Is this becoming a stampede?
Is this becoming a stampede?
What started as a trickle of top brass leaving EMI Classics is turning into a stampede. Head of A&R Stephen John was first to go last year, followed by head of catalogue, Graham Southern (who has recently found a niche at Universal).
Now it’s the head of North America and head of digital, or as he is known in the office V-P, EMI Classics NAMEX (North America-Mexico). Chris Montgomery lasted less than a year after succeeding Mark Forlow. The mind boggles at how much compensation the label must be paying out to senior execs who can’t cut the mustard – or at least can’t cut it with label chief, Eric Dingman.
The latest departure has not yet been officially announced. Dingman will be spending part of his time in New York to cover the vacancy until another appointment is made, hardly the best way to run a corner store. But it may not be for long. The general expectation is that EMI will be broken up by Citibank before the the first daffodils are in bloom. And then, I guess, the last v-p will turn the lights out.
LATE EXTRA: Hedge trimmer Guy Hands is appealing the verdict he lost against Citibank, possibly delaying the inevitable by a few extra months. Report here.
What started as a trickle of top brass leaving EMI Classics is turning into a stampede. Head of A&R Stephen John was first to go last year, followed by head of catalogue, Graham Southern (who has recently found a niche at Universal).
Now it’s the head of North America and head of digital, or as he is known in the office V-P, EMI Classics NAMEX (North America-Mexico). Chris Montgomery lasted less than a year after succeeding Mark Forlow. The mind boggles at how much compensation the label must be paying out to senior execs who can’t cut the mustard – or at least can’t cut it with label chief, Eric Dingman.
The latest departure has not yet been officially announced. Dingman will be spending part of his time in New York to cover the vacancy until another appointment is made, hardly the best way to run a corner store. But it may not be for long. The general expectation is that EMI will be broken up by Citibank before the the first daffodils are in bloom. And then, I guess, the last v-p will turn the lights out.
LATE EXTRA: Hedge trimmer Guy Hands is appealing the verdict he lost against Citibank, possibly delaying the inevitable by a few extra months. Report here.
The Mexican tenor with vocal and domestic issues that have resulted in frequent cancellations is about to make his debut as an opera director. January 24 in Lyon is where it’s happening – Massenet’s Werther, with Arturo Chacon-Cruz, Karine Deshayes, Lionel Lhote and Anne-Catherine Gillet. Leopold Hager conducts. More here.
Villazon is not scheduled to sing another opera before May, when he is down as Werther at Covent Garden.
Among other less smart career moves, meanwhile, he is promoting Mexico tours for Daily Mail readers and pitching for TV reality slots. Shame. He coulda bin a contender.
Rolando as tour guide in the Mail
The Mexican tenor with vocal and domestic issues that have resulted in frequent cancellations is about to make his debut as an opera director. January 24 in Lyon is where it’s happening – Massenet’s Werther, with Arturo Chacon-Cruz, Karine Deshayes, Lionel Lhote and Anne-Catherine Gillet. Leopold Hager conducts. More here.
Villazon is not scheduled to sing another opera before May, when he is down as Werther at Covent Garden.
Among other less smart career moves, meanwhile, he is promoting Mexico tours for Daily Mail readers and pitching for TV reality slots. Shame. He coulda bin a contender.
Rolando as tour guide in the Mail
The autograph manuscript can now be viewed online, thanks to a New Year splashout by the Morgan Library (formerly the Pierpoint Morgan). This formidable institution, once the private library of New York’s most powerful financier, conserves the final drafts of three Mahler symphonies, the second, fifth and ninth. The fifth is the only one actually owned by the Morgan, the other two are placed there on deposit by private collectors.
Studying all three scores side by side, as I was once privileged to do for an afternoon, it was possible to see the growing confidence in Mahler’s handwriting, alongside a constant, fretful concern for minute detail. The sheer energy that went into writing his music bursts off the page, unmistakably Mahler Compared to the icy, taut graphology of Igor Stravinsky or the magnifying-glass script of Pierre Boulez, it proclaims a rumbustious individuality along with a complete unconcern for neat appearance.
You can learn an awful lot about a composer just by admiring the score, before you attempt to read a line of music.
Here’s the opening page of Mahler’s Fifth, inscribed to my beloved Almscherl’ whom he met when he was halfway through the work and married before it was finished.
And here’s the opening of the Adagietto, the most famous ambiguity Mahler ever wrote:
The images appear courtesy of the Morgan Library. You can study the full symphony here. Thanks to Alex Ross for bringing the online initiative to general attention.
Morgan’s meddlesome role in Mahler’s US career is touched upon in Why Mahler?
The Montreal conductor Yannick Nézét-Séguin has issued a short statement, explaining his decision to cancel Chicago concerts this month.
‘Due to an overly taxing fall schedule, I made the extremely difficult decision to create additional time in my schedule for rest and study.’
