When 18-year-old pianist Yunchan Lim stunned the world at the 2022 Van Cliburn Competition, audiences saw a once-in-a-generation talent whose playing combined a rare poetry with ferocious technique. But Lim’s artistry didn’t come from nowhere. This is a musician who,
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Cooking with Leonard January 23rd, 2020 Inspired, as always, by the things around him, Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) took a cookbook off the shelf and created a set of 4 humorous songs. Émile Dumont’s La Bonne Cuisine Française (Tout ce qui a rapport à la table, manuel-guide -
Bringing Children to Music
Haw Par Music in Hong Kong January 22nd, 2020Music is seen largely as a private matter – the hours spent alone practicing, the emphasis on the personal interpretation, the solo spotlight. However, at the same time, music is a social activity: the number of composers and performers who -
Beethoven and Minona January 21st, 2020 In 2020, the world will celebrate Beethoven‘s 250th anniversary. Official events start on December 16, 2019, and run until December 17, 2020. The main events are concentrated around Beethoven’s birthplace in Bonn, Germany. In Bonn, Beethoven’s home has been reopened -
A Europe of Music January 20th, 2020 Europe is well known for being the birthplace of classical music. With major cities such as Berlin, London, Milan, Paris, Prague, Saint-Petersburg or Vienna, and an endless list of musicians and composers from Bach, Mozart and Chopin to Debussy, Stravinsky -
The Music of Poetry
Heinrich Heine “Softly Flow Through My Soul” January 19th, 2020Heinrich Heine’s poem “Leise zieht durch mein Gemüht” (Softly flow through my soul) inspired 250 composers to fashion musical settings. This poem contains none of Heine’s famous irony or his love of paradoxes. Instead it is the purest lyrical rejoicing -
How to Practice January 19th, 2020 A follow-up to my earlier article What Is Practice? Debussy: 12 Etudes – No. 1. Pour les cinq doigts (For the five fingers) (Joseph Moog, piano) No. 11. Pour les arpèges composés (For written arpeggios) (Joseph Moog, piano) “Practice Makes -
Multi-Tasking Conductors—Commendable or Ineffective? January 18th, 2020 The headline tantalized— “OSM guest conductor Schiff ‘flies off the handle’ in rehearsals, musicians say. ‘The concertmaster of the Montreal Symphony, Richard Roberts, asserted, ‘I don’t think he [Sir András Schiff] is a professional conductor.’” Apparently, Schiff accused the musicians -
The King of Instruments January 17th, 2020 For an instrument that is said to rule over all the other family members in the vast empire of musical instruments, the organ does not get much prominence or recognition. Outside popular pieces like the Toccata and Fugue in D