Music
BBC Music Magazine
Atlanta US
Though well known for its world-class orchestra, Georgia's leafy state capital also boasts a thriving opera scene, as Michael Beek discovers
3 min |
February 2025
BBC Music Magazine
Ludwig van Beethoven
Terry Williams explores the best recordings of a symphony that shows the perky sense of humour lurking within its curmudgeonly composer
4 min |
February 2025
BBC Music Magazine
Puppet of the Reich?
Wilhelm Furtwängler has long been seen as a symbol of Nazism. But, as Andrew Green explains, the conductor was a strong opponent of the regime
8 min |
February 2025
BBC Music Magazine
"The first time I was shown how to play Bach on the harpsichord, it gave me goosebumps
As Bach Collegium Japan celebrates its 35th anniversary, its legendary music director speaks to Amanda Holloway about a lifetime devoted to the great Baroque composer
7 min |
February 2025
BBC Music Magazine
Discovering Donizetti - Thanks to a two-year lockdown project, nearly 200 previously lost Donizetti songs will now see the light of day
Thanks to a two-year lockdown project, nearly 200 previously lost Donizetti songs will now see the light of day. For most people, undertaking a lockdown project meant learning to bake sourdough bread, getting fit with Joe Wicks, or taking up a language. But Professor Roger Parker, the eminent historian of Italian opera and emeritus professor at King's College London, had something far more ambitious in mind. He set about unearthing songs by Gaetano Donizetti - many of which had been lost since the composer's lifetime - and the enterprise turned into a two-year labour of love.
6 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Composer of the month - Bohuslav Martinů - Though the Czech absorbed many influences from his exile abroad, his colourful music was always distinctively his own
The youngest of six, Bohuslav was a sickly child, and his father or older sister often had to carry him the 193 steps up to the tower. He was shy at school, too, though showed an early talent for the violin and gave his first concert at 14. By the following year, the future composer was off to the Prague Conservatoire to take the first, if faltering, steps towards a career in music.
6 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Symphonies Beside the Sea- Before cinema, the wireless and coach trips cast them adrift, seaside orchestras were once a major holiday attraction
Before cinema, the wireless and coach trips cast them adrift, seaside orchestras were once a major holiday attraction. It's a dimension of music-making that once was integral to many a British holiday experience, yet now has all but vanished. The tide went out, you might say, on the professional seaside (or pier, or spa) orchestra many decades ago. In their glory days, though - perhaps a quarter-century on either side of 1900-these ensembles were everywhere, from Bridlington to Eastbourne, New Brighton to Worthing, Blackpool to Bexhill-on-Sea, Cleethorpes to Brighton... the list is astonishing.
6 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Richard Morrison- Do Classical Works About Mortality Reveal More To Us As We Get Older? Is it inevitably true that, as we journey through the decades, we are better able to interpret or empathise with a profoundly death-obsessed masterpiece such as Schubert's Winterreise?
As we get older do we respond differently to that vast canon of music dealing with mortality? Is it inevitably true that, as we journey through the decades, we are better able to interpret or empathise with a profoundly death-obsessed masterpiece such as Schubert's Winterreise? Or do human beings possess such a flexible sense of empathy that we can relate to virtually any state of mind if it is evoked convincingly enough by a composer?
3 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Do Notes Win Votes? - There are multi-dimensional ways that music is used by political campaigners and their supporters today.
It was a little bit of history repeating when Rishi Sunak announced the UK General Election to the heckling of his political opponents blasting out D:Ream's 'Things Can Only Get Better'.
2 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Västra Karup Sweden
The spirit of soprano Birgit Nilsson is alive and well in the town of her birth, home to a festival dedicated to her memory
3 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Federico Colli
\"At this moment in time we don't need more virtuosi. We need musicians to engage with the philosophy of music
6 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Harmonic Progression
What happens when classical music-style levels of ambition, invention and sheer length are brought to pop? The answer, as Meurig Bowen explains, is Prog Rock
6 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Golden years
Young musicians may be physically fit, but with age come the advantages of wisdom and experience
6 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Sweet Sixteen
As The Sixteen celebrates its 45th birthday, founder Harry Christophers speaks to Andrew Stewart about directing a choral powerhouse
8 min |
August 2024
BBC Music Magazine
FESTIVAL GUIDE 2024
It's that time of year again... Spring has finally sprung, and along with the promised sunshine we welcome a brand-new season of glorious summer music.
10+ min |
May 2024
BBC Music Magazine
The mighty Sampson
As soprano Carolyn Sampson turns 50, she tells Ashutosh Khandekar about the development of her voice through a remarkable catalogue of recordings
7 min |
May 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Music to die for
From wrathful Verdi to ethereal Fauré, there are many different ways to compose a Requiem, as Jeremy Pound discovers
6 min |
May 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Avian anthems
From Vivaldi to Messiaen, composers have often been inspired by birdsong. But accurately mimicking chirrups and tweets in music is far more difficult than it sounds, finds Tom Stewart
6 min |
May 2024
BBC Music Magazine
THE BIG 400!
BBC Music Magazine has reached its 400th issue! To celebrate, we look back over eight milestone issues since the very firstin 1992
10+ min |
May 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Northern light
From her first piano lesson, composer Errollyn Wallen has lived and breathed music; and though inspired by a range of styles, her composing is a deeply personal expression, as she tells Kate Wakeling
9 min |
May 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Felix Mendelssohn Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor
Jo Talbot celebrates the Mozart of the 19th century’ as she searches out the finest recordings of this masterful work for piano, violin and cello
7 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Antonio Salieri
Forget the hate-filled murderer of Mozart, says Alexandra Wilson; the real Salieri was an opera composer of considerable standing
8 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Aix-en-Provence France
Rebecca Franks breathes in the spring air in the popular southern city, where the music making sparkles and the sun always shines
3 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Composing is like breathing. It's just something I do, like a hobby, really...or an addiction
The world's most performed classical composer, a small, black-suited figure with a mop of white hair and mutton-chop whiskers, stands on the huge Brucknerhaus stage, almost invisible among the sea of musicians.
7 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
A cast of thousands
From its unlikely conception in a pub, The Really Big Chorus has become a cultural phenomenon, offering amateur singers the opportunity to take part in vast performances, writes Andrew Green
8 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Tours de force
What secrets lurk behind the stages of the world’s great concert halls? To find out, Brian Wise takes backstage tours of five leading venues in London and New York
7 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
A Marriner's tale
This month marks 100 years since the birth of Sir Neville Marriner, legendary founder and director of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields. Michael White speaks to those who knew him best
8 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Larger than life
Before Milos Forman’s Amadeus came Peter Shaffer’s theatrical take on Mozart and Salieri, staged in 1979 at London’s National Theatre. lifts the curtain...
6 min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
MUSIC MALICE & MURDER
Everything you've heard is true,' proclaimed the posters for Miloš Forman's Amadeus - a cinematic tale of genius and envy, based on Peter Shaffer's acclaimed stage play about Mozart and Salieri's bitter rivalry. Forty years on, Charlotte Smith looks back at a very special production
10+ min |
April 2024
BBC Music Magazine
Start spreading the music...
No city has been sounded and celebrated by composers and musicians as thrillingly as New York and, in particular, Manhattan – a place where 800 languages are spoken, and even more musical genres are currently being played, remade and born.
2 min |