The Spin Doctor Europadisc's Weekly Column

The Ever-Evolving Canon

16th August 2023

However enterprising performers, broadcasters, record companies, audiences and listeners might be, there’s no getting away that classical music – like its sister disciplines in the arts and literature – is dominated by a few dozen ‘great names’. These are the Composers You Need To Know if you’re to be taken seriously as a connoisseur of great classical music. They are overwhelmingly male, white and dead (or, as the phrase goes, ‘Male, Pale and Stale’). They range from medieval and Renaissance masters to the present day,... read more

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The Return of the Composer-Performer/Performer-Composer

9th August 2023

However familiar the idea of the ‘composer’ of music – the person who thinks up and writes down the notes – is to us now, it’s a relatively recent concept. Until a few centuries ago there were just musicians who, as part of their occupation, wrote music for performance by themselves and their colleagues. Some of the earliest named composers in the Western canon – figures like Léonin, Pérotin and (a little later) Machaut – were essentially clerics whose duties involved making music for the greater glory of God. Additionally,... read more

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Building a Library: Practical Challenges and Motivations

2nd August 2023

One of the perpetual challenges of the privilege that is reviewing new compact discs on a regular basis is: where to put them all? Some reviewers have no compunction in giving them away, or even in selling them. However – and possibly this is the collector/hoarder in me talking – you never know when you might need to refer back to a particular item! Besides, so many are desirable recordings in their own right, particularly the ones we select for eventual review. Previously, we’ve looked at the problems and challenges of disc... read more

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Remembering Graham Clark (1941–2023)

26th July 2023

The death on 6 July of Graham Clark at the age of 81 has robbed the operatic world of one of its most outstanding character tenors. Born on 10 November 1941 in Littleborough, Lancashire, he began singing as a treble in the local church choir. After studies at Loughborough University and a period working as a PE teacher, he took up singing in earnest, studying with American baritone Bruce Boyce in London. In the early 1970s he joined the chorus of Wexford Opera, but his breakthrough role came with a 1975 Royal Opera House... read more

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The Human Factor

19th July 2023

The recent swathe of headlines about the challenges presented by Artificial Intelligence (AI), including the current strike by Hollywood screenwriters and actors, will no doubt give many in the creative sector pause for thought. And it might resurrect memories of the famous joke (or urban myth?) about the Time and Motion coordinator who attended an orchestral concert and concluded – among other things – that the number of violins could be drastically reduced as they were all playing the same music. (That coordinator now... read more

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