PODCAST · music
Classical For Everyone
by Peter Cudlipp
Five hundred years of incredible music. No expertise is necessary. All you need are ears. If you've ever been even slightly curious about classical music then this is the podcast for you.
Episodes
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Mozart Opera Overtures
Why Mozart Opera Overtures? Well, whilst they were not really intended to be stand-alone pieces they have in many instances become favourites of concert programmers and broadcasters, not to mention the public. And with most of them being about five minutes long you can fit eleven of them into a...
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Film Music
Who knew that Camille Saint-Saens of 'Carnival of the Animals' fame wrote the world's first film score? Or that the Pulitzer Prize for music has been given to only one work for the screen. Or that five composers, including the American music theatre legend Richard Rodgers, were approached for...
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Diving For Pearls – Part Two
[Please feel free to leap straight into this second part of the 'Diving for Pearls' episode but there's background information in the first half you might enjoy if by chance you have missed it.] How did the term 'baroque', the French version of a very old Portuguese word for a misshapen pearl…...
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Diving For Pearls – Part One
How did 'baroque', the French version of a very old Portuguese term for a misshapen pearl… which became an insult applied to complicated music… and was then rehabilitated as a description of an ornate style of art and architecture… become the term now almost universally used to describe music...
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Night and Darkness
It could be argued that Night and Darkness are sort of the same. The Night is Dark. That's kind of the point. But there are brightly moonlit nights and there are very dark nights; in more ways than one, and then there is darkness that is as black as night. So it's "Night and Darkness"… including...
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Frederic Chopin
I have been asking myself why it has taken close to a hundred episodes before I got around to one devoted to Chopin. When I was chatting with Claude about doing the episode he described my neglect of the composer as, and I quote, 'an alarming gap… genuinely startling given Chopin's centrality to...
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Germans In Italy
Let's be fair, this is a deeply flawed title. Why? Well the idea is to play music written by German composers when they were living in or visiting Italy. But in the 18th century… which is when most of the music comes from… Germany and Italy as we know them today did not exist. And to make things...
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Chamber Music Three + A Festival Conversation
In two earlier episodes I have referred to Chamber Music as 'Music For Small Spaces'. But if you search more broadly for that term you will come up with very little. If you want music for small groups of instruments often performed in intimate spaces then, in English at least, you are going to be...
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Felix Mendelssohn
In the latest episode of the 'Classical For Everyone' podcast… Scottish caves and rescuing Bach, becalmed boats and banking intrigue, Shakespearean fairies and a garment sellers' orchestra, a prophet in the wilderness… and a stolen statue. And… if that wasn't enough… eleven pieces of music from...
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Music For The Very, Very Young
A good friend asked if I could do an episode of music for her very young daughter. So, welcome to a bit of a Classical For Everyone podcast experiment. On the plus side for the intended audience… There's not a lot of talking. And the show is well under an hour. This might be balanced by the…
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Sunday Night Special … Camille Saint-Saëns' Symphony No. 3 (Organ Symphony)
The name comes from the night of the week when for some of us, the frustrations of insomnia hit the hardest… and because my preferred antidote is getting lost in some music. Of course this series is for everyone… but it is perhaps intended a little more for those of you whose sleep has been...
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Neglected Beethoven
Is Ludwig van Beethoven neglected? No, not at all. But with the well-deserved emphasis on his symphonies, a couple of piano concertos and a handful of piano sonatas and string quartets; there is another roughly eighty hours of music to explore. And in the same way that maybe Picasso, Rembrandt,...
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Not Dead Yet - Two
When a podcast is about five hundred years of music, there is going to be a reasonable amount of music from people who are no longer with us. Now if you combine that with the baggage of the term 'classical' then you can kind of forget that there is a lot of music being written, performed…
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Winter
Winter... Now if you are in the northern hemisphere maybe think of this as a form of aural air conditioning. But if, like me, you are near the bottom of the planet then the music will be bringing up sensations you are all too familiar with. I hope that wherever you are listening to this you are…
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Music For Pets
There may have been wine involved when the decision to put together a show of music for pets was first discussed. But when I was presented with art for the episode featuring a the surprisingly gifted cavoodle, Bob; it was too late to go back. So, music for pets it is. But I don't imagine you…
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The Other Russians
Who are 'the other Russians'? Well, I've played a fair bit of music by Russian and Soviet era composers in the show. Tchaikovsky got two whole episodes and there has been relatively frequent appearances by Rachmaninoff, Rimsky-Korsakov, Prokofiev, Stravinsky and Shostakovich. But there are a…
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Sunday Night Special … Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 6
The name comes from the night of the week when for some of us, the frustrations of insomnia hit the hardest… and because my preferred antidote is getting lost in some music. Of course this series is for everyone… but it is perhaps intended a little more for those of you whose sleep has been...
