This was the first review I read of Jorge Bolet, March 1983 in Gramophone magazine. It was of the first volume of his Liszt series for Decca (the 1978 disc for L'Oiseau-Lyre, a Decca subsidiary notwithstanding). The reviewer was Max Harrison, and his review prompted me to buy the LP in Glasgow's HMV shop, in Union Street.

Happy New Year from the Jorge Bolet Website

Jorge Bolet: not Hungarian enough! Okay, the title might be what is known as clickbait , but I've been amused by this diary entry by a Hungarian who heard Jorge play some Liszt in 1981. She found the lassú (slow) part of the csárdás too slow. 31 March 1981, Bishopsgate Hall, London: lunchtime recital.  Since opening on New Year's Day 1895, the Bishopsgate Institute has been a centre for culture and learning. The Great Hall, in particular, was erected for the benefit of the p

The pianist David Wilde died on 23 October 2025. Although I never met him, I owe a great deal to him (as the video explains). See also this blog entry David Wilde, ‘magnificently berserk’ pianist and composer of The Cellist of Sarajevo Billed as ‘the 10-year-old Boy Prodigy’, he performed the Grieg Concerto at Blackpool, and broadcast it that year on the BBC Telegraph Obituaries 12 November 2025 ​David Wilde, who has died aged 90, was a thoughtful and dazzling pianist, thou

The great Austrian pianist, Alfred Brendel died at his home in Hampstead, north London on 17 June 2025. I was privileged to hear him many...

In 1983, I was in the audience of a masterclass in what was then called the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland). The pianist David Wilde was in charge of proceedings. I recall he wore a dark blue double-breasted suit jacket. Born 1935 in Manchester, as a boy he had studied with Solomon and his pupil Franz Reizenstein, who had also studied composition with Hindemith and Vaughan Williams. Wilde shared with cellist Jacqueline du P

Mattheus Smits recalls: 'After finishing my professional music education in Holland, I decided to continue my piano studies with a...

After leaving music conservatory [in Utrecht], I continued my piano studies in 1972 with the Dutch pianist Mr. Johan Ligtelijn, who had...

Jorge Bolet recalled by a Spanish friend from a meeting in 1981; I believe the friend to be Ramón Rodamiláns Vellido (Spanish, with...