Originally published September 2013 The singer on the influence of Elvis (and his mum), the brilliance of Bruce Hornsby and Bridge Over Troubled Water, and the musician who always turns the most heads at his famous parties Continues HERE
Music @ The Guardian
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“Classical pianist Simone Dinnerstein and country-folk singer Tift Merritt have collaborated on a joint album called Night — and it’s a triumph of creative risk” – writes Martin Chilton of The Guardian. Musical collaborations can sometimes be tired sparring sessions, but classical pianist Simone Dinnerstein and folk-country singer-songwriter Tift Merritt have worked on an album, […]
It’s 30 years since the death of Glenn Gould, but the pianist still provokes strong reactions. So how do today’s top players assess his legacy? It still sounds like nothing you’ve ever heard, however many times you listen to it: Glenn Gould’s first recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, made in 1955, has an energy, an intensity […]
From 2011 but still relevant, useful and interesting Details HERE
The Madness singer on royal canapés, being a butcher’s boy and scoffing strawberries as a kid. Interview by John Hind MORE
It was a great day for music when the young Rolling Stones discovered the blues. Keith Richards looks back on a lifelong love affair Continues HERE
“Nick Clegg admitted that he regularly cries when he listens to music. But which songs bring tears to the eyes of Guardian writers?” MORE
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https://www.theguardian.com/music/opera
ALEXIS PETRIDIS Rock and pop music has been obsessed with its own past almost from the start: by 1959, a New York record store called Times Square was doing a roaring trade in what it called “oldies”, selling mid-50s doo-wop singles to teenagers already convinced the golden age of rock’n’roll was over. That said, a […]
MALCOLM JACK: Electric shock of voluminously frazzled hair, baggily dressed in what else but black, the Cure’s singer, songwriter and guitarist Robert Smith is one of those rare rock stars whom you can recognise even in silhouette. His band’s shadowy yet anthemic music – comfortably the creepiest thing to crawl out of ….. Read more […]
ERICA JEAL: I love this music and no-one seems to play it.” It’s only a slight exaggeration on Leif Ove Andsnes’s part to say that about Dvořák’s Poetic Tone Pictures; this beautifully recorded release is one of only a handful available, and he is the highest profile of today’s pianists to have recorded this baker’s […]
Acclaimed director John Hillcoat has made a video for a song from Johnny Cash’s forthcoming ‘lost’ album. The film-maker John Hillcoat is listing the things about Johnny Cash that appeal to him. It’s quite a list, from his distinctive voice and constant championing of the underdog to the way he’d play guitar (“he’d string it […]
HADLEY FREEMAN The singer/songwriter, best known for Werewolves of London, died 10 years ago next month. His family and friends, including the writer Stephen King, explain why, despite his dark side, they still miss him. Warren Zevon, who died a decade ago this September at the far-too-premature age of 56, was a singer, a songwriter […]
CHARLOTTE HIGGINS: England no longer values the profound, weird art of opera – and that leaves us all poorer I n Kyiv, daily performances at the National Opera of Ukraine are acts of brave defiance against the Russian invasion. They symbolise what the country is fighting for: life, culture. In Britain, untouched by war, we […]
ALEXIS PETRIDES: Wilko Johnson’s second act was every bit as belligerent and explosive as his first Before a miraculous recovery from cancer made him more famous than ever, the Dr Feelgood guitarist fired up 70s rock with proto-punk playing and divisive songwriting Read more HERE
Tim Ashley writes: Olga Peretyatko’s latest album is essentially an old-fashioned recital of coloratura show-stoppers, some drawn from the mainstream operatic repertoire, though others, like Alyabyev’s The Nightingale and Tosti’s Il Bacio, are party pieces associated with the great divas of yesteryear. As a technician, the Russian soprano is ……….. http://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/may/08/olga-peretyatko-arabesque-review
Geoffrey Norris (The Guardian) writes …. This trio of sonatas resumes Paul Lewis’s exploration on disc of Schubert’s piano music after a gap during which Beethoven was the prime focus. Lewis’s mature insight into the workings and emotional characteristics of these works lends … MORE
ESME BLEGVAD: A new documentary sheds light on a brilliant voice of the era who never received the recognition she deserved Read more HERE
JOHN FORDHAM: When Esbjörn Svensson made his UK debut at the 1999 Swedish Jazz Extravaganza festival, the then-34-year-old pianist/composer’s jubilant fusions of Thelonious Monk, Ornette Coleman, Keith Jarrett and his …. Continues HERE
The singer on arriving in the UK alone aged 7, her first £3 guitar, and meeting the anti-apartheid activist Read more HERE
Alexis Petridis writes: We tend to think of 1971’s Hunky Dory as the moment David Bowie finally snapped into focus after years of dead ends and false starts. It opens with a song often seen as his mission statement, Changes, with its promise of constant forward motion and undertaking to make pop weird again. It […]
SHAAD D’SOUZA (The Guardian) writes: Posthumous lawsuit brought by Jan Roeg, who worked as a talent scout, alleges a long history of harassment and assault Jan Roeg, a talent scout who worked for Atlantic Records under label founder Ahmet Ertegun from 1984 until the mid 00s, has sued the label and the estate of Ertegun […]
PETER WALKER: “The song is absolutely hopeless, beyond despair. It’s the saddest song I’ve ever heard.” That was Rolling Stone magazine’s description of A Song for You in March 1973, reviewing the album on which it featured, GP. They meant it as a compliment. Sadly, the studio version of A Song for You has been […]