Last Friday I was fortunate enough to experience Kimiko Ishizaka's remarkable musicianship for the second time. The first time around we had been treated to the Goldberg Variations; this time the Well-Tempered Klavier was on the programme, together with two sets of early Schumann Etudes.

Kimiko arrived to generous applause and quickly took hold of the evening with Robert Schumann's sombre Beethoven Etudes, which contrasted melodic consistency with impressive technical and emotional range.

So why, might you ask, would an artist begin an evening with such relatively gloomy fare? The first notes of the Well-Tempered Clavier provided the answer: in order to prepare her canvas. Against the dark background of the Schumann, Bach's music shone out like a splash of sunlight, revealing contours in the shadows. As the work progressed, the radius of illumination widened, revealing Bach's special world: serene, orderly, sublime, unshakable.

After the first eight preludes and fugues there was a short intermission during which I had the pleasure to meet Andrew Joy, himself recently featured on this blog. Read more »

C, E-flat, and G go into a bar. The bartender says, “Sorry, but we don’t serve minors.”

So the E-flat leaves, and the C and the G have an open fifth between them. After a few drinks, the fifth is diminished; the G is out flat.

An F comes in and tries to augment the situation, but is not sharp enough. A D comes into the bar and heads straight for the bathroom saying, “Excuse me. I’ll just be a second.”

An A comes into the bar, but the bartender is not convinced that this relative of C is not a minor.

Then the bartender notices a B-flat hiding at the end of the bar and exclaims, “Get out now! You’re the seventh minor I’ve found in this bar tonight.”

The E-flat, not easily deflated, comes back to the bar the next night in a 3-piece suit with nicely shined shoes. The bartender says: “You’re looking sharp tonight, come on in! This could be a major development.” This proves to be the case, as the E-flat takes off the suit, and everything else, and stands there au naturel.

Eventually, the C sobers up, and realizes in horror that he’s under a rest.

The C is brought to trial, is found guilty of contributing to the diminution of a minor, and is sentenced to 10 years of DS without Coda at an upscale correctional facility.

"On one stave, for a small instrument, the man writes a whole world of the deepest thoughts and most powerful feelings. If I imagined that I could have created, even conceived the piece, I am quite certain that the excess of excitement and earth-shattering experience would have driven me out of my mind."

This is what Johannes Brahms had to say about the Chaconne from Bach's Partita in D minor for solo violin, often referred to simply as Bach's Chaconne. More than anything I can add about the piece, this should be enough to persuade you to take the quarter of an hour required to listen to it in its entirety and give it your full attention. Based on a simple harmonic progression with variation after variation, the Chaconne stretches the limits of what is even possible to play on a violin and is still considered one of the most challenging and certainly one of the most beautiful pieces that can be played on the instrument. Read more »

Programming a computer is fun and challenging. I once described it like this:

To program you have to crawl on your belly through a maze in a dark mine shaft memorizing all the turns until you find the problem, grope at it with your hands until you understand what's broken, back out slowly, and get the tool to fix it. Then you have to remember how you crawled in there to begin with.

The last thing you want while programming is to have the music you are listening to suddenly overwhelm and distract you. It's like bumping your head in the mine shaft, and not at all good for productivity. Read more »

In the world of contemporary classical music, John Adams is something of a star. Operas like The Chairman Dances and Dr Atomic are regularly performed, and his brief A short ride in a fast machine is one of the most played modern pieces in the repertoire.

On a recent visit to the London, Adams was interviewed on BBC Radio 4's Start the Week programme. He was in town to conduct the British première of his City Noir symphony, but also mentioned the fact that Youtube had approached him to write a piece for the Youtube symphony orchestra. Here's Adams' discussion with Start the Week host Andrew Marr in MP3 format: Read more »