Author: bfc-admin

“Talk of renovating or replacing Philharmonic/Avery Fisher/David Geffen Hall has been swirling for years,” writes Justin Davidson in Monday’s (12/2) New York magazine. In a new plan, announced on Monday, “a joint [New York] Philharmonic–Lincoln Center project … the auditorium stays where it is but gets gutted and rebuilt (again). In 2022, the orchestra moves out … from May to November, returns for an abbreviated season in the reconfigured but unfinished hall, and spends most of 2023–24 touring, floating, and sojourning…. The new Geffen reopens in March 2024 [with a new] lobby by Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, and Diamond Schmitt’s curvaceous blond-wood auditorium…. [Acoustician] Paul Scarbrough, a principal at the firm Akustiks … dictated the major moves: Cut the number of seats from 2,700 to 2,200, slide the stage nine rows forward, raise the ceiling, lower the floor, and tear out most of the third tier…. Rejuvenating Geffen Hall is a high-cost, high-risk operation, but the reason it’s worth doing is … the people in the cheap seats … music students, kids, retirees, first-time ticket buyers, first-date couples, and hard-core aficionados … who can be turned on by a visceral experience.” The renovation is expected to cost $550 million.

Posted December 3, 2019

In photo: Artist’s rendering of David Geffen Hall after a renovation planned for 2024 completion. Image courtesy of Lincoln Center

The Las Vegas Philharmonic has launched a new collaboration with Nevada School of the Arts, through which NSA’s Chamber Orchestra students receive intensive mentoring from LVP musicians in conjunction with NSA educators through professional coaching and side-by-side performances. The series includes three formal coaching sessions in fall and spring of 2019-20, with each session culminating in a free public side-by-side performance with students and professional musicians from the LVP and NSA, the first of which took place on November 4. Further performances are planned on December 8 at Nevada School of the Arts Auditorium, and March 1, 2020 at Green Valley Presbyterian Church, and May 3 at NSA Auditorium. The initiative is the first program to debut under the Philharmonic’s new Music SPARK program, which encompasses all of the organization’s education and community engagement efforts under one umbrella. “The Las Vegas Philharmonic is deeply committed to young musicians in Las Vegas, and is thrilled to be partnering with NSA to launch a new program bringing the talent of LVP musicians into the education system more directly,” said LVP Executive Director Lacey Huszcza.

Posted December 2, 2019

“Teodor Currentzis and his musicAeterna chorus and orchestra made their belated North American debut last week with the Verdi Requiem [at] the Shed, the new performing arts facility in the Hudson Yards section of Manhattan,” writes George Loomis in Tuesday’s (11/26) Musical America (subscription required). “Currentzis and musicAeterna performed the Requiem in a ‘reimagining’ that coupled it with specially commissioned cinematic artwork…. The instrumentalists, dressed all in black, performed standing up (as best I could tell, except for the cellos), a Baroque practice that the orchestra followed when it was established in 2004 as a period-instrument ensemble in Novosibirsk, Russia.… Currentzis made his entrance in near total darkness…. Currentzis exudes a performance personality that is palpably magnetic, and his musicians … respond as if they were guided by some superhuman force…. The performance had a vitality that kept you thoroughly involved…. The big moments of the Dies Irae, and its subsequent reappearances, were terrific, their climactic moments achieved with torrents of impressive, well-balanced sound. Expressive moments were full of nuanced detail…. This Verdi Requiem made an impact, no matter how one responded to it, and it will not soon be forgotten. ”

Posted December 2, 2019

“Denton-based singer-songwriter Sarah Jaffe will perform Feb. 3 at the Meyerson Symphony Center with members of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra,” writes Thor Christensen in last Monday’s (11/25) Dallas Morning News. “ ‘I’m really looking forward to this and so excited to be sharing the stage with my band mates and members of the Dallas Symphony,’ Jaffe said. ‘I’m gonna look at the last 13 years, nine records and … reflect on every single person that shared their time and talent in helping me make those records. Then I’m gonna make a really long set list.’ The concert marks the latest collaboration between the DSO and a prominent non-classical musician from North Texas. Erykah Badu performed with the orchestra in June, and St. Vincent joined the DSO in concert in 2015. Unlike those shows, this one won’t feature the full DSO, although members of the orchestra will join Jaffe and her band during some songs. The singer will feature tunes from her most recent album, SMUT, which came out in October.” Jaffe performed in April 2018 at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas to kick off the DSO’s Soluna International Music and Arts Festival.

