Hey! Us Classical Folks Can Write Soccer Music, Too!

Tom Service gives his “pick of the football-indebted pieces you won’t be hearing on the terraces this summer.” Elgar wrote a chant for Wolverhampton Wanderer fans; Martinu did an entire symphonic piece, Half-Time, a Rondo for Large Orchestra; Mark-Anthony Turnage’s opera The Silver Tassie is about a soccer player. And there’s Michael Nyman’s Beckham Crosses, Nyman Scores.