The American violinist has followed her agent Naomi Ives out of the door at ailing IMG and into the arms of German agency K D Schmid.
Also leaving IMG for Schmid are pianist Jonathan Biss, conductor Jessica Cottis and saxophonist Stephen Banks.
The Finnish music world is in mourning for…
Singers’ agents tell us of a tsunami of…
Colleagues are mourning the sudden death of the…
Some readers have had difficulties over the past…
Session expired
Please log in again. The login page will open in a new tab. After logging in you can close it and return to this page.
Honestly it’s a scum-filled industry. Classical music itself is wonderful, but many people, including pros, are happily awaiting the industry’s downfall. Being “demoted” to the french fry department at McDonald’s will serve as a great reset and might even make many of you play more musically as you will learn something about reality.
Spoken like a true failed musician…no need for that bitterness here. In fact, she stayed loyal to her manager who has worked with her for years and made a hell of a career with her. So what’s your issue with that?
Roddy, the problem in this industry is not the fault of any single component. It is a systemic conflict of the past with a barricade preventing the industry from evolving. It is a prerequisite, most definitely, to be the best possible musician and work together to share the music. It is difficult to do this when relying on the past manner of achieving long term success. With today’s technologies, walls have been torn down – to some extent – and we are more accessible to each other – not all, but most. Most classically oriented musicians are well aware of the shifts in audience attendance and programming. Artists used to rely on their managers to make them known and get them work. That has become nearly unrealistic these days. There are no Sol Huroks anymore, and frankly, that notion has disappeared of the impresario making stars out of their artists. This is slowly moving toward artists interacting among the conductors, administrators of orchestras, and composers. (I’ll be honest, during my early career, I’ve been chided for doing just that, cold calling conductors, etc). In addition, it is becoming more unrealistic for a young competition winner to expect managers to book them a full season of engagements. Another issue is repertoire. While it is important to have the standard works at one’s fingertips, it has become increasingly important to set one’s self apart from the thousands of people playing the same pieces. Honestly, what’s a manager to do? In building commissioning projects for more than twenty five years, I have tremendous compassion for artist managers and artistic administrators at orchestras. It is up to the individual artist to soul search, see which repertoire suits him/her, and the big question is, what would they do with an artist like them to promote, present to others and contract engagements? Taking stock of oneself is perhaps the most important part of the equation. Blaming managers won’t help anyone. It often takes decades to build a sustainable career, rather than a few hot seasons and then nothing. Being ahead of the 8 ball is the greatest challenge.
No shit, Sherlock! But when was classical music not a scum-filled industry? The world’s top talents give up their childhoods, their adolescences, and their young adult lives by isolating in a practice room for hours every day, only to find their lives and careers at the mercy of room-temperature IQ “managers” who are clueless as to how to build careers, and only care about the almighty buck. And you had better be good-looking – because talent is just not enough.
Spot on! Bearing your last sentence in mind, maybe her new Manager could at least find a hairdresser who can work an optical wonder. Ms Hahn does not have to win a beauty contest, but she does herself no favor looking like something the cat dragged in.
It’s the us empire hyper – geriatric look (40yo looking like theyre75) likely from all the stress living there.
I am looking at the news then looking at this comment then look at the news again and trying to understand what caused that kind of reaction… It is a news of some artists changing agency, one of them being the biggest stars of classical music world… It happens like it happens any other profession in any other fields everyday. Folks here are getting more and more miserable. Just go some concerts, enjoy yourself and music, clap and buy recordings to support your favorite artists etc. Or just go out and touch some grass. It must be exhausting being so full of negativity all the time. It is exhausting for me to even read these at least, so bye…
Jessica Cottis?