Press Releases

MARIA MILSTEIN violin (BBT Fellowship 2016)

One of the most famous musical enigmas in literature, the fictional Vinteuil Sonata at the heart of Marcel Proust’s magnum opus, In Search of Lost Time (À la recherche du temps perdu), is the inspiration for a new CD featuring sibling musicians Maria (violin) and Nathalia Milstein (piano). There has been much speculation as to the origins of ‘the little phrase’ that not only bewitched Swann, the protagonist of the novel’s first volume, but also prompted from Proust the most exquisite descriptions of music and the elusive, ecstatic feelings it inspires. Sonatas by Saint-Saëns, Gabriel Pierné and Debussy and two songs without words by Reynaldo Hahn make up the CD and create the spirit of intangible memories and desires.

Two short films, of Hahn’s À Chloris and L’heure exquise, are also released online featuring the Milstein duo, filmed by UNIK ACCESS

Mirare MIR384 UK release date: 27 October 2017

View films here.

Listen to CD excerpts here.

Read press release here.

And congratulations are also in order (see below)…

SIVAN MAGEN harp (BBT Award 2012)

Sivan Magen takes every opportunity to demonstrate his unerring belief in the harp’s flexibility, powerful expression and dynamic range across a wide repertoire. BBT has supported the making of three short showcase films: two feature his own transcriptions of Chopin works for the harp – The Minute Waltz Op 64 No 1 and Mazurka Op 17 No 4 in A minor – while the third features Paul Ben-Haim’s Poème for solo harp, which will be part of Sivan’s new recital programme featuring composers variously inspired by folk music. The films are online now and were made by Culinar Videography.

View films here.

QUARTETTO LYSKAMM (BBT Chamber Music Award in Memory of Claudio Abbado 2016)

BBT made this special music award with the specific aim of nurturing chamber musicians in Italy where the genre is not as well supported as in other European countries. As well as a new website, photographs, audio and video material and a London showcase recital, BBT has supported the quartet’s travels and coaching for various events and competitions. The Trust is delighted that Quartetto Lyskamm has just won first prize at the 2017 Gianni Bergamo Competition for Chamber Music in Lugano, Switzerland.

BEATRICE RANA piano (BBT Fellowship 2016)

Fellowship winner Beatrice Rana was announced as Gramophone Magazine’s 2017 Young Artist of the Year at the 40th anniversary awards ceremony on 13 September. The citation reads: “Everything about Beatrice Rana speaks of maturity, from the playing itself to her modest reflections on it, and from her thoughtful approach to the music … to an attitude towards her career that essentially says ‘not too much at once.’”

AUGUSTIN HADELICH violin (BBT Fellowship 2011)

With this latest Musical America recognition, Augustin Hadelich adds another accolade to an impressive collection that already includes the inaugural Warner Music Prize 2015 and a Grammy Award in 2016. The tribute article, which will appear in the 2018 edition of Musical America, praises his “unambiguously emotional style, abetted by the lyrical, singing quality of his ‘ex-Kiesewetter’ Stradivarius from 1723 [that] affords audiences exalted performances from Mozart to the moderns.”

MARIA MILSTEIN violin

The Dutch Music Prize is the top award for classical musicians in the Netherlands and is given each year by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science to an artist who has entered an intensive course of development for a period of approximately two years. Moscow-born violinist Maria Milstein, who studied – and now teaches – at the Amsterdam Conservatory, is the first non-Dutch national to be honoured since the awards began in 1981.