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PODCAST

Classical For Everyone

Five hundred years of incredible music. No expertise is necessary. All you need are ears. If you"ve ever been even slightly curious about classical music then this is the podcast for you.

music music history

All Episodes

01:16:19

Early Beethoven... From Provincial Pianist to Vienna...

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/06/06

Ludwig van Beethoven arrived in Vienna in late 1792 as a 22-year-old from the town of Bonn to study with Josef Haydn who was at the time undeniably Europe's most celebrated living composer. Beethoven also quickly established himself in Viennese aristocratic circles, securing patronage from nobles who recognized his extraordinary talent both as a virtuoso pianist and as a composer of startling originality. This episode is a collection of music from Beethoven’s first decade in Vienna.

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01:11:12

The Clarinet… In The Twentieth Century

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/05/30

This episode starts in Paris in 1909 and ends up in Buenos Aires in 1994… and the music includes a healthy dose of the influence of jazz. If you have a small voice inside saying this is going to be a little more ‘modern’ and a little less ‘enjoyable’, I hope you’ll trust me to prove that voice wrong… or more particularly that you’ll trust Clause Debussy, Malcolm Arnold, Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky and Osvaldo Golijov.

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01:02:30

Music for Small Spaces… aka ‘Chamber Music’.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/05/22

There’s no way around the fact that this entire corner of classical music is generally known by the term ‘chamber music’ but please don’t let that stop you from experiencing some incredible music… even if you find the term, as I do, just plain odd. This is music originally intended for smaller performance spaces… sometimes even just a dining room… and by virtue of that the connection between players and audience is more ‘intimate’. The music in the episode is by Phillip Glass, Ludwig van Beethoven,

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01:27:42

Stanley Kubrick’s Music… The impact of a well-placed...

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/05/17

No other filmmaker has used classical music to better effect than the American director Stanley Kubrick (1928-1999). Whilst composers did score some of his films, Kubrick frequently used existing classical pieces… in particular for 2001: A Space Odyssey, Barry Lyndon & The Shining. Kubrick’s choices are fascinating and did a lot to get classical music to new audiences. And, besides, how else could I get Schubert, Handel, Ligeti, Penderecki and two Strausses into the one episode of Classical For

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01:10:39

Antonio Vivaldi… So much more than changes in the...

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/05/08

If you have hit play for this episode then that means you are in that part of the population who have not been entirely turned off Vivaldi by the overuse of his deservedly popular set of violin concertos… ‘The Four Seasons’. I am glad you are going to join me for an hour of exquisite music… a concerto for two violins and cello, a mandolin concerto, a song from his semi-opera Andromeda liberata, a cello sonata, a section from his Stabat Mater for solo voice and small ensemble, and because it has to

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01:05:54

The Guitar… From Spanish Courts to Global Stages.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/05/02

This first adventure with the guitar on Classical For Everyone features quite a bit of music from Spain.. probably the country that was most closely identified with the instrument until companies in America popularised the electric guitar. But as well as Spain there’s music from Austria-Hungary, Italy and Brazil with works by Albeniz, Mudarra, Haydn, Granados, Rodrigo, Scarlatti, Villa-Lobos and Falla.

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01:09:08

Happiness… Music to make you feel good.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/04/25

Sometimes music can just be for pleasure and if that is the composer and the performers’ intention, then good for them… and good for us listeners. If most music is created to make you ‘feel’… then some music can just be to make you feel good. And from time to time happiness can be in short supply… and if that is the case then I hope the music I am going to play you over the next hour can at least give you a smile. In service of that objective… in this episode will be music by Beethoven, Rossini,

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01:10:15

Muses. Six people who have inspired great music.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/04/17

Much music has been inspired by love, passion or obsession… but only in a handful of cases has the person who was the inspiration… the muse… become publicly linked to a work. Here are the stories of six of them… Alma Schindler, Josephine Brunsvik, Kamila Stösslová, Peter Pears, Clara Wieck and Mathilde Wesendonck. And the music they inspired… by Gustav Mahler, Ludwig van Beethoven, Leos Janacek, Benjamin Britten, Johannes Brahms and Richard Wagner.

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01:04:26

Percussion. A loud episode.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/04/11

A percussion instrument is pretty much anything that can be hit, tapped, scraped, scratched or banged. In an orchestra it is generally the responsibility of the individual or small group of people up the back… the ones who get to make the most noise and have to master the most instruments and who, in this episode, help give us armies fighting on an ice covered lake, a peasant girl dancing herself to death, big gates, small rocks and a visit to The Overlook Hotel… with works from the composers

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01:08:57

Johann Sebastian Bach. An introduction in nine pieces.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/04/03

If you’ve ever been puzzled why once you scratch the surface of classical music the name Johann Sebastian Bach seems to just keep turning up… this episode might offer some clues… beyond the fact that the music is pretty good. With the assistance of The English Concert, Maurizio Pollini, John Eliot Gardiner, Wolfgang Rübsam, Masaaki Suzuki, Glenn Gould, Itzhak Perlman, Christophe Rousset, Helena Rathbone & Richard Tognetti.

