Category: News Briefs

In Thursday’s Chicago Sun-Times, Larry Finley writes about longtime Chicago Symphony Orchestra cellist Joseph “Sam” Sciacchitano, who “died of complications from pneumonia on May 22 at Advocate Illinois Masonic Health Center” at age 96. “He played for the CSO from 1961 until he retired in 1983. He also taught at DePaul University and the American Conservatory of Music. … Mr. Sciacchitano was born in Chicago in 1913 and studied music as a small child. While at Lane Tech High School, his music teacher suggested he switch from the violin to the cello … ‘When Sam was at Lane Tech, he was a copy boy for the Chicago Daily News,’ his wife [Barbara] said. ‘The Daily News organized some outings to Symphony Hall and the opera. They had sports teams. Sam was in all of that in the late 1920s.’ He spent two years with the Civic Orchestra (the CSO’s training orchestra) before going to the Indianapolis Symphony in 1937 through 1943. He played for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1943. Then he went to the WGN Symphony Orchestra, the NBC Orchestra and the Milwaukee Symphony. He returned to the CSO in 1961, where he played out his career.”

Posted May 29, 2009 

In the Friday (5/29) edition of The Guardian (London), pianist Andras Schiff makes an impassioned defense of Haydn, citing in particular the composer’s humor and musical style. Schiff discusses the merits of Haydn’s works for keyboard in the article, as well as the symphonies, which he feels are often not properly placed on concert programs. “Haydn’s 104 symphonies are widely admired, although only a handful are regularly performed, and when they are, they are invariably placed at the beginning of programmes. This is a pity. Audiences, at the start of concerts, do not really listen to the music. They need to be warmed up—just as the players do—and so Haydn’s wonderful ideas are not fully appreciated. Why don’t we hear these symphonies at the end of the programme? Or indeed, what’s wrong with concert of nothing but Haydn symphonies?” Schiff’s remarks in The Guardian were translated and edited from a version that appeared in the May edition of the German-language publication Fono Forum.

Posted May 29, 2009 

A report in Wednesday’s (5/27) Telegraph (London) states, “The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra is to perform at the world’s first horse race run to live music at Kempton Park. Their recital of the William Tell Overture will accompany the sound of thundering horses’ hooves at the Surrey racecourse in July. The experiment has been sanctioned by the Jockey Club and organisers say that trainers have had their horses practising to the sound of music. If the one mile three furlongs ‘Classical Canter’ race is deemed a success, other racetracks may follow suit. Animal psychologists plan to monitor the horses’ performances during the race to see if they are inspired by the music. A conductor will lead 12 members of the orchestra and the overture will be played through loudspeakers all the way around the track for the benefit of the horses. … The live music performance will take place on July 8 as part of the racecourse’s Best of British celebrations and an audience of 2,000 is expected.”

Posted May 29, 2009

The Des Moines Symphony reports an increase in ticket sales for its 2008-09 season, which included seven classical pairs of concerts, plus an opening-night gala and two pops concerts. In response to the current economy, the orchestra implemented a new ticket price of $15 in its lowest-price section, as well as tickets for students at half-price. Single-ticket revenue exceeded the orchestra’s 2008-09 goal by $30,000. Earned revenue and attendance increased by 25 percent and 56 percent, respectively, from the previous season. The orchestra’s New Year’s Eve pops concert, featuring Cirque de la Symphonie, sold out 2,662 seats at the Des Moines Civic Center, and three additional rows that were added sold out in 40 minutes for a total of 2,714 paid seats. In addition to its paid-attendance figures, the orchestra reports that more than 125,000 people attended its free annual Yankee Doodle Pops concert last July on the grounds of the Iowa State Capitol.

Posted May 29, 2009 

The Robert and Carol Morris Center for 21st Century Music, located at the University at Buffalo in New York, has launched a new website and blog. The site, http://www.music21c.org, is searchable and will highlight current and recent activities of the center, which include the annual June in Buffalo festival, a weeklong gathering of student and established composers; the Slee Sinfonietta, the center’s resident ensemble; and other new-music events. The blog, www.EdgeOfTheCenter.com, will post interviews with composers and performers associated with the center, as well as selections from the center’s audio, video, and photo archives. The Center for 21st Century Music’s roots go back to 1963, when composer Lukas Foss founded the University at Buffalo’s Center for Performing Arts; in 2006, it was renamed the Center for 21st Century Music by David Felder, a member of the University at Buffalo composition faculty since 1984. Composers who have been associated with the Center for 21st Century Music and its predecessor include John Cage, Elliott Carter, John Harbison, Mauricio Kagel, Alvin Lucier, Steve Reich, Christopher Rouse, Poul Ruders, and Charles Wuorinen.

