BROADCASTS.com

The other day I received a press release about an intriguing album of keyboard music by 16th- and early 17th-century composers, three Englishman and a Dutchman, played on the modern piano by Mishka Rushdie Momen, one of this country\u2019s most gifted and intellectually curious young concert pianists. It\u2019s called Reformation, and before I\u2019d heard a note of the music \u2013 which is performed with thrilling exuberance and subtlety \u2013 I knew I wanted to interview Ms Rushdie Momen.\xa0
\n
\nThat\u2019s because Hyperion had included with the press release a strikingly perceptive essay by the pianist putting this ostensibly secular keyboard music in the context of what she rightly calls the \u2018vandalism\u2019 of the English Reformation, shockingly illustrated by the demolition of the great shrine of Walsingham. At the same time, she recognises the unnerving pressures facing both Catholic and Protestant composers in an era of bewildering and violent cultural upheaval \u2013 but also one in which we can glimpse\xa0 elements of toleration and compromise.\xa0
\n
\nHere\u2019s my Holy Smoke interview with Mishka Rushdie Momen, which begins with a track from her album: a little galliard called La Volta, danced at Elizabeth I\u2019s court even though the Queen knew that its composer, William Byrd, had remained faithful to the Catholic Church.