Updates from the world's leading classical music label
This week we take a look at four works that were all premiered on 20 November, the same date as the posting of this blog, respectively in 1889, 1911, 1945 and 1964. Usually an occasion of great positivity, the first performances of these particular compositions all carried some heavy baggage. I refer to Mahler’s First Read More …
Here are the openings of 20 well-known works, or of movements within those works. Can you name the composer and the title of the work? Scroll down the page to check your answers. Question 1 Question 2 Question 3 Question 4 Question 5 Question 6 Question 7 Question Read More …
Mozart is reckoned to have posited that silence, paradoxically, is the most powerful element in music. And I once read that, while there’s one particular zone of your brain that is stimulated when an object starts to produce a sound, it’s a different part that reacts when a clock, for example, ceases its tick-tock and Read More …
Alma Margaretha Maria Schindler was born on the date of this post, 31 August, in the year 1879. On her death in 1964, aged 85, she had become Alma Maria Mahler Gropius Werfel. Alternatively, Alma Mahler-Werfel. She might be summed up as a Vienna-born composer and socialite who vacuumed up men’s attentions and several wedding Read More …
The 2015 BBC Promenade Concerts, the world’s largest music festival based at London’s Royal Albert Hall, kick off this week and run for the next two months. The first four weeks of performances sport a wealth of exciting music, opening on July 17 with Walton’s big-boned Belshazzar’s Feast (8.555869) and closing with Messiaen’s Turangalîla Symphony Read More …
Most people know about the curse of the ninth, but if you don’t, here’s a quick explanation. Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Choral (8.550181) laid down a few benchmarks. Its influence was felt most recently, perhaps, during the dawn of the age of the compact disc. Consideration had to be given to how many minutes of music Read More …
“Setting the right tone” is a common enough phrase that’s readily understood and achieved in everyday life. But how does a composer set the right tone in a piece of music? Composition is an increasingly common activity in schools nowadays, so even the youngest students will be able to rattle off for you the tools Read More …
While there’s no magic formula for clinching success when two people tie the knot, the old adage of ‘opposites attract’ has proven a winner for many a couple, allowing them to mix and enrich contrasting personas. But, for many musicians, both partners being in the same game has also proved a winning recipe. There have Read More …
