Category: Music Piece of the Week

Piece of the Week 26th March 2020

26th March 2020

Good Friday 1727 in Leipzig was a particularly good Friday. When Bach had first arrived, four years earlier, he had no doubt wowed his employers – not to mention the congregation – with that year’s Easter offering, the St. John Passion. Bach was ushered to Leipzig on the promise of a very large salary indeed,…

Piece of the Week – 20th March

20th March 2020

This piece is the stuff of legends. Mozart himself, allegedly, once heard Allegri’s Miserere being performed in the Sistine Chapel. The precocious young composer apparently rushed home and wrote down the entire work from memory. The work itself is a sublime nine-voice setting of Psalm 51: Miserere mei, Deus, secundum magnam misericordiam tuam (‘Have mercy…

Piece of the week: 6th March 2020

6th March 2020

James Hook (1746-1827) was an English composer and organist. He displayed a remarkable musical talent at an early age, playing the harpsichord by the age of four and performing concertos in public at the age of six. Hook was appointed organist and composer to Marylebone Gardens in 1768. In addition to his performances as an…

Piece of the Week – 28th February 2020

28th February 2020

Composed in 1929 for Austrian pianist Paul Wittgenstein, who lost his right arm during World War 1. The concerto had its premier in January 1932 with Wittgenstein performing with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. Paul Wittgenstein plays Ravel – Piano Concerto For the Left Hand (Solo Excerpts)

Piece of the Week – January 31st 2020

31st January 2020

The tortured chords at the opening of Elgar’s Cello Concerto sound as if they have to be excavated from the cello face; it would be a similar situation if Shakespeare had started Hamlet at ‘To be or not to be.’ Most concertos take a little time to come to the main point but Elgar was…

Piece of the Week: Pachelbel’s Canon

17th January 2020

Pachelbel’s Canon is a musical work for three violins and ground bass by German composer Johann Pachelbel, admired for its serene but joyful character. It is Pachelbel’s best-known work and one of the most widely performed pieces of music from the Baroque Period. Although it was composed about 1680–90, the piece was not published until…

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