That’s it. No apology, no direct communication with Chicago, its musicians and media, no promise to make good – no, the statement was issued by the Philadelphia Orchestra, via the New York Times. Andrew Patner gives the local reaction here.
This is a very bad start for a young conductor. I hope he does well next season in Philadelphia, because he won’t be welcomed many places else for a very long time.
In any other business, Yannick and his new band would face a lawsuit for breach of contract.
Five months into the job, the former Barbican Centre artistic director has resigned as chief of the West Kowloong arts complex.
Here’s the press release:
And here’s Graham on the stomp:
And here’s his upbeat New Year’s message, posted only a fortnight ago:
As the year ends, I should like to take the opportunity to thank you all very warmly for your support of WKCDA throughout 2010. It has been an eventful and fruitful time for us as a new Executive Team, with many young professionals also joining our ranks. Since August the project has evolved from abstract ideas to concrete concept plans, on which the public and stakeholders have been enthusiastic in giving us their views during the consultation. We will take the project forward in the coming year and the objective, by this time next year, is to present a detailed Development Plan to the Town Planning Board and begin the process of construction after its endorsement.
The latest word from leaky Bayreuth is that Wim Wenders is being lined up by Katharina Wagner to direct the next Ring cycle. It’s a good call, if it comes off.
Wim’s latest shot is a biopic of ballet genius Pina Bausch, due to screen out of contest in the Berlin film festival.
Can’t see why he needs Bayreuth. Wim likes tortured heroes, exemplified by his terrific debut film, The Goalkeeper’s Fear of the Penalty.
Wagner’s Siegfried is a superhero. He doesn’t do ambivalence. Wim will have to give him a convincing back story if both of them are to emerge with credibility intact.
C’mon, Katie, get that deal done.
(from The Goalkeeper’s Fear of the Penalty)
The latest word from leaky Bayreuth is that Wim Wenders is being lined up by Katharina Wagner to direct the next Ring cycle. It’s a good call, if it comes off.
Wim’s latest shot is a biopic of ballet genius Pina Bausch, due to screen out of contest in the Berlin film festival.
Can’t see why he needs Bayreuth. Wim likes tortured heroes, exemplified by his terrific debut film, The Goalkeeper’s Fear of the Penalty.
Wagner’s Siegfried is a superhero. He doesn’t do ambivalence. Wim will have to give him a convincing back story if both of them are to emerge with credibility intact.
C’mon, Katie, get that deal done.
(from The Goalkeeper’s Fear of the Penalty)
Some months ago I relayed a dolorous email from Cameron Carpenter’s agent. The self-styled Bad Boy of the Organ had gone missing. More specifically, he had given his agent the push and was off into the wide, wide world to make his fame and fortune.
photo by Dana Ross
Well, now we know where the naked organist has landed. A press release announces that Cameron’s cake has been cut in three chunks – CAMI for North America, KD Schmid for the rest of the world and Peters Edition for publishing his flamboyant arrangements. That’s how the future lines up for the hottest thing in the organ loft since Saint Cecilia, at least.
photo by Chris Owyoung, with styling by Maeri Hedstrom
Hmmmm…. maybe there’s more to the Bad Boy than meets the ear. It was shrewd of him to avoid becoming exclusively CAMI’s Cameron, as the former conductors agency is no longer the powerhouse it once was. And it was even sharper of him to plant a large footprint in Europe as a clever hedge against declining US attendances for classical variety acts.
As Cam himself puts it: “There could hardly be a better start to the New Year for a musician than to be simultaneously signed by both CAMI Music and Konzertdirektion Schmid. I’m thrilled that my work has the muscular advocacy of both Jean-Jacques Cesbron and Cornelia Schmid on a combined four continents.”
But that’s not quite the full story. CAMI’s Cesbron, who Cam credits above, spends most of his waking hours looking after – you guessed – Lang Lang. So the plot thickens. Suddenly the two flashiest finger men are under the same manager. What price a big duet? Or is that more like a duel? Here’s Lang Lang practising for the event, back home in Beijing.
press photo: AP
Full press release appears below
—————————————————————————————————————–
|
PROVOCATIVE ORGANIST-COMPOSER CAMERON CARPENTER KICKS OFF 2011 WITH NEW MANAGEMENT, PREMIERE OF MAJOR COMMISSION, PUBLISHING CONTRACT Virtuoso Recently Profiled on CBS Sunday Morning; Global Management By CAMI Music and Konzertdirektion Schmid |
|
[New York, NY] – Wherever Cameron Carpenter appears, he generates enormous excitement from audiences and critics alike; and as the only organist in the world filling concert halls from Berlin’s Philharmonie to Davies Hall in San Francisco, it’s clear he is now one of the industry’s most in-demand talents. On the heels of a recent U.S. national television profile on CBS Sunday Morning, the “Bad Boy of the Organ” (CBS) announces his new management team, solidifying his representation throughout the world: CAMI Music, LLC for North America and Asia, and Konzertdirektion Schmid for Europe, the United Kingdom, Scandinavia (including Nordic countries), New Zealand, and Australia.
