Take a look at the Billboard classical charts if you want a lesson in contemporary realities.

At number one, and number six as well, is Jackie Evancho, a variety kid who came second in America’s Got Talent and meets all the key criteria in Simon Cowell’s shlock box. She is small and cute, with a voice that sounds freakishly adult. It lacks anything that might be mistaken for expression or character and occasionally veers off the note, but it’s a variety act, not an opera audition. Eight million viewers and President Obama love it. Here‘s a Youtube sample.

After a debut hit with O Holy Night, Jackie’s now writing her own. Have we been here before? Do I see a Charlotte Church in the making?

Dream With Me - Jackie Evancho

This is a mockery of classical music. So is the rest of the chart. Nothing classical about it.

Can’t someone sue Billboard for misrepresentation?

——–

Here are the latest sales figures: The Official USA ” Dream With Me” sales numbers are:
week one 161k,week two 77k = 238k, the HDD 50-55k is the estimate for week #3( ends Sunday July 3) so definitely well over 250k for the USA alone and over 300k worldwide right now.

The city of Geneva is among the most boring on earth, stuffed with international box-tickers, sporting bribers and private bankers. The last time it had a cultural profile was half a century ago when the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande was conducted by Stravinsky’s friend Ernest Ansermet and recorded regularly and profitably by Decca. Ansermet was not a very nice man and more than a little antisemitic, but he ran a crack orchestra with relatively modern programmes and the world sat up and took notice. He retired in 1967 and the town has gone quiet since.

None of the succeeding conductors has done much to make waves, though Armin Jordan (1985-1997) and Fabio Luisi (1997-2002) kept the band up to scratch and Neeme Järvi, who arrives next year, will be his usual typhoon self.

What’s really changing, though, is the management. The new guy, ostensibly a banker, is one of the founders and fixers of the Verbier Festival, a real livewire. Miguel Esteban his name is, and he looks like the young Michael Douglas.

DR

He won’t leave the orchestra undisturbed in its slumbers. This could be the start of an Ansermet awakening.

Don’t give away the ending, but I can tell you it’s a singer what done it.

René Kollo, the retired German tenor, has his first detective novel out this month.

Overheard audience comment at Mahler’s Eighth Symphony in Zagreb last night, conducted by Valery Gergiev.

The venue was a sports arena, but the atmosphere was intense. Here are some terrific spectator pics.

 

 

Richard Mantle, director of Opera North, has disputed Lee Hall’s claim of having his opera, Beached, censored for homophobic reasons.

(see update here)

The cancellation has provoked a global twitter storm. Mantle, in a third statement put out by the company in 10 hours, gives a measured account of events and blames one participating school for the cancellation.

Here‘s Mantle’s version. It may not be the end of the matter:

Beached was commissioned by Opera North as part of its work to engage communities and young people in the Bridlington area through active participation in an exciting, bold and visionary new work which they would help bring to life. Had we been in a position to perform the piece, the results would have shown just what a excellent new work Beached is and what inspirational achievement is possible through projects such as this, which Opera North prides itself in offering.

The fact that the piece can no longer be performed due to the withdrawal of the major school participant is deeply disappointing for everyone involved in the project to date, not least many young people, and we regret that the efforts of the Bridlington community can no longer be rewarded by a public performance.

The decision of the main school to withdraw from the project – which saw 300 participants removed in one go – was the fundamental and only reason that Opera North had to cancel the planned performances. Opera North has worked tirelessly to urge the school to continue its involvement and continues to fully support the work and the messages it tried to convey through the story.

We do have to recognise that this project is being treated as part of the core curriculum for the school concerned, and to that extent very different from a community project where participation is voluntary.

Opera North did recognise that some of the subject matter contained within the piece would need to be handled in ways which would be appropriate to the age and background of the performers and intended audience. We have been working with both the librettist, the school and participants to achieve a solution which was appropriate.

