Category: music

The update, a new feature called ‘Hum to Search’, was announced at Google’s Search On event and is available from today. It allows you to search for a piece of music which either has no lyrics, or whose lyrics you can’t remember. – Classic FM

Roderick Cox, 33, had been associate conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra for two years when, in 2018, he won the Georg Solti Conducting Award. He then relocated to Europe, and his career has been on the rise ever since. – The Dallas Morning News

Some acts have reaped serious money from ticketed livestreams: Pollstar reports Laura Marling sold 4,500 (UK) tickets at £12 each for her show at London’s Union Chapel in June; YouTube says Japanese artist Reol made $130,000 from a livestream on its platform in August; and BTS’s management company Big Hit said they had 756,000 fans watch their Bang Bang Con live stream in June, each paying between 29,000 won (£19.41) and 39,000 won (£26.10), meaning a minimum gross of £14.6m. – The Guardian

It is his instability—which enlists the audience in active and ongoing negotiation and interpretation, changing as we grapple with him at different historical moments—that makes him relevant. The music may be astonishing, the ideas volatile. Which will have the longer and more consequential afterlife? Perhaps more compelling than either, Ross suggests, is the irreconcilability of the problem. – Slate

Wait a second, those royalties are going to whom? Well: “The church is one of hundreds of investors in a company called Hipgnosis, which, for the past three years, has been hungrily snapping up the rights to thousands of hit songs.” – BBC

Music arranging is a science, and art, and an ability to stand back and respect the composer when the composer wants something different. Or: “Those are arrangement decisions, looking at how the song feels, looking at what key it’s in and looking at the what we call the routine of the song, you know, is it three courses, is it two courses? Do you end the song with a big bang for applause, or do you melt away and disintegrate a little bit to a quiet whisper? Those kinds of decisions are what arranging truly is.” – Slate

Honestly, does it truly take an investigation by Britain’s Members of Parliament to know the answer? Perhaps it does – to get honest, clear answers and clarity about where to go from here. – BBC

To be in live opera right now, soprano Lisette Oropesa gets constant COVID nasal swabs, writes down everyone she’s spent more than 15 minutes with, and wears a mask in the building except when she’s on stage. “Now we are in close quarters, you just have to trust that you’re negative and everyone else around you is negative, and at the time it’s okay to touch and sing close to each other. But it’s still a tiny bit never-wracking.” – The Irish Times

“Music teachers in Canada are being forced to improvise. Choir classes, for example, either must meet outdoors to rehearse or they simply hum and chant their way through class. Host Marco Werman speaks with Toronto-based Anita Elash about how music teachers are managing to keep music programs alive during the pandemic.” (audio) – PRX’s The World

“The deal, approved this week by the orchestra’s members, ties pay in part to the fortunes of the organization. Compensation for musicians will be reduced to 75% of normal pay retroactively to Sept. 12 and through the middle of March. Then, between March 15 and Sept. 12, 2021, pay could be lowered or slightly increased depending on the condition of the orchestra’s COVID-battered finances.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer