Tag Archives: popular music

To celebrate, to commemorate: A long weekend

Posted on 16 August 2019 by

It’s not as though music festivals are a new thing. The Proms will celebrate their 125th birthday in their current form next year, while the Bayreuth Festival is even earlier dating back to 1876. A programme for the “Dr. Who” … Continue reading →

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One small step…or 50 years ago (almost) today

Posted on 19 July 2019 by

One of my very earliest memories is sitting underneath the table in our living-room when I was a tiny child. It was the middle of the night, I’m sure I’d never been up so late before. The reason I was … Continue reading →

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Musical maps

Posted on 15 June 2018 by

A conversation with a reader the other day about street pianos led to me stumbling across this. Mapping the ‘Play me, I’m yours‘ street piano project, the site records the locations of street pianos past and present. It is also … Continue reading →

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Songs of desolation II

Posted on 8 July 2016 by

In last week’s blog post we looked at the popular music that was being published in Britain during the first half of the First World War. By 1916, songs published in the UK were moving away from the more militaristic … Continue reading →

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Up, up, and away

Posted on 18 September 2015 by

Purely by chance this week I came across Le Navire Aérien by Gustave Huot. This suite of pieces for piano has the most extraordinary cover – a bizarre airship consisting of a set of 4 hydrogen balloons and, unlike the later Zeppelins, … Continue reading →

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70 years ago today….

Posted on 24 May 2011 by

For those of a certain age it’s hard to believe, but Bob Dylan is 70 years old on May 24th, 2011. Robert Allen Zimmerman was born in Duluth, where he grew up listening to blues and country music broadcast out … Continue reading →

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And the winner is a London singer!

Posted on 16 May 2011 by

Just in case you didn’t follow my advice and tune in to the Eurovision Song Contest 2011 last week; I’d better tell you that the winner is a London singer, with a song written by an Icelandic-Swedish song writing trio … Continue reading →

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