Robert Black, a member of the Bang on a Can All-Stars, loaded his double-bass onto a flight from Fortaleza, Brazil, to New York. That was a week ago. Since then there has been no sign of the instrument and no help from the airline, TAM, which is the largest in Brazil.
Here’s the story in Robert’s own words:
The unthinkable seems to be happening. I returned to NY from Brazil on TAM airlines on Tuesday morning (7/22) – but my double bass had not been put on my flight. I filed a lost baggage claim with TAM. It is now 3 1/2 days later and the airline has no idea where the instrument is. I’m trying to stay optimistic, but also starting to fear the worst.
To all of the students and teachers at the Festival Eleazar de Carvalho in Fortaleza – as the festival concludes and you start to travel home through various airports, be on the lookout for my bass and let me know if you see it. The case looks like this.
Now 5 days after losing my double bass, TAM Airlines still cannot find it. After countless calls and email messages, they cannot provide me with any information.
Time to go to some agencies outside of TAM.
The bass is one of Patrick Charton’s B-21 models he made for me in 2009 (No. 13). It is a very unique and distinctive instrument. There are only about 30 of these instruments in the world. It easily stands out and cannot be confused for any other bass. There is a unique dedication inscribed inside. In the following photos, especially notice the neck block, scroll, and f-holes.
Along with the instrument, there were two German bows – one made by Robert Dow and the was carbon fiber.
What makes this situation even more unbelievable is that on my TAM flight from NY to Sao Paulo, the bass wasn’t delivered until the next day. On my TAM flight from Sao Paulo to Fortaleza a few day later, the bass wasn’t delivered until the next day. And now my TAM flight from Fortaleza to NY – 5 days and no bass. This is not the typical overweight-oversize bass case – it is 48 x 30 x 12 inches and weighs 50 pounds. There is room on the planes for it.
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Message for TAM: Get that bass back to Mr Black or face the concerted wrath of musicians.
h/t: Daniel Wolf
We hear that Sarah Billinghurst, former artistic manager of the Metropolitan Opera, has resigned from the board of disintegrating English National Opera.
Sarah was brought in by John Berry to support his vision of international co-productions and superior casting. She has a Rolodex of contacts unequalled in the opera world. She also has a very wide reach into wealthy American society and she was working on creating an endowment base for ENO to pursue its ambitions.
With John Berry gone, however, there was nothing to keep Sarah at the Coli.
Her loss is entirely calculable. It costs ENO an indispensable artistic resource and a potential line of financing.
Disaster is too moderate a word to describe it.
Jean-Jacques Rapin, former conductor of the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra and head ot the town conservatoire, has died at 82.
He founded the Ernest Ansermet Society and wrote books about music and, surprisingly, national defence.
The film composer and conductor has pulled out of the festival with back pain. JW is 83. We wish him better.
Keith Lockhart takes over the evening.
Last year, Williams pulled a crowd of 18,000.
The tenor, annoyed about a spoiler remix put out by his former label, is telling fans on his Facebook page to wait for the new one on Sony. Summer storm in a hair-dryer? No, he feels caught between forces beyond his power.
Here’s the message:
Dear Friends,
Please do not let yourselves be deceived by the Decca release “Jonas Kaufmann – The Age of Puccini”. This compilation contains only 3 Puccini Arias – my recordings of “Che Gelida Manina” and “E lucevan le stelle” from 2007 and a scene from “La Rondine”, did I recorded with Renée Fleming in 2008 for the album Verismo. The remaining 18 tracks are Essentially my old recording “Verismo Arias” from 2010. THEREFORE familiar recordings- in new packaging. I was not Consulted in its making, this thing done without my knowledge and approval.
The “real” album Puccini Which I recorded with Antonio Pappano in Rome in Autumn last year is titled “Nessun dorma” and will be released on Sony in the middle of September. It Exclusively contains arias and scenes from Puccini’s operas Including Highlights from “Manon Lescaut”, “La Boheme”, “Tosca”, “La Fanciulla del West” and “Turandot”.
Jonas Kaufmann
It’s one of the biggest no-nos in classical music. Brahms represents form at its purest, Tchaikovsky represents raw emotion. They are polar opposites. To mix one into the other is anathema, right?
Last night at the Bristol Proms, Daniel Hope and friends played alterante movements of Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir de Florence and Brahms’ String Quintet No. 2 in G major, Opus 111.
It worked. Better than worked, it triumphed. The applause increased after each and every alternate movement.
Somehow, the expressionism of Tchakovsky added warmth to Brahms while the meticulousness of Brahms mitigated the excesses of Tchaikovsky.
There was some entertaining chit-chat between movements about the rivalry between the composers, but the music made the best argument.
The Cleveland Orchestra has to fill the principal clarinet seat, left vacant by Franklin Cohen’s retirement.
From the auditions, Ben Lulich of the Seattle Symphony emerged in first place. Ben will play next season as Acting Principal, while on leave from Seattle. He can be heard in Europe when the Cleveland comes on tour in October.
A couple of years ago, as a favour to a friend, I attempted to conduct a rare interview with the Greek composer Vangelis, famed for the Chariots of Fire score.
I should have known better.
Everyone in the music biz has a Vangelis story and none of them is filled with sweetness and light.
Early success can be a curse, breeding a sense of entitlement. Vangelis does what he does on his own terms. When I turned up at his Dorchester suite at the appointed hour of the afternoon, he was in his dressing gown and apparently disinclined to discuss any of the topics he had previously agreed to consider.
The next hour was, for me, excruciating. I came away thinking we had maybe got something new out of the encounter, but feeling in dire need of a large compensatory bar of chocolate.
Now, after intensive effort by a brilliant editor, the interview has finally been published.
The music audience is divided between those who do and those who don’t.
Myself, I’m an eyes-wide-open man, fascinated by body language as much as by musical expression.
Last night at the Bristol Proms, we heard Beethoven Opus 131 played in the dark. Not totally dark. There were some clever shafts of occasional light from above and below, giving a spectral appearance to the Sacconi Quartet, who bravely played one of the summits of the repertoire in conditions where visual communication between the players was impaired.
At best, the performance acquired an ethereal dimension, taking us by free association into Beethoven’s black world of deafness. These were transcendent moments.
The deficiency was the difficulty the players had adjusting to slippages of intonation – they needed to pause between movements at least once to retune – and to the loss of physical awareness of each other.
It was a fascinating experiment. Maybe it worked better for those who listen habitually with eyes closed.
Do you?
An Austrian project to collect all known Bruckner manuscripts in a single site appears to have reached completion.
The dominant Youtube pianist, an outspoken pro-Kremlin activist in the Ukraine conflict, has published a video titled ‘To Donbass with Love’. An English translation is added for worldwide fans.
Donbass is the part of eastern Ukraine that is torn by civil war between Putin-backed secessionists and Ukraine loyalists.
Valentina has nailed her colours to the mast.
A moment’s silence, please, in the timps.
Everett ‘Vic’ Firth, maker of the world’s most trusted drumsticks and friend to players and bangers everywhere, has died at 85.
