Category: music

The financially-troubled Edmonton Symphony whacks down its deficit by a third with a gift from a longtime supporter. Meanwhile the Calgary Philharmonic, which suspended operations last month after failing under a $1.2 million debt, says it will announce next week its plans to reactivate.

New operas are so expensive that after a first production (where interest is highest because it’s brand new) most never see a second. Yet, “a second run can be vital to the life of an opera. The established repertory is crowded with works that really took off only at their second airing.” Now William Bolcom is getting a second chance with a Met Opera production of A View From the Bridge.”

Midori has spent her adult life trying to live beyond being a child prodigy. “In many ways, she says, she has spent her adult life pushing to create the normalcy she missed as an international child star. Her image as a prodigy was carefully cultivated by those around her. ‘They would tell me things like, ‘You have to say you like classical music, you never listen to anything else’.”

Pianist Alicia de Larrocha, plays her final public concert at Carnegie Hall, and retires. “As departures go, Ms. de Larrocha’s appearance was unusually low-key. Not much had been made of it publicly, although her retirement at 79 was not entirely unexpected. Like any musician who has enjoyed a long career, Ms. de Larrocha has seen performance style, and the tastes that drive it, move through cycles of change and reconsideration. In the Spanish works in her repertory she has remained peerless, but in Mozart, the expansion of the early-music world and the expectations it has created have been challenges for her.”

Nicholas Maw’s new opera Sophie’s Choice has a star cast: “Sir Trevor Nunn to direct. Sir Simon Rattle to conduct. The dazzling Austrian mezzo Angelika Kirchschlager making her long-awaited London opera debut in the title role. Oh, and tickets so massively subsidised that the best seats in the house cost only £50.” Still, no one expected Sophie to be a hit, so it’s only playing five nights. And it’s become one of the season’s hottest tickets.

Pianist Andre Watts has been released from the hospital after suffering a subdural hematoma just before a Nov. 14 concert in California. He’s expected to recover fully and resume performing. “Hemorrhages like these are fatal in 50-60 percent of people. He was in the very fortunate 40 percent of people who make it through the event. The bleeding was on the anterior part of the brain, away from the fine motor area.” Doctors describe Watts as “personable” and “Zen-like” during his hospital stay.

Saying that “the energy and time the Brooklyn Philharmonic deserves are beyond my capacities anymore,” conductor Robert Spano steps down as music director of the orchestra after seven years. Spano has recently renewed his contract leading the Atlanta Symphony and becomes director of the Festival of Contemporary Music at Tanglewood next year. “As a highly regarded interpreter of new music in particular, he has been mentioned as a candidate for the podiums of leading world orchestras.”

While other orchestras around North America post bad financial news, the Toronto Symphony has some good to report. Last year, the Toronto Symphony declared itself “on the precipice of complete collapse” after posting a $7 million deficit and seeing its subscription sales drop alarmingly. The orchestra’s then-executive director quit. This year’s been another story – the orchestra has reduced its deficit to $5 million and fundraising for the season was up 50 percent.

What is it about the music of Arvo Part that makes its listeners become cultish in their devotion to hearing it? “According to the unsentimental evidence of record sales, Pärt’s music reaches far beyond the conspiracy of connoisseurs who support most new classical music. He is a composer who speaks in hauntingly clear, familiar tones, yet he does not duplicate the music of the past. He has put his finger on something that is almost impossible to put into words—something to do with the power of music to obliterate the rigidities of space and time.”

The Seattle City Council has begrudgingly approved a loan of $27 million to finish construction of the Seattle Opera House. Fundraising for the $130 million project has fallen off, with expected contributions from county and state governments failing to come through. “We didn’t plan on making that loan. It sets a bad example for future partnerships that might also keep coming back for more and more money.”