For the average citizen of the Soviet Union, anything with the exception of plain breads, cabbage, potatoes and vodka was a luxury item. Soviet leadership, however, did produce a number of cultish consumer items of frequently questionable quality. A reflector

Film music has always tread that fine line between classical and not-classical. Should it be considered ‘light’ classical or not classical at all? But film music itself is an interesting genre. There are so many films for which the music

Although a relatively young institution, the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing has seen its fair share of highly talented composers. Founded in 1950, the department of composition—for better or for worse—has been the cornerstone of its academic endeavours. Guo

Does jazz music make you want to tap your feet and dance? For many, those catchy swing beats can somehow drive our troubles away. In fact, that is one of the reasons why jazz became so popular in the early

Watteau, in many ways, was a painter of rococo love. His pink and frothy paintings overflow with courting couples and cupids galore. His 1717 painting, L’Embarquement pour Cythère (The Embarkation for Cythera) is such a work, with cupids circling in

Two cellists, coming from neighboring Balkan countries, studying in England but at different conservatories, are starting to make us look at cellists and the highly versatile instruments they play in a very new way. No longer just the lower support

Bohuslav Martinů composed a large quantity of music in various styles and forms, but according to the composer “in pure chamber music I am always more myself.” His first Piano Trio, nicknamed “Cinq pièces brèves” spontaneously emerged in Paris in