Released in 2025, Nicola Benedetti‘s Violin Café is one of her most personal and unusual projects to date. In a shift away from the large-scale concerto repertoire that has dominated much of her discography, Benedetti curated a programme that abandons

One would be hard pressed to argue that the harp is not one of the most unique – and beguiling – of the instruments currently still in frequent use in the Western classical canon. Although you can find one in

Baroque music – composed roughly between 1600 and 1750 – is some of the most recognisable and beloved music ever written. You almost certainly know more of it than you think. The driving pulse of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, the soaring

Uruguayan composer Enrique Crespo (b. 1941) was the founder of the ensemble German Brass in 1974, playing trombone in the group. In 1977, seeing a need for more brass ensemble music, he wrote the American Suite No. 1 for brass-wind

The piano concerto was the supreme musical mistress of the 19th-century. Composers-pianists from Beethoven to Rachmaninoff have left us unforgettable masterpieces that still dominate concert halls today. But what is hiding behind those familiar favourites? This question brings me to

For most in the world, it is Nikolai Rimsky Korsakov’s 1888 symphonic suite Scheherazade that brings the stories of The Arabian Nights tales (collected as One Thousand and One Nights folktales) to the musical stage. The framing device for the

Commended by the French government in 2020 for her significant contributions to the arts, the Franco-Italian mezzo-soprano Lea Desandre has established herself as a leading voice in early-music performance. Desandre started her career as a ballet dancer, and to celebrate

Why is it that some musical works remain forever, while others slowly fade away? When we look back at the repertoire of Western classical music, what is most striking is how a relatively small selection of pieces has passed the