Composer and pianist Sergei Rachmaninoff had two daughters, Irina and Tatiana, born at the family estate of Ivanovka in 1903 and 1907. The Rachmaninoff children grew up between Russia, Dresden, and Switzerland before the Russian Revolution forced the family into

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 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

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

Ludwig van Beethoven is one of the most famous composers who ever lived – but how much do you really know about him? Beyond his iconic symphonies and the legendary deafness, he lived a life full of mystery, heartbreak, and

Stradivari violins may be the most thoroughly analysed musical instruments ever made. We have taken photographs and videos of them. We have put them into CT scanners and under electron microscopes. We have scientifically analysed the wood cell by cell,

In the world of string-instrument making, the 17th-century masters from Cremona, Stradivari and Guarneri, top the list. They made not just violins but also violas, cellos, and guitars, which have become legacy instruments passed down from generation to generation. To