Author: bfc-admin

“The San Francisco Symphony is not the only orchestra making a quick move to capitalize on” audience interest in film screenings with live orchestral accompaniment, writes Joshua Kosman in Friday’s (1/13) San Francisco Chronicle. “Across the U.S., symphony orchestras have suddenly begun adding movie nights to their programming rosters, screening popular classics and blockbuster hits while the orchestra performs a score that used to be channeled through a tinny sound system.” On Saturday, the San Francisco Symphony performed Leonard Bernstein’s Oscar-nominated score to the 1954 film On the Waterfront. “Last fall, the New York Philharmonic devoted a Big Apple-centric week to screenings of West Side Story and Manhattan. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s three-part ‘CSO at the Movies’ series opened over the Thanksgiving weekend, with … John Williams’ score for E.T.: The Extraterrestrial.… The Los Angeles Philharmonic … served up … back-to-back presentations of Casablanca, On the Waterfront and Rebel Without a Cause.… The [San Francisco] Symphony’s four-program subscription series typically sells at more than 90 percent of capacity. It’s a younger demographic as well…. Matching live music to film has become easier with advances in technology.”

Posted January 18, 2017

Pictured: David Newman leads the San Francisco Symphony in Bernstein’s score to “On the Waterfront.” Photo by Eric Kayne / San Francisco The Chronicle

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, National Symphony Orchestra, and medici.tv will film and stream three NSO concerts between January and June 2017. The first of the three live-streamed performances will take place on January 22 at 3 p.m., with two evening concert streams to follow on February 11 and June 17. NSO Music Director Designate Gianandrea Noseda will lead an all-American program on the January 22 program, with actress Phylicia Rashad serving as narrator for Copland’s Lincoln Portrait. Joshua Bell will lead the February 11 concert as part of his weeklong residency at the Kennedy Center, and Christoph Eschenbach will lead his final concert as music director on June 17, featuring Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with Washington’s Choral Arts Society and vocal soloists. The three concerts will be streamed free, with on-demand streaming available for 90 days following the initial live broadcast.

Posted January 17, 2017

“Public relations and marketing veteran Lois Cohn died on Friday at her home in Manhattan. She was 80; her death was confirmed by her longtime friend and concert companion, Barry O’Neal,” writes Susan Elliott on Sunday (1/15) at MusicalAmerica.com (subscription required). “Lois Cohn was born on April 15, 1936 in Brooklyn, NY…. She was raised in Montevallo [Alabama] and attended the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, graduating with a BS degree in education. Her first major professional association in the classical music business was with the 92nd St. Y. In 1984 she was named director of marketing and public affairs at Carnegie Hall…. That same year she was hired by Deborah Borda to become director of marketing and public relations for the New York Philharmonic and its 150th-anniversary activities. [In 2000] she launched her own firm with former 92nd St. Y colleague Helene Davis to form Cohn Davis Associates, specializing in entertainment and the arts. Five years later, Ms. Cohn formed a partnership with Dan Dutcher, to launch Cohn Dutcher Associates. Most recently she had her own firm, Lois Cohn Associates. Ms. Cohn was the widow of composer, conductor, and author Arthur Cohn, who died in 1998 at the age of 87.”

Posted January 17, 2017

“Proposals for a new world-class concert hall in London appear to be back on track after the City of London Corporation agreed to replace money withdrawn by the government,” writes Mark Brown in Thursday’s (1/12) Guardian (London, U.K.). “The scheme, costed at £278m, appeared derailed in November when the government unexpectedly announced it was withdrawing money it had pledged for a detailed business case to be made. On Thursday the City said it would provide the money, up to £2.5m, needed to complete it. The new building would be erected on a site next to the Barbican currently occupied by the Museum of London, which is moving.… The hall would become the new home of the London Symphony Orchestra…. The hall’s supporters say London desperately needs a new concert hall.… It would also be more than a concert hall. Called the Centre for Music, it would have an ambitious educational dimension ‘to bring music-making to the widest possible audience.’ …. The City decision is a sign that the hall’s supporters believe it can be built, even without government money.” The project’s leading partners are the Barbican Centre, London Symphony Orchestra, and Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

