A good way to start the week

A note from Korngold supremo Brendan Carroll not only alerts me to the presence on Youtube of this clip, but also explains that the pianist/comedian Great Dane was a tremendous Korngold fan and knew the composer in Hollywood.

This is, of course, Liszt...

Bonne anniversaire, Monsieur Gabriel

Those eyes. That moustache. And oh, that music... Happy birthday to my beloved Gabriel Faure, born on 12 May 1845.

Vladi scoops the RPS!

Our own utterly glorious Vladimir Jurowski, principal conductor designate of the LPO and music director at Glyndebourne, has been named the Royal Philharmonic Society's Conductor of the Year! (Just in time to do Korngold's Das Wunder der Heliane in November :-))). He's opening the Glyndebourne season with MacVerdi's Macbeth next week. Vazhazdarovye, Vlad!

Bach to basics...

...while I was up to my eyeballs in kitchen building site dust, Jeremy Denk had one of those moments of pure inspiration...see what happened when a certain composer answered his ad...

Angelic Angelika

Here's my interview with Angelika Kirchschlager from today's Independent. A glorious singer and a strong, expressive woman full of intelligence and intuition, she is about to take on Debussy's Melisande at Covent Garden. The piece doesn't really have much to do with trouser roles, despite the standfirst.