Chamber Music & Recitals

When the five-part series the Choir of Hard Knocks aired on ABC TV last year the choir became an overnight sensation and it was an instant "water cooler show". This group of around 50 homeless and disadvantaged men and women came together under the...

When the 'fadista' sings, a hush falls over the room... Fado, Portugal's blues, can not only be described as a song; it represents a certain feeling which many people call the spirit of Portugal. These melancholic and often tragic songs, beautiful and...

When the Court Opera Director Wilhelm Jahn commissioned the by no means unvain Johann Strauss Jr. To write a 'genuine' opera, he readily accepted. So, he wrote Ritter Psmn, a work the Waltz King himself regarded as his only one in this genre, although...

When the cantor Johann Sebastian Bach performed sacred cantatas in Leipzig on Sundays and public holidays, his colleagues did the same in many other places in Lutheran Germany. Among them was Christoph Graupner, the court conductor of Hesse-Darmstadt. In...

When the Bamberg Symphony and their principal conductor Jakub Hrua went on tour in Germany with Mahler's Fourth Symphony in January 2020, no one would have thought that this symphony in particular would become a kind of "symphony of fate" of the year,...

When talent meets devotion towards an artistic expression, and a particular musical instrument appears to win the attention of a young girl, this combination of precious factors fosters the start of a life dedicated to that instrument. Growing up in such...

When Swedish composer Wilhelm Peterson-Berger's secret compartment was opened in connection to his 150th birthday in 2017, several unknown and forgotten recordings were discovered. These were of P.B. himself as narrator, pianist and conductor, as well as...

When spirits are low, the music of Jacques-Martin Hotteterre is sure to raise them. Now the most celebrated member of a distinguished family of flute makers and players, he paid his way into the French royal court through his father's well-rewarded...

When Silvius Leopold Weiss died, he was eulogized as Europe' greatest lutenist and one of Germany' most gifted musicians.1. Ouverture 2. Courante Assai Moderato 3. Bourr??E 4. Siciliana 5. Menuet 6. Presto 7. Allemande 8. Courante 9. Bourr??E 10...

When Shostakovich wrote his Piano Quintet in 1940, most of his chamber music had yet to be composed. Combining formal purity and freedom of tone, the quintet was hailed as a masterpiece and has remained his most popular chamber work. In the last years of...

When Rossini drew a line under his own hugely successful operatic career at the age of 37, he spent his final years in Paris where he wrote numerous short piano pieces arranged in 14 volumes, which he jokingly called Peches de vieillesse.1. 1...

When Ravel orchestrated his works, the scoring emerged with total spontaneity, for he had already worked out his orchestral colors with immense care at the piano. His fascination with the Orient, the fantastic, poetic homages, the enthralling world of...