Séverine Ballon plays Rebecca Saunders' 'Solitude' for solo cello
British composer Rebecca Saunders was this week awarded the €250,000 Ernst von Siemens Music prize, becoming the first woman to win it in its 45-year history.
Séverine Ballon plays Rebecca Saunders' 'Solitude' for solo cello
Max Baillie: Cherubic Hymn by Tchaikovsky arranged for 8 violas
Two minutes with Leonidas Kavakos
Lauren Pierce plays Zigeunerweisen on double bass
Yo-Yo Ma plays Bach in globally sourced video
Renaud Capuçon plays at archaeological site
Former Emerson Quartet cellist David Finckel on Articulate with Jim Cotter
Luca Ruggiero: Spreading varnish with the fingers
Backstage with Ray Chen at the San Francisco Symphony
Massenet's Méditation alongside acrobatics
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Opinion
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Rostropovich's record-breaking Guadagnini on loan to Torleif Thedéen
Norwegian musical instrument foundation bought the cello for nearly £2m from an auction of the great Russian’s collection
The 'Four Circles' system of violin making
Luthier Kevin Kelly explains his ‘Four Circles’ system for instrument design, adaptable to violins, violas and cellos
Plane and simple: steel bow planes
Taking inspiration from the design of traditional French bow-making tools, these bow planes are constructed from machine-tooled steel that has been ground and flash-chromed for additional durability. The blades are custom-made by Hock tools and are also available separately.
Luca Ruggiero: Spreading varnish with the fingers
The Italian luthier demonstrates his personal technique for applying varnish on a finished instrument
In focus: the 1706 'Brott-Turner/Schumacher' Tecchler cello
Tom Wilder examines an instrument in an excellent state of preservation by the foremost maker of the Roman school. From the September 2014 issue of The Strad
Blank canvas: unvarnished 5-string instruments
These unvarnished five-string violins and violas are built by a Chinese maker using flamed maple and seasoned spruce. They feature extra-wide necks, extended pegboxes and adjusted bass-bars, and most have one-piece backs.
Reviews
Hilary Hahn: Bach Solo Violin
Exceptional technical command and the utmost integrity and communication
Thomas Albertus Irnberger: Martinů
A rare joy of a performance of Martinů’s Violin Concertos
Guy Johnston: Holst Invocation
Contemplative cello music predating The Planets watershed
Baiba Skride: American Concertos
Persuasive and attention-grabbing versions of a trio of American concertos by Bernstein, Korngold and Rósza
Vadim Repin: Prokofiev Violin Concerto no.1, 1997 recording
Exciting live recording of an almost runaway late-nineties performance with the London Philharmonic Orchestra
Roger Reynolds: Aspiration
Irvine Arditti (violin), Paul Hembree (computer musician), Inauthentica/Mark Menzies
Galleries
Viol trashed during flight emerges from restoration
Viola da gamba belonging to Myrna Herzog is back in action after year-long restoration at Shlomo Moyal’s Jerusalem workshop
Saving Stradivari's forests: effort to harvest precious tonewoods felled in storms
A factory in the Fiemme valley has launched a crowdfunding effort to enable it to quadruple its processing capacity before the wood deteriorates
In focus: an 1859 violin by Nicolas-François Vuillaume
Roland Baumgartner examines a violin representing a free interpretation of the work of Guarneri ‘del Gesù’, by J.B. Vuillaume’s younger brother [click ‘+’ to zoom]
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