Classical Music

A plain guide to the string quartet: its four instruments, standard four-movement form, Haydn’s role and the composers who followed.

What Mozart really left of his Requiem, who finished it, and which famous stories come from his widow rather than…

How the symphony grew from Haydn’s court and London works through Beethoven’s Ninth to Mahler’s enormous Eighth.

A plain guide to the six classical music periods, with approximate dates, key composers and tips for listening.

How a Florentine harpsichord maker’s experiment became the iron-framed concert grand, and why composers kept asking for more.

A plain-language guide to how Classical and Romantic music differ in structure, emotion, orchestra size and approach.

Five anchor composers, from Monteverdi to Stravinsky, give you a simple map of Western classical music with dates and landmark…

A plain guide to the sound of Baroque music: continuo, terraced dynamics, ornaments and drama.

How Beethoven’s Ninth reached its Vienna premiere in 1824, who really conducted, and the ovation the composer could not hear.