Joan Baez sings Sibelius
Yes, you read that right. 2007 brings the fiftieth anniversary of Jean Sibelius’ death, and his tone poem Finlandia was written as a protest against Russian influence in Finland at the end of the 19th…
Celebrating Benjamin Britten
Benjamin Britten, composer, pianist, conductor, pacifist, humanitarian, and visionary, died on December 4th 1976. The thirtieth anniversary of his death is being celebrated with the remarkable story of how he…
One day, two musicians, three anniversaries
There are three anniversaries today of important events connected by a fascinating thread. November 22nd is remembered by many for the assassination of John F Kennedy in Dallas in 1963, while…
New music and the wider culture
‘If you’re talking about “relevance to the wider culture” and “speaking to our times“, and all that Greg Sandowian stuff, I couldn’t possibly care less … People seem to forget that…
Really nice to see so many young people
All too often today, appealing menus of new music turn out to be measly meals relying heavily on technical gimmickry, self-serving cliques, bitchiness and cynicism. By contrast the Britten Sinfonia…
Contemporary art loves contemporary music
The demise of Tower Records mean tough times ahead for the independent record labels, so it’s great to welcome an unlikely new label which was launced this month with real fighting talk. The FRED…
Soloist blogs on major new music premiere
Tomorrow (Nov 6) soloist Nicholas Daniel (left) and the Britten Sinfonia give the world premiere of John Tavener’s oboe concert Kaleidoscopes at London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall. The new work is Tavener’s…
More to Dowland than the lute
You don’t need to be a rock star to have a different take on the music of John Dowland. Jazz pianist, cellist, accordion player and envelope pusher Huw Warren (left) uses piano, keyboards…
New Music Is A Global Language
Kalevi Aho, Lowell Liebermann, Áskell Másson, Þorsteinn Hauksson, Haraldur Sveinbjörnsson, Eiríkur Árni Sigtryggsson, Þorkell Sigurbjörnsson, Atli Heimir Sveinsson, Atli Heimir Sveinsson, Björk, the Sugarcubes, Quarashi, Sigur Rós, Minus, Olga Bochihina,…