The Royal Concertgebouw has scrambled up subs for Andris Nelsons, who is out for several weeks with a shoulder complaints. Here’s the announcement:
The concert on 11 December will be conducted by Paavo Järvi. The programme will remain unchanged: Benjamin Britten’s Violin Concerto featuring Baiba Skride’s first performance with the RCO, Le tombeau de Couperin and the second suite from Daphnis et Chloé – both by Ravel.
The concert performances of Wagner’s opera Lohengrin on 18 and 20 December will be conducted by Sir Mark Elder. A highly experienced Wagner conductor, the Englishman has made regular guest appearances with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra since 1996.
Chopin winner Seong-Jin Cho has just been awarded his sixth platinum disc for Korean sales of his debut DG album. It’s the top-selling classic in Korea for a decade, say DG, outstripping Sumi Jo’s Missing You.
More than 40 percent of buyers from one e-tailer said they had never bought classical music before.
From the conductor’s site:
Andris Nelsons withdraws from his upcoming performances with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra (December 11, 18 and 20, 2015), on Doctor’s orders, with an acute shoulder strain issue. Mr Nelsons will have complete rest from conducting duties for a number of consecutive weeks, whilst receiving a course of physiotherapy. Mr Nelsons is expected to make a full recovery, returning to the podium in January 2016.
He won’t be doing any of this
CBC Canada has come up with a jolly list, and very hipster they are too.
But there are always more lurking in the wardrobe, awaiting their call to fame. Here’s Slipped Disc’s Top Ten (can be read either way up), with judging notes for extra transparency.
Note the matching car
Check those matching bow-ties
Total Ballroom Champions of 2015
Sweet-singing psalmist of Savile Row
The cello came, too
Doktor Kuhl (photo: Eric-Brissaud)
Collar of the Year
Gardening Gear of the Year
With matching ‘roo
Best beach boy
We regret to share news from Dance Europe of the death last Wednesday, from a heart attack, of Bryony Brind, former principal dancer of the Royal Ballet at Covent Garden.
Bryony, who was 55, created roles for Ashton, Macmillan and David Bintley, leaving the ROH to go freelance in 1991. She was outspoken about the need for Covent Garden to attend more to developing British talent.
We’ve been alerted to an advertisement for a ‘Senior University Lectureship in Wagner, Liszt and the Cultural History of Technology at the Faculty of Music, University of Cambridge with effect from 1 January 2016’.
This seems ever-so-slightly case-specific.
There are lots and lots of scholars who specialise in Wagner and Liszt, but probably only one who combines it with ‘the cultural history of technology’.
Word is it has been fixed for one David Trippett, a ‘principal research associate’ at Cambridge. See his specialties here (and below*).
As for due process, equal opportunities and Nolan rules – well, chaps, this is Cambridge. We don’t need all that stuff to judge a new fellow.
UPDATE: A University spokesman said: “The University has advertised to fill an identified need for a specialist academic role within the Faculty of Music. The open application process which includes a rigorous interview stage, is ratified by our HR team and is fully in line with UK employment law.”
* My research focusses on Richard Wagner, and the intersection of German aesthetic thinking with the growth of the natural sciences. Other interests include Franz Liszt and post-Classical Weimar; posthumanism and the philosophy of technology; as well as performance theory, the grey area between improvisation and composition, and musical creativity in the digital age. I welcome applications from potential Ph.D. students in these areas.
When time permits, I am also active as a collaborative pianist, having performed in Germany, Italy, the UK, and on both coasts of the US.
The first crisis left by Nikolaus Harnoncourt’s decision to retire immediately from all performances is a Fidelio, coming up at the Theater an der Wien on January 17.
We’re informed it will be led by Harnoncourt’s assistant, the harpsichord player, Stefan Gottfried. It’s not clear at this stage if he will direct from the keyboard. The singers include Juliane Banse, Michael Schade and Anna Prohaska.
Gottfried, Vienna born, studied piano with Michael Hrubý and harpsichord with Gordon Murray. He has been Harnoncourt’s regular assistant since 2004.
Stefán Höskuldsson has been explaining in the CSO players’ magazine why he has left the Met orchestra to become principal flute with the Chicago Symphony in May 2016.
‘I come from a small town in the east coast of Iceland called Neskaupstadur. At the age of nine I showed talent for the flute and since there were no real flute teachers in my town my father decided that I should get the best possible teacher in Iceland….
‘In 2004 I won the 2nd flute/piccolo audition at the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. I held that position until 2008 when I won the MET Principal Flute position…
‘In 2010 I had the great good fortune to work with Maestro Muti when he conducted Attila by Verdi at the MET. It was the highlight of my time at the MET*.’
This weekend, Riccardo Muti conducted his 250th concert with Chicago…
and was given something for his wall. Photo (c) Todd Rosenberg.
*UPDATE: This post quotes he original edition of the CSO musicians newsletter. The quotation was later adjusted. One of the editors explains: ‘In the article that you posted about our new principal flute, Stefan Hoskuldsson, there was a revised edition of his spotlight that didn’t get to me in time before I sent out the newsletter. He meant to say that the performance of Attila with Muti was ONE OF the highlights of his time at the MET.’
Sometimes an encore becomes an anthem.
You never know where Martha Argerich will pop up next.
But a walk-on performance on a prepared piano has just taken our breath away.
When you change the timbre ever so slightly on a grand piano, other problems arise. Martha was unhappy with her left-handed thumb D in the Mussorgsky transcription. (Jura) Margulis resolved her qualm by playing the note on an orchestral tube gong.
It’s an unexpected five-star review, my Album of the Week on sinfinimusic.com. Read here.
This happened last week in All Faiths Chapel at the School of Music, Theatre, and Dance, Kansas State University.
Respect? No respect.
Photo Theresa Breymeyer
A Cornish teenager with a lovely voice and ambitions to be a singer-songwriter decided the best way to get started was to play a piano in the sea, in a shallow beauty spot at low tide, and call in a film crew.
According to local media: ‘A plea was sent out on Facebook by Diani to find an old piano for the film, luckily a lady from Newquay who had owned one for 45 years heard about the appeal and offered hers; although she was not told what it would actually be used for.’
All well and good, and we hope Diani, 17, gets the lift-off she seeks. But every time a musical instrument is abused by getting dumped on a beach, or thrown out of a window, or mishandled by an airline, the art of music gets devalued one more notch and the profession of musician becomes that much more tenuous.
There needs to be a society for the protection of unloved musical instruments.
