Culture

A novel kind of music

So-called ‘classical’ music was as revolutionary as the modern novel in its storytelling, harmony and depth

Joel Sandelson

Folk music was never green

Don’t be swayed by the sound of environmental protest: these songs were first sung in the voice of the cutter, not the tree

Richard Smyth

The peculiar beauty of a song caught between composition and improvisation

3 minutes

‘Dun dun dun duuun!’ Why Beethoven’s Fifth sticks in the head and stirs the heart

5 minutes

To the tune of dystonia

One day, my hand stopped speaking to my brain. As a doctor and flute player, I had to understand this strange affliction

Lynn Hallarman

Fighting kung fu

From chopsocky films to disco earworms, Asian caricatures have proliferated since the 1970s. Can Hollywood kick the habit?

Stephanie Wong

Electronic gloves and even potted plants make music in a playground for sound innovation

6 minutes

As a pianist strikes a chord, visualisations of his notes appear in real time

5 minutes

Give the drummer some

As AI drum machines embrace humanising imperfections, what does this mean for ‘real’ drummers and the soul of music?

Jack Stilgoe

Enter the conductrice

Will a new generation of women on the podium perpetuate the tyrannical charisma of their male predecessors or overturn it?

Xenia Hanusiak

Nick ponders the life of the mysterious girl whose used CDs shaped his teenage years

5 minutes

Before the Beatles dropped acid, a BBC workshop was creating far-out sounds

6 minutes

Bad puns, regrettable costumes, and other joys of collecting kitschy album art

13 minutes

A musician and a storyteller collaborate in a daily duet of words and music

5 minutes

Absorb the infectious rhythms of Setapa – a joyous dance from southern Africa

7 minutes

Honouring the caribou, in dreams and memories from an Innu singer-songwriter

5 minutes

Songs of conquest

From Tallis’s choral beauty to the unnerving bells of Mexico City, early modern power created a whole new world of sound

Thomas Irvine & Christopher J Smith