Category: music

The West Australian Symphony Orchestra had egg on its face last week after publishing brochures touting Edo de Waart as its next music director, only to have de Waart pull out of the negotiations, which had not been finalized. Now, the WASO’s board chair has publicly apologized to de Waart for comments made by the orchestra’s president at the time, in which it was implied that de Waart’s change of heart had to do with not wanting to pay Australian taxes.

Now that the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony has managed to raise enough money to stay afloat in the short term, the organization is looking to its long-term future. One possible model for a turnaround is the Calgary Symphony, which had to seek court protection from its creditors, only to reemerge with three straight years of balanced budgets. But there is no magic formula for orchestras on the brink, and little margin for error along the way.

The Cincinnati Symphony is one step closer to a much-needed renovation of its home base, Music Hall, with the unveiling of plans to construct a new parking garage and public plaza attached to the main building. While such amenities might seem to be putting the cart before the horse, the sad truth is that Music Hall is located in a crime-ridden neighborhood, and the hope is that the attached garage, which will allow concertgoers to go from their cars to their seats without braving the mean Cincy streets, will boost attendance at CSO concerts.

Hurricane-related setbacks and a lack of expected government funding combined to put the Tampa Bay-based Florida Orchestra $676,615 in the red for fiscal 2006. It’s the orchestra’s third deficit in the last five fiscal years.

The definitions of early music are fungible. But why? “So when does early music really end? Perhaps when new music begins. When is that? Ives and Schoenberg have been dead for more than half a century, and their music still frequently gets called new music.”

“New relationships between music companies, advertisers and file-sharing networks are signalling a major change in the corporate attitude toward illegal downloads. Instead of trying in vain to stop a trend that has spread like wildfire, record giants have finally figured out that when it comes to music piracy, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”

Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater is reimagining Tchaikovsky’s grand opera, “Evgeny Onegin,” and the project has drawn the ire of at least one important presence. “The great soprano Galina Vishnevskaya was so infuriated by a new production of “Onegin” at the Bolshoi in September that she canceled her 80th-birthday gala, which was to be held there last Wednesday.”

The BBC Scottish Symphony is mounting a complete cycle of Sibelius’s seven symphonies this season, the second time in a decade that they have undertaken such a project. So why all the Sibelius? Michael Tumelty says that “however much we might feel the music of Sibelius to be in our blood, there is still a great deal of missionary work to be done.”

It seems like nearly every year, some small to mid-sized North American orchestra or other finds itself in danger of folding. Usually, some emergency funding is found, and the orchestra is “saved,” at least temporarily. But why do orchestras continually find themselves in such dire straits? It has to do with a deadly combination of high fixed costs and executive burnout.

Buenos Aires’s landmark music hall, the Teatro Colón, is in disrepair and set to undergo a $25 million, 18-month renovation that will close the venue to the public for more than a year. “But the tight-knit community of musicians, craftsmen and others who ply their trades at the Colón have voiced profound concerns about the artistic integrity and the timetable of the government blueprint.”