The Colorado Symphony has promoted its principal conductor, Peter Oundjian, to music director.
The agreeable Oundjian was formerly chief of the Toronto Symphony and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.
Long before that, he played a football trial for Chelsea.
In a move that has shocked the orchestra, concertmaster Vineta Sareika has told the Berlin Philharmonic she will be leaving in February. Sareika has spent three years in the orchestra and 18 months in the hot seat. The tone of her departure notice suggests they have been turbulent. But then the Berlin Phil is a demanding orchestra and, when the going gets tough, the less-tough get going.
Sareika is the first woman ever to serve on a regular basis as concertmaster of the Berlin Phil.
Sareika, who is Latvian, joined the Berlin Phil first violins in February 2022 after the break-up of the famed Artemis Quartet, in which she was leader for nine years. She was appointed concertmaster exactly a year later.
Her abrupt departure raises inevitable questions about the orchestra’s culture, as well as her own adaptability.
Here’s Sareika’s announcement on social media:
After three enriching and exciting years with the Berlin Philharmonic I have made the decision to leave the orchestra.
It has been an honor for me to serve as its first ever woman concertmaster and I am truly grateful for this unique life experience, fantastic concerts and inspiring encounters.
One of the many valuable learnings during the past years however is that being part of this particular orchestra is not the path I’d like to continue on in the future. I wish the orchestra the best of luck finding a fantastic new colleague for this position, I am at the same time looking forward to the next chapter of my personal musical journey.
My last concerts as concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic will take place in February 2025.
The vocal quartet G4 have made public the death of their former low tenor, Ben Thapa. No cause has been shared. Ben was known to have been hospitalised last month with kidney disease.
G4 say: ‘Words cannot express how we all feel right now. We understand that this will be heartbreaking news for so many others too and we send you our love and support as we all remember the amazing man and memories that he has left behind. Ben has been such a major part of the international singing community and he was a critical part of our journey as a group. Thank you for your love at this difficult time. RIP Ben’
Thapa left G4 in 2018 to concentrate on his operatic career. He was due to sing next week in an Anglo-German production of Mozart’s Magic Flute.
The Canadian pro-Ukraine activist Keri-Lynn Wilson has been rewarded with the leadership of a Kyiv orchestra. Wilson is married to the Metropolitan Opera general manager Peter Gelb.
From the AP:
NEW YORK (AP) — Keri-Lynn Wilson was hired Monday as music director of the Kyiv Camerata.
She succeeds Valery Matyukhin, who established the chamber orchestra in 1977 and died last year.
“We shall be performing for Ukraine’s brave and discerning audiences and defending Ukraine’s cultural identify from those who wish to deny it,” Wilson said in a statement.
The Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg will feature identical concerts in the same week by Christophe Rousset and the Monteverdi Choir and Orchestra, and by the MCO’s founder Sir John Eliot Gardiner with his newly created ensemble, the Springhead Constellation Orchestra and Choir.
Gardiner, who was sacked by the MCO after a violent incident, has got the first date. It looks a bit like a grudge match.
Make what you like of this Hamburg press release.
9 September 2024: Sir John Eliot Gardiner performs with his newly founded ensembles for the first time on 7 December. The Constellation Choir & Orchestra perform Christmas baroque music by Marc-Antoine Charpentier and Johann Sebastian Bach in the Elbphilharmonie Grand Hall. The pioneer of historically informed performance practice originally planned to travel to Hamburg a week later with the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists with the same programme. However, in July, the ensembles and Gardiner announced their separation after sixty years of collaboration. Gardiner is replaced by French baroque specialist Christophe Rousset on the rostrum for the concert on 14 December.
»It gives me great pleasure to announce the foundation of Springhead Constellation, a unique new project embodying a vibrant collective of musical ensembles, creative artists and makers. Our flagship groups, The Constellation Orchestra and The Constellation Choir will produce ambitious, multidisciplinary performance projects that tour around the world. (…) I am so excited and grateful to be working with such exceptional musicians once again, not forgetting the important lessons I have learnt and needed to learn from the past year,« says Sir John Eliot Gardiner in a press release about his new project.
Christophe Rousset is looking forward to working with the Monteverdi Choir & Orchestras (MCO): »From an early age, I have been a great fan of [MCO] and its founding conductor. Having the chance to work with this wonderful ›instrument‹ at my fingertips is a great privilege.«
In his midnight mass »Messe de minuit«, composed around 1694, Marc-Antoine Charpentier elicits delightful rhythms and timbres from old French Christmas carols. The two Bach cantatas »Schwingt freudig euch empor« and »Unser Mund sei voll Lachens« were composed for the Christmas season in Leipzig’s Thomaskirche in 1731 and 1725 respectively.
The Elbphilharmonie Hamburg is the only place in the world where this special programme can be heard in both first-class interpretations within a very short space of time. Ticketholders of the concert featuring the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists have been given the opportunity to change the date of their tickets if they wish.
