Category: music

When soprano Deborah Voigt told officials at the Metropolitan Opera that she had long dreamed of singing the lead in Richard Strauss’s little-known 1928 opera, “Die Ägyptische Helena,” the company leaped at the opportunity. But was all the effort worth it to stage an opera that might be neglected for good reason?

When the Cincinnati Pops scrapped tentative plans for a concert with a Dukes of Hazzard tie-in, fearing that the series’ heavy use of the Confederate flag could offend the city’s black community, they figured they were playing it safe. But one of the former stars of the TV show, ex-Congressman Ben “Cooter” Jones, was infuriated when told the reason for the cancellation, and is doing everything he can to provoke a backlash in Cincinnati.

The annual indie music orgy that is Austin’s South by Southwest festival is underway, with an unexpected twist. “Performers from countries like Australia and Norway have long added an international flair to this tastemaking festival, which is regarded as a supermarket for talent scouts to shop for new acts aiming to break through in America. But in a twist, the growing number of international players… at the festival have reversed some of the traffic — many artists from North America now visit Austin to pursue overseas opportunities, like releasing their music in Germany or booking a show in Japan.”

South by Southwest may be a big music industry party, but it can’t obscure the fact that the record business remains in serious trouble. “Major labels have slashed employee and artist rosters. Perhaps most critically, the big record companies have largely failed to embrace the digital revolution, putting severe restrictions on their artists’ catalogs. In the process they alienated customers and drove away business.” But the indies who flock to SXSW may provide an example for the big boys to follow out of the digital wilderness.

With Daniel Barenboim gone and no new music director in sight, the Chicago Symphony has been entertaining a slew of guest conductors. But does such ever-changing podium leadership hurt the orchestra in the long run? More importantly, does the parade of guests make it difficult to judge who would truly make a good long-term partner for one of America’s great orchestras?

The scandal over the “Joyce Hatto” piano recordings that turned out to have been copies of other artists’ work begs some interesting questions. “Whether you are a master teacher, an opera buff, a concertgoer or a critic, knowing something of the background of the artist you are hearing will inevitably affect your perceptions.” So, when the artist you think you’re listening to turns out to be someone else entirely, your impressions of the entire performance can turn on a dime.

“Shrinking CD sales and major-label downsizing only tell one side of the story. The other side is that a lot of independent labels, touring acts and their attendant hangers-on seem to be doing very well on a scale smaller than that to which the business might be accustomed, but with a reach extending further than previously thought possible.”

“Approximately 1.8 million Iraqis have fled the country in nearly four years of violence since the fall of Saddam Hussein. Amid the chaos, Shiite and Sunni Muslim extremists have grown bolder in enforcing religious strictures — forcing stores selling CDs and DVDs to shut down. Sometimes, employees of those shops have been killed.”

The John Cage Trust is moving to Bard College. “The Trust, which oversees Cage’s works and performances, is to be called the John Cage Trust at Bard College effective as of its move in the spring. Previously, the Cage Trust had been housed in the Archive Building in the West Village in Manhattan; after 9/11 Kuhn and the Trust moved to Phoenix, Arizona.”

“A couple of generations ago, symphony orchestras were all-male, lily-white clubs. Today, women make up 46 percent of orchestra musicians and nonwhites 14 percent, according to a survey by the American Symphony Orchestra League. But women do far better getting positions in smaller, part-time ensembles, where they outnumber men (they constitute 67 percent of the Long Island Philharmonic, for instance) than they do in the most prestigious orchestras, where they constitute just over a third of the players.”