by Virginia Lloyd | Jul 16, 2009 | Blog, Memoir
Having spent much of June in gumboots and raincoats, a large chunk of New York’s population streamed on to Central Park’s Great Lawn on Tuesday night to hear the New York Philharmonic perform Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony and Beethoven’s Symphony...
by Virginia Lloyd | Jul 14, 2009 | Blog, Memoir
A cellist from Manchester has successfully sued a venue under the Trade Descriptions Act for failing to provide live musicians at a “magical familiy musical”. Adrian Bradbury took his family to the Lowry Theatre at Salford, near Manchester, to see a live...
by Virginia Lloyd | Jun 20, 2009 | Blog, Pianos and pianists on the stage and the page
I just stumbled across this article from the LA Times about the declining sales of acoustic pianos, the rise in sales of electronic instruments and digital keyboards, and what it all might mean. According to the article, 105,000 acoustic upright and grand pianos were...
by Virginia Lloyd | Apr 17, 2009 | Blog, Memoir
Last week I saw Australian pianist/composer Barney McAll and his band – featuring the fabulous saxophonist Billy Harper – at the Jazz Standard in Gramercy, which is possibly my favourite jazz club in Manhattan. The space is respectful of the musicians,...
by Virginia Lloyd | Jan 19, 2009 | Blog, Memoir
What is it about the piano? At this month’s Sydney Festival (sadly the last one under the direction of the brilliant Fergus Linehan) a proliferation of piano-related events has brought into focus the peculiar ability of that instrument to appeal to high and low...