I knew Robert Simpson’s name before encountering his music, first as the author of the still definitive biography of Nielsen, who was and still remains one of my Gods, and later as one of the most compelling speakers on Radio 3…
Thomas Rajna was an adventurous performer, an imaginative composer, and a truly endearing person…
My mother always used to say with a sigh, “I wish you could have known your grandfather”. She loved him dearly, and kept a rare full-face picture of him on her desk.
Read about a musical migrant who settled in Britain in 1790, living in London and Liverpool until he made Edinburgh his home from 1815 until his death in 1848.
Arriving at the Guildhall School of Music early in 1961, the old building by Blackfriars Bridge, I was directed to a room upstairs, where, after knocking, the door was opened by Peter Wishart surrounded by the delicious aroma of French Disque Bleu cigarettes…
