CLASSICAL ICONOCLAST

Brahms and Szymanowski? An unlikely combination  but sometimes odd contrasts enhance. What does Gergiev make of them? Gergiev and the LSO...

Pierre Boulez brought Schoenberg's Gurrelieder into the mainstream with his three performances at the BBC Proms. Thanks to his work at ...

Valéry Gergiev's cycle of the Brahms symphonies for the Edinburgh International Festival has started at the Usher Hall., writes Jul...

Andris Nelsons, the charismatic conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, has renewed his tenure on the basis of an annual ...

From Juliet Williams, on BBC Prom 43 and more: "As this anniversary year unfolds, Delius' contribution to music has been marked ...

Delightful Londoin Sinfonietta experience at BBC Prom 44. Ligeti, Xenakis, Berio, Jonarthan Harvey, Louis Andriessen and John Cage. Menta...

Susanna Mälkki and the Philharmonia together at the BBC Proms.  A match mde in heaven. The Philharmonia is - I'll stick my neck out -...

Arnold Schoenberg's Gurrelieder is conceived as cosmic panorama. King Waldemar curses God and is himself cursed, doomed to ride the ...

Hector Berlioz Requiem (Grande messe des morts) needs grand performance spaces, so hearing it at BBC Prom 39 at the Royal Albert Hall was...

Leoš Janáček The Makropulos Case at the Edinburgh International Festival. Juliet William's review in Opera Today;    "A myster...

Mark Elder's Elgar The Apostles (BBC Prom 37) is exceptional, and could be a contender for best Prom of the season. It outclasses Sak...

The Edinburgh International Festival trumps the BBC Proms with Frederick Delius A Mass of Life .  This year's Proms have been big on ...

My friend and regular reader has written about the first ever recording of Bizet's Carmen Habanera . It was made in 1891 by Julius Bl...

Today, 9th August, is the anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, three days after Hiroshima. The irony is that Nagasaki was the most wes...

Is this the oldest recording in the world? The original was made by inventor Emile Berliner,m who patented the first gramophone technolog...