The world of music knows that Carlo Gesualdo, Prince of Venosa, murdered his wife and her lover on the night of  16 October 1590. The murder was premeditated and very well-organised. Gesualdo was generally a cold fish. But in the act of murder he deliberately chopped his wife to pieces. Why would a man do something like that?

I Fagiolini, the vocal ensemble, called in a forensic psychiatrist to assist with their forthcoming Gesualdo project. Read her clinical assessment here.

We’ve just come across this summary by Graham Spicer of a survey by Classical Voice of the fees paid to top conductors, singers and instrumental soloists at the leading Italian opera houses.

The 30,000-Euro fee for international conductors is some way above the European norm.

The rest are pretty average.

When they remember to pay.

Read Graham here.

It’s Jansons’s final concert tonight as chief conductor of the Concertgebouw.

You should be able to catch it on the ‘live’ button here.

He once predicted it would be whistled by milkmen. No milkmen left, sad to say.

But David Schafer, an art professor at the University of Southern California (where Schoenberg taught) arranged for five hospitality trucks to play Schoenberg tracks around the campus for a week.

Truck 1 played Brettl-Lieder, truck 2 aired Gurrelieder, truck 3 broadcast Erwartung, truck 4 drover around playing the 12-tone Wind Quintet, opus 26, truck 5 stuck to the late violin-piano Phantasy, opus 47.

Here‘s a real-time, unboosted sample.

The Los Angeles Philharmonic has not played a note of Schoenberg in almost a decade. They’ve lost the trade to the ice-cream merchants.

Claire Wickes, who has guested with several London orchs, had landed the hot seat at the Coliseum.

The situation at Radio France is described today as ‘out of control’. Musicians are raging at the cancellation of two orchestral concerts this weekend, five unions have gone on strike, the head of radio, Mattheiu Gallet, is under official investigation for a lavish office redecoration and the head of music, Jean-Pierre Rousseau, has not been seen at the radio all week.

Two inside sources tell Slipped Disc that Rousseau (pictured) has been sacked – after less than a year in the job. There has been no official word on his position.

Kit Wynn Parry, author of The Musician’s Hand and a rheumatologist who treated John Williams, Alfred Brendel and many others for upper limb pain, has died at the age of 90.

He was among the founders of the British Association of Performing Arts Medicine, which now has centres around the country. Amazingly, he escaped the royal honours that befell so many of his grateful patients.

Obituary here.

Orchid, a boutique label, is staging a contest for under-30 UK artists. The winner gets a record debut.

See here.

At a time when all labels have shed their longterm deals with orchestra, Decca has popped up with a five-year partnership in Montreal. Yes, we understand he sentimental attachment to the so-called golden years when every score that Charles Dutoit beat was released on CD.

But the deal starting losing money in the early 1990s and Kent Nagano, Dutoit’s successor, does not sell records.

So, why?

Press release below.

Montreal, Thursday, March 19, 2015 – The Orchestre symphonique de Montréal is pleased to announce a five-year partnership agreement with Decca Classics, a prestigious label on which the Orchestra recorded about 80 albums from the beginning of the 1980s to the early 2000s. The OSM wished to share this happy development on the occasion its 2015-2016 season launch.

“We at the OSM are delighted to reunite with our historic partner and look forward to the special artistic projects which will result of this collaboration,” stated Kent Nagano, music director.

“We’re very happy to be re-signing with the prestigious international record label Decca, with whom we were highly active in the recording market for over 20 years. Even though the industry has undergone upheavals and the OSM itself has diversified the ways in which it supplies its music to audiences, our desire is to continue to make recordings that enable the Orchestra to maintain its international celebrity has never faded,” stated Madeleine Careau, chief executive officer.

“It gives me great pleasure to see the return of the OSM to Decca, its recording home for so many years. Now in its magnificent new hall it is sounding back to its very best under the enterprising musical direction of Kent Nagano. The projects we have agreed, starting with L’Aiglon, add several world-premiere recordings to the catalogue, while maintaining the tradition of Francophone music that was so important during the Dutoit years. So all in all, this is a logical way to continue a much-cherished partnership,” commented Paul Moseley, Managing Director of Decca.

The relationship with Decca started in 1980 when the OSM signed an exclusive contract with the label. The OSM recordings, under the Decca label, won about 40 national and international prizes, including two Grammy Awards. The OSM is therefore particularly proud of returning to the label.

L’Aiglon: Son of Napoleon, a work by Honegger and Ibert, presented in a grand North American premiere on March 17, 19 and 21, 2015 at Maison symphonique de Montréal, is the first project in the new partnership. The second project, inspired by Halloween, with works by Ives, (Hallowe’en), Dukas, (The Sorcerer’s Apprentice), Dvořák, (The Noon Witch), Balakirev, (Tamara), Saint-Saëns, (Danse macabre), and Mussorgsky, (Night on Bald Mountain), was being announced today in the framework of the launch of the 2015-2016 OSM season.

A survey of 10,000 British schoolchildren and 250 teachers finds that those who join a musical ensemble are more likely to make good moral choices in their daily lives. Playing sport, on the other hand, makes no difference.

Those who were members of choirs or took part in other musical activities outside school were 17 per cent more likely to choose the more moral options than those who did not. Similarly those involved in drama groups outside school scored 14 per cent better on average….By contrast those involved in sports clubs or teams scored marginally worse than those who did not.

This is, of course, exactly what we’d like to believe.

The caveat is that the research was conducted by the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at Birmingham University. How objective is that? Report here.

A spectator reports from the Royal Festival Hall:

We were sitting in the side stalls of tonight’s Philharmonia concert at the Royal Festival Hall and it looked like Vladimir Ashkenazy gave himself a rather nasty paper cut (on the edge of the music stand?). It bled for most of the third movement of Lemminkainen. He appeared to never miss a beat as he retried a handkerchief from his pocket but had to suck his thumb / finger quite a bit or clench is fist until the bleeding stopped. It’s not often you see a conductor pointing with a fist!

The US tenor is the latest victim of Viennitis. He was down to appear with Marina Rebeka but fell sick shortly before showtime.

Abdellah Lasri, a Moroccan, was the capable stand-in, reaping ovations at the curtain.