You’ll never buy a nicer hacienda.

Gustav Dudamel has put his Los Angeles house on the market, only 18 months after he moved in. Since then, however, he got divorced.

The asking price is $3.3 million.

More pics here.

dudamel house

 

It has been reported this morning on Galei Zahal radio that a musician in the Israel Philharmonic has been suspended for sexual harassment of female colleagues. No further details have been given. A female contact tells us that the charge has substance. The man is considered innocent until proved guilty.

Sexual harassment in the workplace is taken very seriously in Israeli institutions. The country’s past president, Moshe Katsav, went to jail on charges of this nature.

dudamel israel2

Wesley Collins has been named principal viola of the Cleveland Orchestra from September.

He succeeds his Cleveland Institute of Music teacher Robert Vernon, who is retiring after 40 years, the longest tenure of any string principal in the Orchestra’s history.

Wesley has been playing in the Boston Symphony for the past four years.

wesley collins

We’ve just seen the Nielsen Soundscan sales ratings for last week and can pronounce, in full confidence, that fewer classical records were sold than at any time since records were kept.

For the first time, no release sold as many as 100 copies in the entire USA – that’s CD sales and downloads combined.

Of the enfeebled remainder, the top three consisted of two albums of monkish chant and one of Yo Yo Ma.

What will it take to turn this around?

urania records

(And before you think this marketing gimmick is a remedy – no, it has failed.)

This is what we need to bring back.

 

Records_store

Radio France has announced the death of Harry Halbreich, the world authority on Olivier Messiaen and an indefatigable cataloguer of other composers. The works of Honegger and Martinu are listed in H numbers.

Berlin born, based in Belgium, he wrote at least a dozen composer biographies.

Harry was 85.

harry halbreich

Message from the Chamber Orchestra of Europe:

All of COE’s thoughts are with Håkan Björkman (principal trombone) who is undergoing surgery today to rebuild his face after a cycling accident last week. Get well soon Håkan!

 

hakan bjorkman

Riccardo Chailly is taking the Filarmonica della Scala on a 10-stop Europe tour, including a first visit to Moscow.

A date will have been offered to the BBC Proms, which evidently declined. Who needs La Scala at the Proms?

press release:

 

18 maggio 2015,Milano, Teatro alla Scala Direttore Riccardo ChaillyPianoforte Maria João PiresLudwig van BeethovenConcerto per pianoforte no.4Dmitrij ŠostakovičSinfonia no.5


Riccardo Chailly and Filarmonica della Scala will return to Europe for a 10-concert, August 21- October 2, to include stops in major musical cities in Austria, Germany, France and Luxembourg. The FDS’s 2016 European tour will feature the orchestra in performances at Gstaad (Festivalzelt, 21/8), Salzburg(Großes Festspielhaus 22/8), Moscow (Bol’šoj 15/9) Essen (Philharmonie 24/9), Vienna (Musikverein 1/10). Chailly leads the Orchestra in Cherubini’s Symphony in D major, Verdi’s Four Season from Vespri Siciliani and Rossini’s Ouverture from Guillaume Tell.

Pianist Daniil Trifonov will join Filarmonica della Scala and Riccardo Chailly for concert in Dortmund(Konzerthaus 25/9), Luxembourg (Philharmonie, 26/9), Hamburg (Konzertsaal 28/9), Baden Baden(Festpielhaus 30/9) while Martha Argerich for the FDS’s debut at Philarmonie Paris (2/10), both performing Schumann’s Piano Concerto. These concert will also feature Mr. Chailly leading FDS in Schumann’s Manfred-Ouverture and Symphony n. 2.

Filarmonica della Scala’s Activity is supported by the Main Partner UniCredit.

It’s all right…. it’s just the LSO Chorus rehearsing last night’s posthumous world premiere of Hogboon, by Peter Maxwell Davies.

lso chorus2

picture (c) Robert Garbolinski

Mahogany Opera, founded two years ago and specialising in contemporary work, has appointed Ivan van Kalmthout as chief executive.

Ivan, who is Dutch, was recently  interim Artistic Director at the Liceu in Barcelona. Before that, he worked at  Vlaamse Opera, Hamburg Staatsoper and Berlin Staatsoper.

This kind of cross-channel hiring has been placed in jeopardy by Brexit.

ivan van kalmthout

British opera companies are in a state of alarm and confusion.

Most casts rely on singers from the other 27 members of the European Union. It would not be terribly challenging to get by without them.

But when someone falls sick at Covent Garden or Glyndebourne the only recourse is to fly someone in at short notice from Europe. If barriers went up again – of the process was even delayed by a few hours for visa stamping and extra-long alien queues at Heathrow – opera will be in serious trouble. Stuffed, is the word I’m hearing.

On the other side of the coin, hundreds of British singers who got their start in small German houses would no longer be able to do so.

The word ‘disaster’ was being bandied in my hearing last night. And not in jest.

operacoventgarden

What Brexit means for music in London.

Following the departure of music director Paavo Järvi and artistic advisor Didier de Cottignies, today sees the veteran head of press, Annick Boccon-Gibod, clearing her desk.

Last one, please turn out the lights.

Here’s Annick’s farewell note:

philharmonie_de_paris

 

Chers amis,

Ce message pour vous informer que je m’apprête à quitter mes fonctions d’attachée de presse et de responsable du protocole de l’Orchestre de Paris. Le temps est venu pour moi de prendre un peu de repos après un parcours de 31 ans à ses côtés.

Je tiens à vous exprimer ma reconnaissance pour votre écoute et votre disponibilité et l’intérêt que vous avez porté à la vie de l’orchestre pendant toutes ces années. J’ai toujours apprécié les échanges amicaux que nous avons su entretenir en toutes circonstances.

J’aurai grand plaisir à vous retrouver, car je compte bien garder le contact avec la vie musicale.

En attendant, je vous souhaite un très bel été.

 

Bien fidèlement à vous,

Annick Boccon-Gibod

We can identify the anonymous seller of the autograph of J S Bach’s Prelude, Fugue and Allegro in E-flat for Lute or Harpsichord, BWV 998, up for sale at Christie’s on July 13.

The sale is said to ‘benefit a renowned musical institution’. That institution is Tokyo’s Ueno Gakuen conservatory, which appears to have fallen on hard times.

The manuscript was the property of its founding family. An attempt by teachers at Ueno Gakuen to debate the sale had to be moved off campus after an edict by the president. No word about the sale has appeared in Japanese media.

It is extremely unusual for music treasures ever to be sold by a Japanese institution. There must be pressing reasons for doing so.

ueno gakuen