Famous stories have frequently been turned into operas by different composers. “Romeo and Juliet” was set to music by Vincenzo Bellini in 1830 as I Capuleti e i Montecchi, with Charles Gounod composing his version in 1867. Giovanni Paisiello composed

Antonio Stradivari was the greatest violin-maker to ever live. Over the course of a seven-decade career, he made around a thousand instruments, with roughly 650 surviving today. Those instruments have become the most sought-after on the planet, selling for millions

‘You must have played well today, for I did not notice you.’ In his memoirs titled Am I Too Loud?, pianist Gerald Moore recalls the remark of famed (and famously egotistical) British singer John Coates, among many an anecdote from

In November 1828, composer Franz Schubert died in his brother’s house, unmarried. The fact is somewhat ironic. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the most emotionally expressive composers of his generation. He helped invent the Romantic-era art song,

In June 1933, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed a symphony by an American woman for the first time in its history. The composer was Florence Price – a Black woman from Little Rock, Arkansas, who had spent years navigating an

Alexander Glazunov, born on 10 August 1865, was Russia’s greatest symphonist in the generation immediately following Tchaikovsky, and he subsequently passed down his legacy to his most famous student, Dmitri Shostakovich. A prodigious musical talent, Glazunov began his studies with

Reynaldo Hahn, born on 9 August 1874 (1874–1947), is widely known for his beautiful art songs that capture emotion with elegance and subtlety. It is hard to believe, but his French mélodies were initially dismissed as merely evocative of the

In our inaugural episode on forgotten Romantic piano concertos, we discovered unexpected and wonderful music by Bortkiewicz, Scharwenka, Beach, Potter and Widor. These much-neglected nineteenth- and early twentieth-century piano concertos and concertante works have been brought to light in 87