Gustav Mahler's Physiognomy "Mahler nevertheless perceived his Jewishness to be an encumbrance, even a physical disability. He told a friend that being a Jew was like having one arm shorter than the other. … His appearance was protean to an uncanny degree. Even people close to Mahler described him in contradictory ways: old, young, sickly, strong, pallid, swarthy." The Nation 06/24/09

email this story | Posted 07/02/09@09:13PM

The King Of Pop, On The Organ "Over the last few days, we've noted the many ways that homage has been paid to Michael Jackson, from sculpting him in butter to naming one's Ukrainian village after him. … Yet none of these tributes possess the grandeur of this church organ medley of Mr. Jackson's hits, performed by Robert Ridgell on Sunday at the conclusion of worship services at the Trinity Wall Street church." New York Times 07/02/09 (video)

email this story | Posted 07/02/09@09:01PM

Surge In Private Commissions Enlivens Concert Repertoire "[S]mall-scale commissions by individuals are becoming increasingly popular as new types of networks link composers with potential patrons. While many of these commissions arise out of private occasions, the resulting music is set to revitalize the concert repertoire for generations to come." Wall Street Journal 07/02/09

email this story | Posted 07/02/09@06:18AM

At Last, Some Good News: St. Louis Symphony Sees Increases In Audience And Revenue "Though the SLSO performed the same number of concerts at Powell Hall as it did in 2007-'08 - 109 - this season it reported a 15 percent increase in revenue: $5.57 million, up from $4.84 million. In addition, total attendance rose … [by] 7.8 percent. Between January and May, the orchestra played to seven near-capacity or sold-out houses." Riverfront Times (St. Louis) 07/01/09

email this story | Posted 07/01/09@09:57PM

A Grant To Keep Opera Alive In Orlando "United Arts of Central Florida Board of Directors voted to earmark $200,000 for a proposal to keep opera alive in Central Florida" - with a semi-staged opera-in-concert presented by the Orlando Philharmonic next year - "following the Orlando Opera Company's Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing in early June. […] The [ultimate] goal is for a new opera company to be in place when the $425 million Dr. P. Phillips Orlando Performing Arts Center opens." Orlando Business Journal 06/29/09

email this story | Posted 07/01/09@09:50PM

The New-And-Improved Alice Tully Hall? Not Everyone Is So Impressed Allan Kozinn: "I hate the new Tully Hall. To me it is everything Lincoln Center and its enthusiasts insist it is not. I find it corporate, sterile, claustrophobic and as acoustically arid a hall as I've ever heard. Similarly, everything now being said about the old Tully rings false to me." New York Times 07/02/09

email this story | Posted 07/01/09@09:39PM

Things Aren't Really That Bad At The Belgrade Philharmonic That newspaper ad last month offering the musicians' services "at weddings, funerals, baptisms, birthdays, divorces and saints' days"? The orchestra's music director says, "This was our way of drawing the attention of a broader public to the problems of the Philharmonic, to somehow present our financial problems in an absurd, Monty Python way." And it worked: "Within 36 hours a Facebook support group had sprung up with several thousand members … [and] the advertisement attracted a surge of support from new, younger music fans." The Independent (UK) 06/30/09

email this story | Posted 07/01/09@09:28PM

Skylight Opera's Fired A.D. To Direct Four Shows There "William Theisen, recently ousted as artistic director of the Skylight Opera Theatre, has agreed to return to direct 'The Barber of Seville,' 'The Marriage of Figaro' and 'Forever Plaid'" as well as one other show there next season. "Theisen said his decision to direct for the company in no way endorses his firing, carried out by the executive committee of the board of directors and managing director Eric Dillner." Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 06/30/09

email this story | Posted 07/01/09@07:44AM

New Artistic Director Hopes To Calm Troubled Opera Australia "[Lyndon] Terracini is expected to bring stability to the national company and wants to mend bridges. He is keen to see OA's former music director Simone Young return as a guest conductor when he programs his first season in 2012. He also plans to introduce Wagner's Ring cycle into the repertory, commission new Australian work, forge closer ties with arts festivals and develop 'a family' of young composers." The Age (Melbourne) 07/01/09

