On the show, she played her own composition, “Dreams,” which was written in memory of her late husband, Phil, to whom she was married for 63 years. Phil was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2015 and passed away six years later. 

The finale of The Piano took place in Gateshead, where Newell performed “Dreams” in front of a live audience of 1,600, with almost 3 million watching at home.  

In October, she performed “Dreams” with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and conductor Mark Wigglesworth as part of Classic FM Live at 25 at the Royal Albert Hall. 

This performance, her Royal Albert Hall debut, can be viewed below!

“I first started sitting on the organ bench with my teacher when I was four years old and I just kept going ever since,” Newell said in an interview. “Piano has been with me all my life. It’s music, isn’t it? It’s music you can make for yourself. It’s opened the door for me for so many things.”

“I went into the RAF because there was a band, and I wanted to do music,” she explained. “I had to do an audition and that opened the door for me to carry on with music. My instrument there was a tenor horn though. I met my husband in the RAF … And sometimes we’d end up on the same engagements. I always used to say that he marched to my tune!”

“Because of arthritis in my hands, I cannot play what I used to — Chopin and Beethoven and Grieg. My husband Phil’s favourite piece of music was the Moonlight Sonata, but I have to adapt it to my hands now and it’s not really satisfactory. When he passed away, I went to the piano, because the piano has always been my best friend. I went to play, just to improvise, on the piano.”

“I was used to playing with a lot of people listening, as an organist, and then as piano accompaniment to different groups of singers,” she said on appearing on The Piano. “So it didn’t hit me until we were taken on to the stage in the auditorium, just with a grand piano sitting there, and I was thinking ‘That’s going to be me on there!’ The hosts were absolutely amazing though and made us all feel at ease. I never thought I’d win. I was so shocked!”

The post 88-Year-Old Diana Newell Makes Her Royal Albert Hall Debut appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The recital's program includes well-known staples of the violin repertoire such as Saint-Saëns' Introduction et Rondo capriccioso, Op. 28, Kreisler's Liebeslied from Three Old Viennese Dances, and Elgar's La Capricieuse, Op. 17. In a nod to her own Armenian heritage, Adamyan performs a work titled Nocturne by Armenian composer Edvard Baghdasaryan.

Hear the full performance below:

VC Artist Diana Adamyan won First Prize at the 2018 Menuhin Competition and the Khachaturian International Competition, and she has since performed as a soloist with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Kaiserslautern Saarbrücken, the Aspen Music Festival, the Boston Pops Orchestra, and more. A graduate of the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München and a former student of Petros Haykazyan, Ana Chumachenco, Pinchas Zukerman, and Leonidas Kavakos, Adamyan currently plays on a 1760 violin by Nicolò Gagliano on loan from the Henri Moerel Foundation.

The post VC Artist Diana Adamyan Performs Saint-Säens, Kreisler, Baghdasaryan, and Elgar appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

VC Artist Stella Chen is the inaugural recipient of the Robert Levin Award from Harvard University, where she was mentored and inspired by Robert Levin. Her teachers and mentors have included Donald Weilerstein, Itzhak Perlman, Miriam Fried, Li Lin, and Catherine Cho. She received her doctorate from the Juilliard School, where she was recently appointed to the College and Pre-College Division Faculty. She also serves as Visiting Assistant Professor at the Shenandoah Conservatory and is on the faculty of the Nume Festival and Academy in Cortona, Italy.

Stella performs on the "General Kyd" 1720 Stradivarius, generously on loan from Dr. Ryuji Ueno and Rare Violins In Consortium, Artists and Benefactors Collaborative.

The post VC 20 Questions with Violinist Stella Chen appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The winner of the 2024 edition was Anna Im. She is a laureate of several major competitions, including the Michael Hill International Violin Competition 2019, the ArsClassica International Competition 2024, and the Queen Elisabeth International Violin Competition 2024.

​A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and the Royal Academy of Music, Im has studied with Shmuel Ashkenasi, Aaron Rosand, and So-Ock Kim.

