April 15, 2026 • 7:30 am 0
I interviewed Franco-Belgian cellist Camille Thomas for The Strad about the creation of her new album Rendez-vous, a project that she and pianist Julien Brocal conceived during a recent residency at Tippet Rise Art Center.
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Filed under: cellists, The Strad, Tippet Rise
April 6, 2026 • 12:11 pm 0
For the April 2026 edition of The Strad, I spoke with Midori about her album of music by the Schumanns, with Festival Strings Lucerne and Daniel Dodds as well as pianist Özgür Aydin:
For many violinists of Midori’s generation, Robert Schumann’s Violin Concerto in D minor occupies an ambiguous position on the edge of the core repertoire. ‘As a young violinist making my way through the repertoire for my instrument, I encountered a healthy portion of Romantic concertos – Tchaikovsky, Sibelius, Bruch, Dvořák, Brahms and others,’ she notes. ‘But the Schumann Violin Concerto? It is missing from the list without that being overly noticed.’ It was only later, she reflects, that the concerto gradually took its place alongside those more familiar works….
Filed under: Clara Schumann, Schumann, The Strad, violinists
April 1, 2026 • 9:07 pm 0
I had the pleasure of interviewing violinist Irvine Arditti for The Strad about his role in this fantastic new release of music by Roger Reynolds from Ekkozone records (for which I also wrote the liner note essay). He performs in WISDOM’s Sources, an expansive duo for violin and viola.
You’ve known Roger Reynolds and his music for many years now. Tell us a little about how you first connected and how your friendship and collaboration developed.
Irvine Arditti: Roger appeared at one of our concerts in Huddersfield’s new music festival in the early ’80s. We were playing music of Xenakis, whom I later found out Roger admired as much as I did. We were then a young, promising group rapidly gaining a reputation, and Roger offered us a quartet gratis if we agreed to programme it as much as we could.
Filed under: Arditti Quartet, Roger Reynolds, The Strad
February 19, 2026 • 10:13 am Comments Off on György Kurtág at 100
In celebration of his centenary, The Strad recounts György Kurtág’s musical upbringing and shares words from leading string players about their experiences with the composer and his music.
Filed under: Kurtág, music news, The Strad
February 12, 2026 • 10:18 am Comments Off on Beauty Unbound by History: Cellist Tommy Mesa Explores the Many Voices of His 1767 Gagliano
From The Strad:
The enigmatic-looking album title 17(67) pairs a fragment of internet slang with the year in which Tommy Mesa’s Nicolò Gagliano cello was made. Recorded with pianist Yoon Lee, the album places that rare instrument in dialogue with music shaped by different eras, traditions and cultural contexts.
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January 31, 2026 • 10:30 am Comments Off on ‘Once a Musician, Always a Musician’: Itzhak Perlman and Peter Oundjian in Conversation
Ahead of their Carnegie Hall appearance together on Sunday, February 1, with the Colorado Symphony, I spoke with Itzhak Perlman and Peter Oundjian for The Strad about their enduring friendship and shared musical values:
A few weeks before their reunion on stage at Carnegie Hall with the Colorado Symphony, Itzhak Perlman and Peter Oundjian reflected on a relationship shaped over many decades. They spoke from different locations – Perlman from Florida, where he was leading this year’s edition of the Perlman Music Program, and Oundjian from his home in Connecticut – ahead of their joint appearance on 1 February, which marks both the orchestra’s first performance at Carnegie Hall in nearly half a century and a return to shared music-making for two artists whose connection began in mentorship and has evolved into enduring friendship.
Filed under: Colorado Symphony, conductors, The Strad, violinists
January 30, 2026 • 10:26 am Comments Off on “Finding Hope in a Desolate Landscape”
I spoke with Minnesota Orchestra principal violist Rebecca Albers for The Strad about preparing the North American premiere of Donghoon Shin’s Threadsuns – a viola concerto inspired by Paul Celan’s poetry, which she performs this weekend. Fabien Gabel conducts. Given everything happening in Minnesota right now, the piece feels heartbreakingly timely.
In a moving decision, the Minnesota Orchestra also announced a change to the program in response to tragedy in the community. Opening the concerts is the Adagietto from Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, offered in memorial for Alex Pretti and Renee Good, and shared “with love for our audience and our beautiful city” on a program that explores resilience and the search for “songs to sing” amidst darkness.
January 16, 2026 • 11:44 am Comments Off on ‘The Struggles of Our Time Are Ours to Own’: Curtis Stewart
Virginia Symphony Orchestra premieres Curtis Stewart’s I wouldn’t stop there: in the words of a KING this weekend. He spoke with The Strad about the work:
Curtis Stewart embodies a distinctly contemporary vision of the classical violinist today. On stage and off, he operates with a directness that resists polish for its own sake, favouring instead a sense of immediacy and responsibility. As a violinist and composer in equal measure, with education central to his work, he treats classical music as something to be actively made, not simply handed down….
Filed under: American music, The Strad, violinists
December 26, 2025 • 12:24 pm Comments Off on ‘Pur ti miro’: Martin Stegner on Listening, Balance, and Freedom
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The Berliner Philharmoniker violist Martin Stegner discusses reimagining early music for sheng, viola and double bass on Pur ti miro, an ECM New Series release bringing together Wu Wei (sheng), Stegner and Janne Saksala (double bass) in an unconventional but remarkably cohesive trio.
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Filed under: early music, The Strad, viola
December 18, 2025 • 4:18 pm Comments Off on Making the Violin Sing: Gil Shaham on Three Concertos Written for Him
A new Strad interview with Gil Shaham about Premieres, his forthcoming album of violin concertos written for him by Scott Wheeler, Bright Sheng, and Avner Dorman:
Premieres, Gil Shaham’s new release on Canary Classics, brings together three violin concertos written expressly for him and realised in close collaboration with conductor Leon Botstein and The Orchestra Now. Recorded at Bard College’s Fisher Center, the album reflects a network of long-standing artistic relationships and a shared belief in the concerto as a living, evolving form…
Filed under: new music, The Strad, violinists
Arts & Culture Stories from NPR
MEMETERIA by Thomas May 