Our New York operatic ingenues Elizabeth Frayer and Shawn E Milnes have been to see Bellini’s soprano show at the Met and came away confused. The fat lady sang pretty well (even though she’s not allowed to be fat) but there were big gaps in the back-story that neither the creaky production nor the sketchy synopsis did anything to clarify. If Norma was a mummy, who was big daddy?
Read here.
Three bone-flutes found during excavations in Henan province offer evidence that indigenous people in China were making music nine millennia ago.
“People who created Jiahu culture were not only hunters, fishermen and craftsmen, but also early farmers and brilliant artists,” said Zhang Juzhong, professor at the University of Science and Technology of China who oversaw the work.
There may be older traces of music making in the Middle East, but this find is an important one, pointing to an earlier musical culture in China than previously imagined.
The Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja has been invited to sing later this month for justices of the US Supreme Court. Calleja will be in the US for a Chicago run of Traviata, before moving to the Met for Bohème.
The Swedish-American soprano Erika Sunnegårdh got her breaks the hard way. In a candid confession, published exclusively below, she describes the struggle that so many singers endure to reach the footlights. Erika made the front page of the New York Times. Now, she’s seeking support on Kickstarter for a signature album. Music needs to go, she says, where music is wanted. She’ll give house concerts, if asked, to donors.
Watch and, if you can, click on ‘K’ below and chip in.
I’m Erika Sunnegårdh. I used to be a student, a waitress, a personal assistant, a teacher and a church singer and then, one remarkable January afternoon, at the not so tender age of 37, a last minute audition got me my big break.
I booked my first professional job singing in an opera. 18 months later, after lots of auditions and first trembling steps in the “business” of music, I made my Metropolitan Opera debut in Beethoven’s Fidelio. It was April 1st, and the star got sick. On 24 hours notice I stepped onto the Met stage and sang to 4000 people in the house, and 11 million on the radio and I landed on the front page of the New York Times. It was an incredible day and it changed my life.
That was seven years ago, and my life and how I spend my time, still sometimes moves me to tears. Mine is a blessed profession. One that takes everything you think you have to offer, and then it asks you for even more.
One of the places I feel the most at home singing, is with the Malmö Symphony Orchestra in Sweden. I sang my very first Tosca with them, and have had the pleasure of doing a variety of projects with them for over 8 years now.
A while back we were tossing around the idea of recording together, and to my surprise, the orchestra management offered to partner with me by giving the orchestra’s time for free. All I had to do was finance and produce the recording.
There are two things I believe deeply: The first is that artists should get paid for their art and the second, that once that art is paid for, it should serve the community.
After being given an orchestra, I invested a lot of my own money towards hiring the other artists and funding the production, and, I sang my little heart out! But most importantly, I made the decision to offer the album in its entirety as a free download on my website. Why? Because music needs to go where music is wanted. And some of us are able to spend more on our love of music than others.
The album includes some of the greatest soprano repertoire by Beethoven, Wagner and Richard Strauss. These three composers depicted women in radically different ways and the women, or sometimes adolescent girls, on this album fascinate me.
So now I’m asking those of you who CAN pay for music to do so.I have set my goal at a level I think is achievable. It’s only a part of the actual cost, but it would go a long way towards making my personal investment more meaningful.
In return for your participation I can offer you anything from a signed CD to a house concert, or your gift of a performance, masterclass or event to your community.
Please give what you can, and I promise I will continue to match your every dollar with all I’ve got – through this album, and hopefully many more to come!
The Brentano Quartet, who played the soundtrack on Yaron Zilberman’s film A Late Quartet, have given up their residency at Princeton for a better deal at Yale. You can guess what Albert Einstein would have said about that.
Press release below.
NEW HAVEN | The internationally acclaimed Brentano String Quartet has been appointed the new quartet-in-residence at the Yale School of Music (YSM). The members of the quartet — Mark Steinberg and Serena Canin, violin; Misha Amory ’89, viola; and Nina Lee, cello — will also serve as artists-in-residence.
Their faculty appointment will begin in fall 2014. They succeed the Tokyo String Quartet, which retired in 2013 after 37 years at YSM.
“The Brentano Quartet comes to YSM and the Yale Summer School of Music/Norfolk Chamber Music Festival with international renown for their exquisite artistry and their musical insights as gifted teachers,” said Robert Blocker, Dean of the Yale School of Music. “They join our distinguished faculty in our commitment to chamber music, a fundamental component of advanced musical study at Yale.”
The Brentano Quartet will anchor the School of Music’s chamber music program, serving as faculty coaches to the next generation of musicians. The ensemble will perform a concert each semester for the Oneppo Chamber Music Series at the School of Music, and will also spend part of each summer in residence at the Yale Summer School of Music/Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, where as artist faculty they will perform and teach.
