The RTE put out this statement late last night:

It is with the deepest regret that we announce that conductor David Heusel has passed away in Dublin. David was to conduct the RTÉ Concert Orchestra this evening in Dublin. The concert has been cancelled as a mark of respect. RIP.

David T. Heusel was an American conductor who made his career mostly abroad.  From 1995-1997 he was music director of the Opéra Comique in Paris. Since then he has worked across Europe and at Canadian Opera Company in Toronto. He conducted recently in Metz and was a regular in Dublin.

He had been about to conduct the RTÉ Concert Orchestra in the Opera Pops show at the National Concert Hall when he was found lifeless. This portrait was taken a few hours beforehand.

David turned 60 last December.

He studied at Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana, obtaining a BA degree before plunging straight into work as a vocal coact at Richmond’s Whitewater Opera Company. He left for Europe in 1981 and never looked back.

Our sympathies to his loved ones.

 

An unnamed teacher has been arrested in Orange County, California, after bodily fluids were allegedly found in flutes that were handed out to students in class, from elementary school upwards.

Orange County Register reports:

In emails sent to parents of students Friday afternoon, Sept. 29, district officials notified them there was an investigation regarding flutes given to students — as young as elementary-school age — by an individual who is also being investigated.

The flutes were made of PVC plastic piping and a single wine cork and had an exterior that could be decorated, district officials said. The individual… worked at multiple schools districts in Southern California.

We were informed that an independent contractor who provided a music enrichment program to the fifth-grade classes at Courreges Elementary School, in June 2017, gave the students flutes/recorders that were potentially contaminated with bodily fluids,’ said Mark Johnson, superintendent of the Fountain Valley School District….

 

Hossein Pishkar, 29, came top in the international Deutsche Dirigentenpreis in Cologne, winning 20,000 Euros and some TV attention.

Second was a German, Dominik Beykirch. A Russian, Anna Rakitina, came third.

Richard Morrison, chief critic of the Times, on English National Opera’s new Aida:

The show’s musical qualities are fatally impaired, however, by the conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson’s continual struggle to keep pit and stage together.

His colleagues are just marginally more respectful.

Tim Ashley (Guardian): Canadian conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson propelled the score forward with considerable passion. There were a couple of awkward moments of stage-pit coordination on opening night.

George Hall (FT):  Conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson engages their focused attention, though here and there a bit more drive would be welcome.

Rupert Christiansen (Telegraph): There are some solid musical consolations, starting with Keri-Lynn Wilson’s elegantly incisive conducting and the vivacious playing it draws from the orchestra.

Warwick Thomson (Metro): Keri-Lynn Wilson’s conducting feels underprepared and lacking in accuracy.

Keri-Lynn Wilson is married to Peter Gelb, general manager of the Metropolitan Opera.

It is unclear why she has been given a plum production at a national opera house in London. Her only other operas this year were Don Giovanni in Bilbao and Tosca in Toronto.

Reember Sir Thomas Beecham’s quip? ‘Why do we in England engage at our concerts so many third-rate continental conductors when we have so many second-rate ones of our own?’

Plus ca change.

 

A message from Emma Dunch, the SSO’s incoming Chief Executive Officer.

“As the incoming Chief Executive Officer of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra next January and an out, gay leader, I am proud to express my personal and professional commitment to advancing equality and inclusion for the LGBTQIA community, and to affirm my unflinching support for marriage equality. I believe that same-sex marriage is inevitable in Australia, and that this outcome is right and just.

Over the weekend, I have joined the SSO’s musicians, staff, and Board members in discussions that have helped clarify the organization’s position in support of marriage equality in Australia. I deeply appreciate the thoughtfulness that has been brought to bear throughout a respectful and nuanced dialogue. I know that there are very diverse views across Australia on this issue, and I respect the Board’s commitment to encouraging every Australian to develop his or her own opinion, and to vote.

For me, this is about more than my own identity. Personally, I believe that our society and its institutions are made stronger and more vibrant by the diversity of the individuals who people them. And I believe that denying those of us in same-sex relationships the civil rights accorded the married is the antithesis of the Aussie “fair go” and perpetuates profound inequality. I hope that my home country will soon be one that validates my committed relationship of 17 years.

