Category: music

The company commissioned five short operas from well-known writers and composers. “The contributors, many of whom are new to writing opera, were given a free choice of subject matter. The results are intriguing, with protagonists ranging from the Celtic god of dreams to a young Asian girl who works in a Glasgow kebab shop.”

The Songwriters Association wants a $5 tax on internet connections that would be used to pay musicians. The recording industry opposes the idea, saying it would ruin online music sales…

“While a sizable segment of the public apparently no longer wants to pay for its recorded music, the age of downloading could be turning into a golden one for the concert business. Concert-ticket revenues are up, younger acts are touring earlier than they would have a few years ago thanks to the magic of online networking, and live-music venues are so jammed in some cities that artists are finding it tough to weasel a little onstage space for themselves.”

“That America’s oldest and finest should play to the successors of Josef Stalin and Mao Zedong as an act of cultural diplomacy was acceptable inasmuch as history had turned a page and successors had renounced their tyranny. In North Korea, no page has been turned.”

In his award, Hancock finds hope for jazz and the Grammys’ other poor stepchildren: “I think ‘Give the people a choice’ is the statement that they’re making.”

Although the Hallé Orchestra has invited female guest conductors to perform with them before, Polish-born Ewa Strusinska, who teaches at the Royal Northern College of Music, will be the first one to be on a two-year contract, the first woman to hold such a position in the country.

The New York Philharmonic counts prominent Chinese members among its ranks. But they’re not being featured on the orchestra’s current Chinese tour. “Despite expectations that the oboist, Liang Wang, and the conductor, Xian Zhang, would return as conquering heroes on the mainland, neither was featured in concerts in Shanghai this week nor will they be in Beijing, where the orchestra plays this weekend.”

The Songwriters Association of Canada is “calling for the creation of the Right to Equitable Remuneration for Music File Sharing, which would make it legal to share music on peer-to-peer networks in exchange for the monthly fee. The fee – amounting to an estimated $500 million to $900 million annually in Canada – would be administered by a collective of artists, songwriters, music publishers and record labels.”

The health of jazz, as a topic of conversation, has long inspired a lot of hand wringing among sympathetic parties. When the focus turns toward the health of jazz musicians, the discussion assumes a different, less abstract character: solicitous and supportive.

“The market for big-screen opera may be new, but it is also finite. The world’s major opera houses would be well advised to operate a clash system if they want to avoid choking the new big-screen medium in its infancy.”