Violin and electronics
A young composer asked me about great works for violin and electronics. My immediate response was this; I was lucky enough to work with Anthony…
A young composer asked me about great works for violin and electronics. My immediate response was this; I was lucky enough to work with Anthony…
Music on the edge of the precipice: Roderick Chadwick and I play one of Michael Hersch’s 22 movements from ‘Zwischen Leben und Tod’
In 2002 George asked me to make a version of his ‘Pachelbel Variations’ (6th Quartet). This is the result. If you visited George and Gene…
There are moments when only the 1600s will do. Session outtakes of the glorious Gottfried Finger sonatas, with the inspired Olwen Foulkes – on our…
Side by side: another glimpse of the work at the Library of Congress – where I have been making films of very old and very…
On this dark morning, we need Heine and Schumann, arranged by David Matthews
Here is the (first draft) of the documentary film that Malene Skawerved and I made about the 1722 ‘Rode’ Stradivari at the Ashmolean Museum as…
Knowledge Exchange Violin films building at pace now. Here are Vilsmayr, Matteis, and Eccles on the Metropolitan Museum of Art 1693 ‘Francesca’ Stradivari in modern…
On December 4th, the Kreutzers went back into the studio with David Matthews’ 16th & 17th Quartets. It has been my joy to work with…
Celebrating Robin Holloway’s birthday. One of his two tremendous works for violin alone
My reflections on three days playing quartets at the Aldeburgh Festival – there will be more tomorrow! Some thoughts about Kreutzer Quartet Britten-Pears Arts/Aldeburgh Festival…
Just a glimpse of what I have been doing at the Library of Congress for my Knowledge Exchange Violin project this autumn (find out more…
I am in the midst of a welter of wonder – new music in the Midwest Fall colours, filming at the Library of Congress and…

It’s been a very busy week, and I will write about it more this weekend. But here’s a picture of the premiere of Robert Saxton’s…

‘Moonstone Fire’, the first movement from Sadie Harrison’s exquisite ‘… An Amaranth from the Shade …’ which Roderick Chadwick and I premiere in Carmbridge on…
. The
This afternoon at the Metropolitan Museum, I could not resist the chance of playing the music of Robert Saxton, on this wonderful Voirin bow owned…
It’s not possible to be in New York City, practising and writing about Bartok, and NOT play the great sonata he wrote here. So here…
Over the past few days, watching California Condors over buttes and ravines of the South Rim of the Canyon, I found this wonderful piece by…
At the end of this extraordinary day, Malene Sheppard Skaerved Garrison Keillor and I were looking at this view and talking about music. The conversation…
I was thinking about my dear friend Gloria Coates’ wonderful quintet on the train over the Rockies, and into New Mexico yesterday. There was the…
Conversations with Bartók – August 2023 It’s not possible to be in New York City, practising and writing about Bartok, and NOT play the great…
Some thoughts about wear patterns on violins and violas …A letter to a fellow musician (August 2023) Your fascinating letter offers so many…

Dialogues: Bartok on the practice desk. I studied this piece with Manoug Parikian when I was 18, and it is fascinating to work on the…