Category: music

“It is easier to make the case that the music industry, far from imploding, is one of the great success stories of the recession. Last year sales of singles soared to an all-time record of 152.7m units, an astonishing 33% rise in a year when the whole economy (GDP) contracted by 3.3%. If the music pundits seriously think that these are not being bought by kids, then it shows how out of touch they are with their customers.”

The “report says that there are more than 4,000 artists on major record label rosters, with thousands more on independents. Around one in four of these artists were signed in the last 12 months. The report points out that, in the UK, record labels spend 23% of their total revenue on A&R (the average worldwide is 16%), comparing that to the pharmaceutical industry, which spends 15% on research and development.”

“Each year the UK music industry is responsible for around 540,000 tonnes of greenhouse-gas emissions, according to researchers from the UK and US. Three-quarters of this is due to live music performances, while the rest is caused by music recording and publishing.”

It’s Bristol. At least by the per capita number of successful musicians born there, reports the Performing Rights Society. “Bristol has spawned more musicians relative to population size than any other in the UK.”

“Glimmerglass Opera, the 35-year-old summer opera festival in Cooperstown, N.Y., has named Francesca Zambello as its general and artistic manager.” The well-known and well-traveled director “will likely give the small company, which presents four operas a season, a higher profile.”

The recordings, under OSM music director Kent Nagano, are of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde (on Sony) and Unsuk Chin’s Violin Concerto (on the Montreal-based label Analekta); both use German soloists. Says a Juno spokesman, “We understand that the OSM is Canadian. But it was in the Soloist with Large Ensemble Accompaniment (category), so the focus is on the soloist. And the soloist, not being Canadian, can’t qualify.”

The Dutch conductor, who has been at the helm of the HKPO since 2004, steps down at the end of his current contract in 2012. He now makes his home in Wisconsin, where he is music director of the Milwaukee Symphony; in 2010 he begins a stint as artistic partner of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

“The work, by composer Mark-Anthony Turnage and writer Richard Thomas, will be ‘a major event in the UK arts calendar’ the ROH said. Thomas was a co-creator of the controversial production Jerry Springer: The Opera.”

Facing a 26-hour drive from Winnipeg to his D.C. audition with the National Symphony Orchestra, timpanist Jauvon Gilliam “called up timpanists in major American orchestras along the way and asked if he could play for them. He wanted to get used to playing nervous, in unfamiliar situations. … [B]y the time he got to Washington, he was in great form.”

An official at the Pantheon interrupted a recent performance by the Russian ensemble Bach-Consort by walking into the performing area and announcing that the concert was over because closing time was 6pm sharp. (video here) The subsequent controversy led Italy’s culture minister to issue an official apology.