The Irish Government has given Wexford Festival Opera House national status

It is now the only EU member not to have a national opera house, apparently a source of some embarrassment over Brussels  mussels.

The announcement was made at the festival’s opening this week.

 

Wexford1

Four months ago, we were asked by two musicians to publish the case of a gifted young pianist who was being hospitalised against his will. The young man was supported by the warm-hearted Martha Argerich, among others. His parents and his wife appeared to be on opposing sides. Despite appeals from several musicians, the court appointed a guardian to act on the young man’s behalf.

In matters of an individual’s health, whether physical or mental, media coverage is invariably harmful. When a court order has been issued, there are further hazards and constraints. For these and other reasons, we decided against reporting the case.

This Tuesday (we are told by one of his friends), Christopher Falzone jumped from the tenth floor of a hospital in Geneva. He was 29.

 

We are sad to learn of the death of David Redfern, maker of hundreds of iconic musician photographs and creator of a thriving archive.

David, who was 78 and battling pancreatic cancer, had gone to his place in France to cover a jazz festival. He was passionate about jazz above all other musical forms, and vastly knowledgeable. Starting with Kenny Ball and Chris Barber at Ronnie Scott’s club in the 1960s, he worked up to Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra, the Beatles and more. In 2008, he sold his archive and his business to Getty.

In contrast to many artform specialists, David was curious and respectful about every kind of music. Although there were areas where he and we competed, he always offered a friendly greeting and a raised glass. He was never happier than in the company of fellow-enthusiasts, remembering the nights when music was young.

david redfern

 

A few hours ago, representatives of the Woodruff Arts Center walked away from federally mediated talks with the locked-out musicians, with no indication whether they planned to return. The talks appear to be deadlocked. The WAC refuse to agree a minimum number of musicians in the orchestra.

The Atlanta Symphony is now in deep-freeze.

We have another Minnesota in the making, perhaps without the same level of public engagement.

Here’s the musician’s statement:

atlanta musicians

 

Last night just before 11:00 PM, the Woodruff Arts Center representatives for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (WAC/ASO) walked away from the table after three days and almost 40 hours of talks ably mediated by Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service Commissioner Rich Giacolone, leaving the musicians at the Buckhead venue the FMCS arranged. Although some significant progress was made in health care — and further time together may well have resulted in a complete agreement — the WAC leadership continued steadfastly to refuse to support the need of a world-class Orchestra for a minimum fixed number of musicians.  While the orchestra has been reduced by departures to only 77 Musicians, despite the required contractual complement of 88, the WAC refuses even to commit to 77 Musicians.

The ASOPA Committee volunteered to assist in health care cost savings by making a radical shift to a different type of plan that will save the WAC/ASO at least 25% — over a quarter of a million dollars — annually over the previous plan, which was canceled by WAC/ASO management last month three weeks after it locked out its musicians on September 7. The Musicians also proposed an annual compensation package which, in the final year of the proposed agreement (2018), would have the musicians earning $1,043 less per year than the compensation they earned during the 2011-12 season. 

The ASOPA Committee has worked tirelessly — and will continue to do so — with no other intent than to achieve a fair agreement that protects the Orchestra’s stature and allows it to return to making music on the stage where it belongs. The Musicians are available to meet and are certain that an agreement is entirely possible that will end the heinous lockout to which the musicians have been subjected. “We deeply appreciate the Orchestra’s Board members and other supporters who are working to raise funds and who understand and appreciate the fight to maintain the artistic quality that has made the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra one of the world’s great symphony orchestras, and Atlanta’s cultural flagship,” stated ASOPA President Paul Murphy.

The Mariinsky-reared diva has never bothered much with Moscow and never graced its historic stage.

But she has received a summons to Elena’s Obratsova’s 75th birthday event and will perform at the Bolshoi next Tuesday with her fiancé Yusuf Eyvazov, Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Maria Guleghina and more.

Forget about getting tickets.

eyvazov netrebko2

 

We have received tragic news of the death of Christopher Falzone.

A Leon Fleisher student at Curtis, he won a fistful of awards, including Martha Argerich’s Virtuosos of the Future (2009) and the Blanche Selva (2010). He gave concertos with Michael Tilson Thomas in Los Angeles and Leonard Slatkin in Chicago, and a wide range of recitals in Europe.

argerich falzone

 

He had technique to spare and made his own transcription of Busoni’s notoriously difficult piano concerto. But all was not well with his mental health and he was confined to hospital. He was unable to attend the Argerich festival last summer, prevented from doing so (he maintained) by legal restraints.

We do not yet have confirmation of the cause or place of death yesterday (Tuesday), but the loss is very great indeed.

