BBC Music Magazine

Write to: The editor, BBC Music Magazine, Eagle House, Bristol, BS1 4ST Email: music@classical-music.com Social media: contact us on Facebook and Twitter LETTER of the MONTH In response to your 15 Unusual Ensemble Names feature (January), my all-time

Venezuelan conductor set to make the switch from Los Angeles in 2026/27 season Gustavo Dudamel has been named as the next music director of the New York Philharmonic, a move the Venezuelan conductor describes as ‘a dream come true’. He will be taking

The King’s Singers have expressed their sadness at having a concert in Florida called off at the last minute on the grounds of sexuality. Pensacola Christian College, which was due to host the group, said in a statement that it cancelled the event ‘u

‘Hringing voice – one of the loveliest I ever heard – was as ‘His fresh as a young man’s… His effortless high notes, sturdy rhythms and clear unmistakable intervals were a sheer delight to hear.’ Writing these words, Percy Grainger was referring not

2nd: A service is conducted by Swiss and Italian bishops to bless the spot at which workers on the two sides of the Simplon railway tunnel have recently met in the middle. Running for 12 miles under the Swiss Alps, the tunnel will be used for the fir

I treat playing and composing as different disciplines. I like to think, however, that one fuels the other. We’ve got away from that idea of the performer being a composer, although we have a vast amount of repertoire from composers who were just tha

Organist Anna Lapwood is something of a TikTok sensation since becoming an associate artist at the Royal Albert Hall. Her late-night exploits at the RAH’s organ console have won her many new fans and, now, a recording contract with Sony Classical. La

This month: JOHN NELSON Conductor Berlioz Les Troyens Joyce DiDonato et al; Strasbourg Philharmonic/John Nelson Erato 9029576220 (2017) Often when I am conducting a great piece of music with a fine ensemble I feel it is my finest moment. But in 2017

Shostakovich was probably the last great symphonist. No later composer will equal his number of masterpiece symphonies. He was also able to absorb the melodies, tunes and characteristics of folk musics from different nationalities. He had no Jewish h

For all their association with military matters, marches were often adopted for an entirely different purpose by composers of the last two centuries, says Tom Service What’s happened to marches? Military, funeral, wedding, or revolutionary: composers

Nupen was a true pioneer in the field of classical music documentary, taking advantage of the improved (quieter) camera technology of the 1960s and his own ability to put musicians at ease in front of the lens. Born in Johannesburg, Nupen studied law

One of my lockdown projects was to learn the Renaissance harp. I’d been so inspired by Andrew Lawrence-King, who has been on a number of Alamire’s records, that I wanted to learn it myself. My favourite piece to play is ‘My Lady Carey’s Dompe’, writt

Braving a trip to the Barbican on a cold February evening was well worth the effort, not only to hear Bacewicz’s Fourth Symphony, passionately performed by the BBC Symphony under Sakari Oramo, but also for the chance to see two of the best young stri

In the spring of 2016, in a Shoreditch restaurant, violinist Rakhi Singh and cellist Adam Szabo dreamt up Manchester Collective. ‘It was one of those astonishing right place, right time things,’ says Szabo, now the ensemble’s artistic director and ch

New Year’s Day 2016. On BBC Four up pops a new Tom Service documentary on the life and works of Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninov, featuring a multiplicity of resonant locations in and outside Russia. Slowly a veil is lifted. I’m totting up so many favo

The Russian-born pianist tells Michael Church about stretching the bounds of a phenomenal natural talent that happily embraces everything from classical music to jazz When a revolutionary new piano design, the Maene-Viñoly Concert Grand, needed to be

‘In the darkest days of the pandemic, as I was sitting at home, it occurred to me that 2023 would be a significant year – the 150th anniversary of Rachmaninov’s birth. Would I live to see another anniversary of such importance? Perhaps if I lived to

The pencil-drawn diagrams are meticulous, noting the contents and whereabouts of their author’s discoveries. A map depicts a bird’s eye view of one room, showing a pile of wheels; another shows a series of steps. The documents – recently displayed at