Posted January 17, 2017

In Monday’s (1/16) Toronto Star, William Littler reports on “Canada Mosaic, an ambitious cross-country celebration of Canadian music and musicians spearheaded by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and funded (to the tune of $7.5 million) by the government of Canada.… And it surely is a welcome way to fund some major commissions to our composers in addition to 40 or so two-minute fanfares to be performed by the TSO and partner orchestras from British Columbia to Newfoundland. The whole enterprise begins next Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in Roy Thomson Hall, when Victor Feldbrill and Alain Trudel preside over a program titled Canadian Legacy,” with works by Godfrey Ridout, Pierre Mercure, Jean Coulthard, John Weinzweig, and André Mathieu. Canada Mosaic’s offerings stretch “ ‘from indigenous to indie, classical to cutting edge’ as the Toronto Symphony press release states—but it does represent a consciousness-raising effort primarily on behalf of our concert music.… During 2017, every new Canadian commission is to be recorded and available free online in more than 40 audio and video recordings. Through streamed and recorded TSO concerts, listening guides and interactive educational resources, tso.ca/canadamosaic offers an opportunity for millions of Canadians to broaden contact with our music.”

Posted January 17, 2017

“Three hours into a ‘Spirit of the Season’ concert featuring the Minnesota Orchestra’s first-ever performance in north Minneapolis, its new associate conductor, Roderick Cox, welcomed the … chorus [at Shiloh Temple International] to help close the event with Handel’s ‘Hallelujah’ chorus,” writes Graydon Royce in Saturday’s (1/4) Star Tribune (Minneapolis). “The urgent passion and throaty call of the 90-voice choir swayed up against the rigorous beats of the orchestra to fuse a new sound: gospel sung on the back of Handel’s rhythms and lyric lines. It shook the room. And at this confluence stood Cox, a young man feeling his way toward becoming a symbol of unity between two groups—classical musicians and diverse audiences. ‘It was one of those surprise moments you couldn’t anticipate,’ he said.… As associate conductor, Cox leads young people’s concerts and serves as understudy if music director Osmo Vänskä can’t go on…. At the same time, given his duties with the orchestra’s education initiatives, Cox wears on his broad shoulders an evolving responsibility for building bridges.” Cox was one of five conductors who participated in the League of American Orchestras’ most recent Bruno Walter National Conductor Preview with Giancarlo Guerrero and the Nashville Symphony. 

Posted January 17, 2017

“The more than 70 musicians who play in the Cape Symphony have voted to unionize five years after a similar effort failed by a narrow margin,” writes Sean F. Driscoll in Thursday’s (1/12) Cape Cod Times (Mass.). “The 48-25 vote makes them members of the American Federation of Musicians, which covers 80,000 musicians in the United States and Canada. The results of the mail-in ballot to the National Labor Relations Board were released Wednesday, said Patrick Hollenbeck, president of the Boston Musicians’ Association, the AFM local that covers the Cape and Islands…. The symphony and the Cape Conservatory merged in 2010 to form Cape Arts and Entertainment. Hollenbeck said union members will now vote on a negotiating committee, which will take a survey of its members to determine which issues to address with the board. Ultimately, the two sides will work toward a collective bargaining agreement.” Said Douglas MacDonald, chairman of the Cape Arts and Entertainment board, “We have every confidence that our past, direct interactions with the orchestra members were fair and effective and that the relationship between management and the orchestra was constructive. We know our colleagues in the symphony share our commitment to enhancing the arts and music community on Cape Cod.”

Posted January 17, 2017

Photo of Cape Symphony by Jerome Karter

In a blog at Medium.com, the California Symphony, based in Walnut Creek, posts results of a discussion it hosted in August 2016, in which orchestra newcomers shared feedback about their experiences with the orchestra. Executive Director Aubrey Bergauer writes, “We put out the call for people who should go to orchestra concerts—millennials and gen-xers that are smart, have expendable income for entertainment options, and are generally culturally aware—but for whatever reason don’t attend. The set up was simple: come to a few California Symphony concerts and then tell us about it.” The initiative was launched, Bergauer says, “with the idea that arts organizations must change the way we think about new audiences, and specifically, must change our willingness to have hard conversations about the things newcomers hate, are turned off by, or are just uninformed about.” Topics include ticket-buying options at orchestra websites; program notes; online concert calendars; orchestra diversity; and supplemental activities. Included is a bullet list of actions the orchestra is taking to address issues raised in the discussion. As for the music itself, Bergauer says the orchestra was “blown away that almost every single comment was very positive…. We’ve stopped stressing over the concert programming.”

Posted January 13, 2017