On tour in South Africa, the Minnesota Orchestra is about to pay a visit to the all-African township of Soweto, home to the late president Nelson Mandela. The cvisit was prompted by music director Osmo Vänskä, who wants to break down perceptions that orchestral music is predominantly a white art form and is reportedly dismayed that audiences so far have been mostly white.

Soweto was the scene of a 1976 student uprising that left hundreds dead and injured as a result of police fire.

Report here.

In an unacknowledged followup to Slippedisc’s story of a French orchestra abandoning printed notes, the Times has a page three story today of British bands racing to replace paper with tablets.

Key points:

In Leeds tonight the Yorkshire Young Sinfonia will go “100 per cent digital” with sheet music ditched from its musicians’ stands in favour of iPads and Bluetooth foot pedals deployed to turn the pages.

The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra is to allow audience members sitting anywhere in the auditorium to use smartphones and tablets to receive real-time information on, for example, the oboe solo that has your neck hairs tingling. It said it expected about 10 per cent of its audiences to use the Encue app, adding that concerns about light disruption had been alleviated during trials.

 

Kate Molleson has written a fine obituary of Helen Macleod, ‘one of Scotland’s finest harp players’, who was killed on the roads at a terribly young age. Engaged in all styles of music, she was a regular with the Hebrides Ensemble and a teacher at St Mary’s.

‘She was energetic, creative, vibrant and inspiring. She was wickedly funny and full of spirit, a person who would light up any room.’

 

The debate continues. From the conductor Uri Segal:

I was Szell’s assistant at the New York Philharmonic during the 1969-70 season when he served as interim MD before Boulez was to take over, and I have nothing but praise and love for the man.

Apart from his great musicianship he was a man of the highest integrity and honor. True, music mattered to him perhaps more than anything else, but once he realized you are serious about your music you gained his respect for ever. In my case it was also connected to Mahler 6.

Backstage before the first rehearsal on the piece I approached him with a question concerning two almost identical bars in the final movement (bars 110-111) where only 3rd trumpet changes note in the chord. Szell looked at the score and then raised his chrystal blue eyes and asked me in his abrupt way “where did you study”. He then went to admitt he did not notice that and did not have an answer without looking at the manuscript. His first thing to do once he was on the podium was to approach the 3rd trumpet player to make sure the score matched his part (which it did). Anyway, from this moment on we “became friends”.

 

Years later I met and befriended Myron Bloom at Indiana University and we spent many great evenings together sharing stories about Szell.

 

 

Announcing the Berlin State Opera’s new season, its music director said the focus would be on Greece.

He said that Greece had suffered ‘for years’  from a European Union led by its finance ministers and ‘at this time, we have a responsibility to give something back. As an artist, we can do that only through culture. ‘

The season will include Greek-themed operas – Richard Strauss’s Elektra, Luigi Cherubini’s Medea and Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo’, but the central spotlight will be on the Greek composer Nikos Skalkottas, who studied in Berlin with Kurt Weill and Philipp Jarnach, attended Arnold Schoenberg’s masterclasses and wrote his first important works in the city – a violin sonata, piano sonatina, the first piano concerto and an octet.

There are two glaring flaws in Barenboim’s statement. First, the EU assault on Greece was led as much by his patron Angela Merkel as by any of the finance ministers. She, if anyone, is to blame for the austerity.

 

Second, if Barenboim believes that artists can only achieve through culture, why does he persist in making political statements? Does he consider them to be futile?

From the Guardian jobs page:

The English National Opera (ENO) is Britain’s only full-time repertory opera company, based at the London Coliseum, in the heart of the West End of London and a stone’s throw from Trafalgar Square.  The ENO is founded on the belief that opera of the highest quality should be accessible to everyone, with a large proportion of tickets at affordable prices.  The organisation brings its productions to the widest possible audience, whether at the London Coliseum, nationally or internationally.  The ENO aims to introduce completely new audiences to the magic of opera through stimulating and creative learning and participation programmes.

(Small correction: ENO is no longer a fulltime rep company. It plays much less than a full year.)

Following Stuart Murphy’s appointment as Chief Executive earlier this year ENO are now seeking exceptional candidates to join the organisation in the new role of COO.  This post will report to the Chief Executive and be responsible for all financial, IT and legal aspects of ENO’s operations.  Candidates will ideally bring a track record of success in an FD position, bring both strategic nous and attention to detail, be an effective manager of people and have excellent communication skills.

From our string quartet diarist:

The studio complex on Malaya Nikitskaya Street – Kachalova Street until 1993 – has been Moscow’s premier recording centre since the 1930s. Mosfilm used it for soundtracks and both DG and Philips made legendary albums on its premises.

The building is to be vacated of all its recording and broadcast equipment by August 25.

More here.

The death is reported of Marie-Francoise Bucquet, a much-recorded pianist, mostly of modern repertoire.

She became professor of piano at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in 1986 and head of department in 1991.

This Vogue promo is paid for by a wristwatch.

Moscow City Court has again extended the house arrest of the director Kirill Serebrennikov, who has now been detained for more than a year.

Serebrennikov is accused of embezzling federal arts money. His lawyers say he is being held on false witness testimony designed to silence a Putin critic.

Either way, he can’t leave the house til mid-September, earliest. Them longer he is held, the less foreign protest you hear. Serebrennikov is being forgotten by most western media.

The Queen of Soul died today, aged 76.

She could sing anything.

Here’s the night she stepped in for Luciano Pavarotti.