Opera North does not consider the subject matter to require censorship nor do we feel that the inclusion of the themes was inappropriate to the intended audience and participants; and there was no attempt to excise a gay character from the piece. Lee Hall  has been willing to introduce changes and make adjustments to the libretto, but in relation to the scene which has caused the most difficulty for the school, Lee refused to make any further change, as is his right as a librettist.

We regret that some people associated with the project have decided to view the decision not to proceed with performances as being based on a homophobic fear on the part of Opera North. This is utterly at odds with the reality of the company’s ethos about inclusivity, diversity and access to all, indeed Opera North prides itself on its stance towards sexuality.

Opera North feels that the decision by Lee Hall to suggest that the production was cancelled due to a homophobic stance on the part of the company is unacceptable. It is so at odds with the reality of our views on the issue, and so publicly misrepresents the situation in such a demeaning way.

Richard Mantle

General Director | Opera North

 

It’s Ljubljana, capital of Slovenia, and as far as I’m aware it’s the first capital to do so.

No public edifice in Vienna, Prague, Budapest or Berlin. Nor anywhere else that I’ve tracked him.

Hats off to Slovenia for being first.

 

Here‘s the report in Slovenian. Thanks to Dominik Bagola for alerting me.

There were 1,140 performers last night in Valery Gergiev’s performance in Ljubljana, the town in Slovenia where Mahler landed his first job (see Why Mahler? for more)

That could be a record. Stokowski had 1,068 in Philadelphia in 1916 and Mahler himself a mere 1,029 in Munich.

Anyone done it bigger? Let me know, if so.

Here’s a report from Ljub by Branimir Profuk. Itis in Croatian.  The headline reads: “Magnificient music sounded on the Congress square where Mahler himself was walking 130 years ago”.  Google-translate can help with the rest.

One of the great partnerships in world literature is over.

J K Rowling has parted company with Christopher Little, who was the first to recognise the brilliance of Harry Potter and sent the manuscript to 12 publishers before finding one independent imprint, Bloomsbury, that shared his faith.

Rowling says the ‘painful decision’ was not taken  ‘without good reason’.

It is not clear whether this drastic move is connected in any way with her new website, Pottermore. But the Bookseller reports that Rowling’s personal agent at Christopher Little, Neil Blair, has also left the agency and is setting up on his own with Rowling as his first client. Blair is listed as one of the directors of Pottermore.

Little, 69, was said to be ‘disappointed and surprised’.

Whatever the background, this is a major upheaval in literary publishing.

 

 


The Czech government is forcibly merging the State Opera with the National Theatre, demolishing 150 year-old separate traditions. The National was founded by Smetana and sang in Czech; what is now the State Opera was originally the German Theatre and had Mahler and Zemlinsky as chief conductors.

But tradition counts for nothing in politics and the demolition of an opera house in ‘a faraway country… (of which) we know nothing’ has attracted no outside attention, none of the outcry that justly attends the destruction of Dutch infrastructures. If you love Prague, now is the time to shout. Here’s an update on the local protests.

And here’s an insider account sent to me, in Czech-English:

On June 6, 2011 the minister of culture Ji?í Besser (former profession dentist, former party Communist) announced the fusion of the National Theatre in Prague (NT) with the Prague State Opera (PSO), starting January 1, 2012. The PSO Ballet will be disestablished and there will be only one National Ballet (Ballet of the NT with its present chief Petr Zuska). In spite that minister Besser declares that there will be NT orchestra and choir and PSO orchestra and choir, it is clear that in fact it tends to the liquidation of the PSO. The management is already only one: the present director of the NT Ond?ej ?erný is director in charge of the PSO and since July 1, 2011 there will be one head of the opera, young Slovenian stage manager Rok Rappl.

