In Wednesday’s (9/16) Vancouver Sun (British Columbia), David Gordon Duke writes, “It was the big scandal in the classical music scene: the head office decision to close down the CBC Radio Orchestra. The demise of the last surviving broadcast orchestra in North America, and the flagship national musical institution based on the West Coast, created a storm of protest and left a legacy of bitterness. Another chapter in the saga began Tuesday with the official launch of the newly established National Broadcast Orchestra. At the Chan Centre’s Telus Studio Theatre, plans were revealed for the new ensemble’s first performances and projects. … The ensemble intends to be a new orchestra for a new age, offering live performances and traditional radio broadcasts but adding high-definition video projects and Internet broadcasts into the mix. The whole idea is to redefine what a national broadcast orchestra is in a 21st century context: There will be public performances, but not in the accepted sense of a regular series of concerts in a specific locale. … The orchestra plays on Saltspring Island tonight, a program featuring Prokofiev, Haydn (his first symphony and the popular Trumpet Concerto, with Jens Lindemann) and Canadian works, including Rodney Sharman’s Scarlattiana. The formal debut—in the orchestra’s new home, the Chan Centre—is slated for Jan. 8, 2010, a concert to be broadcast by the CBC.”
Posted September 16, 2009
