Featured content

When Spanish cellist Pablo Casals was in his seventies, he retired from the concert stage and lived in Prades, Southern France. Casals began each day by playing from Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier on the piano (1), then heading out for a walk with his German shepherd, cocking an ear for birdsong and saluting the snow-capped peak […]

“Take a music bath once or twice a week for a few seasons, and you will find that it is to the soul what the water-bath is to the body.” Oliver Wendell Holmes, American physician, lecturer and author.

“There can be no music without idealogy … We, as revolutionaries, have a different conception of  music from the composers of other [non Soviet-Russia] countries.  Lenin himself said the “Music is a means of unifying people”.  It is not a leader of the masses, perhaps, but certainly an organising force … I think an artist […]

A letter from the conductor Leopold Stokowski to Sylvan Levin gives an insight into his sense of humour: Caro Maestro Illustre, Now that you have not a thing to do!!!!! Do you think you would have time to do me a favor and time the whole of Parsifal without cuts?  I suggest you do this […]

Title: I will walk in the presence of the Lord Text:     – Psalm 115 (116b):10, 15-19 (R. Psalm 114 (116a):9)     – Psalm 114 (116a):1-6, 8-9. R. v.9. Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: SATB and piano Product medium: PDF Score and part Sample:

In Halina Rodzinski’s book Our Two Lives she describes how on the very first day Artur Rodzinski came to assist Stokowski in 1929, his boss immediately restyled his hair without a part and combed straight back from the brow.  “That’s how a conductor should look,” said Stokowski, pointing Rodzinski at a mirror in his dressing […]

Title: Smooth Sailing Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Piano duet Level: Piano 1 – 1.1 (five finger position) Product medium: PDF score (audio of accompaniment track only)

“Opera in English, is about as sensible as baseball in Italian.” – H. L. Mencken, twentieth century American journalist, critic, and satirist. Peter, Lawrence J. (ed) (1977) Quotations for Our Time

Title: Advance Australia FairComposer: Peter Dodds McCormickArranger: Greg SmithInstrumentation: SATB and pianoProduct medium: PDF score and part Available from:Sheet Music Direct

Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in C-sharp minor proved very popular with the public. At times, it was programmed “by request” (1), and if not was freqently expected as an encore. In 1922, Rachmaninoff performed in the Queens Hall (London). A critic in the Musical Times described the event: It was clear that the bulk of those who filled Queen’s Hall […]