1200 seats sold out within seconds. That was how the audience responded to Augustin Hadelich’s only solo recital in mainland China this September. Last year, he closed off the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra’s season with Beethoven’s Violin Concerto. Across concert halls

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

In July 2020, a Japanese pianist named Hayato Sumino sat down at his piano to record a video for his YouTube channel, Cateen. In it, he performs “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” seven times in a row. Each time he ups

The violin sonata is one of the most intimate forms in classical music: two instruments, face to face in conversation. The best violin sonatas are not merely showcases for the violin; they are conversations between equals. This list covers ten

Few composers have generated as many myths and misunderstandings as Richard Wagner. Depending on who you ask, Wagner either invented modern music – or ruined it. The man redefined what opera was. He wrote some of the most harmonically radical

Richard Wagner (1813–1883) was a revolutionary in German music and in opera. For opera-goers, the advent of Wagner onto their stages was cause for comment, particularly in the caricature sections. In images, the cartoonists could take aim at all they

No Moonlight Sonata or Heart and Soul, here. The most frustrating part of learning any new skill is that period of time in which your taste and your abilities just don’t quite match up. You’d love to be playing Rachmaninoff