Minister Besser announced this fusion without submitting any analyses of the functioning of the ensembles and buildings to which the fusion was to pertain. A good manager would have first ordered audits of the affected organizations (which are administered by and partly funded by the Ministry of Culture). He would have had variant solutions prepared, publicly compared them, and only then have made a decision by approving the chosen conception. However, Mr. Besser preferred the style of Zden?k Nejedlý (Stalinist Minister of Culture). He himself knows best what is good for opera, even without analyses, without audits, without variants, and without a conception. He has already announced it to the nation: ‘The Czech capital has room for only one opera and ballet company.’ Whatever it costs.

Prague State Opera has about 45% economical self-sufficiency. The ballet performance (mostly classical ones) has 85%-99% attendance. The visitors are not only Czech, but also many foreign visitors, who are the economical benefit to the City of Prague. Within the two last years the National Theatre has under the direction of Ond?ej ?erný the well balanced economy only owing to liquidation of the reserve fond (almost 100 milions of crowns). The Minister Besser repeadly refused to publish the results of the economical control from June 2010. So the bad manager ?erný who led the National Theatre nearly to the collapse, is now managing both theatres…

Finally, here is a letter I’ve been sent on the need for saving the State Opera by the conductor Jan-Latham Koenig (above):

I have been considering the question of the two Prague opera companies, since I conducted the Tristan and Isolde premiere last May, and would like to offer a few comments. In the first place, there is not only room but a necessity to maintain both  leading opera houses in a city, such as Prague, which is one of the most cultured cities in Europe with  a rich musical tradition, rivalled by only Vienna in Central Europe. The repertoires of the two houses should be and must be complementary, with only occasional overlaps. What do I mean by this? Emerging from its German roots, the PSO should be most motivated, after the success of Tristan to explore much further this part of its heritage. In the first place, what an orchestra such as that of the PSO needs, is repertoire that challenges it, stretches it, and in working hard of this repertoire , such as more Wagner operas, Weber, even the twentieth century masterpieces, such as Wozzeck. The orchestra, as proved by last May’s Tristan is fully capable of performing to the very highest artistic level, given the right motivation. I would like to stress that what makes orchestras lose their standards is not lack of talent but lack of self discipline and being constantly challenged by new repertoire and most exigent conductors… I believe very firmly that with a great team, the orchestra, chorus, soloists and  production department will work together to produce an overall artistic level which could be compared to the finest houses in Western Europe and North America.

 

Warner executive Joe McKesson is working on a production of Carmen that he intends to stage in central Africa as a corrective measure to the spread of rape as a political and military device.

Here’s what he tells me:

Our La petite Carmen is a cautionary tale against violence toward women. We will also give Make-your-own-opera workshops to children suffering from Riverblindness…we are being sponsored by the United Front Against Riverblindness, and we have a documentary already being made. We have our first fundraiser at the end of July.

Joe McKesson

Daniel Shungu, the Executive Director of UFAR spoke Wednesday to a fundraiser at the New York Public Library and the crowd was riveted…the Congo could very well be our future if we do not work to preserve the water ways and control disease, in America 900 billion gallons of sewage are poured into the rivers and streams…that is as much water as pours over Niagra Falls in 21 days. I’m very passionate about this….we want to use opera to support the actual people of the Congo and bring attention to the people beyond the headlines of violence and disease…my brave troupe are truly pioneers …music is eternal, story telling through music our greatest tool.

Photo-full

Here‘s more about the project, which is based in Philadelphia, together with details of how to support it. If you’re mulling over how to make a better world on Independence Day, this is no bad place to start.

It’s the big one, the overall gold medal, the grand prix.  It’s awarded when all the fuss is over. It’s the last, but not least.

And the winner of the 2011 grand prix is….

(photo: EPA/BGNES)

…. Daniil Trifonov, the piano gold medallist, seen here receiving his bit of sculpture from Valery Gergiev.

Here‘s video of him playing Liszt Mephisto Waltz #1.

He’s the 13th to post a Soldier of Orange video online – his is with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra – and the weightiest Dutch cultural figure so far to pronounce on the government’s programme to subect the arts to severe cuts.

The adjectives are taken from his address in Dutch on the video. I hope I understood him right.