A Minute with Miles

Have you ever wondered why, when we’re feeling sad, or lonely, or downright miserable, we usually prefer to listen to music that somehow reflects our mood, rather than music that might jar us out of it?

If you like beautiful old keyboard instruments, not to mention beautiful small museums, I strongly recommend that you pay a visit to the Carolina Music Museum, in Greenville South Carolina.

For those of us who don’t play a brass instrument, watching brass players play always seems a bit like watching a magic show. We hear the French hornists, trumpeters, trombonists, and tuba players playing plenty of different notes, but the number of times they move their fingers—or in the case of trombonists their slides—doesn’t nearly add up to the number of notes.

Why have Verdi's operas stood the test of time, while those of his contemporaries have not?

If you’d like a remarkable example of the genius of Leonard Bernstein, I recommend that you listen – or listen again – to the song “Cool,” from West Side Story.

One of the reasons Mozart’s operas seem so profound to us is because they’re so true to life, and perhaps especially true to life’s complexities and contradictions.

The tools and techniques of conducting have changed a great deal over the centuries.

Louis Spohr isn’t one of those composers who fell into complete obscurity. But for better or for worse the majority of his works remain unknown to modern audiences.

Should we really care about the personal lives of the composers we admire?

Bach and Mozart died over two hundred years ago – – Is there anybody alive today whose music will be played two hundred years from now? It’s a tricky question.