Diminutive in stature he may have been but Pierre Boulez was a titan of the musical world of the second half of the 20th century. Despite the relative paucity of his own compositions — at least completed ones — his influence over the course of musical history was enormous.
That influence has always been resisted in some quarters, not least because of his alliance with William Glock, Controller of Music at the BBC in the Sixties, a period when the cutting edge of the avant garde was in the ascendancy. But as the BBC’s Total Immersion day, marking the centenary of his birth, reminded us, his best work, in its technical ingenuity and expressive power alike, is incomparable.
