VIDEO PODCAST: Women Composers - Our special hour-long illustrated feature on women composers includes contributions from Diana Ambache, Gail Wein, Hilary Tann, Natalie Artemas-Polak and Victoria Bond.
VIDEO PODCAST: New Recordings - Find out about Adrian Williams, Andriy Lehki, African Pianism, Heinrich Schütz and Walter Arlen, and meet Stephen Sutton of Divine Art Recordings, conductor Kenneth Woods, composer Graham Williams and others.
VIDEO PODCAST: John Dante Prevedini leads a discussion about Youth Involvement in Classical Music - this specially extended illustrated feature includes contributions from Christopher Morley, Gerald Fenech, Halida Dinova, Patricia Spencer and Roderic Dunnett.
Latvian composer and pianist Pēteris Plakidis was born in Riga on 4 March 1947. He studied at the Emīls Dārziņš College of Music and then at Jāzeps Vītols State Conservatory.
He was musical director of Latvian National Theatre from 1969 until 1974. From 1975 he taught composition at the Latvian Academy of Music, and from 1991 he was professor of composition.
His Music for Piano, String Orchestra and Timpani won him a diploma at the All-Union Young Composers' Competition in 1969, and his Variations for Orchestra won the Latvian Great Music Award in 1996.
He was commissioned to write music for orchestral works for the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra.
Pēteris Plakidis died on 8 August 2017, aged seventy.