Category: people

“Opera star Luciano Pavarotti has postponed five concerts on his worldwide farewell tour because of complications from back surgery. Four performances in Canada and one in the US have been delayed until October.”

“Though among the greatest Bach pianists of our time, Edward Aldwell, who died Sunday at age 68 as the result of an automotive accident, was also among the least known. While a fixture in Philadelphia concert life, thanks to his faculty position at the Curtis Institute of Music and his frequent recitals presented by the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, he was known to a larger public only through a half-dozen prestigious recordings and occasional concerts in other major music capitals, such as New York and San Francisco… His death was the result of a freak accident on May 7.”

Archie Drake sang 109 different roles for Seattle Opera in more than 1,000 performances over 39 seasons. He sang the last performance of the company’s “Macbeth” Saturday night, then headed home where he suffered a massive coronary and died. Seattle Opera general director Speight Jenkins last year described Archie Drake as “the soul of Seattle Opera.”

“Falling into his armchair, Hodgkin looks beautifully patrician, but gloomy: the Emperor Hadrian on catching sight of yet more Northumbrian rain. In a way, it is odd that he wants to be interviewed in his studio. It is a place associated with pain and strife because, even after all this time, he still dreads painting.”

It’s been more than two years since Spalding Gray killed himself (likely by jumping off the Staten Island ferry). Now he’s being remembered in readings of his work. “It feels like the first time we’re opening the book again and going, ‘It’s O.K. to talk about Spalding.’ It was such a harsh end. But all those beautiful, graceful moments that he recognized in his work, they still stand. They don’t get negated by that last moment.”

For 13 years, Benjamin Treuhaft has been taking pianos to Cuba – 237 of them so far. “Treuhaft keeps returning to survey donated instruments and tune and restore others, striking an insistent chord against the U.S. trade embargo. After nearly 20 trips to the island — some without U.S. approval — the jocular former hippie who sports a bandanna on his head and likes to tune pianos while barefoot is now a personality in some Cuban music circles.”

Lots of press this week about Simon Rattle not living up to his promise at the Berlin Philharmonic. But Martin Campbell-White, Rattle’s agent, dismissed the German coverage: “This is one man mounting a campaign against Rattle … there is huge togetherness between Simon and the orchestra, and this episode has actually served to reaffirm their faith in him.”

Christopher and David Alden are opera directors. “They are that most unusual phenomenon – twins who have pursued the same career, as opera directors, and reached a comparable eminence. Next week, when David’s revival of Handel’s Ariodante joins Christopher’s well-received new production of Janacek’s The Makropulos Case in repertory at English National Opera, their work will be running in tandem. The Guinness Book of Records has been alerted.”

Andrés Duany is the prophet of new urbanism. “Opponents cast this architect as an imperious enemy of progressive design and a threat to the Gulf Coast, where he has been involved in plans to redesign communities that were devastated by Hurricane Katrina.”

Katherine Dunham, who died this past weekend aged 96, “was one of the first American artists to focus on black dance and dancers as prime material for the stage… Though Miss Dunham’s academic credentials as an anthropologist were impeccable, including a doctorate from the University of Chicago, it was her gift for seduction that helped most to pave the way for choreographers like Donald McKayle, Talley Beatty and Alvin Ailey.”