This rare image of the transformational composer was taken in Buffalo, upstate New York, in March 1968.

It has been rediscovered and is now represented by Lebrecht Music&Arts.

The photograph, by Jim Tuttle, shows Cage taking part in a performance of David Rosenboom’s To That Predestined Dancing Place. Buffalo, in the late 1960s, was a hive of modernist activity.

Read all about it here.

John Cage with gun during performance of David Rosenboom's 'To That Predestined Dancing Place' at Albright-Knox Art Gallery performance for the 2nd Festival of the Arts. (Edward Burnham on percussion). March 1968 ©Lebrecht. This image is the property and copyright of Lebrecht Music and Arts. The moral rights of LMA and its Authors have been asserted. The image cannot be reproduced without obtaining a licence from www.lebrecht.co.uk

An Austrian named as Arthur Magnus, aged 31, has been found dead on a highway after apparently falling from the Williamsburg Bridge in New York.

Austrian media have identified him as the grandson of the great conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who died in March this year. Arthur was the son of Elisabeth von Magnus, a deputy vice-chancellor of Graz University and an accomplished mezzo-soprano who made many recordings with her father.

We send her and the whole family our condolences at this tragic loss.

Arthur Magnus worked as a manager for the freestyle motocross event, Masters of Dirt, and ran his own company, Next Level Entertainment, Gmbh.

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Harnoncourt lost his son, Eberhard, a promising film director, in a 1990 road accident at the age of 33.

 

In a Q&A posted by Jessica Duchen on her site, the octogenarian post-minimalist was asked about the future of music. He sounds quite upbeat:

I’m no longer young and sometimes foolish, so I’ll quit while I’m ahead. But, I can tell you this, in the English-speaking world, there’s a huge group of wonderful young composers, so many good ones – like Nico Muhly and Bryce Dressner here, and Jonny Greenwood (- pictured – of Radiohead, who performed Electric Counterpoint at Glastonbury in 2014) in your country.

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More here.

It belonged to the composer’s sister and stayed in the family.

Now. it is going on display at the Handel House in Halle.

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It is thought that an anonymous painter copied the portrait from the London original by Thomas Hudson and that Handel sent the copy as a gift to his family.

Sofya Tsygankova, who was accused of smothering her two daughters with pillows in March of this year, has been found unfit to stand trial in Fort Worth. She will be sent for 120 days of treatment in a mental health facility, after which she will be brought before the court for reassessment. Court report here.

Sofya, 32, is the estranged wife of the international pianist Vadym Kholodenko, Ukrainian winner of the 2013 Cliburn competition. It was Vadym who discovered the bodies of their children at the former marital home.

He has continued to live in Fort Worth, closely involved in its musical life.

 

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A new photoshoot has landed from the Italian pianist Vanessa Benelli Mosell.

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She plays Stockhausen.

Seriously.

The Czech Museum of Music has acquired a legacy of letters and memorabilia of the great soprano Emmy Destinn, formerly owned by her close friend Hilda Schueler. They have been donated to the Czechs by Mrs Schueler’s Swedish grandchildren.

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Destinn is of such national significance that she has appeared on the currency. The bequest was accepted in person today by the Czech Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka at the Czech Embassy in Stockholm.

More here.

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This weekend, Christopher Warren-Green is conducting Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’ marvellous piece An Orkney Wedding with Sunrise with the Charlotte Symphony.

Chris was friends with the composer and visited him at home in Orkney not long before his death earlier this year. Max inscribed the following instruction on the front of his score:

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(right-click to enlarge)

‘Think about Highland Park or Scapa (MY favourite!) before lifting the baton – & afterwards, down a FEW most generous glasses! Much love & infinite thanks, Max.’

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Sorely missed.

CLEVELAND – On November 2, 2016, members of the string section of The Cleveland Orchestra performed the National Anthem at Game 7 of the 2016 World Series.

(No-one asked the Chicago Symphony, apparently.)

The eight musicians included first violinists Takako Masame, Chul-In Park, and Jeanne Preucil Rose; principal second violinist Stephen Rose; second violinist Carolyn Gadiel Warner; cellist David Alan Harrell; and bassist Mark Atherton as well as violinist Stephen Warner, who retired from the orchestra earlier this year.

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photo: Cleveland Orchestra/Getty press

Chicago, however, won the Series.

Khatia Buniatishvili, the Georgian superstar pianist, has decided to grow her profile in English speaking territories by signing up with Stefana Atlas and Doug Sheldon at Cami for UK and North American management.

Khatia, 29, has a huge public and media following in France and Germany. It’s not yet clear if she will retain her original Paris management, Jacques Thelen, for Europe. She has played rarely in the US in the past three years and was previously with Lang Lang’s agency, CAMI Music, which did not know what to make of her.

This is a fresh start with two experienced and dedicated agents.

khatia buniatishvili

Some sixty to a hundred Juilliard students turned out this morning to face down three envoys of the Westboro Baptist Church who denounced the school as a den of pride and vanity.

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Police kept the two groups fifty feet apart.

First report and pictures here.

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