Category: music

Does anyone not respond to music in some basic way? “Some scientists have recently proposed that music may have been an evolutionary adaptation, like upright walking or spoken language, that arose early in human history and helped the species survive. The ‘music gene’ would have arisen tens or hundreds of thousands of years ago, and conferred an evolutionary advantage on those who possessed it.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

Placido Domingo miscalculated when he took on directing the Washington and Los Angeles opera companies. He thought he’d be about finished singing by now. But at age 60 the voice still works, and the conducting, directing and singing are easily three full time jobs. What next? – The Telegraph (UK)

Leon Fleisher’s recording of Brahms’ D-minor Piano Concerto with George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra is one of the 20th Century’s best. But 35 years ago Fleisher injured his right hand and was relegated to performing left-hand works only. But he’s been on the mend in recent years and this weekend took a crack at the Brahms again with the Chicago Symphony. It was a mixed pleasure… – Chicago Tribune

“Based upon a simple, deft theatrical idea, it has a text nearly as luminous as Vermeer’s paintings, which the work venerates, and it has compelling, appropriately incandescent music. In the usual sense of an opera as music first, text second and stage possibilities last, it is unerring – immediate, subtle, probing, inherently operatic and gorgeously crafted. But as a radical intertwining of operatic elements into the kind of entirely new theatrical experience that ‘Rosa’ was, it is a mild disappointment.” – Los Angeles Times

London’s Royal Opera House has finished its first season after a £200 million makeover. Was it worth it? Well, “the ROH is, first of all, seen as the home of the toffs and fat cats, whose lush, velvet pleasures are paid for by the sweat of the working man. Second, it is technically incompetent, with shows routinely being cancelled. And third, it is a gilded cage full of bitching queens and grandes dames, all of whom regularly flounce out of meetings and lock themselves, sobbing, in the loo.” – The Sunday Times (UK)

Recent performances by the New York Philharmonic of Stephen Sondheim’s “Sweeney Todd” left audiences cheering. Yet despite a lot of trying, concert organizers were unable to get a recording or public television broadcast out of the deal. Why? “The recording not happening can be chalked up to the general crisis in the industry.” – New York Times

This week EMI begins selling music over the internet. As battles over copyright rage, the giant recording company decides to try offering its recordings in downloadable format. – BBC

— dies at age 75 after complications from surgery. – CBC

Louis Andriessen’s opera “Writing to Vermeer”, getting its US premiere at the Lincoln Centre Festival is a long sit. “For all its visual beauty and technical slickness, this 100-minute opera (which ended its run on Saturday) is a dramatically neutral, philosophically and emotionally barren exercise in poststructuralist contemplation.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

A French orchestra conductor has been charged with allegedly indoctrinating members of a doomsday cult, many of whom died in a bizarre group killing five years ago. – New Jersey Online (AP)