Some international artists are chuckling among themselves at a list of instructions sent out by Concerts at Cratfield, an English chamber music series. Among them:
5. What turns our concertgoers off fastest is a programme which they perceive as lightweight (in length or depth), or performers who assume that listeners are not knowledgeable because it’s ‘just’ a Suffolk country church on a summer Sunday afternoon. [More on not ‘talking down’ to the audience under At your concert below.]
6 By the time you see this, the programme for your concert will have been made public via a printed season brochure, as well as on the website. We are reluctant to agree any changes to this, but recognise that sometimes there are good reasons for doing so: contact me as soon as possible if you wish to discuss a change.
7 If you wish, or are asked, to perform any of the works you have agreed to perform for us at any public event within 50km of Cratfield in the three months before your concert for us, please check this out with me first.
8 If any of the works you will perform include repeats asked for by the composer, we encourage you to observe these, unless you have a good reason for not doing so.
Any is left undotted or ts uncrossed?
This is the Springer executive hired by Universal to revivify Deutsche Grammophon.
This is his c.v.:
Dr. Clemens Trautmann has extensive experience in classical music, the arts and today’s rapidly evolving media business which he will bring to the leadership of the celebrated label. He began his career studying the clarinet with Sabine Meyer and Reiner Wehle at the Lübeck Academy of Music and then with Charles Neidich at New York’s esteemed Juilliard School where he received his Masters of Music degree. As a soloist he has performed at numerous concerts and festivals and featured on a variety of recordings. He was awarded the prestigious Hans Sikorski memorial prize and was honoured by the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival.
A fully qualified lawyer, who is 38, Dr. Clemens Trautmann has held a number of senior and strategic roles at leading media companies. For the last six years, he has worked at Germany’s foremost digital publishing company Axel Springer, most recently heading up the office of the CEO as Chief of Staff. He has served as Chief Executive of Axel Springer’s Immonet online business and has run a number of the company’s priority management board programmes including those focusing on developing new businesses and driving digital change.
Dr. Clemens Trautmann succeeds Mark Wilkinson who, as announced in March, is taking up a new global role within Universal Music’s classical business.
Deutsche Grammophon has poached Axel Springer’s head of online to be label president.
Dr Clemens Trautmann, 38, has been chief executive of Axel Springer’s Immonet online and developed several other businesses for the German media concern. But when DG’s headhunters came knocking, Clemens couldn’t resist. A former clarinet player, a student of Sabine Meyer with several recordings to his credit, he rose to the bait of a cultural giant struggling with new media.
He is the first DG president in memory without executive experience in the music business. That may well be to his advantage.
Almost two years ago, the veteran Dutch conductor said he would never work again with the Concertgebouw after being ‘virtually humilated‘ by its administration in the orchestra’s 125th anniversary season.
Bernard Haitink, 86. was music conductor of the C’bouw from 1961 to 1988 and has been feuding on and off with the institution ever since. Happily, peace has finally broken out and Haitink will conduct the Concertgeouw once more next season.
The Dude and his team have taken on a dramatic animator to reconfigure presentation across their season. This is radical, blue-sky thinking, far beyond the conventional operating modes of other US orchs. It could be a trend-setter. Press release below.
Los Angeles, CA (SEPTEMBER 2, 2015)- Los Angeles Philharmonic Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel and President and CEO Deborah Borda today announced the appointment of Yuval Sharon as the organization’s Artist-Collaborator. The three-year appointment begins in the 2016/17 season, and continues through the LA Phil’s Centennial season, in 2018/19.
“Yuval is an extraordinary director and producer,” said Dudamel. “His projects challenge us to think differently about how music and the arts can play a part in our lives, and they make us look at the world around us in different ways. We’re giving him the platform of the LA Phil to work with creatively, and I can’t wait to see the results.”
In this newly-created post, Sharon, with the support of his experimental opera company The Industry, will curate multiple projects for the LA Phil using his experience in developing new works and re-interpreting established works. These projects will cut across the LA Phil’s various series and incorporate several performance genres. These varied performances will take place not only within Walt Disney Concert Hall, but also outside of the venue in diverse locations throughout Los Angeles. The collaboration marks the first multi-year association Sharon has entered into with a major U.S. orchestra.