Posted May 29, 2009 

Music Director Robert Spano will lead the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in the June 20 opening concert of the orchestra’s second classical season at Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre at Encore Park in Alpharetta, Georgia. The concert—featuring soprano Georgia Jarman, tenor Nicholas Phan, baritone Matthew Worth, the Gwinnett Young Singers—will include excerpts from Rossini’s Barber of Seville and Orff’s Carmina Burana. It is the only one of the ASO’s seven Saturday concerts through August 15 to be led by Spano, who is in Seattle during the summer rehearsing and conducting the Ring cycle with the Seattle Opera. Guest conductors for the remaining concerts include Grant Llewellyn (all-Mozart evening); Bridget Reischl (Independence Day concert featuring U.S. Army Chorus); ASO Assistant Conductor and League of American Orchestras Fellow Mei-Ann Chen (Also Sprach Zarathustra, The Planets with NASA footage of the solar system); Hugh Wolff (all-Beethoven concert); Richard Kaufman (“Rodgers and Hammerstein at the Movies”); and sixteen-year-old conductor Ilyich Rivas (Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4, Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with Elena Urioste). As in last year’s outdoor concert series, the ASO will also show the concert on 15-by-20-foot screens at either side of the stage; the transmission will include a preconcert show and live intermission interviews of guest artists and orchestra musicians, which include an interactive component of text-message questions submitted by audience members. Details of the ASO’s free September concert at the Amphitheatre will be announced at a later date. 

Posted May 29, 2009 

The final concert of the New York Youth Symphony’s 2008-09 season at Carnegie Hall on May 31 will feature a world premiere as well as Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 with soprano Jennifer Zetlan and Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. The 110-member orchestra has previously performed the first, fifth, sixth, and ninth symphonies of Mahler, but it is the first time that Music Director Ryan McAdams is conducting the ensemble in a Mahler work. McAdams, a Fulbright Scholar who has worked with Alan Gilbert and Lorin Maazel, is currently in his second year as the orchestra’s music director. Gureckis’s previous compositions include [Very Large Array] which received its premiere by the Minnesota Orchestra in 2007. Gureckis is a 2007 recipient of a Charles Ives Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and Young Composer Awards from ASCAP and BMI, both in 2008. In addition to its regular concert activity, the New York Youth Symphony also offers programs in chamber music, conducting, composition, and jazz.

Posted May 29, 2009 

In the June/July/August issue of Bookforum, Elizabeth Wilson writes, “Sergey Prokofiev (1891–1953) was the last of the great Russian composers whose artistic formation took place before the Bolshevik Revolution.” In 1915, impresario Diaghilev brought him to Italy to discuss Ala and Lolli, the ballet he had commissioned. “This visit and the arduous journey across war-torn Europe are described in riveting detail in Prokofiev’s diaries, two substantial volumes of which—Diaries 1907–1914: Prodigious Youth and Diaries 1915–1923: Behind the Mask—are available in Anthony Phillips’s superb English translation. … Prokofiev’s diaries have nothing of the routine stamp; they are on occasion confessional but often resemble a series of sketches, like a novelist’s notes on people and events worth remembering. They were written when time allowed, sometimes a ‘chapter’ per month rather than daily or weekly entries. Prokofiev had ambitions as a writer and said that, had he not been a composer, he would have become an author. … Prokofiev’s evolution from a jaunty if somewhat prickly youth to a self-assured and suave young man is amply detailed. As he matured, he lost something of the enfant terrible’s desire to shock, while retaining a spontaneous and endearing natural charm.”

Posted May 28, 2009

Wednesday (5/27) on the Los Angeles Times arts blog Culture Monster, Lee Marguiles writes, “Just as it said it was planning to do last October, KUSC-FM (91.5) has extended the reach of its classical music programming—which includes the Los Angeles Philharmonic and L.A. Opera—to the central California coast. But not on the station it first intended. The L.A.-based public radio station, which already simulcasts on outlets in Palm Springs, Thousand Oaks and Santa Barbara, has purchased KESC-FM (99.7) in Morro Bay and can now be heard throughout the area surrounding San Luis Obispo. KUSC had said last October that it was going to accomplish that task by buying a station in Santa Maria. But legal complications developed and KUSC pulled out, station president Brenda Barnes said today. KUSC wound up spending $400,000 more for KESC—$1.2 million—but she said its signal reaches a slightly larger area.” Barnes believes the investment will pay itself back over time through donations from new listeners.

Posted May 28, 2009

In Wednesday’s (5/27) Winona Post (Minnesota), Cynthya Porter writes, “Orchestra [instruction] for the district’s fourth graders was preserved within the regular education setting this year, but Community Education officials presented a plan to offer it just in case it ends up on the chopping block again in the future. According to Community Education staffer Linda Jacobs, the district’s 60 or so fourth grade orchestra students could be served through an after school program that would run in two 16-week sessions through the school year. While orchestra instruction is currently free in schools, offered through Community Education it would carry an estimated cost of $122 to $167 per student, per session, an amount that would be paid by families instead of the district. … In April, school board members contemplated cutting $20,000 from the orchestra budget, the entire amount needed to run the fourth grade program. Orchestra teachers Cindy Johnson and Lori Carlson, as well as a parade of parents and students, implored the board to reconsider because of the importance of starting orchestra instruments early. The board opted to continue funding the program at its current level.”

Posted May 28, 2009