John E. Borland described in a paper of June 1897: It was customary to commence with a Bach prelude and fugue (usually perverted from one intended for the organ), a Beethoven sonata (choice limited to four or five), some Chopin pieces (there were about twelve orthodox ones to select from), and a Liszt rhapsody. These […]

Title: Intermezzo, op. 118, no. 2Composer: Johannes BrahmsArranger: Greg SmithInstrumentation: Cello and pianoProduct medium: PDF score and part  

Bach was once complemented on his organ playing: “There is nothing remarkable about it.  All one has to do is hit the right notes at the right time, and the instrument plays itself.” Quoted by Johann Friedrich Köhler, Leipzig, after 1776.  Hans-Joachim Schulze, ed. Dokumente zum Nachwirken Johann Sebastian Bachs, 1750-1800. Bach-Dokumente, III. 1972, no. […]

I need time to be idle in order to experience and romance my muse, Music, my lifelong partner. In some ways, when I think about the enforced thirty minute practice sessions and much-resented violin lessons during Friday recess which introduced us during my early childhood, our story feels a bit like the plot of a […]

“They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.” — Edgar Allan Poe

“Writing music is seventy-five per cent an intellectual activity.  This effort is often more pleasant for me than having a rest.” Conversation with Ravel, recalled by Robert de Fragny, Echo liberté, 7 November 1950. Cited in: Nichols, Roger (1987) Ravel Remembered.  London: Faber & Faber., p. 61.

Early phonograph recordings were a little rough.  In 1889, pianist Hans von Bülow was asked to play into a phonograph in America: After playing upon a pianoforte, from which issued sounds compared to the soft and dreamy gurgle of a brook, the far-off sighign of the night wind and the roar of the cataract, he […]

Einstein wrote that Mozart’s music “was so pure that it seemed to have been ever-present in the universe, waiting to be discovered by the master.” Lyth, David (2019) The Road to Einstein’s Relativity. Boca Ranton: CRC Press, p.131.

Tchaikovsky, later in his life, reflected on hearing Mozart's Don Giovanni as a boy: The music of Don Giovanni was the first to conquer me completely.  It awoke an ecstasy in me of which the consequences are known.  It gave me the key to the spheres of pure beauty in which the greatest geniuses soar.  […]

Debussy would sit himself down without speaking at the piano of the little study-cum-library and start to improvise. Anyone who knew him can remember what it was like. He would start by brushing the keys, prodding the odd one here and there, making a pass over them and then he would sink into velvet, sometimes […]