UPDATE: More details here.

christopher falzone

The National Arts Centre Orchestra of Ottawa will open its European tour tonight in Edinburgh with a minute’s silence.

The concert will be dedicated to Corporal Nathan Cirillo, who was gunned down at the National War Memorial yesterday.

Rosemary Thompson of the NACO said: “It was frightening for all of us because the National Art Centre is steps away from the National War Memorial so the shooting that happened yesterday was literally at our doorstep. As we were flying to Edinburgh all of our colleagues were on lock-down in Ottawa. Many of our friends and family work on Parliament Hill so it was a frightening day and we are sorry it happened.

‘We will be dedicating tonight’s performance to the soldier that was killed.’

national-war-memorial ottawa

Steve Forman is a creative percussionist who started out in the Phoenix Symphony Orchestra and went on to become a sought-after session collaborator for the likes of James Taylor, Sarah Vaughn, Pink Floyd, Art Garfunkel and David Bowie.

In 2008, he gave up the studio work and moved to Scotland to develop and record his own diverse scores, and complete his PhD.

Now the UK wants to throw him out.

Forman, 68, has been teaching for the past four years at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow, but does not earn much for his input. The Home Office in London says he needs to show income of £31,000 a year before they will agree to let him stay.

It is one of those absurd situations where a person bringing real benefit to the country falls foul of bureaucratic rigidity.

steve forman

 

 

David Gilmour of Pink Floyd says: ‘We need innovators and mentors like him. I find it very odd that he is being faced with being sent back to the US when he clearly has so much to offer the next generation. It is wonderful that he has chosen to channel his unique talent into teaching. His skills and approach are totally his own and as far as I know there is nobody I know of like him teaching rhythm in the UK or even Europe.’

Steve Forman said: ‘Glasgow is heaven for me. It is Valhalla. I’m contributing. I’m not going to cost you a dime. I’ll pay for my own funeral. I just want to keep working. I’m teaching people what I know. All the other guys I worked with are polishing their Mercedes Benz and lounging by the pool. I don’t want to be retired. I want to empower other people.’

If you are Scottish, please email your MP or MSP.

 

Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, sounded off today about the ejection of a woman in a niqab from a performance at the Paris Opéra.

Clegg told LBC Radio: ‘She’s just in the audience. That’s ridiculous to stop it. What are you going to do next, throw people out for having tattoos?… I do not want this country to become like France where you start prescribing by law what people can wear.’

carnival mask

Baldur Brönimann’s ten proposals for changing classical music, which we flagged up at the weekend, has been read by 97,000 people and rising.

That’s a significant body of people who have declared an interest in change. They may not agree with all of Baldur’s the points, but they don’t want things to carry in the way they are. Emptying halls. No new faces. Stiff conduct. No surprises.

Baldur’s right. Let’s start a movement for change.

Click here to read his latest thoughts on the swelling response.

Concert halls shouldn’t become purified spaces where of presenting safe music is presented in a safe environment. Danger, risk, surprise and challenge should be at the heart of artistic experience.

Can’t quarrel with that.

baldur bronniman

 

Alan Gilbert famously stopped a Mahler 9 when a cellphone went off.

A German maestro asked for an intruding bird to be shot.

Michael Tilson Thomas asked a front-row lady with a fidgety child to leave her seat.

Proportionate? Appropriate? Necessary? One astute Slipped Disc reader asks: What would Karajan have done?

Good question.

Karajan would never have addressed an audience member directly in the middle of a concerto. If he found the situation intolerable, he would have quietly stepped off the podium for a handkerchief break and ordered someone in the wings to do something about it.

We have no record of any such incident with Karajan, either because audiences in those days were better behaved, or – more likely – because conductors were trained to turn on the tunnel vision and ignore anything that was not their concern.

Such as a fidgety child in the audience. That’s a house management issue. Or a matter for the audience itself to influence. Not a baton job. Karajan would have shut his eyes to it.

 

Karajan eyes shut

 

MTT, we think, made the wrong decision. People have conducted in far worse circumstances than this – in traffic noise, warfare, freezing cold and blazing heat. The conductor is there to get on with the job, keep his mind on the music and lead the best possible performance.

 

 

 

A scholar at Caltech was wondering if the music you listen to most says much about your intelligence.

So he collected the average SAT scores from ten colleges and correlated them against their ten most frequent “favorite music” page on Facebook.

The results? Click here.

Gospel and Beyoncé lovers had the lowest SAT scores.

Beethoven came way out top

Ludwig-van-Beethoven-006 or    Beyonce4PR600180511

h/t: Gideon Glass