Category: music

The Philadelphia Singers, one of that city’s major choral groups, has canceled half its season. “The decision comes after five years of declining support from private donors, foundations and subscribers, which numbered 400 last year. Executive director Rebecca Bolden called the move ‘painful’ but ‘fiscally responsible’ in consideration of the chorus’ $40,000 deficit against a $600,000 annual budget.”

Surely Diana Damrau sings the highest of any soprano. In a world where high “C” is considered an upper range, she goes higher. Much higher. “Last December, in the first modern performance of Antonio Salieri’s “Europa Riconosciuta,” at La Scala in Milan, she topped the composer’s three F sharps with an unwritten high G. What’s more, she managed to give that unearthly note real sheen and body. And in concert, she has sung an A flat in Johann Strauss’s “Voices of Spring.”

Everybody’s getting in to podcasts. The latest is the recording label Naxos. “The label has five free mini-documentaries on classical music already available, and more are on the way. ‘They’re not really sales pieces. We designed them to help people get involved, learn about and appreciate classical music. It gets kids thinking about classical music too, using a medium that younger people are tuned in to’.”

The Los Angeles Philharmonic has a new contract with its musicians which will make it the highest-paying orchestra in the U.S. in the deal’s final year. The ensemble, which currently has a minimum salary of $2025 per week, will get a better than 20% raise by 2009, eventually reaching an annual salary in excess of $127,000. “Among other provisions, the contract includes measures to streamline the Philharmonic’s auditioning, hiring and vesting processes; allows for free local radio broadcasts; reduces the orchestra by two players (through attrition); redesigns the musicians’ healthcare plan; and calls for the members to donate three concerts to help finance pension costs and raise money for the orchestra’s endowment fund.”

Jeffrey Kahane debuts this week as the Colorado Symphony’s new music director, succeeding Marin Alsop, and he has big plans for the ensemble. “He envisions the orchestra in four or more years playing in New York’s Carnegie Hall and perhaps even touring to Europe or South America.” Kahane is also promoting a “chamber music style” of music-making in which he and the musicians work as colleagues, rather than a conductor simply barking orders from on high. In that vein, he will conduct several concerts this season while seated at a piano keyboard, playing a concerto while leading the orchestra.

The prestigious International Sibelius Conductors’ Competition, held every five years in Helsinki, has ended with the jury declining to award a prize to any of the three finalists. Conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, speaking for the judges, declared the level of competition to be “disappointing,” and further announced to the audience that “not one finalist conducted the symphony by Sibelius in a way that would entitle him to any of the first three prizes.” The jury awarded each of the finalists a lesser prize instead, but the competition’s chairman was clearly displeased by the decision.

For those who have been wondering what the big deal is about Apple’s new iPod/phone hybrid, and even more for those who have become more than a little resentful about the whole iPod phenomenon, here’s a pleasant thought: the MP3-playing phones, which come with powerful built-in speakers, may just have the potential to jerk us back into a reality in which music is meant for sharing with others. If the basic iPods “suggest that music is a solitary experience, comprised solely of plugging into your own greatest hits,” the phone version allows for the possibility that music “can once again be something that is not just the soundtrack to your own little world, but which you enjoy with other people.”

No matter where you live, you’re probably going to be hearing a lot of Mozart this year, as the classical music world celebrates the composer’s 250th anniversary. “Mozart is so easy to underestimate. His music chimes in every muzak-infested lift or restaurant or shopping centre, and in these days of the call centre, Mozart’s is among the music you hear most often when on hold. You can claim to know nothing about classical music, but you have heard of Mozart, and heard Mozart. Yet just when you are about to write Mozart off as over-exploited and over-exposed, there is the music, utterly direct, communicative yet emotionally elusive, simple yet infinitely complex, which has been moving listeners for over two centuries, offering different qualities to new generations.”

Members of the Louisiana Philharmonic, scattered around America after Katrina, are gathering up in Nashville to perform a benefit concert. “It’s about hope for them. The notion that they are all together, making music together, will be an incredible thing. It’s about raising some money, but it’s also about healing their souls.’ Mark O’Connor will be guest soloist for the concert, which is scheduled for national broadcast on National Public Radio.”

The Kennedy Center is expanding an initiative to provide management help to more than two dozen struggling small and mid-size orchestras. “Sustaining the American Orchestra,” the new initiative, is an effort to design strategies that will change the way many orchestras do business. Initially the center will work with 23 orchestras, ranging from the Indianapolis Symphony, which has a $23 million budget, and the St. Louis Symphony, a $21 million budget, to the Reno Philharmonic and Berkeley Symphony Orchestra, both with $1 million budgets. The Kennedy Center is using a model it developed three years ago to help minority-run dance, theater and music companies.