Sat, 7 December 2024, Elbphilharmonie, Grand Hall
The Constellation Choir & Orchestra
Marie Luise Werneburg soprano
Eline Welle mezzo-soprano
Peter Davoren tenor
Alex Ashworth bass
conductor Sir John Eliot Gardiner
Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Messe de minuit à 4 voix, flûtes et violons, pour Noël
Johann Sebastian Bach: Schwingt freudig euch empor, BWV 36c
Johann Sebastian Bach: Unser Mund sei voll Lachens, BWV 110
Sat, 14 December 2024, Elbphilharmonie, Grand Hall
English Baroque Soloists / Monteverdi Choir
Hilary Cronin soprano
Bethany Horak-Hallett mezzo-soprano
Florian Sievers tenor
Florian Störtz bass
conductor Christophe Rousset
Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Messe de minuit à 4 voix, flûtes et violons, pour Noël
Johann Sebastian Bach: Schwingt freudig euch empor, BWV 36c
Johann Sebastian Bach: Unser Mund sei voll Lachens, BWV 110
From the Korea Times:
Renowned soprano Angela Gheorghiu caused a stir during a performance of Puccini’s “Tosca” in Seoul, halting the orchestra and interrupting her co-star’s mid-show encore, much to the dismay of opera enthusiasts who had eagerly anticipated her performance.
The incident occurred during Sunday’s performance at the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts, when Gheorghiu, regarded as one of the greatest opera singers of all time, abruptly took to the stage midway through the third act, as Korean tenor Alfred Kim was performing an encore of the famous aria “E lucevan le stelle” in response to the audience’s enthusiastic applause and requests for more.
The Romanian soprano signaled for the orchestra to stop and although conductor Jee Joong-bae initially tried to continue, he eventually halted the music in response to Gheorghiu’s persistent gestures. The soprano then said, “Excuse me. It’s a performance. It’s not a recital. Respect me.”…
Read on here.
The Royal Musical Association marks its 150th anniversary with a conference in London this week.
Keynote speaker will be the New Yorker critic Alex Ross. His paper is titled: ‘The End of the Family Line: On the Probable Death and Possible Transfiguration of Music Criticism’.
Tributes are flowing for the late Herbie Flowers, whose distinctive twang can be heard on recordings by David Bowie, Paul McCartney, Elton John and, indelibly, on Lou Reed’s Walk On The Wild Side.
Herbie learned to play an instrument as a national serviceman in the Royal Air Force. His credit apppears on some 500 releases.
You may recall that the San Antonio Symphony was liquidated by its board, only to be revived by the musicians as the San Antonio Philharmonic.
Sad to say. they are not a happy crew.
Music director Jeffrey Kahane has told them he is importing a New York principal oboe, Belinda Rosen, without audition, for the whole season. The local musicians are simmering.
Rosen, principal oboe at Brooklyn Chamber Orchestra, teaches at the 92nd St Y. She will commute to Texas.
The Eva Marton singing competition in Budapest was won this weekend by a Korean tenor, Jihoon Park, 33. It was not without incident.
Our man on the spot reports:
In his semi-final Jihoon Park sang two arias. First was from La Boheme. Second was from Massenet’s Manon, the weakest of the 7 arias he sang over the three rounds. He finished at 46 minutes and 20 seconds on the ensuing livecast:
What you don’t hear on YouTube but was very very audible in the hall was that, in the last minute of singing, we heard parts of his performance being played back. My first thought was that this was a technical glitch on. It wasn’t — someone in the audience had been filming and managed to start playing back his recording before the singer had finished.
At 46 minutes and 20 seconds you see Eva Marton get very angry. She breaks in before the applause can start, starts pointing towards the area from which the play-back had come and makes comments. She then apologies to the tenor, ask the audience to applaud. The tenor bows and leaves.
Eva Marton then rises from her seat and talks directly to the area of the hall again from which the play-back had come. It’s clear the ‘guilty’ part does not speak Hungarian. She then says in English that he must leave and asks one of the ushers to make this happen. You see an usher somewhat sheepishly identifying the responsible man — who is older rather than younger. He is marched out of the hall.
I have seen this happen at football games but never seen it happen at a concert or competition. I heard some discussion on whether she had been too strict. But at the start of each session we were told that mobile phones should be turned off and this message was repeated on the TV screens showing the singers and their arias. So I think she had good grounds for getting so angry.
The tenor is sick this week. Next week, he’s expected in the Bowl.#
Soprano Diana Damrau writes:
In less than a week, @tenorkaufmann and I will reunite once again to sing a program of operetta arias and duets, this time with the @laphil and maestro @gustavodudamel at the @hollywoodbowl.
Jonas and I have collaborated many times throughout our careers, and to say I am more than thrilled to be starting off this season singing glorious operetta duets with him is an understatement. We always have the best time together and there is no doubt next week will be filled with great music and lots of laughter!
The music faculty of Wittenberg University in Springfield, Ohio, have been informed that the department is to be eliminated at the end of the current academic year. Five full-time faculty and 17 part-time adjuncts will lose their jobs. There will be no freelance teaching. The department of World Languages and Cultures has also been scrapped.
Wittenberg is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, and has been a nationally recognized school of music. Among prominent Lutheran musicians who attended Wittenberg are Susan Palo Cherwien, Wayne Wold, and Robert Hobby.
