And so the circles of brutality resume their merciless course….. Will humanity never change its self-destructive, murderous, imperial urges ? Collective narcissism of the most ruthless, paranoid and evil kind. Surely the grimmest of ironies today is that Volodymyr Zelenskyy is Jewish ….. as is Benjamin Netanyahu Just now I cannot help reflecting on the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, living as I do where these tragic events occurred not so very long ago. I decided once again to read what I had written in my Polish book about this particularly valiant and frantic mo ..read more

  The Pigeon of  Peace in flight from the Cenotaph at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park This evening I have just arrived in Hiroshima in Japan from Warsaw on this is my first visit to the country. Such a long and tiring journey from Poland but worth every minute given the humanist aim. I intend to keep a daily internet journal of my experiences here over the next four days as part of an initiative known as the ‘Music for Peace’ project. Perhaps a few more personal observations as well. The concept brings together communities of differen ..read more

Click on photos to enlarge for a superior image One of the beautiful wooden formerly Orthodox (now Roman Catholic) churches in the remote Bieszczady region of  S-E Poland Below is an extract from Chapter 16  Vistula – Of Dragons, Martyrs and Lovers  taken from the book     A Country in the Moon: Travels in Search of the Heart of Poland by Michael Moran (London 2008)  In Poland I feel strongly surrounded by the atmosphere of religion particularly at Easter. During my first experience it was as though childhood religious feelings had bu ..read more

The young Maurizio Pollini The indiscriminate power of Nature has now claimed the soul of Maurizio Pollini, one of the greatest of legendary pianists. He accompanied me in sublime Chopin all my adult life in London and through Bach and innumerable piano compositions leading ultimately to the more inaccessible end of the music spectrum, the piano compositions of Arnold Schoenberg, Boulez, Nono, Stockhausen ….. Glorious, uplifting musical memories overwhelm me at this cruel, depressing and fraught time in world history  Sublime creation lies here, not destruction At such moments a ..read more

NIFCCD 146 Lessel, Haydn, Vorísek, Beethoven, Chopin (2023) I feel have nothing left to say about this magnificent, electrifying recording apart from the fact it is without doubt the finest period piano recording I have ever heard.  In my adopted role as music critic I have experienced many!  Here is an extract of my criticism of the Ritter performance in Stage II of the competition when he won the 1st International Chopin Competition on Period Instruments in September 2018 : Tomasz Ritter has had a distinguished career associated with both the harpsichord and the histor ..read more

 Eric Guo Winner of the 2nd International Chopin Piano Competition on Period instruments Warsaw, 2023 Fryderyk Chopin 214th Birthday Concert, Warsaw  1st March 2024 Photographs by Wojciech Grzędziński Eric Guo chose to play the infrequently performed Chopin F minor concerto arranged for solo piano by Chopin. Remember despite the opus number,  this was the first piano concerto Chopin wrote. It follows the Mozart model and was directly influenced by the style brillant of Hummel, Kalkbrenner, Moscheles and Ries. Schumann wrote of it ..read more

Eric Guo Winner of the 2nd International Chopin Piano Competition on Period instruments Warsaw, 2023                  Fryderyk Chopin 214th Birthday Concert at Żelazowa Wola 1st March 2024 Performed on an 1838 Erard The Dworek at Żelazowa Wola, the birthplace of Fryderyk Chopin, 1st March 1810 The Eric Guo recital at the Dworek at Żelazowa Wola, the birthplace of Fryderyk Chopin on 1st March 1810, is on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPiGYtSvCkU My review Variations in B flat major on a ..read more

Review of the recording by Eric Guo, winner of the 2nd. International Chopin Competition on Period Instruments. Warsaw 2023 NIFCCD 660    https://sklep.nifc.pl/en/produkt/77458-eric-guo                                                                                                          (photo Wojciech&nb ..read more

Eugen Indjic (1947-2024) I was so shocked to hear of his death shortly after waking this morning. A gentle and civilized man, warm, humorous, engaging, generous, a refined musical artist and magnificent pianist who had a profound understanding of Chopin. I was fortunate to have heard him in moving recitals and as a teacher in empathetic Masterclasses in Poland at Duszniki Zdrój and Warsaw. And he was only 76 ….. During his career he was successful in three piano competitions:  8th International Piano Competition Friedrich Chopin (1970) - IV Prize  Leeds Internat ..read more

 Today is the second anniversary of the eruption of yet another inhuman conflagration in Ukraine at the heart of Europe. A reminder, as if we needed it after World War II, of how little does humanity learn from history apart from the fact it repeats itself and that humanity does not learn from the past. The situation is worse now with another mindless conflagration in the Middle East. Our leaders in every country have lost moral direction and sense of truth. How I yearn for a man of Paderewski's charisma and his projection of the image of a moral beacon in the world. Rather than add to t ..read more