I never thought I’d feel much regret when Alain Levy went through the window, but either I’ve seen too much blood on the record floor or else I’m going all gooey in my old age. Or maybe I just prefer to deal with the devil you know.
Levy was the man in the black suit and matching black shirt who, in the mid-90s, was responsible for sacking dozen of classical artists on the Universal labels, Decca, DG and Philips. Ousted in a boardroom ruck, he popped up at troubled EMI where, instead of reaching once more for the axe, he (privately) confessed past errors to trusted individuals and gave the classical label a limited license to expand under ex-Philips/Decca man Costa Pilavachi.
Only for the brute logic of the music biz to throw him out in January on the strength of a set of lousy results that was largely not of his making, leaving Alain with nothing more than a seven-digit payoff to cushion his terrible fall. Weep now, or forever hold your tears.
Levy was the kind of man who would give himself a birthday party and, the moment he was out of the room, all the guests would ask each other why they had been invited. He had few close friends and artists never knew what it was he got paid for.
He once wrote me a vituperative letter (copy to the Editor) demanding to know why I hated the music business so. I don’t, was my cc-ed reply. I love music – the rest follows from that.
He sent henchmen to lunch me, administering over Notting Hill restaurant tables dire warnings as to the damage I was causing. Moi? said I. You can’t blame pauvre petit moi for ruining the record biz when it’s M. Levy that’s making all the bad decisions.
And now he’s gone, forever it seems, I miss the sad suit. Nobody is ever going to rebuke me again for dissing the classical record biz, because there’s not much left to diss. Nobody is going to care what the media says about the classical side of things because the once-fat side has become a faint margin.
Levy came out of the Paris office of the old Columbia Records school that believed every major label needed a classical outlet, if only for sentimental resons. Now he’s gone, who’s left that cares?

I never thought I’d feel much regret when Alain Levy went through the window, but either I’ve seen too much blood on the record floor or else I’m going all gooey in my old age. Or maybe I just prefer to deal with the devil you know.
Levy was the man in the black suit and matching black shirt who, in the mid-90s, was responsible for sacking dozen of classical artists on the Universal labels, Decca, DG and Philips. Ousted in a boardroom ruck, he popped up at troubled EMI where, instead of reaching once more for the axe, he (privately) confessed past errors to trusted individuals and gave the classical label a limited license to expand under ex-Philips/Decca man Costa Pilavachi.
Only for the brute logic of the music biz to throw him out in January on the strength of a set of lousy results that was largely not of his making, leaving Alain with nothing more than a seven-digit payoff to cushion his terrible fall. Weep now, or forever hold your tears.
Levy was the kind of man who would give himself a birthday party and, the moment he was out of the room, all the guests would ask each other why they had been invited. He had few close friends and artists never knew what it was he got paid for.
He once wrote me a vituperative letter (copy to the Editor) demanding to know why I hated the music business so. I don’t, was my cc-ed reply. I love music – the rest follows from that.
He sent henchmen to lunch me, administering over Notting Hill restaurant tables dire warnings as to the damage I was causing. Moi? said I. You can’t blame pauvre petit moi for ruining the record biz when it’s M. Levy that’s making all the bad decisions.
And now he’s gone, forever it seems, I miss the sad suit. Nobody is ever going to rebuke me again for dissing the classical record biz, because there’s not much left to diss. Nobody is going to care what the media says about the classical side of things because the once-fat side has become a faint margin.
Levy came out of the Paris office of the old Columbia Records school that believed every major label needed a classical outlet, if only for sentimental resons. Now he’s gone, who’s left that cares?

Why blog?
It’s a question that has been taxing me for months. As one who makes his living by writing for profit (none but a fool would do so otherwise, said Doctor Johnson), I feel as much reluctance at doing it for free as any blue-lipped sex worker on a busy intersection.
On the other hand, I see esteemed colleagues taking to the blogosphere like birds to worms and some of the amateurs out there stealing our thunder by reporting events and conveying opinion on their blogs faster and more furiously than we do in print.
So I thought, hey, give it a go – at least for a while. But do it my way.
Let’s have a set of rules.
1 No personal pictures – no cats, babies, sofas, work desks.
2 No access to my interior life.
3 No response to those who slag me off for paltry infelicities, a slip of the finger here or there that eludes my built-in sub-editor.
4 No response to those I don’t respect.
5 Stick to the topic – and the topic is what is happening to our fragile sound world now that the steady flow of classical recordings has died to a thin trickle.
The decline has been so swift, so precipitate, that many are unaware that we have lost the equivalent of a public library of musical civilisation. There is still some activity in the rubble, and some entertainment, and I shall try to give a sense of them as the weeks go by.
All of this is much on my mind as I launch a book called (in Britain) Maestros, Masterpieces and Madness, (in the US) The Life and Death of Classical Music and (in Germany) Ausgespielt. Aufstieg und Fall der Klassikindustrie, a title which is closest to my heart, having resonances of Brecht, Weill and the whole Weimar decadence cat show.
For those who want more, there are links below.
For the rest, read on.

Why blog?
It’s a question that has been taxing me for months. As one who makes his living by writing for profit (none but a fool would do so otherwise, said Doctor Johnson), I feel as much reluctance at doing it for free as any blue-lipped sex worker on a busy intersection.
On the other hand, I see esteemed colleagues taking to the blogosphere like birds to worms and some of the amateurs out there stealing our thunder by reporting events and conveying opinion on their blogs faster and more furiously than we do in print.
So I thought, hey, give it a go – at least for a while. But do it my way.
Let’s have a set of rules.
1 No personal pictures – no cats, babies, sofas, work desks.
2 No access to my interior life.
3 No response to those who slag me off for paltry infelicities, a slip of the finger here or there that eludes my built-in sub-editor.
4 No response to those I don’t respect.
5 Stick to the topic – and the topic is what is happening to our fragile sound world now that the steady flow of classical recordings has died to a thin trickle.
The decline has been so swift, so precipitate, that many are unaware that we have lost the equivalent of a public library of musical civilisation. There is still some activity in the rubble, and some entertainment, and I shall try to give a sense of them as the weeks go by.
All of this is much on my mind as I launch a book called (in Britain) Maestros, Masterpieces and Madness, (in the US) The Life and Death of Classical Music and (in Germany) Ausgespielt. Aufstieg und Fall der Klassikindustrie, a title which is closest to my heart, having resonances of Brecht, Weill and the whole Weimar decadence cat show.
For those who want more, there are links below.
For the rest, read on.