She has appeared as a soloist with the Stuttgart Philharmoniker, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, Baden-Baden Philharmonic, and Salzburger Solisten, and has been invited to festivals such as the Kronberg Academy Festival, Ravinia Festival, IMS Prussia Cove, and Aspen Music Festival, among others.

In 2024, The Violin Channel sat down with Anna Im to discuss how she prepares for a major competition and how it felt to win the Stuttgart competition.

She also discussed the challenge of remaining expressive while meeting the technical demands of the competition environment.

"It's easy to view the rounds as just another part of the competition, but it's crucial to see them as opportunities to express your music and believe in yourself, even under high pressure," she said.

"Doubts are natural; dedicated musicians rarely feel entirely ready. We need to do our best and let go of unnecessary worries. Letting go and not adding extra pressure on yourself is really helpful."

You can hear her performing Ysaÿe's Caprice d’après l’Étude en forme de Valse, Op. 52 No. 6 de Saint-Saëns at the 2024 Stuttgart Competition below.

The post Anna Im Plays Ysaÿe Performing at the 2024 Stuttgart International Violin Competition appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The company aims to offer an alternative to the cheaper bows that are often used in schools. These typically have the hair glued in, meaning the hair cannot be replaced. Students can purchase a more expensive bow, but then the rehairing process must be carried out by a trained luthier.

You can see how the bow works in the video below:

Even if the student is too young or doesn't feel able to carry out this process, it can be done swiftly by their teacher, eliminating the cost and effort of a trip to the luthier.

This system is also more sustainable than using cheap bows that have to be replaced regularly, helping slow the deforestation of Pernambuco and other precious woods.

The post New Bow Aims to Simplify Bow's Rehairing Process appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

Julian Rhee, recipient of the North Shore Music Festival's Arkady Fomin Scholarship Fund, is joined by pianist and Executive Director Angela Yoffe in this presentation of Lera Auerbach's 24 Preludes Op. 46.

Founded in 2010 by violinist Vadim Gluzman and pianist Angela Yoffe, NSCMF provides Chicago's North Shore with exceptional live chamber music performances.

The post VC LIVE | North Shore Music Festival Presents Violinist Julian Rhee appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The pair discussed Ma's new podcast Our Common Nature, which thinks about nature as a force that is "creative but also utterly destructive" and considers humanity's tendency towards those same qualities.

The project has involved a number of outdoor performances in nature, such as Ma playing a carbon fiber cello on a ship in the ocean.

On a light-hearted note, Ma also starred in a TikTok with actress Amanda Seyfried, lip-syncing a sound from the movie School of Rock.

@colbertlateshow Those that can't do, teach. And those that can't teach, go on The Late Show. #Colbert #AmandaSeyfried #YoYoMa #SchoolOfRock #MeanGirls ♬ original sound - colbertlateshow

You can watch Ma's full interview on the show here.

The post Yo-Yo Ma Performs on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The post VC LIVE | Minnesota Orchestra Dedicates Concert to Alex Pretti and Renée Good appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

Performing Liszt’s Les Préludes for 4 hands, Dutch pianist Martyn van den Hoek, who won the competition’s inaugural first prize in 1986, joins pianist Jean Dubé, who won in 2002.

The video of van den Hoek’s and Dubé’s duo performance was recently released in honor of van den Hoek, who passed away in 2022. The concert filmed in the Vredenburg Leidsche Rijn concert hall can be viewed below. 

The 2026 edition of the Franz Liszt Utrecht recently streamed live here on The Violin Channel. First prize with €25,000 went to Alexander Kashpurin, who was also awarded the €2,000 Audience Award. 

Martyn van den Hoek began his musical studies at the Rotterdam Conservatory before settling in Austria. Among his teachers was Josef Raieff, who was a late student of Alexander Siloti, one of Liszt’s favourite students in Weimar, Germany.

