BBC Music Magazine

BBC Music Magazine is a must for anyone with a passion for classical music. Classical music connoisseurs and new enthusiast alike will enjoy the fascinating features and reviews of over 120 new works in every issue.

Welcome

THIS MONTH’S CONTRIBUTORS

BBC Music Magazine

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Chauhan and Osborne awarded New Year Honours • Recognition also accorded to musicians who coped with exceptional trials of Covid

THE MONTH IN NUMBERS

SoundBites

Rising Stars • Three to look out for…

Mendelssohn’s Passion sparks a JS Bach revival

Also in March 1829

Concertgebouw musicians prove a cut above

DÉJÀ VU • History just keeps on repeating itself…

Rachel Portman

Studio Secrets

REWIND • Great artists talk about their past recordings

Buried Treasure

Dramatic openings

FAREWELL TO…

Music to my ears • What the classical world has been listening to this month

Our Choices • The BBC Music Magazine team’s current favourites

Richard Morrison • The UK’s leading music colleges have always benefitted from European ties

From strength to strength • Whether singing Schubert while administering vaccines or preparing to play Samson at the Royal Opera House, Nicky Spence is a versatile tenor with a truly choc-a-bloc diary. And, he tells Richard Morrison, he’s just loving it

Nicky Spence’s top albums • Five essential recordings to explore

Learning curves • When musicians on TV show and tell

Annelien Van Wauwe

And breathe… • Musicians and yoga

Trains of thought • Almost from the moment the first tracks were laid, composers have been inspired by the railways to produce train-related works, says Julia Winterson

Staying on track • Well trained composers

A Walk with Holst • Jeremy Pound and five friends follow in the footsteps of the countryside-loving composer as they spend a weekend on the Gustav Holst Way

Troubled times • Clare Stevens recalls how her generation coped with an ever-present threat as they studied and performed classical music during the Troubles in 1970s Belfast

The start of the Troubles • The early events in N Ireland

A Hebrew tale • Michael White reports on how a rediscovered 18th-century oratorio is set to enjoy its British premiere in the language of the Old Testament

15 musical nonagenarians • For some performers and composers, the notion of retiring at 90 has been simply out of the question, as Terry Blain explains

Lausitz Germany & Poland • This extensive region straddling Germany’s eastern border is now the proud host of an international festival, as Simon Broughton explains

A wintry premiere

Richard Strauss • Strauss made his reputation with his ‘big three’ operas but, as Malcolm Hayes explores, many of his great masterpieces were still to come

Strauss’s style

RICHARD STRAUSS Life&Times

Francis Poulenc Figure humaine • Amanda Holloway finds the best recordings of this spectacular choral hymn to freedom, written while France was under Nazi occupation

A fresh and uninhibited triumph

Continue the journey… • We suggest five works to explore after Poulenc’s Figure humaine…

Welcome

Kloetzel and Koenig’s benchmark Beethoven • Malcolm Hayes thinks this performance of the great composer’s works for cello and piano is a masterclass in musicianship

An interview with Jennifer Kloetzel

An impressive Leningrad from the LSO • This live recording of Shostakovich 7 is vivid and exceptional, says Erik Levi

Melancholy moods in an engaging soundworld...