In November this year, the first Birmingham International Piano Chamber Music Festival took place at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire. In my role as founder and artistic director this involved months of planning, complex preparations and a few deep breaths too.

Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924) called his opera La fanciulla del West (The Girl of the West) his “greatest work.” Puccini must certainly have felt a sense of accomplishment as the opera was seven years in the making, and originated during a

Erotic, murderous and biblical themes combine in the opera Salome by Richard Strauss (1864-1949). And as you surely know, it all climaxes in Salome’s declaration of love and kiss for the severed head of John the Baptist. Based on a

When we consider the role musician as “curator”, we tend to think of someone who organizes a concert series or music festival, much in the same way as a museum curator organizes exhibitions.

technique |tekˈnēk| noun a way of carrying out a particular task, esp. the execution or performance of an artistic work or a scientific procedure. • skill or ability in a particular field • a skillful or efficient way of doing

I bet you could easily name a handful of classical musicians who have distinct identities. From vertiginous heels to extravagant physical gestures, hair tossing or audible muttering or humming, these individuals’ public artistic identities are evident whenever and wherever they

Béla Bartók (1881-1945) spent the last five years of his life in the United States. Economic hardship, cultural dislocation, and very little artistic acknowledgement and satisfaction plunged the composer into a state of bitter depression. This depression was compounded by

Multimedia was alive and well in 1924, and with the title Relâche—loosely translated into “No Performance today,” or “Theatre Closed”—everybody automatically knew that the ballet collaboration between Francis Picabia and Erik Satie was in the firm grip of Dadaism.