At intermission during Die Soldaten an old friend of mine, a sculptor I've known on and off for (can it really be?) 40 years broke into a conversation I was having to ask an urgent question. She's not a classical music person, and had read in the program book that the score is 12-tone music. And what she asked was: Is this 12-tone thing the reason why the piece is so horribly bad? Well, no, it's not, but I was grateful for my old friend's honesty (and her curiosity and sense of fairness), because the opera -- for all its great prestige, and … [Read more...]


Recent Comments
Greg Sandow on Marketing the Met — a real strategy
So glad you like this, Katherine. And good to see you here again. The key to getting people interested, in...Katherine Giaquinto on Marketing the Met — a real strategy
Greg, this is SUCH a helpful post! I've been thinking lately about how to promote local opera to my movie-going generation,...Greg Sandow on Peter Gelb and the missing strategy
Neil, there haven't been socialites in the audience, not for years. They came only in past generations, in the 1940s. And...RedBear on Peter Gelb and the missing strategy
Who is responsible? The Board of Directors. Period. They hired a marketing exec. All the other major opera houses in...Neil McGowan on Peter Gelb and the missing strategy
>> Less glamorous. Less buzzy. << Y'mean they're about the music, instead of the socialites in the audience? I like this...