Archives for 2014

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="Dw2kz03C5Plz0J4UqPy9ulCq8rVbsK4W"] That's the title of the course I'm teaching at Juilliard this semester — a graduate course in how to speak and write about music. It began life years ago as a course on music criticism, but that seems to be a subject that engages students less and less. Speaking and writing about music, on the other hand — that the students think is greatly important. We had the first class in the course on Wednesday, and all but one of the students there said they were interested in the … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="2ewjJ5EZe2DHJieInCRNEHyCL0wnQMrq"] Hope you all had a restful, productive summer! I got back from vacation just over a week ago. Many trips, to see family, then a retreat for two weeks in a very remote and peaceful spot in England. A lot of traveling not just for us, but of course for Rafa, who’s about to turn three, but he’s a trooper. Pulls his little wheelie suitcase after him in airports, like a seasoned flyer. Plus, once in England, he walked three miles into town with us. And walked back. Well, got … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="3SE55aOIoN3oDysmDCeuVQDBh6jOiRne"] I first thought I'd write this post on Peter Gelb's two big failures. Or actually three: -- a prickly personality -- failure to look at things other than productions to make the Met lively -- and then, of course, the failure to make even the productions exciting Which last, as I now see it, maybe shouldn't have been a surprise, because in his previous position as head of Sony Classical, the big record label, his artistic initiatives weren't successful.  But I'll save all … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="tnz5eGrBYFXgMuBsVF7KM8c4QZcfwcPJ"] Deadline approaching, as most of us know — July 31. Armageddon day. If Peter Gelb and the unions can’t come to an agreement, Peter says he’ll lock them out. How much of next season could that kill? Since rehearsals have already started. My first thought is that they’re acting like kids at a playground. Not that they’re the only big-time players doing this in our world. Politics. Cable companies/networks. So my second thought is that Peter and the unions should just cut it … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="8eXbFCfAyvhMo76IakNCbXaPLdbhffgb"] I very much enjoyed being on the Diane Rehm show this week, with Alex Ross, Orli Shaham, and Fred Bronstein. And I'm grateful for all of you who said you'd listen, or who commented on the show on Facebook and Twitter. Certainly I understand anyone who wished the discussion had gone deeper, or that the cast of characters had been different. If I were putting my own show together about the future of classical music, I might well do it differently. And I'm sure Alex, Fred, and Orli … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="dQw6wtMfUOpoAEkFzb64xwYR5XCcOeNk"] This is happening tomorrow, Tuesday, 7/22. The Diane Rehm Show is a top NPR offering, broadcast from Washington, DC. I'll be in the studio, talking about the future of classical music with quite a distinguished group of colleagues — Alex Ross, the pianist Orli Shaham, and Fred Bronstein, who as CEO of the St. Louis Symphony helped pull the orchestra out of some difficulty, and now runs one of the leading US conservatories, the Peabody Institute in Baltimore. I think that … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="JtNvwUOYK69GvdLi2R9Ikdv7nqFKTN1T"] So much fuss about Peter Gelb, so many accusations flying! And not just from the unions he's locked in battle with. I'm late to this discussion, but what got my attention was Norman Lebrecht saying that Peter was not only wrong, but was lying — outright lying — when he says that attendance at opera performances (and at classical music events generally) is falling, both in the US and in Europe Lebrecht: This is untrue, and Peter knows it is untrue. The Lyric has just … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="6Noc77JdO5a3lVHeCLT9sJZdKxTcDFSs"] I use an app called TalkTo. Which, when I need it, is one of the most valuable apps I have on my iPhone. With it, I can text stores, to ask questions. Does the supermarket nearest me have a garlic press in stock right now? An answer comes within five minutes. Invaluable! Once, out at our country place, I needed to buy a MacBook Air in a hurry. Ten minutes with TalkTo told me that I needed to drive an hour to an Apple Store, because neither of the Best Buys in the area, which … [Read more...]

This is the second part of a two-part post, abridged from a paper in Artivate, an online journal of entrepreneurship and the arts. In the first part (where you can also read the reasons why we've abridged the version we're publishing here), Jeff Nytch set forth a problem: That far too often in the performing arts (and maybe especially in classical music), we expect people to come to performances because the performances are supposed to be worthy in and of themselves. And so we don't do anything to make the performances an experience worth … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="qiZ0zZXyVU8dA8tN3Eh9CMuKcMrZUavs"] From Greg:  Anyone who's read this blog will know why the words that follow caught my eye. They're about what a journal article I was reading called "the traditional orientation of arts presenting organizations (particularly, but not exclusively, “classical” music groups)." This, said the paper, might be expressed, “this is what we have to offer; won’t you come and see it?”.… To put it bluntly and in market terms: “you should want to buy this. [Now eat your peas!]” When applied … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="bD9WuwLfHFtS9NGa7KuhB7WC30LSfDk5"] Last week I went to a party, where I met a lot of people who are (1) precisely not the classical music audience, but (2) precisely the people we need to have in it: Smart, educated, intellectually curious people in (I'd guess) their 30s. The creative class, if you like, of Washington, DC, in 2014. I talked the most with a couple who were very savvy, and very involved musically, involved enough to go (even though they have a two-year old) to New York for a music festival. Of … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="OUIRG3CfYAXHKD1oEhkkfQCojdCcF1fR"] A thousand apologies. My last two posts, on ornamentation, had bungled links. Due to my misunderstanding of a feature in my FTP software. Very unfortunate, to offer you what I think are stunning examples of ornamentation, and then not let you hear them! But now the links are fixed, including my favorites, which go to Eva Podles's vocal fireworks, showing how an 18th century singer might have ornamented the da capo repeat in a Handel aria. And to three versions of "Ecco … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="DcLxR7KIv8h3t7Xd3l54sBypZSlRABsl"] NEW VERSION — LINKS WORK! I bungled many links in this post, for which I give so many apologies. Not helpful, to set out to show what ornamentation was like, and then block you from hearing it. Now it's all fixed. I also bungled the link to Eva Podles in my last post. And then bungled it again, trying to fix it here. Here it is correctly. Podles is singing "Or la tromba" from Handel's opera Rinaldo, giving a stunning display of go-for-broke virtuosity. And of how to properly … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar id="t2pbrH2KB3OBsaByIS6DZnVptkA34PE7"] Continuing my thoughts about how to make old masterworks sound contemporary. In my last post, I said what I think the problem is. At most classical music performances, the old works don't immediately sound like they come from the time when they were written. (Compare reading Dickens: One paragraph and you know what century you're in.) But they also don't sound like they fit anywhere in our current world. Or at least not in the world outside classical music. So one way to … [Read more...]