After winning the Liszt Competition Utrecht, van den Hoek continued to give concerts internationally, and from 1986 to 1991, served as a cultural Ambassador for the Port of Rotterdam. From 1998, he also served on the faculty of the Vienna Civic Conservatory. 

Jean Dubé, who won First Prize of the National Conservatory of Paris at the age of 14 under Jacques Rouvier, also studied with Jacqueline Robin, Catherine Collard, Vladimir Krainev, Rudolf Buchbinder, Murray Perahia, and John O'Conor. 

Since his win in Utrecht in 2002, he has recorded 50 CDs, with labels including Syrius, BNL, and Naxos, plus featured in several DVDs of concertos for French television and other international broadcasters. He has also been invited as a jury member for many competitions, including at the Franz Liszt Utrecht 2019.

The post Liszt Competition Utrecht Winners Perform at the 25th Anniversary appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

Music listening has previously been shown to lower blood pressure. This study, which was led by Vanessa C. Pope, sought to enhance that understanding by investigating whether individuals with high and normal blood pressure respond to music differently, and whether the loudness or tempo of the music plays a role in these differences.

40 subjects took part, half with high blood pressure and half with normal blood pressure. The participants listened to eight different pieces of Western classical music (with a 5-minute silent period between listenings), which had been adjusted to have different amounts of loudness, as well as faster and slower tempi.

While loudness was found to have a minimal impact on the listener, the effect of the different tempi was significant. The sped-up music was found to decrease blood-pressure variability for both groups — a finding that the researchers described as "unexpected," since it is often assumed that slower music will be more relaxing for the listener.

The researchers noted that the study only examined blood-pressure variability for "acute events" (i.e. short-term listening), and therefore, there is further scope for examining the effects of music on blood-pressure variability in the long term.

However, they speculate that the short-term physiological activation effect of music may help to explain music’s long-term cardiovascular benefits.

The post New Research Expands on Relationship Between Music and Blood Pressure appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The video also features two young artists: the Persian-Canadian countertenor Cameron Shahbazi and the French pianist Aurélien Froissart.

In the text of "Chera Rafti" (Why did you leave?), the song's narrator speaks of the pain of absence experienced when a loved one can no longer be present with us.

A graduate of Berlin’s Hanns Eisler Hochschule für Musik and the Franz Liszt Hochschule für Musik in Weimar, Camille Thomas has worked with mentors including Stephan Forck, Frans Helmerson, and Wolfgang-Emanuel Schmidt.

In 2017, Thomas signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon, on which her second album, “Voice of Hope,” featured Fazil Say’s Concerto for Cello and Orchestra Never Give Up — written especially for Thomas.

Thomas has worked with orchestras including the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Academia Santa Cecilia, Sinfonia Varsovia, Staatsorchester Hamburg, Lucerne Festival Strings, Orchestre National de Bordeaux, and Brussels Philharmonic, alongside conductors such as Paavo Järvi, Mikko Franck, Marc Soustrot, Darrell Ang, Kent Nagano, and Stéphane Denève.

The post Cellist Camille Thomas Records Traditional Song in Solidarity with Iran appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

Divi:de bows function like normal carbon bows. However, there is a small silver ring on the stick, and when this is unscrewed, the stick can be divided into two pieces. The frog can then be detached from the lower of the two pieces.

At present, the company offers five different models of violin bows, and cello and double bass bows are available on request.

The Violin Channel is currently giving away a Divi:de bow until Thursday, January 29!

"We felt the need to create the divi:de bow and the divi:de flight case, because we saw a very real problem that almost every traveling string player faces: our bows don’t fit into cabin-size luggage, and airlines are becoming stricter every year," Haffner told The Violin Channel. "As musicians, we are asked to be flexible, innovative, and mobile, yet our most essential tools were still designed for a world that didn’t include modern travel restrictions."

