Der Abschied

It was a salutary experience visiting the Hôtel des Bains on the Lido in Venice last week. The site of Gustav von Aschenbach’s demise, it is...

Soundworld

This morning at City Lit, one of the students in my Franz Schreker class asked about my use of the word 'soundworld'. Truth be told ...

Helping Complete the Symphonic Picture

I'm guilty of oversights. Beethoven, Brahms, Mahler... it's a symphony trajectory I repeat ad absurdum . Of course I include the fin...

Mengelberg's Mahler

The first part of my 'listening diary' which surveys the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra's Radio Legacy boxed set, celebrating its...

Symphonic Connections

I've often felt that Mahler's symphonies refer to their numbered Beethovenian counterpart.  Mahler's Fifth, for instance, nods t...

Engaging with Folk

We compartmentalise: Classical Music. Pop. Rock etc. And within these genres we further subdivide – Classical, Romantic, Modern – bisecting ...

Longing for Simplicity

Sitting on the banks of the Attersee, where Mahler composed many of his songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn , you could easily drift back to a ...

The Best of 2013... in Recorded Music

1. Mahler's Sixth Symphony by the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and Riccardo Chailly (Accentus Music) This film of Chailly's 2012 perf...