Robert Schumann’s famous piano concerto is not a traditional virtuoso showpiece but a cooperative venture between the soloist and the orchestra. This new relationship transported the piano concerto into the realm of symphonic music. The German…

The Surprise Symphony is the best known of the over 100 symphonies by Haydn. Its second movement is the most popular and gave the symphony its name: legend has it that the sudden beat of the timpani was meant to rouse members of the audience who had…

Alfred Brendel is arguably the most outstanding exponent of Schubert's piano music currently before the public, a man capable of bringing to vibrant life not only the verve of this music but also its poetic intensity and intellectual depth. In this…

Franz Schubert's Symphony No. 8 in B minor, commonly known as the Unfinished, was started in 1822 but left with only two movements complete even though Schubert would live for another six years. Since Schubert's death at the age of 31, the Unfinished…

In the eyes of his contemporaries, Johannes Brahms’s violin concerto was so different from everything that had come before that, after the premiere, a critic stated that it wasn’t a concerto, but a “symphony with violin obligato”. In an interview…

Alfred Brendel is arguably the most outstanding exponent of Schubert's piano music currently before the public, a man capable of bringing to vibrant life not only the verve of this music but also its poetic intensity and intellectual depth. In this…

Alfred Brendel is arguably the most outstanding exponent of Schubert's piano music currently before the public, a man capable of bringing to vibrant life not only the verve of this music but also its poetic intensity and intellectual depth. In this…

Alfred Brendel is arguably the most outstanding exponent of Schubert's piano music currently before the public, a man capable of bringing to vibrant life not only the verve of this music but also its poetic intensity and intellectual depth. In this…

Alfred Brendel is arguably the most outstanding exponent of Schubert's piano music currently before the public, a man capable of bringing to vibrant life not only the verve of this music but also its poetic intensity and intellectual depth. In this…

Almost no musical work has had such a powerful influence or evoked as much controversy as Igor Stravinsky's ballet score “The Rite of Spring”. The work's premiere on May 29, 1913, at the Théatre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, was scandalous. The…