Beethoven
Alfred Brendel was peerless – but he wasn’t universally loved
In middle age Alfred Brendel looked disconcertingly like Eric Morecambe – but, unlike the comedian in his legendary encounter with…
Astonishing ‘lost tapes’ from a piano great
These days the heart sinks when Deutsche Grammophon announces its new releases. I still shudder at the memory of Lang…
‘Death is a very poor painter’: the 19th-century craze for plaster casts
Bourgeois homes in the early 19th century became ‘virtual museums of death’, with models of heroes jostling replicas of the hands and feet of lost loved ones
The filthy side of Dame Myra Hess
The photograph on the cover of Jessica Duchen’s magnificent new biography of Dame Myra Hess shows a statuesque lady sitting…
Dazzling: Marc-André Hamelin’s Hammerklavier
Grade: A When Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata was published in 1818, pianists were confronted with a mixture of ‘demonic energy and…
A lively and imaginative interpretation of an indestructible Britten opera
Scottish Opera’s new production of Albert Herring updates the action to 1990, and hey – remember 1990? No, not particularly,…
‘Some pianists make me shake with anger’: Vikingur Olafsson interviewed
At the BBC Proms this year, an Icelandic pianist dressed like a Wall Street broker played a slow movement from…
Sonic enchantment
We used to call it a ‘meat and two veg’ programme, back in my concert planning days: the reliable set…
Time is running out
This is not a book about tennis. Roger Federer appears early on, trailed by the obligatory question ‘When will he…
True devotion
The 20th century was an amazing time for Russian pianists, and the worse things got, politically and militarily, the more…
Small but perfectly formed
Haydn is looking well — in fact, he’s positively glowing. The dignified pose; the modest, intelligent smile: it’s only when…
Roll over, Beethoven
Ian Pace on musicology’s culture wars
Musician’s notebook
My November was bookended by two characteristic displays of grace. I ushered it in by falling on all fours while…
Parallel universe
There wasn’t going to be a Lucerne Festival this year. The annual month-long squillion-dollar international beano got cancelled, along with…
The keys to Beethoven
If you want to understand Beethoven, listen to his piano sonatas. Without them, you’ll never grasp how the same man…
The alienation effect
‘People may say I can’t sing,’ said the soprano Florence Foster Jenkins, ‘but no one can ever say I didn’t…
Apex carnivore
Beethoven wears a feather boa and pink shades. He wrangles an electric guitar. A red lightning flash streaks across that…
This year, I’m performing all 32 of Beethoven’s sonatas. Here’s why
For the past several decades, little in my life as a professional pianist has been as constant as my relationship…
Why did the Soviets not want us to know about the pianist Maria Grinberg?
Only four women pianists have recorded complete cycles of the Beethoven piano sonatas: Maria Grinberg, Annie Fischer, H. J. Lim…
Is women’s football really that popular?
Ode to all sorts Brexit party MPs were likened to Nazis for turning their backs on a recital of ‘Ode to…
Igor Levit’s Goldbergs were transcendental
Igor Levit has rapidly achieved cult status, as he certainly deserves. He has already reached the stage where he can…
Anderszewski went at Beethoven’s Diabellis with a nail gun
Are Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations really ‘the greatest of all piano works’, as Alfred Brendel claims? It’s hardly what you would…
Dudamel’s Amériques made The Rite of Spring sound like Einaudi
Apparently it’s called ‘expectation management’. Pollux, Esa-Pekka Salonen’s new work for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, takes its name from…
Remembering one of the best – and bitchiest – pianists who ever lived
I’m unlucky with Beethoven’s Appassionata Sonata. Twice in the past year I’ve bolted for the exit as soon the pianist…