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Franz Schubert 1
He was taught by Antonio Salieri and his music was admired by Ludwig van Beethoven… but he enjoyed very little success in his short lifetime. It would take decades after his death for his music to make its way onto concert stages… and for him to become one of the best loved composers who ever...
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Pieter Wispelwey - Cellist
This episode features a living musician, still very much in his prime… the Dutch cellist, Pieter Wispelwey. So, what prompted me to choose him? Well, a few things. I've been a fan for a long while and have been lucky enough to hear him play a number of times over the last three decades. And about...
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Seville… Love and Dreams
Music from and about Seville, the city of Carmen's tobacco factory and Figaro's barber shop; the city of flamenco and fiestas; the city where more operas are set than any other; and the city where almost eight centuries of Spanish dominance does not seem to have been able to erase the sense of…
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Muses... Worth Repeating*
Much music has been inspired by love, passion or obsession… but only in a handful of cases has the person who was the inspiration… the muse… become publicly linked to a work. Here are the stories of six of them… Alma Schindler, Josephine Brunsvik, Kamila Stösslová, Peter Pears, Clara Wieck and...
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The Sea… Worth Repeating*
Composers have drawn inspiration from the sea for centuries but only with the rise of the larger orchestras of the 1800s did they get the palate needed to create fully persuasive depictions of it. So, apart from one piece for solo piano, major orchestral works are what you will hear in this...
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Maurice Ravel... Worth Repeating*
Maurice Ravel (1875 – 1937) is arguably the most beloved composer France has given the world… able to take classical and pre-classical forms, absorb the harmonic colours of Impressionism, draw on the dance traditions of his Basque mother's heritage, and infuse his later work with the energy of...
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Recent Discoveries Two
Recent Discoveries Two This episode is the second one called 'recent discoveries'. And that should only be taken in the very personal sense of 'recent discoveries' for me. Some of it is indeed recent but in addition to music written in the last few years, there are a couple of pieces that date…
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Before Dawn
Music for the hour before dawn. Which is in no way intended to be too prescriptive… the episode can be listened to any time… but I hope it is music that has a calmness and perhaps a contemplative tone that suits the hour when there is a glow in the sky, things are at their most quiet… and you…
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The Oboe
Time for some music from one of the oldest instruments in the orchestra. True to the Old French word its English name came from… 'hautbois' with 'haut' meaning both high and loud and 'bois' meaning wood… the oboe found its place as the earliest woodwind instrument through its high range and...
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An Exaltation of Bachs
Music written by people related to the composer Johann Sebastian Bach. That may seem an odd way put a show together. If you were to make a playlist of the greatest hits of people related to Taylor Swift, it would be a very short list. But if you ever wanted to get into a complicated debate about...
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Conductors 1 – Antal Dorati
Why a conductor? The outcomes of the complicated relationships conductors have with orchestras and ensembles, with record companies and the public; and with composers living and dead, are in themselves interesting… but for the purposes of this show it is the recorded legacy that matters and Antal...
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Sunday Night Special … Johannes Brahms' Symphony No. 4
The name comes from the night of the week when for some of us, the frustrations of insomnia hit the hardest… and because my preferred antidote is getting lost in some music. Of course this series is for everyone… but it is perhaps intended a little more for those of you whose sleep has been...
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Solace… Music To Hold You
I was listening to the conductor Joshua Weilerstein's podcast 'Sticky Notes' the other day. It was an episode on Ludwig van Beethoven's 8th string quartet. He was playing the second section and he described the music as having a sense of 'consolation'… and there was something about that which...
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Music for Shakespeare… Dreams, Lovers and Ghosts
The relationship between classical music and William Shakespeare's writing is one of the longest and most productive partnerships in the history of either art form. Composers have been drawn to Shakespeare's plays for four centuries and there is a vast amount of music to choose from. For this...
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Joseph Haydn: The Early Years.
Haydn's music is in no way neglected or forgotten but I wonder if, because he lived a long life, during which he achieved significant success and seemed free of personality disorders, he is a little taken for granted. The creative artist dying at the height of his or her powers, or never…
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More Brilliant Women.
I did an episode of music by women composers back in November based around a CD Box release by the record label 'Brilliant Classics' and called it 'Brilliant Women'. No prizes for imagination but it was clear and accurate. So, I am going to keep things simple and call this show 'More Brilliant...
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Mozart… Farewell Salzburg, Hello Vienna
Here is the third Classical For Everyone podcast featuring the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. I've done an episode on the music Mozart wrote in the last year of his life, 1791, back in June and one focused on 1786 last October. This one is still going to use the 'year in the musical life'…
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Sunday Night Special 7… Henryk Górecki's Symphony No. 3 – 'Symphony of Sorrowful Songs'
The name comes from the night of the week when for some of us, the frustrations of insomnia hit the hardest… and because my preferred antidote is getting lost in some music. Of course this series is for everyone… but it is perhaps intended a little more for those of you whose sleep has been...
