A S H Smyth

SOSL New World Concert   Arriving at Ladies’ College at the seventh hour, game-faced and Chooty drawn, I was informed that the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka’s New World Concert was sold out.* While a few hundred rupees for an evening’s live music remains a pretty good deal, I have to confess this eventuality had […]

CMSC The Bach Concert 2010 When Glenn Gould said he’d take the music of Bach with him to the proverbial desert island he failed to specify which Bach. It’s fair to assume, though, he did not mean all of them. In a concert sponsored by – whom else? – the German Embassy, the Chamber Music […]

SOSL Première Concert Like a veteran sprinter in a distance race, the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka was quickly away, found stride of genuine grace and quality, travelled well, and then, all-too-predictably, weakened through the latter furlongs until eventually, but barely, making the finish. They came out of the gate with Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in […]

Understanding Music: Philosophy and Interpretation Roger Scruton Continuum, 244pp, £18.99 ISBN 978-1-84706-506-3 That any book might ‘appeal both to specialists of philosophy and musicology and also to the ordinary music lover’ is perhaps a little optimistic. In the case of Understanding Music, however, it is – through either authorial arrogance or editorial blindness – wildly […]