Jean Sibelius

Ten Spooky Classical Music Favorites for Halloween

It’s Halloween, and you’re looking for that perfect, spooky Halloween music that’s a little more sophisticated than “The Monster Mash” and “Thriller” and “Werewolves of London.” Look no further, friends. I’ve done my own hopping around...

10 Great Violin Concertos You Must Hear

The fun thing about really getting to know the violin concerto repertoire is that there are always more treasures to discover... The violin concerto repertoire is so rich and satisfying, I’m embarrassed to admit that, prior to becoming...

Finnish Perfection: The Sibelius Violin Concerto

There is something immoderate about Sibelius' Violin Concerto—something vulnerable and unspeakably beautiful, right there along something dark and brooding. The piece illustrates that not only do darkness and beauty coexist, they enhance each other... It’s complex, gripping, devilishly complicated,...

Sibelius, “Finlandia,” and the Cry of Freedom

In 1900, Jean Sibelius revised his patriotic tone-poem, Finlandia, and its popularity grew in leaps and bounds. Suddenly the world knew about Sibelius, Finlandia, and Finnish national pride... Jean Sibelius Jean Sibelius’ tone-poem, Finlandia, wasn’t supposed to be the...

From the Sacred to the Profane: More Music for My Desert Island

In truth, much of my favourite music is not sacred but profane, insofar as it is not overtly religious or in the least liturgical; and yet these profane favourites are certainly sublime, reflecting the goodness, truth and beauty of Creation, the harmony of the cosmos and the...

“In Memoriam”

Editor's Note: Jean Sibelius wrote In Memoriam (Op. 59), in memory of Eugen Schauman, a Finnish nationalist who assassinated the Russian Governor-General of the Duchy of Finland, in a bid to further Finnish independence. The work is a funeral march for orchestra. Sibelius composed a first version...

My Fatherland! Ten Classical Pieces About Home and Country

In an era of resurgent nationalism, it seems timely to present ten of the greatest classical music pieces written by composers about their countries. 1. Bedřich Smetana: Má Vlast (My Fatherland) Czech...

The Top Ten Greatest Violin Concertos

The violin concerto as a form of music has endured for some 300 years and remains, alongside the piano concerto, the most popular type of concerto played in modern concert halls and committed to recording....

Ten Scary Classical Music Pieces for Halloween

Great music pierces the soul...and can sometimes terrify it. Over the centuries, composers, like nearly all artists of every variety, have been fascinated by the subject of death and by...

The Ten Most Beautiful Classical Symphonies

"Imagination creates reality." —Richard Wagner Though beauty is an absolute reality, we human beings see through a glass darkly, and the space between objective beauty and our own personal taste can be fuzzy. Any list that...