Music

When you hear music — or any rhythmic sound — it activates the portion of the brain that coordinates and times movement, the same neural pathways that regulate your running pace. While any upbeat tune has been proven to aid exercise, music timed so that you’re running in sync with the beat allows for a smoother experience. – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

“The good thing is that the actual material we are dealing with on a daily basis is fantastic — [some of] the best things humankind has ever produced.” So what are the problems? Two, Salonen says: “the grid” (the week-in-week-out subscription format) and the messaging. – The New York Times

David Patrick Stearns talks with the youthful 37-year-old composer about his new organ concerto (titled Register), the operas he’s written already, the massive amounts of music he’s churned out, and what he’s learned about his mental health. – The Philadelphia Inquirer

“Serebrennikov, the enfant terrible of Russian theatre, cinema and ballet, has been shuttered in his apartment for two years, accused of embezzlement in what his followers consider politically motivated charges.” But he’s now finishing his third opera staging under these conditions — an updated Verdi Nabucco in Hamburg. Thank heaven for USB sticks. – Yahoo! (AFP)

For Hollywood, classical music has become the trademark of villains. On screen, orchestral melodies accompany the meditations of mad geniuses and pouting serial killers. Norman Bates practices the Moonlight sonata in Psycho II. Sociopath Lou Ford relaxes to Richard Strauss throughout The Killer Inside Me. Alex Forrest, in Fatal Attraction, plots her revenge while listening to Madama Butterfly. – American Scholar

Composed in 1924, the ‘Andante’ melody had originally been scribbled by Elgar on a sheet of manuscript paper, which he signed clearly with his name. But for more than a century, it was hidden within the pages of a small black autograph book once owned by Lydia Tabb – a Barnardo’s charity fundraiser. – Express and Star

The CSO music director said, in a letter to the board of directors, “I hope that the board will remember that theirs is not a job but a mission, and that tranquility and serenity will be given for the artists to do their work.” The musicians have voted to go on strike if agreement on a contract is not reached by March 10 (i.e., by the end of this Sunday’s matinee concert). – Chicago Sun-Times

Peter Shannon, who was artistic director of the orchestra for all of its ten years, announced last fall that he’d be leaving his post at the end of this season. But the Philharmonic board said in a release on Monday that it had accepted Shannon’s immediate resignation last week. – Savannah Morning News

Orchestral music’s Mr. Maverick and the very avatar of Austro-German symphonic tradition are touring together, playing Mahler (on which they each have longstanding opinions and practices) and Charles Ives (which MTT says the Viennese players are really picking up). David Patrick Stearns talks with the conductor about how he and the Philharmoniker are getting on. – WQXR (New York City)

Most music copyright infringement cases are settled out of court with shared writing credit — and royalties — as it’s extremely rare for these types of cases to make it to a jury. When it gets to that point, determining fault can be tricky. – Washington Post

“Alexander Pereira, the Austrian chief executive and artistic director credited with bringing in more sponsors and creating a healthier balance sheet since his appointment in 2014, said the new board member” — Prince Badr bin Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Farhan Al Saud — “would bring in an additional €15m (£12.8m) over the next five years.” Saudi Arabia is, of course, in bad odor among many in the Western arts world, despite the Kingdom’s efforts to use culture to improve its image. – The Guardian

The opera company said the move had been prompted by a desire to “give audiences even more choice in the new season”, which will be announced in April. “This confirms ENO’s commitment to singing English, and allows those who find the use of surtitles distracting an opportunity to see an opera without their use,” chief executive Stuart Murphy said. – The Stage

“The statistics offer an eloquent answer. In the 2014-2015 season, only 1.8 percent of the music performed by the top 22 American orchestras was by women, according to the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. For the coming season of 2019-2020, the Institute for Composer Diversity at the State University of New York has surveyed 40 American orchestras and seen a slightly better number of 6.5 percent — perhaps reflecting a degree of consciousness-raising in the past few years, as well as a larger pool of orchestras. Orchestras, obviously, are only one part of the classical music world, but these statistics reflect an ongoing underrepresentation of women in the field that increasingly, but slowly, some are trying to correct.” – Washington Post

As one fan puts it, he’s the “ghost of Lester Young.” The irony is that he’s not that well known outside the jazz world. Nevertheless, he has hundreds of fans in social media, particularly on YouTube. He’s the saxman’s saxman, particularly for aficionados of Bebop. Moreover, he’s playing somewhere most nights; at the Seahorse in Sausalito; in the city, at Bird and Beckett in Glen Park, or the Deluxe in the Haight; or the Backroom in Berkeley, or the Sound Room in Oakland. 