“Collaboration will be an essential component for thriving arts institutions in the 21st century. Their value in terms of creativity and outreach will be a key to the future and how we challenge ourselves to grow,” said Borda.”Gustavo and I can’t imagine a more gifted partner than Yuval as we search for new ways to stretch our boundaries. We are in for quite a ride!”
Sharon’s latest project with the company, Hopscotch, an opera performed in 24 moving cars, premieres October 31, 2015. The Chicago-born Sharon made Los Angeles his home after connecting with the city’s open attitude toward artistic exploration. His first experience at Walt Disney Concert Hall was when he attended an LA Phil Green Umbrella series performance and was struck by the audience’s engagement with the music and noted how pivotal the series is to the organization. It was after that and other equally inspirational experiences through his exposure to Los Angeles’ arts scene that he founded The Industry in 2010. Sharon will continue, during his time as Artist-Collaborator, to also produce works independently with The Industry.
“The invitation to play a role in the most innovative musical organization in the country is a profound honor, most importantly for the opportunity to develop a deep relationship over three years,” said Sharon. “My hope is for a sustained exchange of ideas during this residency, where the sum total of the individual explorations we undertake add up to a complete disruption of a conventional trajectory for an organization and a director.’
Zubin Mehta has been named honorary chairman of the George Enescu International Music Festival in Romania. He inherits the title in 2017 from Ioan Holender, former head of the Vienna State Opera who continues as the festival’s artistic director.
Mehta, 79, said yesterday: ‘I can hardly wait to return to Romania. You have the most beautiful festival in the world.’ Mehta is music director for life of the Israel Philharmonic and chief conductor of the Maggio Musicale in Florence.
The Russian baritone, who is undergoing treatment for a brain tumour, has decided after all to sing his two opening performances at the Met this season. Met announcement below.
Dmitri Hvorostovsky has withdrawn from three performances of Verdi’s Il Trovatore at the Met this season, on October 7, 10, and 17. Hvorostovsky, who was diagnosed with a brain tumor in June, will sing the opening performances of the opera at the Met as scheduled (September 25 and 29, and October 3 matinee), then return to London for continued treatment.
Vitaliy Bilyy will sing di Luna on October 7, 10, and 17, a role he performed at the Met in 2010. The Ukrainian baritone made his Met debut in 2007 as Denisov in Prokofiev’s War and Peace and has also sung Shaklovity in Mussorsgky’s Khovanshchina with the company. He has sung di Luna at the Bavarian State Opera, Toulouse’s Théâtre du Capitol, and the Teatro Municipal in Santiago, Chile.
The fall performances of Il Trovatore are conducted by Marco Armiliato and also star Anna Netrebko as Leonora, Dolora Zajick as Azucena, Yonghoon Lee and Antonello Palombi as Manrico, and Štefan Kocán as Ferrando.
The Frenchman Alain Altinoglu has been named chief of the turbulent Brussels opera house.
This has become a game of musical chairs. The last music director, Ludovic Morlot, quit a year ago, since when the post has stood vacant.
Alison Dalton, a first violin in the Chicago Symphoy Orchestra since 1987, found the notes blurring before her eyes while on tour in Hong Kong two years ago. Fifty doctors failed to put things right. Cristina Muti, the maestro’s wife, told her: ‘You just have to keep trying for all of us, because for the grace of God, it could have been anybody.’
So Alison did. And now she’s back. Here’s how.
Barbara Brecht-Schall, daughter of Bertolt Brecht and Helene Weigel, died on Monday at 84.
She was herself a gifted actress.
The office of the Manhattan Public Administrator is seeking relatives of Eugene Bergen, a violinist in the NY Philharmonic who died in 2012, aged 96, leaving no known relatives.
Among other assets, Bergen owned a Gagliano violin. Read more on the search for heirs here.
Under pressure from pro-Kiev activists, Lufthansa has followed KLM in removing recxordings by the pianist Valentina Lisitsa from its inflight entertainment. Lisitsa has taken a militant stand in favour of Russian occupation of Crimea and support of anti-Kiev militants.
