Die Drei Pintos, Mahler’s completion of a work by Carl Maria von Weber, is coming up for a rare performance at University College Opera in London (details below). Its significance in Mahler’s life lies in him falling in love while working on the score with the wife of Weber’s grandson – a passion that prompted him to start writing the first symphony.

I have heard Pintos on record and in concert performance, never staged. Should be interesting.
Here’s the (sketchy) website.
Amazon.uk, by the way, have a short-term special offer on Why Mahler?

Die Drei Pintos, Mahler’s completion of a work by Carl Maria von Weber, is coming up for a rare performance at University College Opera in London (details below). Its significance in Mahler’s life lies in him falling in love while working on the score with the wife of Weber’s grandson – a passion that prompted him to start writing the first symphony.

I have heard Pintos on record and in concert performance, never staged. Should be interesting.
Here’s the (sketchy) website.
Amazon.uk, by the way, have a short-term special offer on Why Mahler?

Days after losing some of its biggest singers, floundering IMG Artists announces a major coup.

It has signed an exclusive representation deal with a ‘vocal sensation’. Phew, hold breaths. Has Netrebko jumped ship? Bocelli changed flaks? Bartoli gone bonkers?
None of the above. IMG has gone for the kiddie market with a 10 year-old from America’s Got Talent. Her name is Jackie Evancho and the agency thinks she’s the next Charlotte Church. Her first album will be produced by David Foster, maker of Josh Groban.
I wish IMG every joy with its stunning new artist. It sends a useful advisory to grown-up IMG singers that this could be a very good time to jump ship.

And here she is, singing on YouTube to a wound-up telly audience.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKhmFSV-XB0

Days after losing some of its biggest singers, floundering IMG Artists announces a major coup.

It has signed an exclusive representation deal with a ‘vocal sensation’. Phew, hold breaths. Has Netrebko jumped ship? Bocelli changed flaks? Bartoli gone bonkers?
None of the above. IMG has gone for the kiddie market with a 10 year-old from America’s Got Talent. Her name is Jackie Evancho and the agency thinks she’s the next Charlotte Church. Her first album will be produced by David Foster, maker of Josh Groban.
I wish IMG every joy with its stunning new artist. It sends a useful advisory to grown-up IMG singers that this could be a very good time to jump ship.

And here she is, singing on YouTube to a wound-up telly audience.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKhmFSV-XB0

Buoyed by his cheerleaders at the New York Times, the chief conductor of the New York Philharmonic has enjoyed a pretty easy run in his first season and a half. No-one local has questioned his international standing (low), his temperament (fractious) or his parentage (both were players in the Philharmonic, trailing a whiff of nepotism).

When he took over as head of Juilliard’s conducting program last week, the Times hack hailed the appointment in terms usually reserved for the Second Coming. No-one, the Times reported, had ever held both posts before. Gilbert was evidently a better maestro than Mahler, Toscanini, Mitropoulous, Bernstein, Boulez or any other predecessor.
Mercifully, New York is a diverse town and if its manifold opinions do not get aired in print media they can always find other outlets. Will Robin, in his Seated Ovation blog, brings an insider view from Juilliard, describing Gilbert as ‘a bratty child’ who had to ‘micromanage’ instruments in the orchestra, demanded constant eye-contact and achieved limited results. Telling the young musicians that they had ‘their heads up their asses’ did not go down too well with students or faculty. But they gave him the job because the Philharmonic has put all its eggs in Gilbert’s basket and the Times blows a trumpet of unremitting praise.
One sour blog, based in Berlin and citing an anonymous whistle-blower, does not burst the Gilbert bubble. There will be many more hallelujahs from the Times before the Philharmonic’s new clothes are proved to be insubstantial. Nevertheless, the dissenting voices from Juilliard are a New York first. Watch for more. 
Meantime, here’s some more commentary on the tyranny of eye contact and a lavish piece of Gilbert puffery from his house journal (photos James Estrin, NY Times)..

Buoyed by his cheerleaders at the New York Times, the chief conductor of the New York Philharmonic has enjoyed a pretty easy run in his first season and a half. No-one local has questioned his international standing (low), his temperament (fractious) or his parentage (both were players in the Philharmonic, trailing a whiff of nepotism).

When he took over as head of Juilliard’s conducting program last week, the Times hack hailed the appointment in terms usually reserved for the Second Coming. No-one, the Times reported, had ever held both posts before. Gilbert was evidently a better maestro than Mahler, Toscanini, Mitropoulous, Bernstein, Boulez or any other predecessor.
Mercifully, New York is a diverse town and if its manifold opinions do not get aired in print media they can always find other outlets. Will Robin, in his Seated Ovation blog, brings an insider view from Juilliard, describing Gilbert as ‘a bratty child’ who had to ‘micromanage’ instruments in the orchestra, demanded constant eye-contact and achieved limited results. Telling the young musicians that they had ‘their heads up their asses’ did not go down too well with students or faculty. But they gave him the job because the Philharmonic has put all its eggs in Gilbert’s basket and the Times blows a trumpet of unremitting praise.
One sour blog, based in Berlin and citing an anonymous whistle-blower, does not burst the Gilbert bubble. There will be many more hallelujahs from the Times before the Philharmonic’s new clothes are proved to be insubstantial. Nevertheless, the dissenting voices from Juilliard are a New York first. Watch for more. 
Meantime, here’s some more commentary on the tyranny of eye contact and a lavish piece of Gilbert puffery from his house journal (photos James Estrin, NY Times)..