The year was 1966. “It seemed full of promise. Houston, the vibrant, growing city that had become the center of manned spaceflight and medicine, and André Previn, the wunderkind Oscar winner who toiled in the world of jazz and classical music.” Then came the drop in ticket sales, and the disastrous tour. – Houston Chronicle

Unbelievably, the run of Sonja Frisell’s grand, gaudy, beloved (and reviled for its length) Aida is coming to an end this week as the Met updates Aida to be sleeker and, yes, shorter. Zachary Woolfe of The New York Times is going to miss the old one: “I love the ridiculous too-much-ness of that moment, with extras circling back into the parade again and again in different costumes, trying to convince us that this really is a cast of thousands. I love the flickering torchlight emanating from the chamber where the priests judge Radamès. I love the starlit Nile Scene, and I love the smoky temple rituals.” – The New York Times

Jackson died in deep debt, but his estate is worried about the new HBO film that gives voice to two men who have long accused him (and who had also, at other times, given statements defending him) of molesting them when they were boys. And the estate isn’t taking the threat lightly. – The New York Times

The singer, perhaps most famous for being married to (and now famous for his alleged abuse of) Mandy Moore, or for re-creating a Taylor Swift album, faced requests for refunds from so many fans that his UK and Ireland tour got canceled, but only after those requests were initially denied. – Variety

Well, it’s really called “spalling” — chipping and splintering by the brick, concrete or other materials on the exterior of the handsome theater, the US’s oldest opera house, now owned by the Philadelphia Orchestra and the venue (these days) for touring musicals, the Pennsylvania Ballet, and Opera Philadelphia. Peter Dobrin explains why it’s happening and what’s being done. – The Philadelphia Inquirer

Last year, the headache for this world music festival was that performers were either denied UK visas or found the process of trying to get them too tortuous to deal with. This year, organizers say, in addition to that problem, artists are afraid they’ll get to the EU but won’t be allowed to cross the Channel. – The Guardian

Netflix is not in the business of selling individual movies to many different customers. Instead, it’s in the business of selling many different movies to individual customers—in bundles. Bundled subscriptions allow Netflix to practice a different kind of price discrimination from the movie studios. The company doesn’t have to figure out how much a consumer values any individual movie on the service. The bundle does that for them—very profitably. – Harvard Business Review

Once she understood the training that goes into distinguishing such voices, she began to fully appreciate the difference in acting styles from what the audience might expect in a non-musical. Opera’s bend towards high drama can only be conveyed through vocal ability, which deprioritizes Turner’s acting preference of a more natural technique. – The Observer

“The Sarasota Orchestra, which has kept its supporters guessing for years about the possible location of a new concert hall, made a pitch to Sarasota city commissioners Tuesday night to build a new performance, administrative and education facility in the city-owned Payne Park. The orchestra … began discussing a move from its longtime home near the Sarasota Bayfront more than 20 years ago.” – Sarasota Herald-Tribune

The Arts Council of Ireland released details of its 2019 grants two weeks ago, and Wexford was missing from the list with no explanation or target date for a decision. “When this kind of issue is out there and nobody wants to say anything meaningful about it you can reasonably suspect that there’s something to hide. And when the Arts Council delays decisions it usually spells trouble.” Michael Dervan looks into what’s going on. – The Irish Times

Newly published research debunks the notion that listening to music can increase creativity. Its three studies suggest precisely the opposite, indicating that background music, with or without lyrics, “consistently disrupts creative performance in insight problems.” – Pacific Standard

Most complaints from orchestral musicians about hearing loss deal with gradual damage; this one involves “acoustic shock,” sudden damage caused, in this case, by a blast from the trumpets right behind the plaintiff during a rehearsal of Wagner’s Ring. A court found the ROH liable, though management is appealing; if the verdict is upheld, no one is quite sure how the industry can address the problem. Tim Bano looks into the issues. – The Stage

In a performance at the city’s St. Isaac’s Cathedral on Feb. 23, “Defend the Fatherland Day,” the St. Petersburg Concert Choir sang a cheerful little ditty about a submarine headed toward D.C. with “a dozen hundred-megaton payloads.” (A few days earlier, state TV had shown a map of the U.S. marking possible nuclear targets.) Said ditty was written in 1980 by a Soviet dissident and was intended (then) as a parody of militaristic propaganda; its reappearance now has causes a minor uproar. – Global Voices