Category: music

“A violin believed to be a stolen Stradivarius has been found by Romanian police in the city of Constanta on the Black Sea coast.”

“The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts has chosen a sound doctor to fix what ails Verizon Hall” — the consensus being that the home of the Philadelphia Orchestra is rather badly afflicted. “[V]arious critics, instrumentalists, administrators, and even [hall designer] Artec have said that the 2,500-seat Verizon falls short of its potential. Sound presence greatly varies from seat to seat, and with the size of the ensemble on stage.”

Conductor Lothar Zagrosek: “[T]his building we are in is our great asset. That is why the first thing I did when I arrived was to the change the name. Before, we were the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, so we were the BSO in a city which already had a DSO and DOO and heaven knows what. Now we are the ‘Concert House Orchestra’, so we are identified with our home, like the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam or the Tonhälle in Zurich.”

Yamaha’s $20,000 Avant Grand digital piano “is a ‘hybrid,’ designed to perfectly mimic the touch of an acoustic piano. The Avant Grand not only uses the same key, level, and hammer mechanism of an acoustic piano, but also special embedded speakers recreate the feel of an acoustic piano’s keys to the player’s hands.” (And it never needs tuning.)

Singer Achinoam Nini, Israel’s representative in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest, “asked if she could bring along her current artistic collaborator, an Israeli Arab singer, Mira Awad. … But coinciding as it did with Israel’s Gaza war and the rise of Avigdor Lieberman, the ultranationalist politician who threatens Israeli Arabs with a loyalty oath,” the decision to allow the duo “was labeled by many on the left and in the Arab community as an effort to prettify an ugly situation.”

“Musicians ranging from will.i.am to Emmylou Harris and Sheryl Crow gathered for a different kind of performance on Tuesday, pushing for legislation to require radio stations to pay royalties to musicians when the stations play their songs. … Bills have been introduced in the House and Senate to require radio stations to pay royalties to performers. Songwriters already receive royalties.”

In his first appearance with the Royal Opera since he abruptly backed out of the Ring two years ago, Bryn Terfel scores a big success as Wagner’s Flying Dutchman. Neil Fisher reflects the London critics’ consensus: “Wagner singing is hardly ever this nuanced, but Terfel’s bass-baritone is now so subtly controlled that he can fire it out over the orchestra or thin it down to a plaintive whisper.”

Vilho Kekkonen isn’t the world’s oldest living tenor (Hugues Cuénod is still with us at age 106), But, at age 100, the former church musician, opera chorister and character still sings in public at Christmas and Midsummer. And he remembers how singing Tchaikovsky saved his life during the 1939 war between Finland and the Soviet Union.

“When I recently converted my largely orchestral CD collection to MP3s, several readers warned me that I would regret it. When it comes to classical music, iTunes misses a beat, they said. … But with just a few tweaks and some tips, you can turn your iPod and iTunes into classical companions. Here’s how you can better organize your classical collection, find high-quality downloads online, and get music cheaply or even for free.”

“The days of paying for music over the internet — or illegally downloading free tracks — are numbered, according to artists, music companies and leading industry insiders. The reason given for this is the rapidly growing popularity of Spotify, a music service that ‘streams’ tracks to your computer. All the major record labels have signed up to allow users to access millions of tracks — from Michael Jackson to Lily Allen, U2 or Shostakovich — free of charge at the touch of a button.”