Category: music

Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith’s “technique of blending synthesizers, acoustic instruments, and electronic-­sounding human voices has made the 30-year-old musician a star among the next generation of post–New Age synthesists.”

This season, the orchestra has a new music director and a new chief executive. But some very big challenges – including raising vast amounts of money for hall renovations and financial stabilization. Also – where is the orchestra artistically? Very big questions hang in the air. Brian Wise explores the issues.

“On what would have been his 105th birthday, [a] national hotel chain is partnering with the John Cage Trust in what the hotel describes as a ‘listening event’ curated by Mode Records called ‘Untouchable Numbers.’ For 24 hours, Ace Hotel locations across the country … will fill their spaces with music by the late American composer.”

On Tuesday, two singers released a memo from Sheraton Cadwell Group, a Toronto firm that contracts and manages big bands, that read in part, “As per our highly selective casting requirements … only singers who are physically fit and slim (or at the very least, those who know how to dress strategically/suitably in order to not bring attention to their temporary physical/dietary indulgences) would be showcased with our boutique orchestras.” On Wednesday, word of the memo hit the media. By Thursday, Sheraton Cadwell was out of business.

“‘Edge of Glory’ is gay music? But plenty of straight people love that song.’ When a bewildered straight friend said that to musicologist Chris White about the Lady Gaga hit, he was struck. “The musical gayness that is so obvious to me is invisible to him. I wonder whether there are reliable characteristics of music that can make a song obviously appeal to my particular sexual expression, while still ‘passing’ for mainstream music. What makes music sound gay to me? So, I took an audio recorder to Provincetown to record how places would signal this particular kind of gayness through particular kinds of music.”

Michael Cooper sees Peter Gelb lunching with William Kentridge, Riccardo Muti at a reception for his new vinyl LP (yes, in 2017), the classical chief for Apple Music listening to Daniil Trifonov play, and Anna Netrebko on the front page of the newspapers (even the tabloids).

In the wake of the fame (or notoriety) of those two founding works of the genre now called “CNN opera,” composer John Adams and director Peter Sellars went on to the heights of the opera world. Yet librettist Alice Goodman didn’t rise along with them; instead, she moved to Britain and became an Anglican priest. Thomas May catches up with her. (Notably, both Adams and Sellars, whose collaboration with Goodman ended in long-lasting acrimony, have very warm words for her here.)

The company enables any artist to upload tracks to its online platform for free. Potential licensers can then search through the site’s entire catalog and listen to individual songs before cutting a deal directly with rights holders through Songtradr’s scalable pricing model.

“In late April and early May, people in bars and restaurants and in the streets wish each other a happy Jazz Fest in the same tones as “Merry Christmas.” Nightclubs book special events for the nights after and the days between the two festival weekends; social and professional groups throw their own parties and gatherings. In a city that both defines and supports itself through culture and tourism, it’s one of the biggest and most active economic engines for both.”

Using AI music creation software by Amper, Southern plugged in various parameters like mood, style, and tempo to auto-compose the underlying chords and instrumentation. The album will even be distributed online through Stem, a platform that allows royalties to be divvied up between various creators. So not only will machines write music in the future, they might even get paid.