In the vast universe of music competitions, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, held once every four years, is among the most prestigious events of its kind. Winners and runners-up receive substantial cash prizes, plus concert tours at world-famous venues.

What is the oldest violin in the world? The answer is almost certainly sitting in a museum in Cremona, Italy – and it has a story worthy of the title. Built around 1566 by Andrea Amati, the founding father of

Classical music has given us some of history’s most complicated fathers. Some were domineering, some were absent, some were both – and a few managed, despite everything, to be genuinely devoted. From Leopold Mozart, who shaped one of the greatest

When people talk about Baroque music, names like Bach, Handel, and Vivaldi usually dominate the conversation. However, in the early eighteenth century, Antonio Caldara was widely regarded as one of Europe’s greatest composers. Born in Venice in 1670, Caldara built

The earliest classical recordings offer modern listeners a priceless gift: a direct line to performers who lived during or shortly after the lifespans of the great composers. These eight early classical recordings, made between 1901 and 1907, capture castrati, legendary

The piano was invented at the turn of the eighteenth century by a craftsman from Padua, Italy, named Bartolomeo Cristofori. Decades later, German instrument builder Gottfried Silbermann picked up where Cristofori left off – refining the design, championing the instrument

In all my years of learning the piano and going to the opera as a young student, I never came across Jean-Philippe Rameau‘s music. This seems surprising, since Rameau made important contributions to keyboard music, and his collection of solo

Over 300 years ago, in 1716, the great French harpsichordist François Couperin published his famous treatise L’Art de Toucher le Clavecin (The Art of Playing the Harpsichord). It is, by all accounts, the main Baroque text on playing the instrument,