Blog
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.
Read reviews of my new book
Last night I gave a talk about Women and the Piano at the gorgeous Toppings Bookshop in Edinburgh. (Photo of me signing books before the talk.) The room was full and there were some expert questions from the audience. It felt like being at a little book festival. I...
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‘An important book’, says BBC Music
The April 2024 issue of BBC Music magazine carries a short but sweet review of my book Women and the Piano. As the text is too indistinct to read in the photo, this is what it says: 'Revealed within the pages of this elegantly written book by pianist and author Susan...
My book on Radio 3’s ‘Music Matters’, 9th March
On Saturday 9th March, my new book will be featured on BBC Radio 3's Music Matters programme, which begins at 11.45am and runs until 12.30. There's more than one feature in the programme, and I haven't been told exactly when my segment begins. I've recorded an...
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...
Looking at Toscanini
I watched a fascinating TV drama-documentary about conductor Arturo Toscanini. During his lifetime he was famous for his expressive gestures when conducting. Orchestral musicians who played for him said that it was always perfectly clear what he wanted them to do. It...
No mud-wrestling rings
Listening to Desert Island Discs on radio this morning, I was startled to hear impresario Harvey Goldsmith discussing the ‘riders' - or additional contractual requests - demanded by some of his pop artists and their entourages to make their lives more pleasant on...
Enjoying the beat
I've started to prepare for the next festival I'm involved in, the annual chamber music festival of the Gaudier Ensemble. It takes place in the lovely old village of Cerne Abbas in Dorset in July. This year I have a few little piano solos and ten different chamber...
Getting up early for a flower
When I was a student, I had a friend whose mother was a keen gardener. She was a pianist too, so I felt she was a kindred spirit. In the holidays I sometimes went to stay with the family for a few days. One day my friend said to me, ‘You know, my mother actually got...
Writing in the recession
The Author, the newsletter of the Society of Authors, has just dropped on to the doormat. It's full of doom and gloom about the effects of the recession on writers, particularly freelance writers. Fewer reviews are being commissioned by newspapers. Rates of pay have...
Pill-popping for cats
Our cat is having treatment, and needs a pill every day or two. She's always hated us giving her pills, so we usually ask the vet to do it. But now that pill-giving has become so frequent, we have to do it ourselves - preferably without chasing the cat round the house...
Eye of the Beholder
It's now a week since the Florestan Festival ended, and lots of people have been kind enough to write and say what they thought of it. One thing is very interesting: there's enormous variety in what people enjoyed best. Some relished the things which were new for...
Listening to Art Tatum
Bob has been writing about Art Tatum, the great American jazz pianist of the 1930s and 40s. Bob managed to find some transcriptions of Tatum's piano solos in the library, and has been listening to Tatum's recordings of those very pieces, comparing the recording with...
My Billy Mayerl CD resurfaces
People sometimes ask where they can find my 1990 disc of piano music by Billy Mayerl, and I haven't been able to tell them. Since Virgin Classics was bought by EMI, and after parts of EMI were moved to Paris, it's become very hard to follow the fate of a record which...
Active Silence
We're just back from the Florestan Festival at Peasmarsh. What an extraordinary thing a festival is. A few hours before the first concert, the church is completely quiet, the country lanes are empty, and you can't imagine that anyone will really come. You finish the...
Cardiff Singer of the World
Despite this week's rehearsals for the Florestan Festival I've managed to watch several rounds of the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition on television (the Final is on Sunday). I've been following this bi-annual competition for many years and always find it...