email this story | Posted 06/30/09@09:50PM

Fabio Luisi Named Next Generalmusikdirektor In Zurich "The Zurich Opera has named noted Italian conductor Fabio Luisi as its next general music director starting in 2012. Luisi, the current director of Dresden's Semperoper, on Tuesday welcomed his appointment at a 'wonderful house with an exceptional orchestra.'" He succeeds Franz Welser-Möst, the Cleveland Orchestra's music director, who leaves Zurich for the Vienna State Opera in 2010. AP 06/30/09

email this story | Posted 06/30/09@09:44PM

Met Opera Strikes Money-Saving Agreement With Stagehands "The Metropolitan Opera and stagehands' union Local One have struck a deal, postponing a promised salary increase this summer in exchange for an extra year on the current contract, with the raise to come a year from now." Variety 06/30/09

email this story | Posted 06/30/09@09:31PM

Vibe Magazine Abruptly Shuts Down The soul/hip-hop equivalent of Rolling Stone revealed its demise without warning on Tuesday. "In a memo to staff members announcing the closure, Steve Aaron, chief of the Vibe Media Group, wrote that for months, the company tried in vain to either find new investors or 'to restructure the huge debt on our small company.'" New York Times 06/30/09

email this story | Posted 06/30/09@09:26PM

No More Vibe? Not So Fast, Says Quincy Jones The music mogul, who founded Vibe in 1993, says, "I'm trying to buy my magazine back now. … They just messed my magazine all up, but I'm gonna get it back. You better believe it, I'm'a take it online because print and all that stuff is over." EbonyJet.com 06/30/09

email this story | Posted 06/30/09@09:25PM

To Survive, Skylight Opera May Need Aid Of A.D. It Fired "The Skylight Opera Theatre continues to stagger under the weight of the public relations disaster in the wake of the firing of artistic director Bill Theisen on June 16. The social media, letter writing and e-mail campaigns to reverse that decision have maintained momentum." The company's only hope may rest in the man it fired, if he chooses to help it. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 06/29/09

email this story | Posted 06/30/09@06:51AM

Western Classical Music Finds Exuberant Embrace In China "Western classical music, banned in Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution of 1966-76, has exploded in popularity. Just as its government is opening economically to the West, China is emerging as an international power in classical music. Millions study the piano and string instruments, and many of the world's most popular classical soloists are Chinese...." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 06/28/09

email this story | Posted 06/29/09@06:16PM

Make Music Festival On A Global Scale On June 21st "New York joined more than three hundred cities--including Montevideo, Djibouti, Kabul, Hanoi, and Sydney--in celebrating Make Music, a global sonic bacchanal that takes place each year on the summer solstice. The ritual began in France, in 1982..." The New Yorker 06/29/09

email this story | Posted 06/29/09@04:14AM

Funding Cuts Imperil Charlotte Symphony "When the Arts & Science Council decides on the orchestra's grant sometime after Aug. 31, the reduction might be as much $1.75 million - a 90 percent cut. That would equal nearly a quarter of the orchestra's budget this season. For the orchestra, closing that gap while contending with the recession's other blows would be a superhuman task." Charlotte Observer 06/27/09

email this story | Posted 06/28/09@07:30PM

The Live Concert Was Supposed To Die. Instead... "Part of the thrill of being present at a great concert is knowing that it's happening in this place and time, among these people, and can never be experienced the same way again. It's both a celebration of singularity and a reminder that life is finite and lived in one direction only." The Globe & Mail (Canada) 06/27/09

email this story | Posted 06/28/09@01:01PM

What Has Happened To The Art Of Writing About Music? "Whereas music writing was once the province of a few hundred thousand fans and a handful of writers, usually in specialised magazines, it's now in the bookshop, the red-top and "quality" press, the blogosphere and beyond. The result too often suggests a very modern combination of abundance and short weight. To put it another way: how is it that writing about music now is everywhere, and yet seems to be nowhere at all?" The Guardian (UK) 06/27/09

email this story | Posted 06/28/09@07:39AM

Royal Opera House Hits Snag In Northern Plans "Before the curtain has even gone up, the proposed scheme to create a permanent new base for the Royal Opera House (ROH) in Manchester has run into trouble." The Independent (UK) 06/27/09

email this story | Posted 06/28/09@07:27AM

Oldest Musical Instrument, A 35,000-Year-Old Flute, Found In Germany "Archaeologists Wednesday reported the discovery last fall of a bone flute and two fragments of ivory flutes that they said represented the earliest known flowering of music-making in Stone Age culture." The instrument "was uncovered in sediments a few feet away from the carved figurine of a busty, nude woman, also around 35,000 years old." New York Times 06/25/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@09:57PM