‘It consists of many parts created by many different components. Everything has a purpose and role, and the result is amazing.’ This is composer Antonín Dvořák discussing not an orchestra nor a symphony, but something equally dear to his heart: the s

As the camera pans from orchestra to audience in the final scene of Tár, we learn just how far the mighty conductor has fallen. We first met her many indiscretions earlier, as she was preparing to record a complete cycle of Mahler symphonies with the

The Swiss Alps are home to some of the most dramatic scenery in the world – and taking the three-hour train journey from Geneva to Saanenland does not disappoint. Lakes of the deepest blue; dense forests and lush, green farmland; waterfalls and majes

Building a Library is broadcast on Radio 3 at 9.30am each Saturday as part of Record Review. A highlights podcast is available on BBC Sounds. World War I had been raging for less than a year when Rachmaninov’s All-Night Vigil was premiered on 23 Marc

LIFE: Steve Reich is born on 3 October in New York. When his parents separate, his life is divided between New York and California, necessitating long train journeys between the two. TIMES: In the US presidential election, Franklin D Roosevelt enjoys

Composer of the Week is broadcast on Radio 3 at 12pm, Monday to Friday. Programmes in April are: 3-7 April Hildegard von Bingen and Isabella Leonarda 10-14 April Sullivan 17-21 April Poulenc 24-28 April Joseph Haydn Away from the kettled crowd, a gro

For more choral Rachmaninov, try his earlier Liturgy of St John Chrysostom. Although he eventually dismissed it as unworthy of the Russian Orthodox services of his childhood, it is a fine work whose main sin is to sound obviously a work of the late-1

What do you feel now, looking back at this project? It has been an incredible journey. At the very beginning I didn’t really have a clue how deeply we were going to get into this whole idea of transforming Bach. The more we enriched ourselves in this

José Iturbi was once the toast of Hollywood and enjoyed a glittering career as a concert pianist, recording artist and conductor when he moved stateside from Spain in the late 1920s. From Hollywood to the World (Sony Classical 19439836502) is a lavis

THIS MONTH: TRUE WIRELESS EARBUDS JBL Tour Pro 2 £250 Of its countless features, it’s the mini LED touchscreen on the charging case that will grab the headlines. This 1.4" screen lets you skip tracks, adjust volume and tweak the excellent active nois

Stephen Hough Faber 253pp (hb) £18.99 When Stephen Hough was at school, creative writing was his favourite subject. ‘I loved the way I could express my inner life fearlessly; the smoulder of hidden homosexuality … a desire to shock, and the irresisti

‘I like to fancy that on my deathbed my last vision in this life will be the scene from my window…of the still brooding dove grey mystery of the Atlantic at twilight.’ Arnold Bax in 1943, thinking of the village in West Donegal that had become his sp

Merton College, Oxford, 31 March – 2 April Web: ticketsoxford.com Merton’s weekend of solo, chamber and choral performances kicks off at Friday lunchtime with violinist Bojan Čičić and organist François Cloete in Biber’s New Testament-inspired Rosary

Violin Concerto in A minor, Op. 53; Piano Trio No.3 in F minor, Op.65 Isabelle Faust (violin), Jean-Guihen Queyras (cello), Alexander Melnikov (piano); Prague Philharmonia/Jiří Bĕlohlávek Harmonia Mundi HMM 931833 (2004) Over the years, Dvořák’s Viol

As part of your concert in Eastbourne, you are paying tribute to John Woolrich. Is he a composer the group knows well? George Strivens (horn player): We first met John when we were all doing a fellowship year at the Royal Academy of Music and were pl

Music for Royal Occasions Works by Byrd, Handel, Elgar, Parry, Walton et al The BBC Singers and BBC Concert Orchestra under Barry Wordsworth PLUS! Transgender opera singer Lucia Lucas speaks to George Hall; 1953 coronation choristers reminisce with A

Having made his broadcast debut on Fox Movietone News at the age of five, the Australian pianist, musicologist and composer has been breaking records ever since. Known as a master of the music of Liszt, he’s the only pianist to have recorded all of t