“There could hardly be a better start to the New Year for a musician than to be simultaneously signed by both CAMI Music and Konzertdirektion Schmid,” says Carpenter. “I’m thrilled that my work has the muscular advocacy of both Jean-Jacques Cesbron and Cornelia Schmid on a combined four continents.”
Formed in 2004, CAMI Music specializes in the worldwide general management and touring of nearly 50 prominent artists, institutions and events across the worlds of theater, dance, and world, jazz, and classical music and beyond. Carpenter joins a roster including such superstars as Lang Lang, Seiji Ozawa, Maxim Vengerov, Howard Shore, Tan Dun, and the American Ballet Theatre. Specifically, Cameron will join CAMI Music’s Instrumentalists as only the sixth artist in that elite group, alongside Lang Lang, Ray Chen, Khatia Buniatishvili, Mischa Maisky, and Vadim Repin. “We are thrilled to bring an artist of Cameron’s stature to the roster,” said Jean-Jacques Cesbron, President of CAMI Music. “We are looking forward to introducing our clients to his phenomenal talent and ground-breaking vision of what the organ can do.”
In addition, Cameron’s manager Tobias Tumarkin of CAMI Music adds “We are so excited to be working with Cameron and strongly believe that he will bring new fans to the organ and the wonderful repertoire, both classical and popular, that it provides.”
Konzertdirektion Schmid is Europe’s leading classical music management, well-known for handling the European careers of artists such as Yo-Yo Ma, Peter Serkin, Joshua Bell, Murray Perahia, Yefim Bronfman, Xavier de Maistre, Mitsuko Uchida, among others. Cameron is represented by Schmid associate Benedikt Carlberg as the sole organist on the Schmid roster.
“We instantly knew that Cameron Carpenter is an exceptional and brilliant artist from the very first moment he caught our attention. Not only because he plays the organ in a way nobody has done before – but particularly because of his deep understanding of the music and his absolute dedication to it,” saysCornelia Schmid, who manages the Konzertdirektion as President from their office in Hannover, Germany.
Carpenter, called a “smasher of cultural and classical music taboos” by the Los Angeles Times, started 2011 with the world premiere of The Scandal, a major 30-minute work for organ and orchestra composed by Carpenter and commissioned by the Cologne Philharmonie (KölnMusic GmbH). This was the first major event under Carpenter’s new relationship with world-renowned publishing house Edition Peters, which has signed the composer to an exclusive worldwide publishing contract. Edition Peters, which has already published Carpenter’s Aria, Opus 1 for solo organ and will soon release his Serenade and Fugue on B.A.C.H as Opus 2, will publish The Scandal in two versions, both as Carpenter’s Opus 3 (for organ and full orchestra) and Opus 3a (for organ and expanded chamber orchestra, as premiered in Cologne).
The Scandal, with Carpenter in the solo organ role, debuted on New Year’s Day 2011 at the Philharmonie in Cologne, Germany with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie under the direction of Alexander Shelley. Lauded by press and audiences alike, the performance garnered such praise as from Germany’s Die Welt: “Carpenter…is proving himself to be a clever eclecticist, who understands to entertain with much finesse.”
“I’m honored to watch Edition Peters launching my career as a composer. With the publication ofThe Scandal, Op. 3 in 2011, I hope to begin an ongoing expansion of the secular organ repertoire, particularly in major works for organ and orchestra,” says Carpenter.
For more information on Cameron Carpenter, including his most recently released CD/DVD set Cameron Live! (Telarc, 2010), visit www.cameroncarpenter.com.
Cameron Carpenter Cameron Carpenter is a dazzling performer and showman, but these are just the first impressions to be had from a diverse and prolific artist. Encompassing the organ in all its iterations – pipe, virtual, classical, and popular – Cameron’s unique voice is emerging as a revolutionary in his field, while still evolving. This exorbitant virtuoso is renowned not only for his playing of the great organ works, but also for his compositions which – in their emphasis on color, secularity, and performative freedom – follow in the footsteps of Percy Grainger, Sigfrid Karg-Elert, and Leopold Godowsky. The 29-year-old (first ever) Grammy®-nominated organist has already performed widely in the U.S. and abroad, and arranges prolifically for the organ (from Chopin’s Études and piano masterworks of Liszt, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff, Medtner, etc., to contemporary pop music and scores from Japanese animé). “No other musician of Carpenter’s generation has more adeptly fused shrewd showmanship, dazzling technique and profound thinking about his instrument and his place in the musical cosmos…” – San Francisco Chronicle
Contact: For Media requests: Amanda Sweet/Bucklesweet Media Amanda@Bucklesweetmedia.com 347-564-3371
For CAMI Music: Tobias Tumarkin Tumarkin@camimusic.com
For KD Schmid: Benedikt Carlberg benedikt.carlberg@kdschmid.de |