Being stuck in front of an empty page is quite a common phenomenon for artists, regardless of the medium or format of the art. The writer’s block is the result of the creator not being able to produce new works,

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) was the rising star on the Viennese music scene in the last decade of the 18th century. He made his name by showcasing his talents as a pianist, and he composed and performed piano sonatas of

When talking about operas, we mostly focus on arias, those glorious moments where all time stops and the hero or heroine tells us of their hopes and their dreams, or their disappointments and anger. Duets, however, have their own strength.

There are certain habits of piano practice which are ingrained in us from an early age and which have become a form of “piano dogma”. As a young piano student we may accept these practices without question, trusting in our

NetEase Cloud Music is a freemium music streaming service publically launched in 2013. Its music service has attracted over 800 million registered users, and its principle aim, according to a spokesperson, is to “actively fulfill our responsibilities to promote the

The composer, conductor and educator Bernhard Sekles (1872-1934) caused a minor scandal in 1928. Sekles was director of the Hoch Conservatory of Music in Frankfurt am Main, and he decided to put Jazz on the curriculum. The courses in the

This atmospheric piece for solo piano, whose Afrikaans subtitle ‘Wind oor die Branders’ translates as Wind over the Waves, is by Richard Pantcheff, a British composer, born in 1959. It comes from ‘Nocturnus’, a suite of six pieces written for

The best teachers want to be made redundant – that is, they aim to make their students confident, independent musicians. In other words, they want to encourage autonomy in their students. As a teacher, perhaps the simplest way to encourage