The title of this memoir is a clue to just how much, or how little, the author, the celebrated concert pianist and polymath Sir Stephen Hough, is prepared to reveal. Anyone looking for an account of “how I became a concert pianist” will not find it in this frank, witty and entertaining account of the…
Category: Book review
‘Return to Latvia’ by Marina Jarre. A profoundly moving memoir.
The late Italian writer, Marina Jarre (1925-2016) is virtually unknown in the UK. Two of her books Distant Fathers and Return to Latvia have been published by Vessel Press and translated into English by American writer Ann Goldstein. I have read both books and am now eagerly awaiting book number three. For those of you who have read, Distant…
Paul Newman The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man. A Memoir
Paul Newman – The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man is not a straight memoir as the title suggests, focusing principally on the man rather than the movie actor, whose star shone for many a decade over Hollywood till his death in 2008. Though his career was long, to some, his most enigmatic and most interesting…
“sensitive, intelligent and vivid writing” – The Ghost Variations by Damian Lanigan
Few writers can truly capture the physical and emotional experience of playing and engaging with music, especially complex repertoire like the Hammerklavier sonata. Not since An Equal Music by Vikram Seth have I encountered such sensitive, intelligent and vivid writing about music as Damian Lanigan achieves here. Added to that, a well-paced, entertaining storyline makes this book a thoroughly good read.
Every Good Boy Does Fine – A Love Story, in Music Lessons
Every Good Boy Does Fine, the title of pianist Jeremy Denk’s recently-published memoir, will be familiar to anyone who had piano lessons as a child. It’s a mnemonic of the notes e, g, b, d and f which sit on the lines of the treble clef – other variants include Every Good Boy Deserves Favour…
The Girl in the Green Jumper: The Story of Cyril Mann, The Forgotten Artist.
Set in London in the 1960s and 70s, The Girl in the Green Jumper, is both a memoir and art book written and compiled by Renske Mann, who for twenty years, lived with British figurative artist, Cyril Mann. In 1959 Renske van Slooten, as she was then, left The Hague for London. She met Mann the…
‘Distant Fathers’ Marina Jarre’s Classic Memoir
Having just put down Marina Jarre’s page-turning memoir ‘Distant Fathers’, I am amazed that I have never heard of her before. I am an avid reader of European authors but it seems that even in Italy where she lived, she has been forgotten about. All this will soon change if her autofiction is anything to go…
The American Art Tapes. Voices of Twentieth-Century Art
In 1965 English artist John Jones set off to the US, his objective, to spend a year interviewing America’s greatest artists. The resulting taped interviews provide the material for The American Art Tapes. It’s been a while since I’ve been so gripped by an art book. All of America’s key artists feature, and through them it…
‘The Piano: A History in 100 Pieces’ – a must-read for pianophiles & music lovers
It was perhaps inevitable that pianist and writer Susan Tomes would turn her attention eventually to the extraordinarily broad repertoire of the piano – her instrument, and mine, and that of countless others, both professional and amateur players. While her previous books have been concerned with the myriad aspects of “being a pianist” – from…
Alpha tale: Pete Paphides, ‘Broken Greek’
I am extremely late to this party, as ‘Broken Greek’ has now been in paperback for a couple of months. Back in 2020, its initial appearance was greeted by a chorus of rave reviews and widespread, well-deserved appreciation. It not only won the Royal Society of Literature’s 2021 Christopher Bland Prize, it was also my…
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