Every year, the Verbier Festival Academy invites 50 exceptional music talents from around the world to congregate for 3 weeks in the scenic Swiss Alps, to be mentored by elite artists in preparation for careers as soloists, chamber musicians and

The “concert pianist” is a relatively recent creation. In the middle of the nineteenth century, a time when the technology of piano manufacture allowed piano makers to build bigger, stronger instruments, the “concert pianist” as we understand the role today,

Our next featured cellist, Daniil Shafran, was born in 1923 in Petrograd, now Saint Petersburg, and came by his talent honestly. His father was the principal cellist of the Leningrad Philharmonic and his mother Frida Moiseyevna, was a pianist.

Truth be told, as a young aspiring pianist I could never get my head around the music of Alexander Scriabin! Despite the best intentions of my teacher, and supreme technical challenges aside, I simply did not understand his musical syntax.

The spectacular display of superstars in the 2018 Verbier Festival program completely dazzled me. The program comprised of a long list of celebrated “who’s who” in the music universe – András Schiff, Martha Argerich, Richard Goode, Evgeny Kissin, Grigory Sokolov,

I’ve never felt drawn to the idea of the definitive performance. Music is a performing art which keeps on changing– Michael Tippett When I was learning the piano as a child and teenager, I was led to believe there was

Portuguese cellist Guilhermina Suggia (1885-1950) best-known for an iconic painting by Augustus John —a chestnut, luminescent cello, a beautiful woman in a dazzling, red gown, bow-arm outstretched, head upturned—was one of the first professional female solo cellists. The mystique surrounding

Before the age of recording, devotion to music was a full-time commitment. Composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875) would say: “Ah, Music! What a beautiful art – but what a wretched profession!”