Damian Thompson

Damian Thompson is an associate editor of The Spectator

Pope Francis raises the white flag

2 June 2018 9:00 am

Just before Ireland voted overwhelmingly to end the country’s constitutional ban on abortion, Catholics in the fishing village of Clogherhead…

Mozart died too late rather than too early. Discuss.

14 April 2018 9:00 am

Glenn Gould used to say that Mozart died too late rather than too early. The remark was intended to get…

Remembering one of the best – and bitchiest – pianists who ever lived

3 March 2018 9:00 am

I’m unlucky with Beethoven’s Appassionata Sonata. Twice in the past year I’ve bolted for the exit as soon the pianist…

Momentum isn’t hard left. It’s a theatrical cult

27 January 2018 9:00 am

Hard left, my arse. Sorry to be vulgar, but surely that’s how Jim Royle, couch-potato patriarch of that glorious sitcom…

Prodigiously gifted but spiky: Nico Muhly

Composer Nico Muhly on drugs, cults and James MacMillan

25 November 2017 9:00 am

There’s a scene in Alfred Hitchcock’s Marnie in which Tippi Hedren is emptying a safe while a cleaning lady silently…

(image: istock)

Cult classic

21 October 2017 9:00 am

In Dan Brown’s new thriller, Origin, we are introduced to the Catholic church’s sinister far-right rival — a paranoid worldwide…

Make mine a double

14 October 2017 9:00 am

If two concert pianists are performing a work written for two grand pianos, there are two ways you can position…

Losing our religion

5 August 2017 9:00 am

Sir James MacMillan’s European Requiem, performed at the Proms on Sunday, isn’t about Brexit. The composer had to make this…

Beethoven: Missa solemnis

29 July 2017 9:00 am

When you first encounter it, Beethoven’s Missa solemnis can sound like the Ninth Symphony with more singing but no tunes.…

Evgeny Kissin in 1993

Kissin in action

17 June 2017 9:00 am

Is Evgeny Kissin, born in Moscow in 1971, the most famous concert pianist in the world? Probably not, if you…

The finest Wotan around: Latvian bass-baritone Egils Silins

Period drama

27 May 2017 9:00 am

Harpsichordists are supposed to make love, not war: Sir Thomas Beecham famously compared the sound they make to ‘two skeletons…

Mission impossible?

29 April 2017 9:00 am

Just before Peter Donohoe played the last of Alexander Scriabin’s ten piano sonatas at the Guildhall’s Milton Court on Sunday,…

Time to retire: pianist Maurizio Pollini at the Royal Festival Hall in March 2016

All’s well that ends well

25 March 2017 9:00 am

There’s a moment in the finale of Beethoven’s Appassionata sonata when the frenzied piano writing turns unexpectedly jolly. The late…

The plot against the Pope

11 March 2017 9:00 am

On the first Saturday in February, the people of Rome awoke to find the city covered in peculiar posters depicting…

The plot against the Pope

9 March 2017 3:00 pm

On the first Saturday in February, the people of Rome awoke to find the city covered in peculiar posters depicting…

Safe and sound

21 January 2017 9:00 am

This week the Southbank Centre began its ‘Belief and Beyond Belief’ festival — a series of concerts and talks claiming…

Safe and sound

19 January 2017 3:00 pm

This week the Southbank Centre began its ‘Belief and Beyond Belief’ festival — a series of concerts and talks claiming…

Safe and sound

19 January 2017 3:00 pm

This week the Southbank Centre began its ‘Belief and Beyond Belief’ festival — a series of concerts and talks claiming…

The trouble with Francis

14 January 2017 9:00 am

On 2 January, the Vatican published a letter from Pope Francis to the world’s bishops in which he reminded them…

Brahms’s benders

10 December 2016 9:00 am

‘Brahms and Liszt’ is a lovely bit of rhyming slang, but it doesn’t have the ring of authenticity. Can you…

Brahms’s benders

8 December 2016 3:00 pm

‘Brahms and Liszt’ is a lovely bit of rhyming slang, but it doesn’t have the ring of authenticity. Can you…

Brahms’s benders

8 December 2016 3:00 pm

‘Brahms and Liszt’ is a lovely bit of rhyming slang, but it doesn’t have the ring of authenticity. Can you…

Magnetic north

12 November 2016 9:00 am

Years ago, when I met a famous concert pianist, I was surprised when he greeted me in a northern accent.…

Magnetic north

10 November 2016 3:00 pm

Years ago, when I met a famous concert pianist, I was surprised when he greeted me in a northern accent.…

Magnetic north

10 November 2016 3:00 pm

Years ago, when I met a famous concert pianist, I was surprised when he greeted me in a northern accent.…