Album Review
An epochal violinist
Eugene Ysaye: Solo violin sonatas (Deutsche Grammophon)
Too formal for the pub
Mr Händel im pub: Baroque meets folk (Arcantus)
Unenticing overtures
Rautavaara: 3rd piano concerto (Bis); Overtures from Finland (Chandos)
Contemplating infinity
Franz Liszt: Transcendental Etudes (Steinway)
Delicate decadence
A tantalising selection of songs
New work, sounding old
A disappointing new collection
An unreviewable album
The music is beautiful; the context is not
No more than curiosities
Bruno Walter: String quartet, piano quintet (CPO)
An epochal set
Nielsen: The Symphonies (DG)
Music of the here and now
Valentin Silvestrov: Silent Songs (DG)
Five rules for governing
Use your power, bring back politics, extend your wings, rebuild your base — and govern in poetry
The scarlet letter
A touchy-feely Labour government must embrace the ugly reality of business
Lockdowns and the problem with science-based policy
Evidence in politics is great, but what evidence and to what ends?
Reboot camp
In the desperate hunt for stories, adaptations are now all-dominant
X scandal
The fault lay in the dirty minds of the viewers, he said
Why levelling up failed
We must think local in order to foster growth
The beginning and end of conversation
A catholic sift through humankind’s advent and our eventual, formative babbling and beyond.
Collapse of the cordon sanitaire
The success of nationalists is shaking European politics
Alan Bennett at 90
From the small screen to the stage, Alan Bennett has been the poet of awkwardness and isolation
Labour’s economic plans are a disaster waiting to happen
They won’t save the planet and they won’t save the economy
The case against “Zero Seats”
Despite everything, some Conservatives still deserve to win