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01:08:24

The Cello. Music as expressive as the Human Voice.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/03/27

Amongst all the instruments in the modern string family… violins, violas, cellos and double basses… it is the cello that most closely approximates the range of the human voice… from the lowest bass to the highest soprano and that may be one reason why it seems especially popular. Music from Josef Haydn, Ludwig van Beethoven, Edward Elgar, Sergei Prokofiev, Samuel Barber, Dmitri Shostakovich; and, to finish, something for solo cello by Johann Sebastian Bach.

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01:05:10

Farewells. Music for Partings, Journeys & Goodbyes.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/03/21

This episode of Classical For Everyone includes musicians slowly leaving the stage… lovers separated by the call of duty… music for beginning a journey… and music for a sad and very final farewell. A section of a symphony by Josef Haydn, eight minutes of a Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart opera, a Felix Mendelssohn overture, maybe one of the saddest farewells ever written… from Henry Purcell, and the Adagio For Strings by Samuel Barber.

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01:00:21

Not Dead Yet. Music from Living Composers.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/03/16

This episode is all music written by people who have the particular distinction of still breathing. I think it’s important to say that nowhere near all classical music is written by dead men from Vienna. One of the unintended consequences of a whole genre of music being called ‘classical’ is that associations with past eras can disguise the fact that exciting and brilliant new music is being written and performed every day and here are works by Jennifer Higdon, John Adams, Gillian Whitehead, Ross

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14:49

Mini-episode: Why is some Classical Music so damn long?

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/03/08

There’s a string quartet written by the American composer Morton Feldman in the 1980s that is about 6 hours long. ‘Einstein on the Beach’, the opera by Phillip Glass and Robert Wilson, is about five hours long and is performed without an interval. There is of course plenty of classical music that is well under these eye-watering durations. A Vivaldi concerto can be over in ten minutes… Samuel Barber’s ‘Fanfare for the Common Man’ is under four minutes and most Chopin Nocturnes are three to five

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01:02:51

Night… Classical music after the sun has set.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/03/02

This episode of Classical For Everyone is all about Night.. music that evokes the night… that captures the different moods of nighttime, and music written to be performed at night. Night in the Gardens of Spain, Moonlight over the Suffolk Coast, Midnight in a Chapel, Goblins in the bedroom, a walk in a deep, dark forest at night… a Nocturne… and a little night music. Sixty minutes of music by Manuel De Falla, Frederic Chopin, Benjamin Britten, Marc-Antione Charpentier, Maurice Ravel, Arnold

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08:22

An Introduction to the Podcast… with a little music.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/02/12

Maybe the place to start... An eight-minute overview of the podcast including some unfairly brief excerpts from music by Ludwig van Beethoven, Dmitri Shostakovich, Johann Sebastian Bach, John Adams, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, George Gershwin and Ross Edwards.

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12:44

Mini-episode: Why does the word 'sonata' keep turning...

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/02/09

If you're exploring classical music, you'll bump into the term 'sonata' everywhere - piano sonatas, violin sonatas, trio sonatas… even sonata-form. This mini-episode untangles the many meanings of this surprisingly variable word, from its simple origins in Italian to its complex modern uses. And suggests perhaps why composers keep using it when they want you to really listen.

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01:00:09

The Sea… When composers face the deep.

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/02/09

Composers have drawn inspiration from the sea for centuries but only with the rise of the larger orchestras of the nineteenth century did they get the palate needed to create fully persuasive depictions of it. So, apart from one piece for solo piano, major orchestral works are what you will hear in this episode... ‘The Sea and Sinbad’s Ship’ from Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s ‘Sheherazade’ an unfairly short interlude from Benjamin Britten’s opera ‘Peter Grimes’, the overture to Richard Wagner’s ‘The

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09:11

Mini-episode: Are conductors really that important?

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/02/09

Spend any time with musicians who play in an orchestra it won’t be long before they are sharing war stories of their experiences with dreadful conductors. The subtext of some of these conversations is a half-serious belief that the conductor is just a face for the poster, a body for fundraising events and a target for critics having a bad night… someone the orchestra could survive perfectly well without and, if anything, the performance would be better and everyone on the stage… and in the audience…

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01:08:23

Music from six remarkable composers... who just...

Classical For Everyone ·

2025/02/09

James Brown once sang, 'It's a Man's, Man's, Man's World' - and for centuries, classical music was exactly that. While talent knows no gender, opportunity certainly did, and countless musical voices were silenced by social barriers and prejudice. But some composers refused to be quiet. This episode introduces music by six women who found ways to make their voices heard: Fanny Mendelssohn, whose works sometimes appeared under her brother's name; Florence Price, who broke barriers as an

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65 results

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