Sir Donald Runnicles studied at the University of Edinburgh and St John’s College, Cambridge, before beginning his career as a singers’ coach and assistant conductor in Mannheim, Germany. He has been

Music cannot work a magic spell. It can, however, do wonderful things. In recent issues of BBC Music Magazine, we have explored the benefits to mental health of listening and playing music, not least

Musical instruments have power, simply as things. They speak. They generate emotion. They tell stories about life, death, happiness and sadness – and about the past, which they can resurrect with curi

Is there a special sorcery in Seoul? Cunning creativity in Canada? Preternatural pizzazz in Paris? Oh, why do so many great pianists come from this or that country? We even have some in Britain; is th

Karishma Patel , a former BBC journalist, attended the counter march to the far right’s Unite the Kingdom rally

Daniel Johnson worries that an illiberal America and a war-torn, world-weary Europe are failing to champion our Western civilisational values of liberty, democracy and the rule of law