“The Norfolk Festival is thrilled to welcome an ensemble with the international reputation of the Brentano Quartet — and such wonderful people, too,” says Paul Hawkshaw, Director of the Yale Summer School of Music. “We look forward to many summers of superb concerts and fine teaching with them.”
Within a few years of its formation in 1992, the Brentano Quartet had already garnered the prestigious Cleveland Quartet Award and the Naumburg Chamber Music Award. Since then, it has continued to earn accolades, including appointments as inaugural members of Lincoln Center’s Chamber Music Society Two and a yearlong residency at Wigmore Hall. The quartet has been in residence at Princeton University since 1999.
For the critically-acclaimed independent film “A Late Quartet,” the filmmakers turned to the Brentano String Quartet for the central music, Beethoven’s Opus 131. Earlier this year, the quartet served as the collaborative ensemble for the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition.
“The Brentano String Quartet is a tremendously exciting addition to the faculty,” said Melvin Chen, Deputy Dean of YSM. “They will thrill audiences and inspire students, and their commitment to interdisciplinary projects will draw interest from the wider university community.”
The ensemble has performed numerous musical works pre-dating the string quartet as a medium, including music by Gesualdo, Purcell, and Josquin. It has also collaborated with some of the most important composers working today, including Elliott Carter, Charles Wuorinen, Chou Wen-chung, Steven Mackey, Bruce Adolphe, and György Kurtág.
The quartet has commissioned works from Wuorinen, Adolphe, Mackey, David Horne, and Gabriela Frank. One of their most recent collaborations is a new work by Mackey, “One Red Rose,” which commemorates the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Another new commission is a piano quintet by the pioneering jazz pianist and composer Vijay Iyer, a winner of a 2013 MacArthur “Genius” Grant and a Yale alumnus.
Peter Oundjian, a member of the Yale School of Music faculty and former first violinist of the Tokyo String Quartet, noted that the quartet “exudes passion and integrity in everything they do. This is a most exciting development in the history of the Yale School of Music.”
“We are thrilled and honored to become part of the community at the Yale School of Music,” said violist Misha Amory. “As a former undergraduate at Yale, I particularly treasure my memories of being coached by Peter Oundjian, Kikuei Ikeda, and Kazuhide Isomura of the Tokyo Quartet. It is a privilege to have been invited to step into those shoes.”
Jules Buckley, 33, has been announced as music director of the Metropole Orchestra, which was almost abolished in last year’s funding cuts. The band has been given a lifeline to 2017 and Buckley – a jazz trumpeter who has worked with the Arctic Monkeys – is seen as its last chance for revival.
We regret to report the death of Jos Dingemanse, a successful baritone and choral conductor. He had been ill for some while.
The second clarinet saw it happening and acted fast. Dr Sheri Rolf, who is a medical practitioner at the Billings Clinic, recognised the signs of a heart attack as conductor Gordon Johnson started to sweat and sway during rehearsal with the Great Falls Symphony, in Montana. Here’s what happened next.
I’ve been having fun on Sinfini with my friend and near-neighbour, Steven Isserlis. Watch.
We are hearing from Milan that the 116 orchestra musicians are divided over who they want to succeed Daniel Barenboim as music director. Our wisp in the wings says it’s currently 61 for Riccardo Chailly and 41 for Fabio Luisi.
Yesterday Alexander Pereira met the orchestra to present his project for La Scala, which was said to include the musical leadership of Riccardo Chalilly as ‘a fundamental asset.’ A resolution is expected in the next few days – though there is no guarantee that either maestro will agree to take the turbulent position.
The vital new collection of Leonard Bernstein letters delivers revelations of the most intimate nature on virtually every page. Here’s my review in Standpoint magazine.
Friends have been telling us about the life and death of Matt Fretton, whose death we reported yesterday. Matt was a boutique agent who devoted his life to managing the careers of Alina Ibragimova, Natalie Clein and two or three others. He never wanted to be big. He just wanted to help artists be themselves.
He knew how because, in the 1980s, he had been a pop star who appeared on the cover of Smash Hits magazine and on the BBC’s Top of the Pops.
Matt gave up that world to return to his classical roots. Six months ago, he decided that he’s had enough of being an agent and went back to writing songs and making films, some with his partner, the photographer Sussie Ahlburg. They bought a house together in Suffolk, a country place for quiet contemplation. Then, in August, Sussie drowned while out swimming in Hampstead Pond, apparently of a heart attack. She was 51.
‘Matt could not go on without Sussi,’ says a friend.
The tributes that we hear describe Matt as a deeply sensitive man, remote from the machinations of the music business, attuned to the inner needs of his artists, of his friends, and of his own, dark, inner voice. He will be widely missed.
