Category: music

“The Rotterdam Philharmonic said on Tuesday that its principal conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin will step down in 2018, his tenth year on the job. The announcement was widely expected, as the conductor has also been juggling directorships at the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Orchestre Métropolitain in Montreal, and is increasingly tapped as a guest conductor.”

The 65-year-old tenor, said more than once in the past to have been a candidate for the top post at the Vienna State Opera, has been named chief of opera at the Mikhailovsky Theatre which artistic director (and chief funder) Vladimir Kekhman has transformed from poor stepsister to the Mariinsky into one of Russia’s most dynamic opera and ballet houses.

“No, there will be no white smoke, and these are not cardinals in the Sistine Chapel. These voters are the tenured musicians of the Berlin Philharmonic, and they are set to meet at 10 a.m. on Monday at an undisclosed location in Berlin to make one of the most prestigious appointments in classical music: a new chief conductor and artistic director, who will succeed Simon Rattle when he leaves the orchestra in 2018.”

A multifaceted examination of the musical properties of hit songs from 1960 to 2010 concludes that pop is, in fact, continually evolving. This process occurred “with particular rapidity during three stylistic ‘revolutions’ around 1964, 1983, and 1991.”

“As music director, he will be the top artistic official at the orchestra, choosing programs, arranging guest artists and conducting concerts. His selection followed a two-year search for a replacement for Christopher Wilkins, music director from 2005-13.”

“It’s easy to understand why any orchestra might be eager to get Salonen onto the payroll. At 56, the Helsinki-born musician is at the top of his game as a conductor, with a broad range of both new music and a standard repertoire that he performs with a blend of technical bravura and interpretive insight.”

“It’s rare that such an old instrument has so clear an inventor and is so obviously a revelation. So why do we have to be reminded of Bartolomeo Cristofori’s name? After all, there must be a reason pianos aren’t called Cristoforis.”

Violinist Vena Johnson of the Prometheus Chamber Orchestra: “There’s this disconnect between what the art means to us and how that translates into the community. Many people just aren’t reached. It’s not necessarily economic – if the art isn’t speaking to a society for what we’re going through, then it won’t translate.” (Philip Glass’s String Quartet No. 5 went over particularly well in the soup kitchen.)

The payment, which includes accrued retirement plan funds and unused vacation pay, to former general director, artistic director and CEO Ian Campbell and deputy director Ann Spira Campbell was negotiated and paid last June, with the money provided by an anonymous donor separately from all operating funds for the company.