JOHN LYDON: News – the long read

THE GUARDIAN: John Lydon has said he is competing to represent Ireland at this year’s Eurovision song contest primarily in order to raise awareness of Alzheimer’s disease. The former Sex Pistols frontman (once known as Johnny Rotten) will appear with his band, Public Image Ltd, on the Late Late Show on 3 February, performing Hawaii, […]

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THE GUARDIAN: The critics pick their classical highlights.

For the first 10 months of 2022, it seemed that British musical life was returning to some kind of normality. But that was to reckon without the decisions of the one organisation in this country whose sole reason for existence is to nurture and encourage the arts throughout England. It was generally accepted that there […]

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SCHUBERT / THE PIANO TRIOS: News

THE GUARDIAN / Andrew Clements The pianist Lars Vogt died in September last year. His cancer had been diagnosed in 2021, and he was already ill when, against doctors’ advice, he had travelled to Bremen to begin these Schubert recordings with his longtime collaborators, the violinist Christian Tetzlaff and his cellist sister Tanja. They began […]

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“FOR NOW, MUSIC IS A WEAPON”

At first glance, Kyiv looks and feels relatively normal. One year on from the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the streets, bars and restaurants once again bustle with people going about their lives. Look a little closer however, and it becomes clear how completely transformative and tragic the war has been. Bombed-out Russian tanks, missile […]

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STRAVINSKI: News

THE GUARDIAN / Andrew Clements Faust/Les Siècles/Roth(Harmonia Mundi)Performed on original instruments, the composer’s neoclassical works – particularly his Violin Concerto, brilliantly played by Isabelle Faust, come into sharper focus t was through their recordings of Stravinsky’s early ballets a decade ago that François-Xavier Roth and the period instruments of Les Siècles cemented their international reputation. […]

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PULP / Steve Mackey: Sad news

THE GUARDIAN / Ben Beaumont-Thomas Steve Mackey, the bass guitarist for Pulp during the band’s most successful years, has died aged 56. His wife, stylist Katie Grand, announced the news on her Instagram page, writing: After three months in hospital, fighting with all his strength and determination, we are shocked and devastated to have said […]

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EVA CASSIDY: News

THE INDEPENDENT: Jim Farber talks to the late singer’s former bandmate Chris Biondo and composer Christopher Willis about using AI and fresh symphonic arrangements ‘to do the right thing by her’ n 1992, four years before the death of a then-unknown singer named Eva Cassidy, and eight before she would achieve posthumous, worldwide fame, she […]

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SCHUBERT: News

THE GUARDIAN / Andrew Clements Tetzlaff/Tetzlaff/Vogt(Ondine, two CDs)The late pianist is outstanding in these last recordings, accompanied by his longtime collaborators, the violinist Christian Tetzlaff and his cellist sister Tanja The pianist Lars Vogt died in September last year. His cancer had been diagnosed in 2021, and he was already ill when, against doctors’ advice, […]

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SCARLATTI: News

omenico Scarlatti’s keyboard sonatas crop up regularly enough in recitals, most often in a group of four or five beginning a programme, or acting as a palate-cleanser between more substantial works. Concerts devoted exclusively to them are rare, but in doing precisely that harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani was on a mission to encourage his audience to […]

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