their dogs trail meekly behind them. Are we really still a nation...
Sensitivity
I’ve just realised that this is my hundredth blog post on this website. I am a centenarian! To celebrate, here’s a sweet story I heard from Mark Morris when I attended his question-and-answer session the other night at Sadler’s Wells. He was complaining about someone...
Transport from tee to green
Yesterday I was astounded to hear a golfer talking on the radio about the current trend whereby competitors in golf championships are ferried from tee to green in little buggies. When asked whether it was really so hard to walk that short distance, the golfer replied...