Category: music

There may never have been a more tragic or bizarre breakup in the classical music world than that of the Audubon Quartet. Six years ago, three members of the Roanoke, Virginia-based group fired their first violinist, David Ehrlich, who promptly sued to prevent the quartet from continuing to perform without him. Since then, recriminations and lawsuits have flown unabated, bitterly dividing Roanoke’s musical community and making several attorneys very rich. The courts have sided mainly with Ehrlich, and this month, two members of the quartet will be forced to surrender their home, their possessions, and – no kidding – the instruments with which they make their living, to pay the $611,000 court award to Ehrlich.

Covent Garden has abandoned a long-established practice of black-face portrayals on stage. “The Royal Opera has been forced into a last-minute U-turn over the casting of a white mezzo-soprano in the role of a black woman. Stephanie Blythe was blacked up during rehearsals of Un Ballo in Maschera (The Masked Ball), but when the production opened at Covent Garden last Thursday her skin colour was its natural white. The company said it made the change because of the need to be ‘sensitive to issues such as racism’. In doing so it overruled the production’s director, Italian film-maker Mario Martone, who was informed just hours before the curtain went up – and did not agree with the decision.”

Is classical music dying a quiet death in Scotland? Composer James MacMillan fears it may be so, and the evidence goes far beyond the dismal state of the temporarily shuttered Scottish Opera. “The de-sacralisation of our world, so enthusiastically cultivated by the new ruling elites, stands at a polar opposite from the potential for transcendence claimed by classical music. In that sense, the battles for serious music are part of a wider culture war apparent at various levels of modern Scotland. What is it about serious music that offends the triumphalistic trendies basking in the apparent victories of a demystified popular culture?”

Is James MacMillan overstating the impact of pop culture on classical music? A glance at the latest standards for music education in Scotland would seem to suggest he is not. “The new Higher music syllabus… misses out key components that are essential for preparing pupils for serious careers in music. In the new curriculum, musical literacy is optional while listening papers have changed from deep analytical essays of musical scores to multiple-choice exercises.”

The chief conductor of Iran’s Tehran Symphony Orchestra has resigned from his position and left the country in protest of what he says is the unconscionably low pay afforded to the orchestra’s musicians. TSO musicians earn approximately $90 a month. Conductor Ali Rahbari announced his decision to leave the orchestra to the audience at last week’s concert, less than six months after he was appointed to the post.

Napster creator Shawn Fanning is back, and he’s got a new plan for music. “He doesn’t simply want to impose fees for the same songs that are available through Apple’s iTunes and other stores. He wants to create an open system that would allow anyone with music to share – big labels and garage bands alike – to register their works with Snocap and set the economic terms under which songs could be traded. Snocap would collect the fees, using software that listens to each song in participating file-sharing services, matching songs that listeners order with those in the registry and forcing users to pay the price the song owner demands.”

The parent company of San Diego’s daily newspaper has finalized a deal to become the principal sponsor of a series of local and national radio broadcasts of the San Diego Symphony, a project which will also allow the orchestra to archive its concerts and create marketable recordings from the master tapes. The 14-part local series will be carried by KPBS radio beginning in summer 2006, and the 6-concert national series will be distributed by National Public Radio, making the ensemble one of a small handful of American orchestras with a national radio presence. The recordings will all be made in high-definition, and the SDS plans to quickly turn them into in-house CDs for wide release.

The Alabama Symphony Orchestra, which emerged from bankruptcy in 1997 and has operated in the black ever since, has hired the young British conductor Justin Brown as its next music director. Brown beat out several higher-profile candidates for the job, and was supported for the position by both musicians and management. The ASO has been without a music director since May 2004, when Richard Westerfield departed following a 6-year tenure. Brown will take up the ASO’s reins in fall 2006.

Small orchestras generally can’t afford to commission composers. Composers have difficulty getting their work played by orchestras. So 64 orchestras around America banded together to jointly commission Joan Tower for a new work.

“In cities from Dakar to Durban, the guitar is now king. Whether acoustic or electric, the six-stringed axe has adapted itself to a huge range of styles, and introduced African artists to blues, rock, pop, jazz and Latin music.”