ArtsJournal: Arts, Culture, Ideas

MUSIC

When A Singer Must Customize Her Song For Every Possible NFL Team Matchup

Carrie Underwood, winner of American Idol in 2005, has sung the musical opener for every game of Sunday Night Football for 12 years. “Underwood gamely sings each version before her, giving NBC options when it edits the song into the version that makes the television broadcast.” - The New York Times

As Terry Riley, The Father Of Minimalism In Music, Turns 90, What’s He Doing With His Life?

Riley’s “In C launched a maximal musical journey and one of the most remarkable in American music. If he was the father of Minimalism — or, more accurately, the affable uncle — he presented In C as a gift to the world, rather than a plan for action.” - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo)

San Francisco Symphony Musicians Authorize Strike

“(The move) escalat(es) a bitter contract dispute just weeks before the orchestra is set to open its new season. The vote, announced Thursday, Sept. 4, allows players to walk out if talks with Symphony management fail to produce a deal. The 2025-26 season is scheduled to begin Sept. 12.” - San Francisco Chronicle (MSN)

St. Louis Symphony Musicians Ratify New Four-Year Contract

“The contract, ratified a year before the current one expires, includes a $10,000 salary increase in the first year and at least 3% raises in subsequent years, bringing the musician base pay to $128,036 by 2030. It also introduces changes to night rehearsals, offering greater flexibility for the musicians.” - Fox 2 (St. Louis)

How John Williams’s Score Made “Home Alone” What It Is

Director Chris Columbus: “(It) not only propels the story forward but from a narrative standpoint, he’s taking the audience’s hand and inviting them inside that world. ... Certain film scores almost keep the audience at bay, but John manages to immerse the audience in the warmth, or the terror, of the film.” - Vulture (MSN)

When Minimalism Took On The Mainstream Classical Music Orthodoxy

There is a yawning gap between Columbia’s marketing—“Let magician Terry Riley float you on his tangerine carousel into a sunshine universe you might have dreamed of once when everything was easy and colorful and innocent”—and the still-reverberant utopian spirit of the actual music, infused with the composer’s lived experience. - The New Yorker

In Summer, The Center Of The Classical Music World…

It is a mammoth undertaking that involves about 3,500 artists; 1,000 staff members; 16 stages; and a budget of 75 million euros (about $88 million). This summer alone, there were six staged operas and four plays, featuring more than 1,500 costumes, including leopard-print hats and glittering Swarovski-covered masks. - The New York Times

Salonen’s New Creative Role At The LA Philharmonic

The creative director post is the first major initiative by Kim Noltemy, who became L.A. Phil president and chief executive last summer, and with it she proposes a possible rethink of the very nature of how a symphony orchestra might operate in the future. - Los Angeles Times

What Esa-Pekka Salonen’s New Jobs Say About Orchestras (And The San Francisco Symphony)

It turns out there are arts administrators — some of them right here in California — who understand the importance of innovative creative leadership. They understand that the key to attracting audiences in both the short and long term is to offer them something exciting and different and worth their attention, rather than warmed-over retreads. - San Francisco Chronicle

Met Opera Makes Deal To Perform Seasons In Saudi Arabia

The company has reached a lucrative agreement with the kingdom that calls for it to perform there for three weeks each winter. - The New York Times

Classical Music Is Expensive To Make. How To Finance It?

In the end it comes down to a simple question. Western classical music as a living art form – do we want it or not? If not, then that is, of course, our prerogative. - Engelsberg

Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra Names John Storgårds Its Next Music Director

The 61-year-old Finn, currently Chief Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic in Manchester and the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra in Finland, takes up his post in Ottawa one year from now. He succeeds Alexander Shelley, who departs next summer. - Ottawa Citizen (Yahoo!)

How Indie Music Became The Voice Of A Generation And Then Ate Itself

The real reason that indie started to die is Spotify. As streaming supplanted downloads and album sales, it automated music discovery. Instead of reading Pitchfork or asking a record-store clerk for recommendations, more and more people began to let algorithms suggest their next obsession. This had a variety of consequences. -The Atlantic

AI Is Changing Who Gets To Be A Musician

Generative AI, with its ability to spit out seemingly unique content, has divided the music world, with musicians and industry groups complaining that recorded works are being exploited to train AI models that power song generation tools. - APNews

Audiences For Met Opera’s Cinemacasts Are Down By Half, Says Peter Gelb

“Our audience globally is about 55% of what it was before the pandemic. We still have a significant audience. We reached countries across eleven time zones, but whereas we used to have over 400,000 viewers per broadcast, now we have around 200,000.” - El País (Spain) (in English)

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