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About this archive

This is a digitised collection of concert programme notes written by the British music critic Gerald Larner (1936–2018). Over a career of more than fifty years he wrote about classical music for The Guardian and The Times, and produced programme notes for orchestras, concert halls and festivals across Britain.

The music critic Gerald Larner — Gerald Larner (1936–2018)

Gerald Larner (1936–2018)

Born in Leeds, Gerald Larner studied modern languages at Oxford. He joined The Guardian as assistant music critic in 1962 and was its chief Northern music critic from 1965 to 1993 — a post once held by Neville Cardus. From his Manchester base he formed a long association with the Hallé Orchestra as a prolific programme-note writer, and with Lynne Walker ran the arts consultancy Edgewise, supplying notes to venues including the Barbican, the Wigmore Hall and the Edinburgh Festival. He also wrote a well-received biography of Maurice Ravel.

How the archive is organised

Each composer page gathers three kinds of writing: programme notes on individual works, often in several versions of differing length; essays & context; and source material — the working research files Gerald Larner kept while preparing his notes. Writing not tied to a single composer — concert programmes, pre-concert talks and wider essays — is gathered under Concerts & Essays.

The archive now holds the complete collection — every recovered note from Gerald Larner’s files. A number of entries are still being checked and refined.

Using the notes

The notes are offered for performers, students and listeners to read and use. They remain the work of Gerald Larner; please credit him when you quote or reproduce a note.

The archive is free to use, and always will be. If one of Gerald Larner’s notes has found a home in a concert programme of yours, a contribution towards the cost of keeping the site online is warmly appreciated — you can support the archive on Ko-fi.