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CD Review: Black Money

CD Reviews

Black Money is an original project of band leader, pianist, and composer John McAll, who launched the debut recording in 2009. His following recordings in the Black Money series are Alter Ego, recorded in 2012, and most recently, Pass the Rainbow.

The first known recording of classical music made on wax cylinder – Handel’s “Israel in Egypt”

As It Happened Classical

Classical music has been enjoyed by audiences for centuries, but the ability to record and preserve these performances is a relatively recent development. The first known recording of classical music was made on a wax cylinder, capturing a performance of Handel's Israel in Egypt.

On This Day: Turandot Premieres (April 26, 1926)

On This Day

Giacomo Puccini's final opera, Turandot, premiered in 1926 at La Scala in Milan, Italy. The composer worked on the opera for several years before his untimely death in 1924, leaving the completion of the work to his long-time collaborator, Franco Alfano. Despite its difficult production history, Turandot has become one of Puccini's most beloved works and is regularly performed in opera houses around the world.

2MBS Fine Music Sydney Open Day Guest: Gerard Willems AM

News and Events Station news

One of our special guests for the 2MBS Fine Music Sydney 2023 Open Day is renowned Australian pianist and music educator Gerard Willems AM, a musician who has made significant contributions to the classical music scene in Australia and beyond.

Born On this Day – Barry Miles

Born On This Day Jazz

Barry Miles is a jazz musician from Newark, New Jersey, who has made significant contributions to the jazz scene since the 1960s. Born in 1947, Miles grew up in a musical family and began playing piano at a young age. He was soon drawn to jazz music, particularly the music of bebop pioneers like Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.

Born On This Day – George Benson

Born On This Day Jazz

George Benson is one of the most influential and versatile guitarists in the history of jazz music. Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, March 22 1943, Benson began his musical career as a young boy, singing and playing the ukulele. By the age of eight, he had already made his first professional recordings, and by the time he was a teenager, he had become a skilled guitarist, playing with some of the top jazz musicians of the time, one of which was Wes Montgomery.

Focus on the Words

Classical

Angela Cockburn introduces a new series on librettists. Starting in January and running through to June, in the first week of the month Treasures of the Voice will feature a series about the librettists – the wordsmiths that create the stories and the dialogue that keeps an opera or a musical moving right along while still being singable for the performers.

The female crescendo

Fine Music Magazine

Having gone to an all-girls’ school, I met a fair share of our species. Some were fierce, others mild and maternal. Pinned outside the philosophy club was a poster, known these days as a ‘meme’: I’m a female. Fe = Iron Male = Man Therefore, I am Iron Man. One doesn’t need to be a chemistry or Marvel Comics nerd to appreciate the mettle of women.

At The Opera – Rivals in Love

Classical Program Highlights program previews Programs

Adriana Lecouvreur is a four-act opera composed by Francesco Cilea with a libretto by Arturo Colautti. The opera premiered at the Teatro Lirico in Milan, Italy, in 1902 and has since become a staple of the Italian opera repertoire. Adriana Lecouvreur tells the story of the titular character, a famous French actress, and her tragic love affair with Maurizio, the Count of Saxony.

Aretha Franklin – An Icon

Fine Music Magazine Jazz

Born with an amazing voice, Aretha Franklin grew up surrounded by music, especially by her mother who was an accomplished piano player and vocalist. Franklin began singing when she was nine, and around this time began to learn the piano – by ear! Her life changed when she was 18 and she walked into New York’s Columbia Records to record with the Ray Bryant Combo. Even at 18 her voice was astonishing and powerful, although Columbia did not have any idea of her future. A year later in 1961, Franklin was declared ‘New-Star Female Vocalist’ in the DownBeat Critics Poll, a measure of general agreement for the jazz press.