Schubert Piano Sonata in A D959 & Moments Musicaux – Steven Osborne, piano

In his latest release, pianist Steven Osborne pairs Schubert’s penultimate piano sonata with the Moments Musicaux in a fine recording which makes a most satisfying “recital album”. ‘Who can do anything after Beethoven?’ the 31-year-old Franz Schubert wrote to a friend. Yet, in the last year of his life, he wrote three extraordinary piano sonatas,…

Monumental Messiaen: Steven Osborne at Queen Elizabeth Hall

Olivier Messiaen’s monumental and profound work Vingt Regards sur l’enfant-Jésus (Twenty Gazes on the Infant Jesus) is one of the greatest works in the pianist’s repertoire, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with such titans as Bach’s Goldberg Variations and Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas in terms of its scale. It is one of the most extraordinary and ground-breaking works in…

A Messiaen double bill at the Barbican

Messiaen L’Ascension Messiaen Turangalîla Symphony BBC Symphony Orchestra Sakari Oramo conductor Steven Osborne piano Cynthia Millar ondes martenot Wednesday 24th May 2017 The authors of ArtMuseLondon must confess to a certain fascination with the Ondes Martenot, that strange early electronic instrument which stars in Messiaen’s Turangalila Symphony. We first encountered the instrument at an earlier…