The death is reported of Maria Luisa Cioni, a celebrated Lucia at La Scala and a sought-after performer at most other European opera houses. She was 93.
For sports fans her greatest fame was as wife of the champion cyclist Adolfo Leoni, who died young in 1970.
This is the new trailer from the London-based Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.
Wrong, wrong, hopelessly wrong.
Her Majesty the Queen, who has turned 90, has allowed BBC Radio 2 to publish her ten favourite pieces of music (below).
All of them are pop songs or church hymns.
No great surprises there. But in a recent award of the Queen’s Medal for music to the composer Oliver Knussen, she detained Ollie for several minutes with childhood reminiscences of Edward Elgar, who wrote a Nursery Suite for the birth of her sister and for whom she retained a lifelong affection. She followed that recollection with memories of six generations of British composers. Her Maj knows much more music than BBC Radio 2 can possibly imagine.
The Queen’s 10 favourite pieces of music (according to Radio 2):
– Oklahoma! by Howard Keel
– Anything You Can Do (Annie Get Your Gun) by Dolores Gray and Bill Johnson
– Sing by Gary Barlow and the Commonwealth Band featuring the Military Wives
– Cheek to Cheek by Fred Astaire
– The White Cliffs Of Dover by Vera Lynn
– Leaning on a Lamp-post by George Formby
– Praise, My Soul, The King Of Heaven (hymn)
– The Lord is My Shepherd (hymn)
– Lester Lanin Medley
– Regimental March Milanollo
photo: David Sillitoe/press pool
We have received distressing news of the death, after a debilitating illness, of Charles M. Rodier, the legal adviser to EMI Classics for more than quarter of a century.
Charlie was a charming and unusual man, a lawyer who liked to say yes.
He facilitated archival access to writers like myself and assisted in the many minor difficulties that arise with peripheral copyright holders.
He loved music and those who make it.
He will be widely missed, like the label he served.
Vesa Siren, chief critic of Helsingin Sanomat, has sent us a short video interview clip with Domingo after he sang in St Petersburg last month.
Vesa asked him why he carries on singing at 75.
Placido’s reply: ‘The big passion that I have. I love so much to have the contact with the public, with the music that I have loved all my life, so I carry on singing.’
He goes on to tell Vesa that he’s learning a role in Verdi’s Luisa Miller.
Watch video here.
Following the Italian government intervention to save the European Union Youth Orchestra from death at the hands of the EU Commission, we learn today that the Orchestra Mozart, the last ensemble founded by Claudio Abbado, will reassemble in January after a three-year silence.
The orchestra was wound up a few days before Abbado died after a bank withdrew sponsorship.
Bernard Haitink will conduct the first concert of the revived band in Bologna on January 6.
The British conductor Nicholas Collon, 33, has done a flit from Stephen Wright at ICA to Stephen Lumsden at Intermusica.
Collon founded the Aurora Orchestra and is starting to get international engagements.
Cleveland Opera Theater has got rid of Andrea Anelli, who started the group in 2006.
She says: ‘The situation became untenable’.
Board President Don Scipione said the company presented Anelli with the option of a long-term transition plan, but she declined to take it.
More here.
June 1, 2016, Bloomington, IN -The Pacifica Quartet has announced the departure of founding member and first violinist, Simin Ganatra. Ms. Ganatra, who has been the first violinist of the ensemble since their founding in 1994, will be leaving at the end of the 2015-16 season to assume an expanded role at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and pursue other musical opportunities. The Pacifica Quartet will announce Ms. Ganatra’s replacement at a later date.
Violinist Sibbi Bernhardsson remarked, “For more than 20 years, we have had the great privilege and honor of collaborating with Simin. She has been an inspiration to us not only as an artist, but as a friend and colleague as well. Her unwavering commitment to the Pacifica Quartet and her boundless energy have helped to shape and mold who we are today. We are so very proud of Simin and wish her nothing but the best on her new adventure. As we say farewell to Simin, we look forward with much excitement to the next leg on our musical journey.”
Simin Ganatra commented, “When I look back over the past two decades of my life, I am awed by all of the accomplishments of the Pacifica Quartet. The performances at home and in places far distant, the recordings of music both familiar and groundbreaking, the masterclasses that inspire the next generation of players – it is truly breathtaking. The decision to leave was not an easy one, but after 22 years with the ensemble I feel ready to explore other musical opportunities. I will excitedly watch as my colleagues continue to grow artistically and further develop this remarkable ensemble into the quartet of the future.”
Home video, published by CBC Montreal.
The price of fame for the Met’s new chief.
The Dutch virtuoso Erik Bosgraaf writes:
I would like to inform you about the death of the greatest recorder maker of our times Ernst Meyer, 24.12.1954 – 04.06.2016.
He was the Stradivarius of the recorder.
Having collaborated extensively with him in the last years I take the liberty to share a few personal thoughts on this remarkable personality. Always wanting to fly further than the horizon, he relentlessly pushed the boundaries of an instrument all too often known for its limitations. His instruments were not only marvels of unsurpassed beauty, they were also genuine instruments for the stage, allowing performers to fill large concert halls, for the first time in the history of the instrument! I cannot stress enough how important this is because this was exactly what led to the demise of the instrument in the middle of the 18th century. Ernst was, by consequence, not interested in what he considered making a slavish copy of the original.
To take the tradition of his 18th century counterparts truly seriously he would have to continue the tradition rather than conserve an original instrument which anyway represented a fraction of its original splendor at most. By making baroque recorders true to this spirit Ernst has opened up roads hitherto unknown, and players worldwide are thankful to him for that. In fact he was to really many young ‘samurai’ the éminence grise sword maker providing them the magic sword for the ‘battlefield’. I have always felt that he wasn’t interested in having ‘customers’, he rather was looking for ‘activists’ that had a similar passion and quest for the ultimate sound. This kind of collaboration is truly unique to the recorder in comparison to factory produced symphonic wind instruments. As performers we are sharing the stage and taking the applause. The work of instrument makers is all too often unseen. Fortunately the Borletti-Buitoni Trust enabled me to capture Ernst in his workshop by making a documentary in his Paris workshop. Graham Johnston took this beautiful picture during this visit. Ernst will remain an inspiration through his legacy of ground-breaking instruments and will live on through his instruments that can be heard on numerous recordings and on the stages of concert halls worldwide.
Hot on the heels of Gemma New, Holly M has landed the coveted Scottish job:
New Zealand conductor Holly Mathieson, currently based in the UK, has been appointed as the Royal Scottish National Orchestra’s (RSNO) new Assistant Conductor, following a recruitment process which attracted over three-hundred applicants world-wide.
Holly has previously been assistant to former RSNO Principal Guest Conductor Marin Alsop, Assistant Conductor to Donald Runnicles at the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, and continues as conductor for the National Youth Orchestra of Scotland’s Junior Orchestra.