"The divi:de bow was born from the desire to give musicians freedom: freedom from stress at the airport, freedom from damaging or checking valuable bows, and freedom to travel light without compromising sound, balance, or playability," Haffner added. "We wanted to create a bow that respects the traditions of our craft, but embraces the realities of our lives today. So the motivation was simple: to solve a problem I personally experienced hundreds of times, and to offer a reliable, elegant, and beautifully engineered solution for musicians everywhere."

“The divi:de bow combines for me the long-awaited and desired seemingly impossible solution of the ‘too long and too heavy violin case’ problem and a great musical instrument,” said VC Artist Sergey Malov. “The response, playability, and weight distribution are excellent. The look is amazing. A visionary concept and masterful finishing. A must have!”

To find out more, visit Divi:de's website.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Noah Bendix-Balgley (@noahviolin)

The post These Travel-Friendly Bows by "Divi:de" Can Be Disassembled appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

Reportedly, nearly 40% of those living in Chocó experience extreme poverty, and only one in three people can read. Women and girls are particularly affected by these conditions: Chocó has one of the highest teenage pregnancy rates in the country, and domestic and sexual violence are widespread.

The donations will be used to fund the expansion of the Casa Hogar Niña María boarding school, which teaches disadvantaged girls from rural areas. Indigenous and Afro-Colombian girls are offered scholarships to receive an education, as well as a safe place to live.

At present, the school can only teach and house 15 girls, but with the donations, the capacity will be increased to 48 girls in the future.

"This concert impressively demonstrated what music can achieve: it touches, connects and inspires people to spread hope," said Dr Theodor Rüber, founder and 1st chairman of Casa Hogar Deutschland e.V. "I am extremely grateful that this special concert by the Gürzenich Orchestra with Casa Hogar cultural ambassador Anna Lucia Richter and other fantastic soloists has also resulted in a record amount of donations."

"I would like to thank our audience for attending the concert and making donations, which will enable us to support a special social project," said Stefan Englert, director of the Gürzenich Orchestra. "The Gürzenich Orchestra sees it as its duty to bring music to all people and to move them with sound. Music connects people, regardless of social and personal status, regardless of the culture and place that shapes our lives. We want to reach out to those who are not on the sunny side of life with the power of music and enrich their lives."

The post Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne Donates €45,000 to Women's Education in Colombia appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

At the center of the project is a concerto composed specially for Newman by Lucas Richman. The work aims to translate the stories of unsheltered individuals into music and reflects on the community’s moral responsibility to those individuals.

Both the concerto and the project can be easily adapted to different locations, allowing Newman to cater to the needs of homeless communities in each city he performs in. Each iteration of the project is conceived like a residency, with several scheduled events culminating in a performance of the concerto.

Most recently, the project has been in Bemidji, Minnesota, where Richman collaborated with the Bemidji Symphony Orchestra to put on performances for local provider organizations. These were held at Community Table, Bemidji High School Auditorium, and the New Day Center.

Alongside the performances, the orchestra also collected winter hats, scarves, and mittens to distribute to those in need in the Bemidji area.

You can learn more about the project by watching the trailer below and by visiting the Paths to Dignity website.

The post Violinist Mitchell Newman's Paths to Dignity Project Hosts Concerts for the Unsheltered appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.

The 2026 cohort of Rising Artists — comprised of violinists Bobby Boogyeom Park and Gabrielle Després, violist Katie Liu, and cellist Sydney Lee — will be joined by artist-mentors Arnaud Sussmann and Edward Arron to perform works by Strauss, Beethoven, and Dvořák.

The CMSPB Rising Artists Program provides emerging professional and conservatory-level musicians with performance, career, education, and community engagement development opportunities.

Now entering its second season, the intensive chamber music program will be held in Palm Beach from January 4–11, with a focus on collaboration and mentorship, and culminates with this concert at the Norton Museum.

To learn more about the program and CMSPB, click here.

The post VC LIVE | Chamber Music Society of Palm Beach Presents Rising Artists in Concert appeared first on World's Leading Classical Music Platform.