Category: music

One expert suggests that, among other advantages, “All piano students must overcome the two hands’ resistance to work separately; by having to work harder on what’s essentially a right-handed instrument, the neurons of left-handed pianists get an extra workout and thus grow stronger.”

The composer of Carmina Burana is often written off as a crypto-Nazi who turned out cheesy crowd-pleasers. He did, in fact, have a dirty wartime secret, and he was generally a selfish piece of work. But, points out Martin Kettle, his preoccupation with “music for use” and his pioneering music education methods have touched many millions of lives.

After the Ohio orchestra’s near-death experience last year, new chairman Martin Inglis is recruiting board members, pushing fiscal prudence and repairing relations with demoralized musicians. “We’re all bruised. There are still a lot of raw emotions out there and differing views, and they’re probably irreconcilable. My comment is, ‘Fine, we can’t go backward; we’ve got to chart our own course.'”

Making Music With the DSO With Host Leonard Slatkin premiered Jan. 3 on Detroit’s WTVS (Channel 56). “Each 30-minute episode in the 13-week series promises to explore a specific theme and is designed to open a window on the world of classical music and the orchestra for general audiences.”

CBC Radio 2 is asking its listeners to submit candidates for a collection of ” 49 songs from north of the 49th parallel that best represent” the Great White North as an offering for Barack Obama iPod.

“A small but growing number of American Indian musicians are embracing classical music. Drawing as much from European composers as traditional American Indian harvest songs, the music and the musicians are getting noticed in concert halls and on reservations.”

Despite a turbulent time announcing and then negotiating her divorce from British film director Guy Ritchie, Madonna managed to rake in $282 million (£195m) from 17 countries during her Sticky & Sweet world tour, which finished in Brazil last week.

Rap battles have been Notoriously nasty and violent. But things are different now… “YouTube has short-circuited the creative process and all but killed the diss rap stone cold dead.”

Ballet BC isn’t the only Vancouver arts organization in serious financial trouble. “Last week, the 11-member Pacific Baroque Orchestra sent out a letter to supporters asking for help in combating a potential C$80,000 deficit on its C$300,000 annual budget this year. The group has been hit with a series of blows: in 2007, both its artistic director, Marc Destrubé, and its general manager, Tom Durrie, resigned.”

“Last spring … Mayor Nutter met privately with Harold Sorgenti, chairman of the Philadelphia Orchestra Association, and agreed to provide a $250,000 unscheduled grant to the city’s premier music ensemble.” The funding was taken from the Philadelphia Cultural Fund, some of whose board members “argue that the Nutter administration … has now undermined the integrity of an arts-funding process that was explicitly designed to steer clear of the muddying influence of politics.”