Features this month include summer reads for music lovers, the Limelight Artists of the Year for 2021, the transformation Simone Young will bring to the SSO, and Henry Handel Richardson's love of music and her treasure trove of songs.

In this month's features we talk to Barrie Kosky about The Golden Cockerel, run an extract by Leigh Sales from the book Well Hello, explore the role of music reviewers today, and examine the pleasures and perils of writing music for the screen.

QSO’s 75th year features classical favourites, works by 20 Australian composers including several world premieres, opera, film and musical theatre galas, and performances by international soloists.

The bumper October 2021 issue contains features exploring the Alice Springs World Chamber Orchestra, arts and the digital world, Max Richter's new album, Circa's classical collaborations, Henry Purcell's early years as a composer, and Australian dramatic soprano Marjorie Lawrence.

Guy Noble suggests ways of keeping busy during lockdown: maybe we need al fresco orchestras?

Features include the return of the opera Voss, the stage adaptation of Boy Swallows Universe, avoiding one-hit wonders in new Australian music, and a profile of Global Creatures' Carmen Pavlovic as Moulin Rouge! The Musical opens in Melbourne.

State Opera South Australia will perform The Turn of the Screw and The Barber of Seville in the remainder of its 2021 season.

We look at opera's love affair with wine, the Australian Chamber Orchestra's new project River, and Virginia Gay's emergence as a playwright. We also salute Paul Goodchild, doyen of Australian brass.

The centrepiece of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra's 2021 season, Part 2, is the ambitious, new Festival of Orchestra in November/December.

Rather than always expecting classical precision, it’s sometimes cool to be like Harrison Ford and make things up on the spot, says Guy Noble.

We look at Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina and why it has inspired so many adaptations, composing women past, present and future, and the piano works of an overlooked Australian composer lost and found.

Highlights this month include Sir Simon Rattle on Janáček’s Vixen, Paul Dean on his new “Symphony” for the Australian World Orchestra, Alan Cumming on Adelaide and ageing, and Amanda Harris on representation and cultural appropriation.