hank Archive

Schumann’s pioneer quintet became the model for a small but select line of similar works by other composers – Brahms, Franck, Dvorak, Fauré, Elgar, Reger, Bloch and Shostakovich. It is interesting that, with a single …

Mussorgsky composed his work titled “Pictures at an Exhibition” first as a composition for piano solo. Later it was orchestrated beautifully by Maurice Ravel. Quite often this work is performed in correctly in that the …

Pianist Alfred Brendel is now retired. I see him in a teaching role occasionally. He certainly had a distinguished career! Recently I heard him play the third movement from Beethoven’s Piano Sonata #18. For me, …

Johannes Brahms was a man quite in awe of the legacy of Beethoven. He was a composer who initially thought himself unworthy to carry on in the footsteps of the giant even though that was …

Grigory Sokolov was born in Leningrad (now St Petersburg) on 18 April 1950. He started to play piano at the age of five and, two years later, began studies with Liya Zelikhman at the Central …