• Home
  • About
    • Chloe Veltman
    • lies like truth
    • Contact
  • AJBlogs
  • ArtsJournal

lies like truth

Chloe Veltman: how culture will save the world

A Festival of Compositions for Conductors

Composers are always being commissioned to write pieces for particular orchestras, opera companies or soloists. Why doesn’t someone commission a composer to write a work especially for a particular conductor?

I’m not talking about works that feature the conductor as a “soloist” in any overt sort of way, as in John Oswald’s Concerto for Conductor and Orchestra or Dieter Schnebel’s theatrical piece for solo conductor, Nostalgie (Modelle No. 1.) I mean, a composer writing a work for full symphony orchestra with the particular personality and style of the person on the podium as the force that underpins and shapes the work.

There are so many charismatic conductors working today with strong, individual styles that would doubtless inspire great or at least interesting compositions. How about a festival dedicated to commissioning and premiering a few such works, in which one orchestra performs pieces written specifically for the likes of Gustavo Dudamel, Alan Gilbert or Marin Alsop?

lies like truth

These days, it's becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish between fact and fantasy. As Alan Bennett's doollally headmaster in Forty Years On astutely puts it, "What is truth and what is fable? Where is Ruth and where is Mabel?" It is one of the main tasks of this blog to celebrate the confusion through thinking about art and perhaps, on occasion, attempt to unpick the knot. [Read More...]

Archives

Blogroll

  • About Last Night
  • Artful Manager
  • Audience Wanted
  • Bitter Lemons
  • blog riley
  • Clyde Fitch Report
  • Cool As Hell Theatre
  • Cultural Weekly
  • Dewey 21C
  • diacritical
  • Did He Like It?
  • Engaging Matters
  • Guardian Theatre Blog
  • Independent Theater Bloggers Association
  • Josh Kornbluth
  • Jumper
  • Lies Like Truth
  • Life's a Pitch
  • Mind the Gap
  • New Beans
  • Oakland Theater Examiner
  • Producer's Perspective
  • Real Clear Arts
  • San Francisco Classical Voice
  • Speaker
  • State of the Art
  • Straight Up
  • Superfluities
  • Texas, a Concept
  • Theater Dogs
  • Theatre Bay Area's Chatterbox
  • Theatreforte
  • Thompson's Bank of Communicable Desire
Return to top of page

an ArtsJournal blog

This blog published under a Creative Commons license