The Berlin Staatskapelle is not the best orchestra in Germany, but it may be the definitive German orchestra. Under the baton of Daniel Barenboim, the Staatskapelle has again become an international force in the music world, and its distinctly German sound is an immediately recognizable beacon, in an era when many orchestras are beginning to sound alike. But what is a “German sound,” and are German orchestras really any more equipped to play German music than orchestras based in the UK or the US? Barenboim believes in the sound, and can explain it right down to the special German method of attacking a note.
Tag: 01.23.04
Taking A Stand Against Funding Cuts
“The artistic director for one of Scotland’s leading theatre companies has resigned only a month into her post, claiming cuts by the Scottish Arts Council has made her job ‘unsustainable’. Emily Gray is to leave TAG, the premiere theatre company for children in Scotland, in April after the SAC cut its grant by more than 40%.”
Is French Film In Denial?
French filmmakers seem to have an obsession with the French Resistance which is all out of proportion to the effect the movement actually had against the invading Germans during World War II. Worse yet, France’s film industry seems decidedly unwilling to confront the ugly truth about the country’s collaboration with the Nazis. It’s not that movies portraying the truth of the situation don’t get made – they simply don’t get screened with much frequency.
A Composer Who Gets Better With Age?
It is a rare composer who lives to see his own centenary, but Elliott Carter seems determined to do so, and at the rate he’s going, he might just write a new piece for the occasion. At 95, Carter is more prolific now than at any time in his long career, and he may well be the last great figure of the long-abandoned modernist movement. “His dogged refusal to bend to the whims of the culture around him makes him a strangely isolated figure in Manhattan. His music is performed much more often in Europe than in America – his only opera, composed in 1998, has never been staged in the US – and he finds himself at odds with the compositional trends that have come and gone in New York.”