Laura Eisen, then the orchestral manager of the Berlin Staatskapelle (the Staatsoper’s orchestra), has come forward publicly to allege that in March of 2018, the conductor “came toward me, grabbed me with both hands on my upper body (between my shoulders and throat) and shook me. As he did so, he screamed at me that I should disappear/leave the room.” – Van
Category: music
Is There A Better Way To Listen To Music?
Music scholars insist that if we listened to music the way a musician would, understanding how notes trigger feelings, how tones take on their own textures and meanings, then we might experience something more visceral and expansive. We could push deeper into every song. – The Paris Review
The Rising Star Soprano Who Taught Herself To Sing By Mimicking Two Opera DVDs
Growing up in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, Vuvu Mpofu never even heard opera until she was 15, and, with no voice teachers in town, all she had to learn from were video discs of La Traviata and The Magic Flute. And now she’s at Glyndebourne. – The Guardian
Chattanooga Symphony Sued By Its Concertmaster For Breach Of Contract
Holly Mulcahy, who has been the orchestra’s concertmaster since the fall of 2013 (and who takes up a second concertmaster position at the Wichita Symphony this month), is seeking damages “for breach of contract, misrepresentation, tortious interference with business relationship and intentional reckless acts related to the same … related to Plaintiff’s confirmed solo performance contract on October 6, 2019.” (The orchestra’s printed season brochure had listed the program for that date as music of Haydn and Philip Glass’s Violin Concerto No. 2, with Mulcahy as soloist; the orchestra’s website now lists it as an all-Haydn program.) – WTVC NewsChannel 9 (Chattanooga, Tenn.)
Kiril Petrenko Takes Over The Berlin Philharmonic And Wows
Mark Swed: “I’m not so sure I buy the mystique business. The ego issue is clearly complicated. But his two concerts in the Festspielhaus in Salzburg, the first a repeat of the Beethoven Ninth and second featuring a performance of Schoenberg’s Violin Concerto with Patricia Kopatchinskaja of speechless greatness, left no doubt about just how special Petrenko is.” – Los Angeles Times
Portland Opera Announces Plan To Get Itself Out Of “Dire” Situation
Combined with rising production costs and, as Interim General Director Sue Dixon puts it, “the shifting philanthropic landscape of Portland,” there was the very real possibility of the organization going broke before the end of the next decade. – Portland Mercury
Soprano Slams Critic Who Body-Shamed Her. Critic Makes Snotty Reply. Bad Idea.
Kathryn Lewek just finished a run as Eurydice in Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld at the Salzburg Festival, one of her first performances since giving birth earlier this year. After a few German and Austrian critics, as she puts it, “[wrote about] postpartum mom-bod instead of reviewing the show,” Lewek took to Twitter to call them out (not by name). Manuel Brug of Die Welt (who had described Lewek and her colleagues as “fat women in tight corsets spreading their legs”) responded to Lewek’s complaint by writing, “If she is so sensitive why is she showing herself the whole time in this corset?” And the just wrath of the Twitterverse rained down upon him. – BBC
Why Are There So Few Women Running Classical Music Organizations, And What’s Happening To Change That
“In general, [new Seattle Opera general director Christina Schippelmann] and others say, the absence of women in top positions results more from systemic factors than intentional discrimination. Rising to the highest levels in the arts means pushing through a series of lower-status, lower-paid jobs, often bouncing all over the planet. Arts managers work long hours but may not earn enough to afford a nanny or to have the other parent stay at home.” – The Seattle Times
Finally: Streaming Music That Cares About Classical
“The bottom line is that classical streaming is here, and, despite the kinks and quirks, it works. The problem of access has been solved. Although classical music is a very small piece of the recording pie, said to be somewhere around 5%, the streamers also claim to have data that suggests that 25% (and maybe more) of all subscribers to streaming services sample classical music at least once.” – Los Angeles Times
Conductor Daniel Harding Will Take Year Off To Work As Commercial Pilot
“‘I am fascinated by the feeling of flying a plane,” said the 43-year-old, who has just stepped down as music director of the Orchestre de Paris. “In the spring I will join Air France as a co-pilot and in the 2020/21 season I will take a sabbatical as an orchestra conductor … to dedicate myself to flying.” – The Strad