Fine Music Magazine | Insider Articles & Features

Film composer Maurice Jarre

Classical Fine Music Magazine

The renowned French composer Maurice Jarre was known almost exclusively for his work on more than 170 film scores. Born on September 13, 1924, in Lyon, France, his early musical experiences were grounded in classical training. Against his father’s will, he enrolled at the Paris Conservatoire, where he studied composition and orchestration with Arthur Honegger.

Full Moon – CD Review

CD Reviews Classical Fine Music Magazine

Michael Tsalka and Diana Weston are both pianists and early keyboard performers: the subtitle of this album, Classical and contemporary music for square piano and harpsichord, indicates the focus of their attention. Roughly two-thirds of the program is devoted to music of the classical era and highlights the virtues of intimacy and clarity.

Matthew Ottignon – Hi Five

Barry O'Sullivan Fine Music Magazine Jazz posts

Saxophonist, composer, and bandleader Matthew Ottignon hails from New Zealand but is now firmly entrenched in Sydney’s vibrant music scene. His schedule brims with tours, soloist work, composing, and educational pursuits, consolidating his status as one of Australia’s most sought-after musicians.

CHUTNEY: klezmer-fusion music

Fine Music Magazine Interviews World Music

CHUTNEY is one of the groups of emerging artists supported by 2MBS Fine Music Sydney. Chutney has just released its debut album Ajar, showcasing its work and diverse origins. Merging classical tradition with music from jazz, pop, swing and musical theatre, CHUTNEY’s music has its own character that has led the group to perform, tour, teach and record to an increasingly large audience.

CD Review – O’Dear It’s O’Dea

CD Reviews Fine Music Magazine Jazz posts

Recording four extraordinary and energetic musicians live in a jazz club could have channelled raucous New Orleans jazz. But Chris O’Dea has created tunes with an essential gentleness, a contemplative stroll rather than a street march. Clever syncopation is matched with superb instrumental harmonisation.

Austria’s Bruckner: The timid master who dared

Classical Fine Music Magazine

Bruno Walter once said that Anton Bruckner had the good fortune to begin by finding God. Sometimes referred to as ‘God’s musician’, Tonerl, as his family called him, was born in Upper Austria near Linz, on September 4, 1824. He grew up a short, nervous man with country ways, was unsuccessful with women and sometimes irritated other people.

Hi Five with pianist and composer Wilbur Whitta

Fine Music Magazine Jazz posts

Wilbur Whitta is an award-winning pianist and composer of contemporary jazz. He is a graduate of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music and the Royal Academy of Music in London, where he studied on a scholarship for two years. Upon graduating with distinction he was awarded the Diploma of the Royal Academy of Music (DipRAM), a prize given for outstanding performance in a postgraduate level final recital.

The forgotten man of Russian music

Classical Fine Music Magazine

Russian composer Nikolai Miaskovsky never achieved the wide renown of his compatriots, but his compositions deserve a wider hearing. The music of Myaskovsky is a bridge between the Russian Romantics and the 20th century modernists.

King’s College Cambridge Choir

Classical Fine Music Magazine

In 1441, King Henry VI ordered King’s College, Cambridge to create a choir to provide music for the daily celebrations of the Mass in the grand Chapel. It should consist of ten secular chaplains, six ‘singing men’ and sixteen choristers.

Ferruccio Busoni: composer, teacher and dog lover

Classical Fine Music Magazine Michael Morton-Evans

You couldn’t miss Busoni wherever he went for, he was sure to be accompanied by his dog, and not just any dog.