All Article articles – Page 9
-
Article
On the question of retirement: string players of all ages share their views
Is there a time when we should put our instruments away for good? Pauline Harding talks to musicians young and old about falling standards, failing physiques and a joy of playing music that, if we want it to, should carry us to our graves
-
Article
How I interpret Bach: Tomás Cotik on Classification
Ahead of his 2020 album release of Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas, the violinist continues his blog series, in which he discusses the contradictions between the opposing trends and traditions in Bach interpretation, and his personal solutions to them
-
Article
Life Lessons: Christian Poltéra
Having the space to breathe is important in more ways than one, says the Swiss cellist
-
Article
Soundpost: Letters to the Editor February 2020
A selection of letters The Strad receives each month from its readers around the world: February 2020 issue
-
Article
New Products: February 2020
PSET pneumatic positioners; Da Capo music theory game; Kun colour collapsoble shoulder rest
-
Article
Urtext editions - friend or foe?
Are urtext editions the only legitimate way to access the composer’s musical intentions? Do edited editions inevitably distort the authentic creative voice?
-
Article
Fiddle thought to be played by Robert Burns is to go on tour
A Scottish fiddle, thought to be played by the Bard, more than 250 years ago, is to go on a three-week concert tour
-
Article
Premiere of the month: Márton Illés’s Én-kör III
Patricia Kopatchinskaja to perform new work requiring ‘power, precision and virtuosity’
-
Article
Giuseppe Sgarbi - an overlooked individualist?
In an era when luthiers were not precious about putting elements of their own personality into the models to which they referred, the 19th century maker Giuseppe Sgarbi created instruments that have a unique vibrancy and individuality
-
Article
‘When I say play in a natural way, it shouldn’t be like cotton’
The great Russian violinist and teacher Nelli Shkolnikova’s principles of violin technique
-
Article
‘I look up to the ceiling and suddenly notice the stucco’
Cellist Thomas Demenga on the illuminating power of ornamentation in Bach’s Cello Suites
-
Article
‘When you are on a hill, the sound is good’
Luthier Stefan-Peter Greiner on the mysterious art of sound-adjustment
-
Article
‘It is so unviolinistic’
Patricia Kopatchinskaja on the heartbreak and pain of Schumann’s Violin Concerto
-
Article
‘He had the ability to touch the soul’
The writer, broadcaster and Menuhin biographer Humphrey Burton remembers meeting Yehudi for the first time in 1959
-
Article
‘Why play drunk people prettily?’
On day seven of our festive season of quotes from The Strad archive, violinist Pekka Kuusisto recalls a controversial performance he gave of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons
-
Article
‘One has to understand minimalism as a “plateau of sound”’
Continuing our series of quotes for the festive season, violinist Darragh Morgan examines the role of articulation in minimalism performance practice
-
Article
‘There is an underlying sense of foreboding’
Marking the twelve days of the festive season, The Strad presents quotes from the archive. Today, the Carducci Quartet players discuss subtext in Shostakovich’s string quartets
-
Article
‘The bow and the student’s arm are one; the student is the bass’
Marking the twelve days of the festive season, The Strad presents quotes from the archive. Here, double bassist François Rabbath gives advice on sound development
-
Article
‘It was a very different way to look at music’
Marking the twelve days of the festive season, The Strad presents memorable quotes from the archive. On day three, Truls Mørk recalls working with Lutoslawski on his Cello Concerto
-
Article
‘The music begins to override the technical challenges’
Marking the days of the festive season, The Strad presents twelve quotes from the archive. Here, violinist Rachel Podger describes the pain and rewards of scordatura tuning