Louis XVI's Opera House At Versailles To Reopen Following Renovation "The 652-seat opera house, which will reopen September 21, was closed in 2007 to overhaul the heating and electricity systems and refurbish technical warehousing at an overall cost of 13 million euros (18 million dollars). Built essentially of wood, it was inaugurated in 1770 for the wedding of then-to-be King Louis XVI." Agence France-Presse 06/18/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@09:43PM

Gergiev Launches New Label For Mariinsky Theatre "I have the good fortune to be able to rely on a large organization, the Mariinsky Theatre, whose label is more a tool for influence than a business venture. So I can put together all the projects that I want, without constraint." Qobuz.com 06/17/09 (in French)

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@09:05PM

Royal Opera House's Manchester Move Hits A Big Bump "Plans for a £100 million outpost of the Royal Opera House in the North West suffered a potentially serious setback yesterday when one of Manchester's leading arts complexes said a new opera house in the city would 'destroy' it. Rod Aldridge, chairman of the trustees at The Lowry, said that the proposed venture would be 'bad for the city, bad for the arts and bad for the taxpayer'." The Times (UK) 06/25/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@07:10AM

Skylight Says Eliminating A.D. Wasn't A Longtime Scheme "Officials of the Skylight Opera Theatre came to the Journal Sentinel Wednesday, to comment on the company's financial condition and the hotly controversial firing of artistic director Bill Theisen and other[s] last week. Much more to come on this," but one thing they said was that "[n]o one dreamed, when [managing director Eric Dillner] was hired a little over a year ago, that he would take on the duties of artistic director." Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 06/24/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@06:42AM

Finding, And Sustaining, A New Trajectory For City Opera It's up to New York City Opera's new general manager, George Steel, to hoist the troubled company out of the ditch. "Given the extreme limitations under which City Opera is now operating, the choices Mr. Steel made in creating this tiny, last-minute season demonstrate a positive strategic spin.... It's a more sensible course than [Gerard] Mortier's wholesale reinvention." Wall Street Journal 06/25/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@05:49AM

City Opera Could Take A Lesson From ENO's Troubles "This is the tale of two city operas, both of which present high art at popular prices. That innate contradiction has landed them in trouble, but where English National Opera in London has turned around its fortunes in the past year to enjoy acclaim, New York City Opera faces a rump season that may be its last. Yet such is City Opera's insularity these days that it seems to have learned nothing from ENO's near collapse. Let's see if we can help." Bloomberg 06/25/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@05:16AM

Boston Symphony Lays Off 10 Staffers "The Boston Symphony Orchestra confirmed today that 10 employees are being laid off, from departments including development and public relations. ... The layoffs follow a staff hiring freeze instituted in December 2008 and the cancellation in April of a European tour the BSO had scheduled for 2010." Boston Globe 06/24/09

email this story | Posted 06/25/09@05:05AM

Gergiev Hires Hot Young Director To Restage Mariinsky Ring The company's version of Wagner's tetralogy, which has been touring the world for several years, has had no credited stage director; critics far and wide have made note of a certain dramatic slackness in the performances, while reaction to George Tsypin's designs has ranged from "magical" to "outlandish" to "pretty funky." But "it will be different in¬London [this summer], promises Gergiev. He has enlisted the young Anglo-Russian theatre director, Alexander Zeldin, to re-direct the existing production - the word being used is 're-imagining' - so the version we see will be tighter and fresher." Evening Standard (London) 06/23/09

email this story | Posted 06/24/09@09:56PM

Utah Festival Opera 'Saved From Financial Ruin' "It's not curtains after all for the Utah Festival Opera Company, according to founder Michael Ballam. Following a 6-1 vote by the Cache County Council to approve a 'heroic' $150,000 stimulus to save the company from financial ruin, Ballam told a reporter Tuesday that the 17-year-old company will be alive in 2010." Salt Lake Tribune 06/24/09