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The Ballets Russes… Firebirds, Fauns and Fighting
Much of the 20th century orchestral music that today dominates concert halls and recording studios started as music for ballets. And the best of it started with the Ballets Russes company; which was largely the creation of one man… the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev. It is hard to think of...
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Beethoven's 9th Symphony
It's Classical For Everyone's 1st Birthday, so here's a personal favourite. This was the first time a choir and soloists had been added to a 'symphony'. Choral and orchestral music had been combined before but at the time there were quite rigid expectations of what a 'symphony' should be. That…
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Very Old (Incredible) Music
If from time to time you happen to listen to a podcast with the subtitle 'Five Hundred Years Of incredible Music' then it would be a reasonable expectation to hear some five hundred year old music. I've played a few pieces from the 1500s and 1600s but as you might expect the focus of the show has...
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The Music of Philip Glass
On the day this episode is released, the American composer Philip Glass celebrates his 89th birthday. In a career now lasting well over five decades he has somehow achieved two extraordinarily rare things for a contemporary composer of classical music... a prolific amount of creative output and a...
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Recent Discoveries
Only be taken in the very personal sense of… recent discoveries by me. Not that I actually discovered anything. In my ongoing mission to keep the production of CDs alive, I came across music I didn't know and thought that you, my fine listeners, might enjoy. Incidentally, I was chatting with my...
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Stormy Weather
Representing the weather with music is probably an ancient practice. In our earliest superstitions the percussive blasts of thunder would probably have been mimicked to either flatter or placate the spirit world. And perhaps whoever was organising the noisy tributes to the sky gods got something…
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Sunday Night Special 6… Cesar Franck's Symphony in D minor
The name comes from the night of the week when for some of us, the demon of insomnia hits the hardest… and because my preferred antidote is getting lost in some music. Of course this series is for everyone… but it is perhaps intended a little more for those of you whose sleep has been troubled.…
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Antonio Salieri – An Injustice Redressed
Antonio Salieri was born near Verona in 1750 but lived most of his life in Vienna. And in the 1780s he was possibly the most successful composer in Europe… writing the music for over forty operas. Later in life he taught Schubert and Liszt. He worked with Beaumarchais and da Ponte, and Goethe was…
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Sunrise (Music for The New Year)
Classical Music for New Years Eve seems to be dominated by nineteenth century Viennese waltzes and eighteenth century music for fireworks. All nice stuff but I wasn't after something for New Years Eve. I wanted music for New Years Day. And that led to thoughts about renewals, beginnings, clean...
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Music For Young People (and their grown-ups)
Sorcerers, Toys, Wolves, Volcanoes and Fossils. Music for young people… but why them… and why now? In some parts of the world people are having a bit of a holiday as this episode goes out… and you may have your children… or nephews, nieces or grandchildren lying around your home or stuck with you...
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Holiday Music (You Can Actually Listen To)
In this episode there will be an amount of Christmas music from the western tradition… which I think you might have to expect from a podcast with the word 'classical' in the title but this is not really a celebration of mangers, shepherds, wise men or difficult to explain conceptions… though I…
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Lullabies and Reveries
Music from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Maurice Ravel, Morten Lauridsen, Ralph Vaughan-Williams, Philip Glass and Benjamin Britten… chosen pretty deliberately for its calming qualities. I'm guessing that quite a few of you are balancing the joys and challenges of the holiday season. So if you just…
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Forgotten Vivaldi… and the Rescue of his Music
The title of this episode is perhaps a little misleading and it certainly contains a contradiction… namely, if I have a recording, and I can play it to you, then really, is 'forgotten' the right adjective? But it is, I hope you'll agree, a little catchier than… 'music from Antonio Vivaldi that...
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Sunday Night Special 5… 'Low' Symphony by Philip Glass
The name comes from the night of the week when for some of us, the demon of insomnia hits the hardest… and because my preferred antidote is getting lost in some music. Of course this series is for everyone… but it is perhaps intended a little more for those of you whose sleep has been troubled.…
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Young Brahms… before the Symphonies.
From playing piano in the waterfront bars of Hamburg in his teens, through the failed premiere of his first Piano Concerto, his fortuitous friendship with Clara & Robert Schumann, reviving the String Sextet… to writing a Requiem more about the living than the dead; Johannes Brahms created...
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Classical For Everyone have?
Classical For Everyone currently has 105 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Classical For Everyone about?
Five hundred years of incredible music. No expertise is necessary. All you need are ears. If you've ever been even slightly curious about classical music then this is the podcast for you.
How often does Classical For Everyone release new episodes?
Classical For Everyone publishes regularly with 105 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Classical For Everyone?
You can listen to Classical For Everyone on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Classical For Everyone?
Classical For Everyone is created and hosted by Peter Cudlipp.
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