The composer Seigfried Matthus has written an opera about Martin Luther for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, which arrives in 2017.
Matthus, 81, describes himself as a Christian but not a churchgoer. He has been shocked by Luther’s outbursts aganst the Jews after they refused to join his breakaway sect.
When he starts to rant against Jews, says Matthus, he gets the orchestra to overwhelm him and the chorus to yell ‘stop!’
Anfangs brachte er den Juden eine große Hochachtung entgegen. Dann ist er ausgeflippt in wahnsinnigen furchtbaren Sätzen, die ich ihn in der Oper geifern lasse, aber ich halte mich im Orchester völlig zurück. Alle Sänger treten dann aus ihrer Rolle heraus und sagen: „Halt ein!“
We’ve reported the decline, derogation and dismissal of music critics. Worse is happening in dance, says The Atlantic. By its calculation, there are only two full-time dance critics left in the whole of the USA.
Read here.
There will never be another Clive Barnes.
HarrisonParrott have been signing them wholesale this summer. First Thibaudet from IMG, then Perianes from ICA. Now they’ve got for François Leleux, an oboist who’s developing a career as conductor.
He’s married to another HP artist, Lisa Batiashvili.
We’ve been sent links to a swap site where users illegally exchange works by living and copyright composers.
Music publishers are invited to contact us for details. Apparently, this is a revival of a different site that was shut down by the Music Publishers Association in the USA.
UPDATE: Since music publishers are even sleepier than usual in August, if you are a composer you might like to alert your editor to this menace.
A jury in Kent has convicted Stephen Tillyer, an insurance salesman, of stealing an instrument left on a train by LSO principal viola player, Edward Vanderspar.
The musician had left his instrument on the train after a long day’s recording with the orchestra. Tillyer saw it and took it. Later, he claimed he wanted to return it to the rightful owner, but the jury rejected his story. He had been captured on video walking away with it.
The viola has an estimated worth of £300,000 ($500,000).
Edward told the court: ‘The train was busy. During the journey I was extremely tired and spent the journey reading and napping. When the train was approaching Marden I was in a daze from being so tired. I suddenly realised that I had to get off the train. I was in such a rush I forgot to get my viola.’
Full story here.
A week ago we reported that orchestras across Italy had been told by the Ministry of Culture that their subsidy was being sharply cut. Media in Germany, Austria and the US have picked up the story with varying degrees of alarm.
Today, the official who signed the letter in the dead of August, Salvatore Nastasi, has been promoted to deputy head of the prime minister’s office.
Looks like a smart career move…. or an Italian job.
Nastasi is 42. He’ll go far.
As for the orchestras, who knows?
Or cares…?
We think it’s Pavarotti they’ve got on the deck, but it’s entirely out of the ordinary for any kind of sports team to put classical music in their training routine so we’re backing the San Francisco 49ers to win everything ths year.
Go, Niners.
Click here to watch warm-up routine.
press release:
Nick Reed, currently Chief Executive of Manchester’s renowned Bridgewater Hall has been appointed as Chief Executive to replace Andrew Jowett OBE, who retires in early 2016.
Nick Reed brings with him a wealth of experience from a thirty year career in the UK and Europe.
He has led theatres and concert halls in England and Wales, and launched The Helix, a new arts centre in Dublin. For the past ten years he has been Chief Executive of the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester’s iconic international concert venue. In addition to leading the Bridgewater Hall, Nick has been active in new business development for SMG Europe, responding to the challenges facing many local authorities in how they manage their arts facilities.
Nick Reed has strong links with Birmingham. His family moved here when he was just one year old and he attended King Edward VI School in Edgbaston. Nick Reed added, “I am thrilled to be coming back to Birmingham as Chief Executive of these two great concert halls. I grew up going to concerts at Town Hall and I have delighted in seeing Symphony Hall take its place as one of the finest halls in the world. Birmingham has always been a major centre for the arts and entertainment and the transformation the city is currently undergoing will enhance its reputation further. I am passionate about music and its place in all our lives and want to ensure that future generations benefit from this musical heritage.”
Andrew Jowett commented, “I have known Nick Reed for over twenty years and think he will do a fantastic job for PBL and I look forward to working with him on the handover.” Nick Reed will formally take up his role in early 2016.
The influential critic Dr Robert Braunmüller has laid into the Salzburg Festival over its new production of the Brecht-Weill Threepeny Opera, in which Peachum is made to look and act like Fagin, Charles Dickens’s anti-semitic caricature in Oliver Twist.
The production is by Julian Crouch and Sven-Eric Bechtolf. Robert accuses them of deliberately using anti-semitic images to arouse controversy.
Read his articles here and here in the Salzburger Abendzeitung.
The first-night visuals are certainly disturbing.
Here is my own take on the Fagin debate.
Serge Collot, principal viola at the Paris Opera from 1957 to 1986 and a member of several good string quartets, has died at the age of 92.
A friend of Pierre Boulez, he performed in the Domaine Musical concerts has inspired many new scores, among them Quatre Duos for viola and piano (1979) by Betsy Jolas and Luciano Berio’s Sequenza VI for viola solo.
photo 2002 by Christophe Desjardins
l-r: Collot, Boulez, Christophe Desjardins
The magnificent mezzo, 78 years old at her last birthday, has made her home in Mozart town.
On August 23, she will take part in a performance of excerpts from Messiah and St Matthew’s Passion at the Salzburger Dom. Admission is free.
Wish we were there.
Grace Bumbry with soprano Elena Kononenko and baritone Fernando Araujo
Access to the online portal will cost users 20 Euros a month. The channel will draw on the vast filmed archives of Munich-based Unitel, as well as live opera and concert broadcasts from ORF.
Another sign of things to come, aimed at the German-speaking market of ‘Klassikfans’ (eeeeek!) .
Will it work?
First details here.
