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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.
MAP concert at St Mary’s Cathedral, Edinburgh
Welcome to my new website! If you’re a seasoned visitor, I hope you like the new look. Last night I went to a fundraising concert in aid of MAP, Medical Aid for Palestinians. It was arranged at short notice and held in St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh. As I bought...
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Heinrich Neuhaus and his ‘Art of Piano Playing’
At a book sale at the weekend I picked up a copy of Heinrich Neuhaus's book The Art of Piano Playing. Neuhaus, who devoted the main part of his career to teaching at the Moscow Conservatory, was the teacher of Sviatoslav Richter, Emil Gilels and Radu Lupu among...
Playing at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge
I've been in Cambridge, where I played a solo recital on Thursday at Kettle's Yard (see photo), a delightful art gallery/museum I used to love visiting when I was a student. The audience at Kettle's Yard has a particular character - perhaps it's partly my expectation,...
Rattling Cello
A friend has been telling me about a DVD of cellist Bernard Greenhouse giving masterclasses. Greenhouse spoke about the great Catalan cellist Pablo Casals, with whom he had studied. Casals was well-known for his love of smoking a pipe. Asked how much he smoked, he...
Our cat’s 14th birthday
This is our cat at her 14th birthday party. She has been having chemotherapy for 15 months now. She's responded to it extremely well, but all the same we felt that her 14th birthday was something to celebrate. Now that the cat is on steroids, she has changed the...
Calligraphy Blues
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...
The poetry of spam
Whenever I delete spam mails from this blog I'm intrigued by their prose style. Sent by shadowy advertisers, this special type of spam is targeted at blogs. I'm still fooled sometimes because they quote the title of one of my own blog posts, and appear to be a...
Flying the Flag
Last night's Prom offered the invigorating spectacle of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra playing beautifully under their fine young conductor Ilan Volkov. One of the good effects of globalisation has been on the standards of orchestral playing. Because of the...
‘The Dark Side of Piano Competitions’
An American friend has sent me an article from last Friday's New York Times about piano competitions. Michael Johnson, who has served on prestigious competition juries, laments the corruption that allegedly prevails. Perhaps there are competitions whose juries engage...
A book review in today’s Guardian
In the Review section of today's Guardian, I've written a review of Daniel Levitin's book, 'The World in Six Songs'. If you'd like to read the review, here's the link.
Feeling free to be themselves
I've been thinking about Charles Hazlewood's article in Monday's Guardian. He wrote about some open-air orchestral concerts he's going to conduct in a field in Somerset, explaining that he wants to bring great music out of the intimidating concert hall and into a fun...
That’s entertainment
Last night, I stupidly didn't watch the first part of the MGM Film Musicals Prom on television, and only turned on for the second half. I'm so used to concerts of this kind being slightly embarrassing; orchestras often sound uncomfortable with the idiom, and there's...
The Hallé at the Proms
Last night we went to hear Mendelssohn's 2nd Symphony at the Proms, played by the excellent Hallé Orchestra under their conductor Sir Mark Elder. A few weeks ago, Bob reviewed all the available recordings of Mendelssohn's 2nd Symphony for Radio 3's CD Review 'Building...
Messiaen by candlelight
The final concerts of my season took place last week at the Cerne Abbas Music Festival in Dorset with the Gaudier Ensemble. During the festival we gave a late-night performance of Messiaen's ‘Quartet for the End of Time' in a candlelit church, with no other lights...
Clapping at the Proms
Controversy in the press about whether Proms audiences should be discouraged from clapping so much. What's under the spotlight is the Prommers' habit of clapping in between movements, and the growing sport of racing each other to be the first to applaud vociferously...