Music has been part of the Jobs-era Apple brand ever since the iconic ‘Silhouette’ iPod adverts that bewitched a generation. Its focus on popular music identified Apple as a company of the young– its products, especially the iPod, became essential

Love is a rather infrequent visitor to the world of sex & drugs & Rock and Roll! Love ballads do constitute an important genre within the repertory of most bands, but reality frequently looks decidedly different. John Lennon, the founder

The musical genre called “Skiffle” originated in African-American culture in the early 20th century. Drawing its influences from jazz, blues, and folk, it usually featured poor musicians using homemade or improvised instruments. Washboards, jugs, cigar-box fiddles and comb-and-paper kazoos accompanied

Imagine… John Winston (later Ono) Lennon was born on 9 October 1940, in Liverpool, England, to Julia (Stanley) and Alfred Lennon, a merchant seaman. When his parents separated, 4-year-old John ended up living with his Aunt Mimi. John showed some

At the age of 19, a promising pianist named Sara Solovitch, struggling with nerves, decided to turn away from her ambitions as a professional musician. Since then she has led an active and varied career as a journalist across the

I don’t do outdoor weddings. Weather can wreak havoc. But when my nephew asked me to play for his wedding I responded with a heartfelt resounding, “yes!” To say I was blown away by the ceremony is an understatement.

When William Herschel (1738-1822) peered into the night sky on 13 March 1781, he noticed something rather peculiar. One of the celestial bodies he had been observing through his homemade telescope was moving oddly across the sky, and Herschel initially

Shanghai’s Municipal Orchestra, later to become the Shanghai Symphony, began subscription concerts in 1919. Under the direction of the expatriate Italian virtuoso Mario Paci, the orchestra relied exclusively on foreign players and rarely strayed beyond Shanghai’s colonial settlements. Over time,