Jonas and Joyce are named singers of the year
mainEcho Klassik, the biggest German music industry event, has just announced its annual awards:
Male singer of the year: Jonas Kaufmann
Female singer of the year: Joyce DiDonato
Solo recording of the year (voice): Elina Garanca
Instrumentalists of the year: Lang Lang (piano), Tianwa Yang (violin) Andreas Ottensamer (clarinet), Maurice Steger (flute)
Conductor of the year: David Zinman
The televised gala awards night will be on October 18.
Awards for rising artists: Bryan Hymel, Sonya Yoncheva, Florian Noack, Sophie Pacini, Nemanja Radulović.
Classics without borders awards: Aurora Orchestra, David Orlowsky Trio, Kronos Quartet
And so the downward spiral continues
Meow…..
I went to a Maurice Steger concert once. I won’t make that mistake again.
Oh, yes, this concert with the Brandenburg Baroque Orchestra and Maurice Steger as leader was fantastic.
I like the most these many colors he can produce with his recorders. In Fiorenza he played dark like a Mezzo-Soprano and in Vivaldi so bright and virtuoso.
Absolutely unique.
The usual suspects…televisual and talented…yes…but it’s such a transparent industry ‘fix’ devoid of fantasy.
Too true. Virtuosic marketing coupled with political correctness made a few of these gongs pretty obvious.
Joyce and Jonas. Of course. No brainer.
Hymel now seems to Falling, alas. (Sob!)
This award is one of the reasons why I started to listen intensively to classical music.
But since then I have stopped paying any attention to it as there are just way too many awards out there.
Lang Lang got me into classical music years before and I also bought a Zinman cicle of Beethoven symphonies ages ago. But I stopped listening to the records.
Then one year this award show shortly after going to a concert made me realize to what music I shall listen to. Nope, none of then won that year.
Btw, since then I lost almost any fascination for Lang Lang, but not for Zinman.
If Lang Lang brings people to classical music, then please plaster him with awards.