PAUL DONOVAN is chilled by the contemporary resonance of Harper Lee’s coming of age tale amidst racism and white supremacy in this excellent production
Latest editorial
Album review: Africa for Piano and Orchestra / Symphony #2 'Nottingham' / Fantasia on Soviet Themes by Alan Bush
NICK MATTHEWS recommends a new recording of works by communist composer Alan Bush
GEOFF BOTTOMS recommends the unashamedly light-hearted escapism on offer in this stage version of the 1963 film
Full of mysterious religious references and radical sound design, the Scottish duo’s new offering is candidate for album of the year, suggests SIMON DUFF
MARY CONWAY revels in a powerful reminder that human lives are not defined by physical perfection
PAUL DONOVAN recommends the fine performances in this account of the pre-war meeting between the US president and the British king
TECLYN AROD relishes an intimate celebration of jazz improvisation that mixes local and national musicians
Just as Britain’s greatest music festival begins comes this release of the very first recording of a piece of music that was first performed at a Prom in July 1945.
It was composed by Alan Bush, later a victim of the cultural cold war, and that may help explain why Fantasia On Soviet Themes has taken so long to be recorded and released.
Bush, who studied under Frederick Corder at the Royal Academy of Music and in the late 1920s was a student of music and philosophy in Germany, joined the Independent Labour Party in 1925 and the Communist Party in 1935. He’s probably best known today as being a founder member of the Workers’ Music Association in 1936.
Similar stories
WILL STONE witnesses an experimental piano concerto inspired by the work of a young Jewish victim of the Nazis
From hunting rare pamphlets at book sales to online panels and courses on trade unionism and class politics, the MML continues connecting archive treasures with the movements fighting for a better world, writes director MEIRIAN JUMP
OLIVER SNELLING, a south London stonecarver and yeoman stonemason, relates how he is helping bring about a new festival next month
Including races at Newmarket, York and Ascot