Classical Music
Christopher Rouse: 5th symphony (Naxos)
What Rouse wrote was an intimate series of love letters to the orchestra
Two lost composers
Feinberg / Winterberg: The lost works (Melism)
Ravel, Dutilleux, Debussy: Quart de nuit (Deux-Elles)
Norman Lebrecht is left wanting more Dutilleux
How I discovered classical music
Daniel Johnson describes the joy of indulging in music as a teenage boy
Alexander Zemlinsky: The Mermaid (Pentatone)
Norman Lebrecht breaks a rule in his review of The Mermaid
An essential record
Norman Lebrecht reviews Shostakovich: Violin concertos 1&2, performed by Alina Ibragimova and the State Symphony Orchestra of Russia
The sadder side of summer
Tragedy struck Gustav Mahler, the archetypal summer composer, in 1907
A path open to us all
Daniel Johnson reviews Wagner’s Parsifal, by Roger Scruton
Welcome to the unfrozen North
How Canada reinvented its musical prowess
Tapping into history
As soon as you enter Idagio.com you can kiss your working day goodbye
Boris the Innocent
The Johnsonian lexicon has yet to incorporate the word “responsibility”
When geek culture was good
A celebration of Spaced
Foul play
David Peace’s new novel is about much more than football
Is “progressive realism” either?
Weighing up the rights and wrongs of the Lammy Doctrine
Let’s leave the Commonwealth
There is no point in being a member just to be browbeaten about our past
Inflation and inflated expectations
To understand inflation, we must understand different kinds of inflation
Is Starmer the anti-Thatcher?
He does not have the right ambition and imagination
The West should stop indulging delusions on Ukraine
Ukraine cannot achieve its maximal goals
Disability is not an identity
Long before trans rights lobby, disability activists were denying biological reality
How the Tories can win again
The new leader of the Conservatives must reach an important, ignored sector
Perfect victims and a tale of two films
Don’t idealise victims — listen to them
