Renowned Chinese pianist Lang Lang is auctioning an eye-catching red grand piano on eBay. Funds raised from the sale, which closes on Thursday, will go to victims of the Sichuan earthquake via the American Red Cross. The piano, of which there are only two in existence and which measures 3 metres in length, was made by Steinway & Sons ...
Steinway & Sons, founded in New York by the Steinweg family of Germany, has been making pianos for more than 150 years. The company was so successful that in 1880 a Steinway Village (now Long Island City) was established, boasting a piano factory and facilities for its employees. Steinway Street, a major thoroughfare in the borough of Queens, is named after the firm ...
Queens is the largest and second most populous of the New York City boroughs and is home to the New York Mets baseball team. The team gained support from an unlikely corner when English comic novelist P.G. Wodehouse (1881-1975) became an avid fan. The writer, who was also a cricket aficionado, spent the latter years of his life on Long Island ...
Wodehouse's Jeeves stories were brought to life in a British television comedy series called Jeeves and Wooster, starring actor-comedians Hugh Laurie (as the wealthy but brainless fop Bertie Wooster) and Stephen Fry (as his valet, Jeeves). The pair had met and formed a double act while they were studying at England's Cambridge University ...
In June 1893, Cambridge played host to Russian composer Pyotr Ilyitch Tchaikovsky as part of celebrations for the 50th jubilee of the the university's Musical Society. A grand banquet was held in the Great Hall of King's College and the maestro was awarded an honorary doctorate of music ...
Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No 1 is one of the best-known and admired of all piano concertos. The piece was first unveiled in 1875, at a concert in Boston, Massachusetts. It was also the piece performed by Lang Lang on the red Steinway, accompanied by the New York Philharmonic, at a free concert in Central Park on July 15.