May 2025 Obituaries

Our summary of some of those the classical music world has lost this month

Here are brief details of some of the people lost to the classical music world during May 2025. May they rest in peace. Please follow the links in this article or click on the images for further information.

Polish contralto Jadwiga Rappé died on 16 May 2025, aged seventy-three.

Jadwiga Rappé (1952-2025)

Peruvian tenor Luigi Alva died on 15 May 2025, aged ninety-eight.

Luigi Alva (1927-2025)

English conductor, bass, composer, arranger, editor and teacher Matthew Best died on 11 May 2025, aged sixty eight.

Bangladeshi musicologist Mustafa Zaman Abbasi died at a hospital in Dhaka on 10 May 2025, aged eighty-eight.

Mustafa Zaman Abbasi (1936-2025)

British composer, conductor and priest Ronald Corp died in Bath on 7 May 2025, aged seventy-four.

Ronald Corp (1951-2025)

French oboist and conductor Victor Aviat died from a brain tumour in Berlin, Germany on 1 May 2025, aged forty-two.

Posted 18 May 2025 by Keith Bramich

Read more obituaries from the previous month by following this link to our April 2025 classical music obituaries.

Read further recent classical music news items here.

The background image on this page has been derived from the 1896 oil-on-canvas painting Coastal View with Cypress Trees by French artist Henri-Edmond Cross (1856-1910).

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Formerly known as Music & Vision –
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Founding Editor: Basil Ramsey (1929-2018);
Editor: Keith Bramich