“The moment of shame came as the Staatskapelle Dresden, one of the world’s best orchestras, opened the 43rd Hong Kong Arts Festival with a performance of Richard Strauss’ Metamorphosen. … But just as the 20-minute masterpiece faded out into intense C minor chords, an audience member began to clap.” And then – well, not all hell, but some hell broke loose.
Category: music
L.A. Phil’s Deborah Borda Is Going To Harvard (Temporarily)
“Deborah Borda will take a four-month sabbatical from her role as president and chief executive of the Los Angeles Philharmonic so that she can assume a residency at the Harvard Kennedy School at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass.”
Russian Opera Director Faces Criminal Charge For Offending Religious Believers
“Thirty-year-old director Timofei Kulyabin told AFP he has been charged over his production of Wagner’s Tannhäuser at Novosibirsk’s State Opera and Ballet Theatre in Siberia, which premiered in December. ‘It’s absurd and I don’t want to take part in something absurd, to be honest,’ he said.”
Classical Music Calms The (Not So Savage) Beast, Study Says
“Dogs at the Scottish SPCA’s Dumbarton & West of Scotland animal rescue and rehoming centre spent less time standing and barking when the music was being played.”
James Conlon Stepping Down From May Festival After 2016 Season
“After Conlon leads the ‘Hallelujah’ Chorus for the last time in 2016 – his 37th season – Music Hall is expected to close its doors for about 18 months to undergo a massive renovation. The festival will be displaced for at least a year. Conlon said that the uncertainty of the revitalization plans factored into his decision.”
Claim: Singing Makes People Smarter, Helps Them Stay In Shape, And Also Makes For A Better Civilzation
“It offers the chance to ‘use your lungs in a way that you probably don’t for the rest of your day, breathing deeply and openly,’ to experience ‘a sense of levity and contentedness,’ and to ‘learn how to subsume yourself into a group consciousness.'”
Memphis Symphony To Lose Music Director Mei-Ann Chen After Next Season
“Roland Valliere, MSO’s president and CEO, said it was no surprise. … Her decision comes at a time when the orchestra has been struggling financially. The MSO announced in January of last year that it was deep fiscal trouble, and it cut staff and expenses to survive the 2013-14 season. It drastically reduced offerings for this season, and musicians took a 38 percent pay cut.”
Opera House Boss Resigns After 53 Days On The Job
Ye-jin (Regina) Han, a 44-year-old soprano, faced opposition from the day she was appointed general director of the Korean National Opera: local organizations argued that she lacked the experience and qualifications to lead the country’s flagship company. Han’s departure comes two months after the CEO of the Seoul Philharmonic was forced to resign following the open rebellion of her staff.
Toronto’s Massey Hall Begins $135M Renovation
“For all its past glories, the hall has a shopworn feel, with those odd reclining seats and scuffed brass railings. The goal of the expensive facelift, paid for largely by corporate and government cash, is to do some sprucing up without sanding away the antique beauty of the place.”
“Amadeus” The Movie At 30 – And Everything It Got Wrong About Mozart And Salieri
BBC Radio 3 presenter Clemency Burton-Hill reviews the liberties writer Peter Shaffer and director Milos Forman took with the historical record (and the device they used to get away with it) – and nevertheless finds that Amadeus is “arguably the finest movie ever made about the process of artistic creation and the unbridgeable gap between human genius and mediocrity.” (text-only)