email this story | Posted 06/24/09@09:34PM

IMG Artists Chairman, Now A Felon, Steps Down "Barrett Wissman, a businessman who in April pleaded guilty to securities fraud in an investigation into corruption at the New York State pension fund, has stepped down as chairman of IMG Artists, one of the largest firms representing classical musicians, and has been replaced by Charles Hamlen." New York Times 06/23/09

email this story | Posted 06/23/09@09:50PM

Opera As Therapy For Heart Attack Or Stroke Victims "Researchers analyzing how listening to classical music affected the study's participants found that songs that alternate between fast and slow sections - like opera - induced dynamic and somewhat predictable change in the cardiovascular and respiratory systems of the volunteers." CBC 06/23/09

email this story | Posted 06/23/09@09:39PM

NY Phil Serves Up Website For The Stat-Obsessed "Creating a little bit of heaven for classical music geeks, the New York Philharmonic has put online an ocean of data about its concerts, dating back to the first one on Dec. 7, 1842." New York Times 06/24/09

email this story | Posted 06/23/09@09:08PM

MPs' Expenses: First The Poem, Now The Opera "I am working on a comic opera, and who knows the set may have a few duck houses and moats in it," said Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, a.k.a. Master of the Queen's Music. "I may even invite a few MPs to the opening night. They will of course want free tickets, but be able to claim them on expenses for some fictitious fee. These people are a public disgrace and deserve to be publicly disgraced on stage." The Telegraph (UK) 06/22/09

email this story | Posted 06/23/09@07:23AM

Season Pruned, Philly Chamber Orchestra Rumors Blossom "Normally a rumor-free zone, Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia is the focal point of speculation about its future existence amid the announcement of a dramatically curtailed season and questions about the continued presence of music director Ignat Solzhenitsyn. The surprisingly well-circulated Solzhenitsyn rumor appears, at this point, to be unfounded...." Philadelphia Inquirer 06/23/09

email this story | Posted 06/23/09@06:35AM

Chinese Pre-Concert Caveat: Don't Clap In The Wrong Place "One thing I expected to find in China but didn't seem to encounter were huge audiences eager to hear Western music." Many who did attend seemed new to concert-going. Pre-concert announcements "included not only the familiar exhortation to turn off cell phones, but instructions about how many movements each piece had, and how the audience should uphold the country's good image (or something along those lines) by not clapping in the wrong places." Washington Post 06/22/09

email this story | Posted 06/22/09@07:42PM

Broward Center To Fill A Classical Void "The Broward Center for the Performing Arts will launch a new classical series this fall, partly filling the void left by the demise of the Concert Association of Florida earlier this year. The lineup of artists will include Joshua Bell, Dame Kiri te Kanawa, the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and the Houston Symphony Orchestra." South Florida Classical Review 06/22/09

email this story | Posted 06/22/09@06:58PM

Skylight Opera's Firing Fiasco Didn't Have To Be One Skylight Opera Theatre's decision to eliminate the position of artistic director, in the process jettisoning its beloved and creatively successful a.d., Bill Theisen, has been a public-relations debacle. Even worse, if the company's intent all along was to merge the artistic- and managing-director jobs, "reduce fixed personnel cost and ... streamline the flow chart," that could have been accomplished "without poisoning their own well." Here's how. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 06/22/09

email this story | Posted 06/22/09@06:04PM

The Man Who Saved English Opera "Nobody is yet calling 34-year-old Edward Gardner 'great', but, after his naming as Conductor of the Year by the Royal Philharmonic Society (RPS) in 2008, critics now pay respectful attention to his sound. In addition, Gardner has come to stand for more than just musical excellence: some see him as the symbol of the most brilliant operatic turnaround in recent history; others credit him with bringing that recovery about." The Independent (UK) 06/21/09

email this story | Posted 06/22/09@08:04AM

Pittsburgh Symphony Glows With Its New Music Director Manfred Honeck's "inaugural season with the PSO went about as well as one could imagine. The post-Jansons experiment with a trio of conductors instead of a music director bought time to find the right guy and integrated capable union musicians in the running of the orchestra." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 06/21/09

email this story | Posted 06/21/09@05:33PM