Das Wunder der Heliane
One thing cannot go unmentioned and that’s the fact that 2017 is a double Korngold anniversary: 120 years old, and 60 years since his death. Revivals are taking place, one of which is… Continue reading
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Wenn ich komponiere, bin ich wieder in Wien – I Return to Vienna when I Compose
This is the title of the exhibition that accompanies the official opening of the exil.arte centre at Vienna’s University for Music and Performing Arts on May 22nd. It is also the reason that… Continue reading
Post-Truth Media – Post-Truth Music
Historically, there are cultural precedents that are worth considering. Nobody disputes this and though it’s perhaps too easy to carry on raising the spectre of Hitler, what I find interesting at this Trump/Brexit… Continue reading
From Utopia
As I move my office from my home in the Cotswolds in Gloucestershire to the belle-etage of the University for Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, I find myself bereft of files, books… Continue reading
Brexit, Trump and Godwin’s Law
A blog such as “Forbidden Music”, dealing with history, music and freedom of expression cannot allow the election of Donald Trump in the wake of Brexit to pass without reflection. There are already… Continue reading
Heinsheimer’s Hidden History
Since posting this article on Heinsheimer, Univeral Edition has now published his history of their publishing house since its founding in 1901 to the death of Emil Hertzka and Austria’s annexation in 1938.… Continue reading
Female composers: “Degenerate”, “Deviant” or Deliberately Downgraded?
This week saw the opening of an exhibition on women composers in Vienna. It follows a run of performances Of Baruchs Schweigen – or Baruch’s Silence, by the composer Ella Milch-Scheriff with a… Continue reading
Popular Music in Exile
I wrote a catalogue chapter on the persecution of popular music during the Nazi years for the exhibition Stars of David, which ran at Vienna’s Jewish Museum in 2015. Obviously, in a… Continue reading
Rhymes and Repetitions of History’s Rondos
“History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme” – a quote apocryphally attributed to Mark Twain. So what does this historic meter reflecting events start to show us? It’s thrown up many… Continue reading
Fremde Erde– Prescience as Opera
On April 22nd, I gave a lecture at Royal Holloway London University, on Karol Rathaus’s opera Fremde Erde – Alien Soil. I’ve now adapted it for inclusion on this blog. Much of the… Continue reading