It's good when something does exactly what it says on the tin. The new mobile app from Bachtrack.com, the classical music event-finding website, might just be the most useful wee classical music widget out there, for mobiles or for any other device. At the moment, you access it through your browser on Bachtrack's home page, but when Apple approve it, it will be a free app in iTunes. By radically simplifying the whole search process for concerts, opera, and ballet to the four essentials of What, Where, Who, When, the mobile version of Bachtrack is, I think, easier and more intuitive to use than the main site. It looks good, it's clear, and is as comprehensive in its coverage as the Bachtrack homepage.
I've got the odd gripe with some aspects of the interface – you can search for composers from Beethoven to Tchaikovsky, but not Dutilleux or Stockhausen, even when their works are listed in orchestral concerts – but the thing is slick, fast and will be genuinely useful when you're at a loose end in Bournemouth, Boston, or Bangkok and need some live classical music in your life. Until it's available as a straightforward app – in the store, you're going to have to wade through the gubbins of your browser to use it, but I think Bachtrack could be on to a winner here. See what you think – and let me know if you've found anything to compete with it for classical music listings on the move.