Artists and their art have long played an important role in challenging accepted norms. I am committed to leading a Sydney Symphony Orchestra that champions its exceptional musicians, serves Sydneysiders in new ways, and provides value to our city beyond traditional concert-giving. I hope that you will join me and my colleagues on that journey, confident that the Sydney Symphony Orchestra will continue to welcome and support our LGBTQIA community and be an organization that strives to foster respectful, meaningful dialogue around complex issues.

After nearly two decades in New York City, I will be returning home to Sydney with my life partner, Elizabeth Scott (pictured left). We have been gratified by the terrifically warm welcome we have received from the SSO’s Board, staff and musicians. We look forward to making new friends when we arrive next year and to proudly counting ourselves among the many Australians who support a fair and inclusive society for all.”

#VoteYes#LoveIsLove

From the Lebrecht Album of the Week:

What did Alexander Scriabin have in common with Donald J. Trump? Small hands, that’s what. 

Scriabin’s 1897 piano concerto was an instant hit with similarly endowed artists, although it also won approval from Sergei Rachmaninov, whose mitts were mega-sized. Despite these contemporary endorsements, it has hovered ever since on the repertoire fringes….

Read on here.

Here.

And here.

The Venezuelan-born Carlos Izcaray, music director of the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, has been talking of his secret struggle this past year with a rare blood cancer that develops in the lymphatic system.

After surgery and during chemotherapy, he was advised to rest. Carlos, 39, carried on conducting.

He has now been given the all-clear, but his wife, Yolanda, has been diagnosed with breast cancer. ‘That was right at the end of my treatment,’ says Carlos. ‘So she’s going through hers now. She’s having a very positive response. Fortunately, the medical community here is as strong as anywhere.’

We wish them well.

Carlos is a survivor of torture by the Venezuelan regime.

Read full interview here.

 

Australia’s best-funded orchestra put out a horribly equivocal statement last week on the Government’s Same-Sex marriage survey. It didn’t need to say anything, but facing both ways was a very bad idea.

Now, under mounting pressure, it has just made matters worse.

A message from the SSO Board to our community on Marriage Equality:

“The Sydney Symphony Orchestra initially decided that it should remain neutral on this question, taking the view that as a matter of principle it would not take a position that might be seen to commit its wide range of stakeholders to one side or the other.

In doing so, the Board now acknowledges that it misjudged the need for such an organisation – with its long commitment to inclusiveness, equality and fairness – publicly to proclaim its support for the yes vote which plainly advances each of those ideals.

This decision has the overwhelming support of the SSO’s musicians and staff.”

As from tomorrow, the organisation will be known as the Sorry Symphony Orchestra.

We’re happy sorry to present its new logo.

 

UPDATE: Why did Sydney change its tune? Read this.

Basia Jaworski informs us of the death of Pieter Vis, a prolific concert singer and larger-than-life personality on the Dutch music scene. Pieter suffered a cerebral haemorrhage on Friday.

Starting out as a boy soprano, he became a prolific broadcaster, writer and musicologist. He occupied a debating space on Facebook as Piotr Ryba, the Russian translation of his name.

Tribute here.

The musician closest to the Russian president talks about their relationship to the state news agency, Tass. As you’d expect, he’s full of praise for Putin’s piano playing, but there are chinks of insight between the cracks.

Even more attitude is the pianist’s attitude to his homeland, his profession and his colleagues:

Believe it or not, but in our two-room apartment on Lenin Street in Irkutsk, the same featherbed I used to sleep on when I was a little boy is still there. Besides that, I refuse to let the apartment be refurbished. Everything there is the way it was nearly 30 years ago. Even my favorite toy lion sporting green overalls is still intact. And there is no place in the world where I can sleep better than at home. Home, sweet home.

Do you know how many recitals I did last year? Read my lips – 264! I enjoy touring the world provided I know that my home country waiting for me. In contrast to many other people in my profession I’ve never had any second or third passports or residence permits. I’ve never made arrangements for any “safe havens” elsewhere. Although I can tell you that getting Israeli citizenship would not be a great problem for me, because my mother is half-Jew. But it never occurred to me to do that. Why should I? And my daughter Anna, who is about to turn one, is a Russian citizen. This is a matter of fundamental importance.

It is true that the world’s attitude to Russia has changed, but my foreign tours still gather capacity audiences, and I don’t feel that the people have begun to react differently. There’s never been anything like this.

Read on here.