Category: music

The Minnesota Orchestra’s highly regarded new recording of Beethoven symphonies might be a short-term success, but does it really bode well for orchestral recordings in the longer view? “The Beethoven series does nothing to distinguish the orchestra — countless other recordings of this music exist — nor does it further new music. Orchestras can’t afford to ground their 21st-century futures on 19th-century music… By championing living composers as their own and entwining the recordings of their works with performances, orchestras can establish distinct identities regionally and internationally and ensure the vitality of new music.”

There are too many Grammy awards. 107, to be exact, as compared with 28 for the supposedly interminable Oscars. And while every single one of those awards probably has its defenders, there is little question that the ceremony is in desperate need of a hatchet job. To begin with, isn’t it time to dump most (if not all) of the classical catagories? “Classical musicians aren’t wrong to feel slighted in a culture addicted to base pop music. But the current arrangement seems mainly therapeutic, like a teacher giving every kid a gold star just for coming to class.” And on the pop side of the ledger, do we really need a Best Album, a Best Record, a Best Pop Vocal Album, and a Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album?

The Welsh National Opera is moving into a big new home – the Welsh Millennium Center. Hopes are high the move will help restore the company’s fortunes. WNO has “endured a number of setbacks in recent seasons: several flops, the unpopular organisational overhaul and the “sudden departure” last summer of the inexperienced young music director Tugan Sokhiev among them. Is the long-serving general director Anthony Freud thinking of moving on? Can the magnificent facilities of the WMC restore the company’s fortunes?”

The New York Philharmonic’s recording of John Adams’ On the Transmigration of Souls won Classical Album of the Year, Best Orchestral Performance, and Best Classical Contemporary Composition at the 47th Grammy Awards…

Pianist McCoy Tyner, vocalist Nancy Wilson, and pianist Herbie Hancock were among the jazz musicians winning Grammy Awards…

The Grammys have introduced a Hawaiian music category, agreeing at long last that the islands’ rich musical tradition are worthy of separate recognition. But what exactly constitutes Hawaiian music? Can it still be Hawaiian if a singer performs in English? Must there be a ukulele involved? And most importantly, who gets to decide the answers to these burning questions?

Picking the winners of the Grammy awards in advance may not be all that difficult. Jon Pareles thinks he’s found the secret predicter: “The album with the oldest song wins.” The rule seems to hold true in almost every year, and may point up the, um, veteran sensibilities of the majority of Grammy voters.

The position of principal oboe is currently open in three of America’s major orchestras, and in several other second- and third-tier ensembles as well. When you consider how many aspiring professional musicians there are in the world, and how few high-profile positions available, the current surfeit of jobs has to be considered mannah from heaven for oboists. “The sudden raft of openings appears on the surface to be a confluence of health problems and retirements. But there is also a generational change under way, as the recent musical descendants of the father of American oboe playing, Marcel Tabuteau, who died in 1966, leave the scene.”

“From dress to choreographed movements and the courtly interplay between conductor and musicians, the classical music stage is rich in etiquette and sometimes hijinks that are not always obvious to the audience. Chronicling this tradition goes back to Hector Berlioz and his classic “Evenings With an Orchestra,” a collection of essays dissecting the world of 19th-century orchestras and musical culture.”

Osmo Vänskä, artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra, will conduct his musicians playing his own arrangements of music by the 1970s Swedish pop supergroup ABBA as part of the 2005-06 season, announced today. While classical purists might view this as “Waterloo,” Vänskä says that expanding musical horizons is “The name of the game.”