Posted December 2, 2019

Stéphane Denève, who became music director of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in September, “is currently music director of the Brussels Philharmonic, principal guest conductor of the Philadelphia Orchestra, and director of the Centre for Future Orchestral Repertoire, a project to identify the best symphonic works created since 2000,” writes Lea Konczal in Tuesday’s (11/26) St. Louis Business Journal (MO; subscription required). “Q: Why are symphonies and classical music important? Denève: Songs are sometimes very short. In our case, we deal with long forms. So it’s a bit like cathedrals, in a way—symphonies have a very impressive structure that allows you to have a journey inside of them. Q: How are you making the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra more accessible? Denève: We recently offered some changes of price, which means that you can enter a classical concert for as cheap as $15…. This season we have a new concert called SLSO Crafted where we do something with food and drinks before and after, and mingling with the musicians and the audience. Q: What do you like about conducting? Denève: It sounds pretentious maybe, but I hope I heal some souls with the music sometimes. Let’s hope.”

Posted December 2, 2019

“One of the best parts of holding the title of Assistant Conductor is how much community engagement the position affords,” writes Deanna Tham, assistant conductor of the Jacksonville Symphony, in Sunday’s (12/1) Florida Times-Union (Jacksonville, FL). Tham will conduct the Jacksonville Symphony’s annual “First Coast Nutcracker” performances this month, featuring professional dancers and young dancers from the Jacksonville area. “I get to travel … and share the treasures of the score with people who may not have thought to step into the hall. This also includes collaborations with other community organizations and art forms…. One of the oldest and most visceral forms of arts collaboration is the one between music and dance…. The First Coast Nutcracker production in Jacksonville is the only local production that stages the work with live symphonic music. This creates an energy and excitement…. For many young dancers, this will be the first time they dance to live sound…. For the seasoned dancers, we create the distinctive experience of being subject to each other’s creativity, experience and artistic lens…. If you listen and watch carefully, the audience is drawn into this relationship as well—a remarkable buzzing in the air of people connecting, sharing and understanding each other.”

Posted December 2, 2019

“In any league table of great conductors, the name of the Latvian-born maestro Mariss Jansons, who has died aged 76 after suffering from a long-term heart condition, would feature very near the top,” writes Barry Millington in Sunday’s (12/1) Guardian (U.K.). “His tours … with his two primary orchestras, the Bavarian Radio Symphony and the Concertgebouw of Amsterdam, were eagerly awaited events…. Lacerating anguish in Mahler symphonies, blistering climaxes in Strauss tone poems, intense, finely wrought detail in almost any repertoire: these were the characteristics that defined his music-making… Even the heart attack he suffered on the podium conducting La Bohème in Oslo in 1996, from which he nearly died, did little to lower the emotional temperature of his interpretations…. Jansons showed exceptional talent at an early age. Having won a prize at the International Herbert von Karajan Competition in Berlin in 1971, he was invited by Karajan … to be his assistant…. He secured his first post in the west, as music director of the Oslo Philharmonic, only in 1979…. His first major post came as music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (1997), followed by the appointments with the Bavarian RSO (2003) and the Concertgebouw (2004).… During his seven-year tenure of the music directorship of the Pittsburgh Symphony, he was credited with transforming the orchestra’s sound…. Often during a concert, he would stop conducting altogether, forcing the orchestral players to listen to each other…. He is survived by his second wife, Irina (nee Outchitel) … and by his daughter, Ilona, a pianist, from his first marriage.”

Posted December 2, 2019

The Canton Symphony Orchestra in Ohio is collecting new pajamas to be donated to the Children’s Network of Stark County, which offers coordinated services to children and their families who are impacted by violence, sexual abuse, severe physical abuse, and human trafficking. Each person who donates a pair of new pajamas—size newborn through adult— at the orchestra’s December 8 Holiday Pops concert at Umstattd Performing Arts Hall will receive a $5 voucher good for a future ticket purchase. At each pops performance this season, the orchestra is coordinating collection efforts with community partners; future collections are planned to benefit the Canton Friendship Center, the Domestic Violence Project, and Compass Rape Crisis. President and CEO Michelle Mullaly said, “The Children’s Network of Stark County is doing great work for children in our community. We hope by this small gesture, we can offer a little bit of hope to people in this county.”

Posted November 27, 2019