Mena Mark Hanna, who became the festival's general director in 2021, has replaced longtime chief conductor John Kennedy with a new music director, Timothy Myers of Austin Opera. Kennedy said the decision "was no surprise," but the absence of a "caring, respectful transition plan" was disappointing. - The Post and Courier (Charleston)
Every note, every rhythm, every dynamic, every timbre, every expression, every slur: you must imagine it all to perfection in your inner ear. That is the job of a composer.” - The Guardian
"For 19 years it has been called Sage (Gateshead) after a deal with its donor the Newcastle-based software company Sage. But the tech firm wants an arena and conference centre being built next door to be called the Sage in a £10m naming rights deal." - The Guardian
The $300,000 quadrennial grant, like the MacArthur, can't be applied for, and candidates don't know they're being considered. Kantorow, now 26, is in illustrious company: among previous winners are Igor Levit, Kirill Gerstein, Piotr Anderszewski, and Leif Ove Andsnes. - The New York Times
The company's fourth general director, and the first to come from elsewhere (he had previously run Houston Grand Opera and Welsh National Opera), Freud will conclude his somewhat controversial tenure at the end of this season, two years before the expiration of his contract. - Chicago Sun-Times
Concerns have been raised that artificial streaming - where devices run chosen tracks on loop - is hindering the music industry, with JP Morgan executives estimating as much as 10% of all streams are fake, according to the Financial Times. - BBC
"The 42-year-old Dudamel has been music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic since 2009, a tenure that will end after 17 seasons when he starts in New York. … (He) will become The Oscar L. Tang and H.M. Agnes Hsu-Tang Music and Artistic Director Chair starting with the 2025-26 season" - AP
We have an odd situation. The slow tune is no longer dreamy music for couples, but sad, lonely music for the isolated and depressed. It doesn’t help that handheld devices, earbuds, and other pervasive technologies have turned music into something consumed alone, not communally as it was in past. - The Honest Broker
"The (opera), which will be written by the Ukrainian composer Maxim Kolomiiets, with a libretto by the American playwright George Brant, tells the story of a mother who makes a long and perilous trip to rescue her daughter, who is being held at a camp inside Crimea." - The New York Times
While he's still scheduled to conduct the orchestra's season opener on Sept. 28, he has cancelled all performances from late October through the end of 2023; he will undergo further treatment between conducting engagements for at least the first half of 2024. - AP
"The orchestra members voted definitively Sunday to reject the Philadelphia Orchestra and Kimmel Center Inc.'s 'best and final offer,' which came after three full days of bargaining. Eighty-five of the musicians voted against the offer, and two abstained. None voted in favor." - MSN (The Philadelphia Inquirer)
The census finds that despite high levels of education and training among professional musicians – 70% have a degree or higher, and 50% have a music degree – more than half the respondents have to cobble together a living through a variety of jobs. - The Guardian
South Dakota’s may plausibly be considered the most genuinely innovative, most inspirationally forward-looking professional orchestra in the United States. It is also the happiest professional orchestra I know, and the most engaged. Fulfilling Theodore Thomas’s credo, it “shows the culture of the community.” - The American Scholar
Apple Music is now eight years old, but there’s no indication that the business is profitable. They need strategies to reduce costs, and substituting cheap music for expensive music is the most obvious way of doing this. - The Honest Broker
The theatre, which had been a civilian shelter, is "a symbol of Russia's war crimes," says the city's exiled mayor. "To turn the theater into a tourist destination and to sing on the bones of the dead is incredible cynicism and disrespect." - The New York Times
