In the history of European music, certain cities seem to hold a magnetic pull, drawing in talent and capital to create something entirely new. In the late 17th century, that city was Hamburg. Today, we often think of Baroque opera

Charles Gounod, born on 17 June 1818, composed twelve operas, with Faust and Roméo et Juliette being his most popular. Between these blockbusters, we find Mireille, an 1864 opera in five acts to a libretto by Michel Carré after Frédéric

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is one of the most famous composers in Western music history – and one of the most mythologised. Over the past two centuries, popular culture has transformed Mozart’s legacy into a series of legends: the genius who

History has a reliable habit of erasing women who made their mark – and the history of classical music is no exception. Some were too inconvenient to remember. Ethel Leginska (13 April 1886 – 26 February 1970) was one of

In 2022, filmmaker Tim van Beveren and pianist Kyra Steckeweh released a documentary about composer Dora Pejačević called DORA – Flucht in die Musik (or, in English, Dora – Escape Into Music). It’s now widely available through Amazon and other

The twentieth century was the first century in which pianists’ careers intersected with mass media. Perhaps as a result, greatness and influence during this period are inseparable from pianists’ public images. Therefore, this is not a ranking of pianists by

Have you ever heard of Sigurd Jorsalfar, one of the most renowned kings in Norwegian history? He was the first European king to lead a crusade, and he was part of the last relatively peaceful reign in Norway in the

Sports fans wear the shirts of their idols, and classical music has never entirely escaped the cult of personality either. Few classical musicians in modern times, with the possible exception of Liberace, have embraced celebrity quite as enthusiastically as Lang