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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.
Jeremy Denk mentions my book in this week’s New Yorker
A kind reader in the US (thank you Diana) has alerted me to the fact that my book Women and the Piano is one of Jeremy Denk's choices in this week's New Yorker magazine. New York pianist and writer Jeremy Denk was asked to recommend a few books that deal with the...
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‘Search for a way to make it natural’
The other day I was listening to a pianist playing the fearsome second movement of the César Franch Sonata for violin and piano. The piano part is highly virtuosic and, apart from anything else, a very good proof of the fact that these big piano parts are not...
Music and longevity
I go to quite a lot of concerts given by amateur musicians - partly because there's a big amateur music scene in the city where I live, and partly because I often have friends and neighbours playing in the concerts. Of course my particular interest is piano. It dawned...
Traditions of music-making can’t be allowed to fade away
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...
A minute’s silence at the start of a concert
I went to a couple of concerts at the Lammermuir Festival - by the excellent Quatuor Mosaiques - over the days since the Queen's death. Each concert started with a minute's silence in honour of The Queen. At the end of the minute, the players arrived quietly on stage...
Picking blackberries
Several times recently I have been out blackberry picking on the hills around Edinburgh. I've gone at different times of day, mostly at weekends. Each time I've met other people picking blackberries too. We've swapped ideas about what to do with them. Blackberry...
Lili Boulanger’s Cantata ‘Faust et Hélène’
At the Edinburgh Festival this week we went to the Usher Hall to hear the French orchestra Les Siècles performing Stravinsky's Rite of Spring on instruments of the period. (The difference in those instruments was not immediately apparent, though there was a soft grain...
Sempé, au revoir
It was sad to read that the French cartoonist Jean-Jacques Sempé has died at the age of 89. I first came across his drawings when my French class at school studied Le Petit Nicolas, the delightful adventures of a little French boy in an idealised 1950s world. It was...
Reading Thurber while recovering from Covid
After managing to avoid Covid for two and a half years, I have now come down with it. It hasn't been fun - suffice it to say I'm very glad I didn't get the virus until I was fully vaccinated. While staying out of everyone's way, I have had the chance to read. My...
Limelight review of ‘The Piano’
Limelight, Australia's leading arts magazine, has reviewed my book The Piano - a History in 100 Pieces. The book came out a year ago, so I was surprised to learn about a new review. You can only read the whole review online if you're a subscriber, but here's an...
An old Scottish lullaby
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...
Mozart’s A major piano concerto K488 in chamber format
Last week I was in Cerne Abbas, Dorset, for the Gaudier Ensemble's annual festival of chamber music in the village church. I think I have played in 27 of the festivals. Of course, the pandemic blew a two-year hole in proceedings and this was my first visit since 2019....
A visit to Peter Brook in 1982
Hearing of the death of renowned theatre director Peter Brook, I went back to my book Beyond the Notes in which I described going to Paris in 1982 to ask his advice about how to keep our chamber music group Domus alive and in good heart despite the many difficulties...
The diary of Liszt’s pupil Lina Schmalhausen
I have just been reading an astonishing little book which a friend lent me - The Death of Franz Liszt, based on the unpublished diary of his pupil Lina Schmalhausen (Cornell University Press, 2002). The distinguished Liszt biographer Alan Walker came across Lina's...
My books pop up in recent commentary
Readers of my books might like to see a couple of mentions which have popped up recently in the US. The first is in the New York publication The Browser, whose mission is to send its subscribers a daily selection of good writing from around the world. Editor Robert...