Backstage at the Leeds Piano Festival
The Leeds International Piano Competition is one of the major keyboard events of the year.
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Summer performances – on and off the air
Professor David Owen Norris describes his summer projects – a special post for all the students who think the staff are on holiday when term is over
Pianos & Premieres
The Geffrye Museum has very kindly decided to give us an 1812 Strecker grand pianoforte with divided pedal. This will fit very well with our other instruments with divided pedals – a Ganer Square of 1781, a Broadwood grand of 1828, and a Bechstein of 1902.
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Sir Arthur Sullivan – Songs
Head of Keyboard Studies, Professor David Owen Norris tells about his new CD release.
The launch concert of our double CD of Sir Arthur Sullivan’s songs on the Chandos label is a major staging-post on a long journey.
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Perfect Pianists
Artur Rubinstein playing Chopin’s ‘Heroic’ Polonaise no. 6
On Friday March 4th at 8pm on BBC 4, Professor David Owen Norris presents Perfect Pianists, a compilation of archive film of great pianists, including Benno Moiseiwitsch, Myra Hess, Artur Rubinstein, Radu Lupu and Murray Perahia – David filmed the links at the Cobbe Collection at Hatchlands, so you’ll hear him as well, playing Chopin on Chopin’s own Pleyel.
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A week with David Owen Norris
David Owen Norris, Professor of Music and Head of Keyboard and Percussion Studies, gives us a round up of a week’s wide-ranging activities…
Some interesting coaching this week – the Banks String Quartet at the Royal College of Music in Frank Bridge’s 1907 student piece, the quartet in B flat, for the Bridge Study Day, where my fellow contributors included Fabian Huss, Lewis Foreman, Anthony Payne and Stephen Banfield.
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Meet the (modern) pianos
In the final instalment of our Meet the Pianos series for this year, David Owen Norris introduces some of our modern concert grands. Many people will find these more familiar-looking than our rarer historic instruments. But they’re not all the same, and modern piano firms, just like their 18th-century counterparts, search to create instruments with their own characteristic sounds.
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Performing Wellington and Waterloo
For our final performance event of the academic year, Catherine Gosney (year 2) led a fascinating concert commemorating the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo – mixing some familiar favourites with lesser-known gems. Here she tells us about putting it all together:
Catherine leading the orchestra
I love the art of programming.
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Meet the pianos again
In the second of our series of ‘Meet the pianos’ videos, David Owen Norris introduces an instrument like the ones Jane Austen would have known – a wonderful 1796 Broadwood grand piano. We acquired the Broadwood four years ago, and it has been a hard-working addition to our historic piano collection.
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Studying the piano on video
Our head of keyboard studies, Professor David Owen Norris, has been working with the university’s educational film unit to put together a video on what it’s like to study the piano at Southampton.
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Celebrating women composers
Barbara Strozzi
Professor of Music Laurie Stras has been working on a programme for a special BBC3 event: Next Sunday is International Women’s Day, and BBC Radio 3 is marking the occasion with a weekend of programmes celebrating female composers, including live concerts and discussion panels, documentaries and debate. I’m taking part along with one of my Southampton colleagues.
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