Patrick Williams, composer for the newsroom soap Lou Grant and the The Mary Tyler Moore Show, has died at 79.

If you were around newspapers in the late 1970s, this should ring some bells.

Richard Egarr is to step down after 15 years as music director of the the Academy of Ancient Music.

Under Christopher Hogwood, the AAM was a dedicated recording ensemble. That work no longer exists. It needs to refocus.

Dame Gwyneth Jones has asked us to publish the following message:

Following recent reports that the London Wagner Society Committee have neglected to honour their commitment to myself and the two young singers Michelle Alexander, soprano, and Adam Music, tenor, who won the President’s Award Public Masterclasses, in the highly successful Singing Competition which I was mainly responsible for organising last year, by refusing to present my masterclasses in one of their regular venues in London and in doing so, depriving the members of the Wagner Society of the pleasure of witnessing the progress these singers would hopefully make in such masterclasses, I am thrilled to now be able to make the following announcement:

As I have had no positive approach from the Committee for almost nine months, since the Singing Competition, I have taken the matter into my own hands in order to fulfil at least my commitment to the young singers and am delighted to be able to announce that my masterclasses will now take place in the afternoon of the 7th August, as a part of the Bayreuth Scholarship Foundation programme, in Wagner’s House “Villa Wahnfried”, using Wagner’s own grand piano.

As Michelle Alexander has unfortunately been confronted with Visa problems and is unable to travel, she will be replaced by the baritone Julien van Mellaerts, who was also a prize winner at the Wagner Society Singing Competition. Julien recently won the 1st Prize at the Kathleen Ferrier Singing Competition, the Wigmore Hall/Kohn Foundation International Song Competition and 2nd Prize at the Montreal International Singing Competition.

It will be an event open to the 250 Scholarship Winners and the general public and will be a wonderful opportunity for the two young singers to present themselves to an international audience.

It will give me great pleasure to be able to pass on the knowledge and experience which I have gained during my long international career and especially the joy I have experienced whilst singing, for almost twenty years, at the Bayreuth Festival.

I would like to especially thank Dr Stefan Specht, Managing Director of the Bayreuth Scholarship Foundation and Dr Horst Eggers, President of the Richard Wagner Verband International for their tireless efforts to fulfil the wishes of Richard Wagner to nurture the next generation of Wagner Artists.  My thanks go also to Dr Sven Friedrich, Director of the Richard Wagner Museum and Archive in Bayreuth and the Lord Mayor of Bayreuth Brigitte Merk-Erbe who have kindly made it possible for my masterclasses to take place in this fantastic venue.

They have all welcomed the prospect of my masterclasses taking place in Bayreuth, during the Festival, with wide open arms and great enthusiasm.

The Irish composer Siobhán Cleary has reportedly ‘turned down a large commission from two Arts Council-funded bodies because she was offered 20 per cent less than her male colleagues were in the last four years, for the same commission.’

This looks like a double first.

It may be the first time composer grants are judged on gender basis.

And it’s definitely the first time in my experience that any composer anywhere has sent back a juicy Arts Council cheque.

Read on here.

The Haydntage in Eisenstadt, an annual celebration of the town’s celebrated resident, have been cancelled this summer, possibly for good.

The festival, which has existed since 1986, has apparently run out of funds.

Chorégies d’Orange has lost its Count Almaviva in Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia.

 

The indisposed Spyres, suffering from laryngitis, will be replaced by a promising Romanian, Ioan Hotea.

 

 

Reinhard J. Brembeck in the Süddeutsche Zeitung reports a symphony of colours:

Third act is increasingly orange. Lohengrin lives out his sadistic passions on Elsa. And she mutates from the frightened waif to a self-determined orange-clad woman, it is she who dumps her husband. At the end, her brother comes back… a green man, he is like Elsa a bearer of hope in the world of uniform grey men….

Im dritten Akt dann zunehmend Orange. Lohengrin lebt an Elsa seine sadistischen Leidenschaften aus. Und dabei mutiert sie vom verschreckten Angstwesen zu einer in Orange gekleideten selbstbestimmten Frau. Sie ist es, die ihren Gatten abserviert. Am Ende kommt ihr Bruder wieder, den sie angeblich ermordet haben soll, weshalb sie zu Beginn fast auf dem Scheiterhaufen verbrannt worden wäre. Der Bruder ist der grüne Mann, er ist wie Elsa ein Hoffnungsträger in der Welt der uniformen Graumenschen. Deshalb sinkt hier dann auch nicht Elsa wie bei Wagner am Ende entseelt zu Boden, sondern die frauenfeindlichen und kriegslüsternen Heerscharen. Und im Hintergrund bleibt auch Ortrud stehen. Den beiden Frauen wird die Zukunft gehören.

 

Berhnard Neuhoff, BR-Klassik:

While the energy on the stage gets stuck in the transformer box, music director Christian Thielemann chases high-voltage flashes through the Festspielhaus. He lures and directs, drives and stretches, spins infinite lines, reveals exciting details and unleashes explosive impulses. What is designed so pleasurable, impulsive and inspired from the moment, is at the same time technically admirably implemented safely: calculated state of intoxication, precise magic. The singers are never covered, and the brilliantly performing festival orchestra follows Thielemann with audible joy of playing.

Während die Energie auf der Bühne im Trafohäuschen stecken bleibt, jagt Musikdirektor Christian Thielemann Hochspannungs-Blitze durchs Festspielhaus. Er lockt und lenkt, treibt und dehnt, spinnt unendliche Linien, legt aufregende Details frei und entfesselt explosive Triebkräfte. Was da so lustvoll, impulsiv und inspiriert aus dem Augenblick heraus gestaltet wird, ist zugleich technisch bewundernswert sicher umgesetzt: kalkulierte Rauschzustände, präzise Zauberei. Die Sänger werden nie zugedeckt, und das brillant musizierende Festspiel-Orchester folgt Thielemann mit hörbarer Spielfreude.

 

Augsburger Allgemeine: An uneven Lohengrin

RP-ONline: A discount Wagner

We are shocked to hear of the death of Glen Roven, an activist composer who was in regular touch with the Slippedisc community.

Glen died after 12 days in a coma and is grieved by his thousands of musicians whom he helped in varying capacities.

Among other things, he composed and produced records for Julie Andrews, Aretha Franklin, Leon Fleisher, Whitney Houston and Michael Jackson. He wrote film scores, concert works and musical satires such as this:

He conducted Frank Sinatra’s last TV concert on television and four presidential inaugurations.

He had his own label, Roven Records, and was always available to musicians who needed a studio session.

Glen was indispensable.

UPDATE:

There will be a funeral for Glen Roven
Friday, July 27th 2018 at
Riverside Memorial Chapel
180 West 76th Street, NYC
11:00 a.m.

For those who cannot attend, the details for a memorial tribute to the man and his music will follow this fall.