Classical Buzz

Musical hands across the ocean

Adam Sweeting Tuesday, 20 April 2010

The American Classical Orchestra is generously offering to lighten the gloom of Europeans trapped by the volcanic cloud in New York (although it's hardly the worst place for an enforced stopover). This Saturday the ACO performs the climactic concert of its 25th-anniversary season at the Big Apple's Cathedral Church of St John the Divine, and any stranded European nationals will be given a free ticket if they show their passport at the door.

Gorecki singer makes it despite volcanic ash

Peter Culshaw Saturday, 17 April 2010

tad_wos_joanna Joanna Wos (left, no relation to Jonathan Ross) put in a stellar performance last night singing in Gorecki's Third Symphony at the Royal Festival Hall with the LPO, singing the part made famous on the million-selling recording by Dawn Upshaw. To get there, she drove for three days and...

Ticciati soars in Scotland

David Nice Wednesday, 14 April 2010

Robin Ticciati: big ideas for the Scottish Chamber Orchestra

Britain's most exciting wunderkind conductor since Simon Rattle first emerged - and, no, I haven't forgotten Daniel Harding - has big plans for his first full season with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. Robin Ticciati is one of the new-generation firebrands determined to change the face of concert planning, hoping to achieve wonders similar to what Vladimir Jurowski has already stage-managed with the LPO.

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Birthdays on the Tube: 28 March-2 April

Peter Culshaw Sunday, 28 March 2010

Serge Gainsbourg: Poet, musician, love machine would have been 82 this week

This week's musicians birthdays include the genius/lecherous mediocrity (according to taste) Serge Gainsbourg, singing a duet with Brigitte Bardot, classic early 60s footage of Marvin Gaye, vibraphone maestro Red Norvo, Herb Alpert in a rodeo video doing “Casino Royale”, and Astrud Gilberto from Ipanema. Composer birthdays of the week are Franz Joseph Haydn and William Walton....

New World theme for Edinburgh International Festival 2010

Ismene Brown Wednesday, 17 March 2010

Jonathan Mills has announced the programme for Edinburgh International Festival 2010, on a theme of modern culture in the New Worlds of the Americas and Australasia.

Alex Ross gives RPS lecture on re-inventing the concert

Peter Culshaw Wednesday, 10 February 2010

Should we be silent in classical concerts? Alex Ross, the classical critic of the New Yorker and writer of the superb panorama of 20th Century music The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century, an “unlikely mass-market proposition” which has been a bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic will be giving this year’s Royal Philharmonic Society Lecture. His talk is entitled Inventing and Reinventing the Classical Concert and will be given on 8 March at the Wigmore...

Earl Wild (1915-2010) plays again

Igor Toronyi-Lalic Tuesday, 09 February 2010

The death of the late great American virtuoso Earl Wild a few weeks ago has had me poring over youtube trying to find a decent clip of him in his prime. You'd think there'd be a raft of footage of a man who spent three decades as a staff pianist for NBC, then ABC, all while building up a virtuoso concert career that saw him become one of the most respected pianists of the 20th century. There is some fizzy footage of him performing Chopin and MacDowell on the American variety and talk shows...

Poles 'ape-shit' over Chopin film

Igor Toronyi-Lalic Thursday, 04 February 2010

According to award-winning film-maker Tony Palmer, the London Polish Daily newspaper has gone "ape-shit" over the re-release of his dramatised Chopin film, The Strange Case of Delfina Potocka, accusing it of maligning the good name of Chopin/Poland/The Polish Daily. They were planning to interview him tomorrow but cancelled, accusing him of "more or less anything you can think of", Palmer tells me.

V&A concedes a few final extra viewing days

Ismene Brown Wednesday, 03 February 2010

The V&A has made a small concession to the musical outcry over its plan to substitute musical instruments with fashion galleries - an outcry you read first on theartsdesk. It is opening the instruments gallery for extra days before the closure on 22 February.

Vox Pop: The V&A - Musical Instruments or Fashion?

Ismene Brown Thursday, 28 January 2010

The Victoria and Albert Museum intends on 22 February to disperse its collection of musical instruments to other venues, to allow more room for fashion and textile exhibits. Conductor Christopher Hogwood and composer Oliver Knussen are two more well-known names in the list of more than 5,100 signatories to the petition lodged at 10 Downing Street asking for the move to be prevented. theartsdesk invited big hitters on either side to debate the case - Roxy Music...