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Greg Sandow on the future of classical music

Generational change

October 17, 2008 by Greg Sandow

Tomorrow — Saturday, October 18 — I’ll have a review in the Wall Street Journal, about CDs I like a lot, Lukas Ligeti‘s “Afrikan Machinery,” and a self-titled debut from Gabriel Kahane.

What ties these CDs together is an intriguing back story, about the emergence of a new generation of classical musicians, with new ideas. Both the artists I reviewed have famous fathers, Ligeti’s being the Ligeti we all know, and Kahane’s being Jeffrey Kahane, the pianist and conductor who’s music director of the Colorado Symphony. And both artists combine classical music with non-classical styles, in Kahane’s case a healthy dose of pop. In fact, I don’t know any music that sits on the knife-edge between classical and pop as much as Kahane’s does. Which contributes to its artistic strength.

If the Journal puts my review on its free website (as opposed to the one you have to pay for), I’ll link to it.

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Greg Sandow

Though I've been known for many years as a critic, most of my work these days involves the future of classical music -- defining classical music's problems, and finding solutions for them. Read More…

About The Blog

This started as a blog about the future of classical music, my specialty for many years. And largely the blog is still about that. But of course it gets involved with other things I do — composing music, and teaching at Juilliard (two courses, here … [Read More...]

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